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Debt Rattle June 1 2026

Jun 012026
 
 June 1, 2026  Posted by at 9:21 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , ,  31 Responses »


Hayami Gyoshu Tea bowl and fruits 1921


• Trump Toughens Terms Of Iran Deal, Bessent Shows Tehran’s ‘Big Mistake’ (ZH)
• President Trump Discusses Current Status of Iran Negotiations (CTH)
• The People’s House Has a Clinton Memory Problem (David Manney)
• Manufacturing Consent for Trump’s Invasion of Cuba (Bannan)
• “It’s All So Tiresome”: UK Social Media Ban Trudges Ever Onward (Kit Knightly)
• Le Pen Leads Every Major Rival In New French Presidential Runoff Polling (RMX)
• Mike Steger on President Trump’s American Manufacturing Surge (CTH)
• America’s LNG Boom Is Real – But China Is Planning Beyond It (OP)
• Volodymyr Zelenskyy Appears on Face the Nation (CTH)
• CNN’s Dana Bash: 250th American Anniversary Should Not be a Joyful Event (CTH)
• A Conversation About Artificial Intelligence -AI (CTH)
• Walt Disney’s Carousel of Progress (Queen)

 


 

https://twitter.com/GuntherEagleman/status/2060831724641386610?s=20 https://twitter.com/catturd2/status/2060762825044230157?s=20 https://twitter.com/PrometheanActn/status/2060787022378205554?s=20 https://twitter.com/MAGAVoice/status/2060841449122656429?s=20

 


 


“Kharg Island is shut down. That’s their big oil loading facilities, and that means that they’re going to have to start taking down the wells..”

• Trump Toughens Terms Of Iran Deal, Bessent Shows Tehran’s ‘Big Mistake’ (ZH)

Fresh Sunday reporting in the NY Times says President Trump has responded to Iran’s refusal to budge on giving up its nuclear material by tightening US conditions as part of a Memorandum of Understanding to get back to the peace negotiating table. “President Donald Trump has toughened the terms of a potential framework for a deal to end the war in Iran, and has sent those proposed changes back to Iran for consideration, according to three officials,” NY Times writes, but didn’t disclose what the precise changes are.


The report then speculates on where these changes likely focus: “Trump has been concerned about parts of the potential deal that would include unfreezing funds for the Iranians, two officials said.” Citing frustration at the slow pace of Iran’s response to the proposals, it adds, “He has been harshly critical of President Barack Obama for doing the same in the more than decade-old agreement that was signed to curtail Iran’s nuclear program.” Tightening the proposals is meant to ratchet up the pressure and ‘force’ the Islamic Republic to respond quicker and agree to a deal. However, the Iranians have time and again rejected being ‘dictated to’ by Washington, as its top negotiator Ghalibaf spelled out days ago. Meanwhile there’s been a recent change in tone when talking about Iran’s military, from Trump himself:

Iran Still Not Budging on Nuclear File
This also comes after a two-hour Friday Situation Room meeting Friday wherein it became clear there was no deal yet to be finalized. According to more from the Times: The official added that Trump’s changes — a new, tougher proposal — were potentially intended to speed up the process by putting pressure on Iran to accept the framework already sent to Iran’s supreme leader, Mojtaba Khamenei, for approval. Reaching the supreme leader has been difficult, so any changes to the document, known as the memorandum of understanding, could mean additional delays.

But for pressure to work, there has to be signs Iranian leaders are getting nervous or desperate – and so far they’ve not urged Washington or Pakistani mediators for some kind of grand compromise. Instead they’ve repeatedly sworn that Iran’s highly enriched uranium will never be transferred to the possession of the United States.

[..] Bessent: Iran’s ‘Big Mistake’
Still, US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent is busy on the Sunday news shows talking tough. He told Fox in a new interview that Iran made a “big mistake” by attacking its neighbors in the Persian Gulf, within the past week. A US base in Kuwait was also reportedly just attacked by a ballistic missile, which was reportedly intercepted – but falling debris injured five US personnel. “We had many very good allies who maybe weren’t completely transparent with us on the money — Iranian money that was in their banking systems — all of a sudden became very compliant in terms of being willing to turn over accounts or help us freeze block accounts,” Bessent told Fox News.

“And then the third part was the incredible blockade. I really think it’s the economic blockade of funds and the physical blockade of the ships not going in or out of the Iranian ports,” he added. “Kharg Island is shut down. That’s their big oil loading facilities, and that means that they’re going to have to start taking down the wells,” Bessent said. And yet, there’s nothing officially disclosed to show this is actually happening – though the Iranians have no incentive to publicize it. But time will tell.

IDF Plunges Deep into Lebanon, Captures Crusader Castle
Some Lebanon war latest, via Al Jazeera, as ceasefire unravels: “Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says he has “instructed the Israeli military to expand the maneuver in Lebanon” after the occupation of the strategic Beaufort Castle, which he says marks “a dramatic change” in Israel’s operations.” The Israeli military claims to have killed 900 Hezbollah “terrorists” since the start of the “ceasefire” on April 16. It added that the army had struck dozens of Hezbollah sites since this morning. nLebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam has accused Israel of pursuing a “scorched-earth policy” as Israeli forces expand their ground invasion.

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He likes talking to her..

• President Trump Discusses Current Status of Iran Negotiations (CTH)

Appearing for an interview on Fox News with his daughter-in-law Lara Trump, President Trump explains the current status of the negotiations with Iran and more of the details within the deal as tentatively outlined.

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“We’ve reached the point where Hillary should leave for whatever mansion she calls home and make Bill a sandwich, sit in the living room, and knit a scarf. ”

• The People’s House Has a Clinton Memory Problem (David Manney)

My favorite villain from Grimm’s Fairy Tales is back! Hillary “At this point, what difference does it make?” Clinton posted another lecture about President Donald Trump, and the internet did what it does best. It opened the old file cabinet, pulled the receipts out, and slapped them on the table, saying, “Bob’s your uncle!” Clinton claimed Trump had left a third of the People’s House in rubble and another third looking like a cage match, meaning the White House ballroom work and the UFC setup tied to the Freedom 250 celebration.

The post was meant to sound grave, wounded, and patriotic. You know, like when she and Chelsea dodged sniper fire that one time in Bosnia. Unfortunately for her, it landed more like a woman walking into a rake, throwing anashtray at her husband, and blaming the rake. Retired Lt. Col. Robert “Buzz” Patterson, U.S. Air Force retired, answered with the sort of memory Clinton probably had wished stayed boxed up in the basement.

Patterson served as senior military aide to President Bill Clinton from 1996 to 1998 and carried the nuclear football, so he didn’t learn White House culture from coffee-table books or campaign ads. He lived inside the system, watched the Clinton years up close, and remembered the exit from 2001 well enough to ruin Hillary’s little sermon about sacred spaces. n The Clinton record gave Patterson plenty to work with; when President Bill Clinton and Hillary left the White House in 2001, controversy followed them out the door. This, if you think about it, balanced the scales because Bill’s and Hill’s background was, let’s just say, colorful when they entered the White House.

The Clintons had reported keeping $190,027 in gifts, and scrutiny later focused on items donors said were meant for the White House, not for the Clinton family. They returned $28,000 worth of furnishings and agreed to pay $86,000 for other gifts. Anybody can argue cataloging errors all day, but the timing and optics were bad enough to survive 25 years of political memory. The mess didn’t stop with furniture. The Government Accountability Office reviewed the 2001 transition and found damage, theft, vandalism, and pranks occurred in the White House complex. Staff described messy offices, excessive trash, offensive signs, damaged government property, and missing items.

Former Clinton staff pushed back on some claims, and the GAO noted disputes over intent. Even with those caveats, the official record doesn’t read like a team leaving behind a spotless civic shrine. It reads like an exit that needed adult supervision and a better checkout sheet.Clinton’s criticism of Trump’s White House work also skipped the obvious point: presidents change the White House because the building serves as a living office, not a museum under glass. Trump’s ballroom project was presented as a 90,000-square-foot addition with space for 650 seated guests, far more than the East Room can hold.

Critics debate cost, taste, process, and scope. Hillary, however, opted for sanctimony, which works poorly when her White House history still sits there like a dented file cabinet, maybe in the shape of another ashtray nobody throws away. Patterson’s response cuts because it didn’t need polish. Public figures forget that old stories don’t die anymore. They wait, sitting in archives, screenshots, reports, old articles, government records, and the memory of people who stood close enough to see the dust.

Hillary Clinton tried to cast herself as guardian of the People’s House while President Trump stood accused of ruining it. The internet answered with a reminder: the Clintons once left Washington with their own White House baggage, and no amount of elegant outrage can pack it away again. We’ve reached the point where Hillary should leave for whatever mansion she calls home and make Bill a sandwich, sit in the living room, and knit a scarf.

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I think both Trump and Rubio would prefer no violence.

• Manufacturing Consent for Trump’s Invasion of Cuba (Bannan)

These days, most of Havana’s streets are fairly empty of cars, but full of people walking or riding bicycles, electric bikes, electric “tricycles,” or scooters. Trash has piled up on most corners where regular pick-up has become impossible given that the garbage trucks have no gasoline. The average conversation starts off with comparing who’s gone the longest without electricity. The sympathy flows, as you exchange stories of what else you are going without: water, gas, food, medicine, transportation. People list the family members they haven’t been able to see and the medical appointments they’ve missed. Inevitably, someone will say better days are coming—“because they have to”—and to keep moving forward.


This week alone, the US Department of Justice indicted Raul Castro, the former head of state, who’s now 94 years old and largely out of public life. In addition, the Supreme Court gave a green light to Cuban-American-owned companies with property claims in Cuba from 67 years ago to sue tourist industry actors who “profited” from that land. Secretary of State Marco Rubio continues to grow more and more publicly agitated with Cuba’s refusal to bow to his demands, and Trump’s consistent incoherence shows an absolute lack of any clear policy position towards Cuba, aside from one that may economically benefit him and/or his family.

The indictment of Castro is a page taken from Trump’s playbook on Venezuela from earlier this year. There, the administration indicted a sitting head of state, Nicolas Maduro, as a legal pretext for a military intervention, which was labelled an “emergency” and thus not an act of war that would require Congressional approval. The administration staged a geopolitical coup d’état involving international kidnapping, acts of war in plain violation of international law and the U.N. Charter, and then imprisoned that leader as a message to the world of what happens to those who defy US interests. Such indictments serve as purportedly fixed legal fictions for shifting political pretexts.

In Venezuela it was supposedly the state’s support for criminal enterprises and gangs, which was the justification for the Trump administration’s stated reason for the extrajudicial killing of nearly 200 civilians in piracy actions in the Caribbean. Once Maduro was kidnapped and jailed, the administration has stopped talking gangs and narcotrafficking rings. In Cuba, the Justice Department’s indictment of Raul Castro is a clear response to the political forces that commanded it. As the island nation is not complying rapidly enough to the changes demanded by Washington, the administration has escalated its threats, military preparations, and legal actions, albeit largely symbolic in nature.

Rubio’s Escalation of Threats as Campaign Messaging
For decades, Marco Rubio has pushed for privately what the Cuban-American community in south Florida has not achieved in nearly 70 years: to run Cuba’s political and economic system remotely from Miami and Washington. These remote “owners” of Cuba have driven and financed Rubio’s political career, leading to this moment where he is adamantly (though unsuccessfully) trying to sell the American public that Cuba is a national security threat while simultaneously telling Cubans that their government is too weak to protect them. That inherent contradiction and incoherence, long the basis of US policy towards Cuba, have never been more dangerous than at this moment when Rubio’s rage and blind ambition to cause widespread destruction is bolstered by Trump’s monarchical goals.

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Brits don’t like democracy.

• “It’s All So Tiresome”: UK Social Media Ban Trudges Onward (Kit Knightly)

The UK government’s “consultation” on social media harm is over, and – brace yourselves – it turns out they’re going to have to do something about it. I know, I was shocked too. The main talking point is that “social media is like cigarettes”. Everyone is saying that, it’s the meme of the day. It’s a sentiment originally taken from a new report submitted to the consultation by the Academy of Medical Royal Colleges.Titled “Growing up in an online world”, it contains this hilarious line in the foreword: …there is, I think, an overwhelming consensus that excessive screen time can harm children and young people and we need to call this out unflinchingly rather than passively wait for someone else to prove causation”.


Which is a pretty neat summary of how our political system works in general, and certainly in this case: We don’t know if there’s even a problem yet, but by God we’re gonna do something about it. That the something they end up doing makes them rich and powerful is just one of the curious coincidences tyrants can always rely on. {Sidenote: This morning the BBC had “Overwhelimg consensus” in their headline on this story, but at some point the absurdity of that quote was realised, and the headline changed. Now there’s this disclaimer near the end: “There is no consensus among the wider scientific community that screen time overall is harmful to children.” Funny stuff.}

Elsewhere, the report wails about “a wave of radicalized children” who pose “a real risk to society”, and calls social media “an incredibly powerful and uncontrolled commercial detriment to health”. In a similar vein, The Guardian is warning of a “tsunami of harm”, and has assembled an all-star cast of interested parties to talk up the scariness of social media meanness. After meeting with “bereaved parents” earlier today, Keir Starmer has “vowed to take action”. His potential rival for the leadership has been even more vocal. Political eunuch and leadership hopeful Wes Streeting is all over this, campaigning hard to be the next disposable suit full of bugger all to “lead the country”:

He thinks a ban should be “just the start”: Social media should be treated like tobacco – it’s extremely addictive, bad for our health, and big tech is borrowing the big tobacco playbook to avoid regulation. We’ve got to give our children their childhood back […] A ban for under-16s must be the start, not the end […]We have given the pen to tech moguls to write our future for us. It’s time to take the pen back.” Streeting is an idiot whose ambition outweighs his intellect by a factor of ten, and who clearly doesn’t understand the rules of the game he’s playing.

Some political handler behind the scenes probably told him to go hard on this issue because it will make him look tough and assertive, but the likely truth is he’s being wheeled out as the extreme option so a “sensible middle ground” option – probably Andy Burnham – can enforce “common sense policies”. What will those policies be? It doesn’t really matter, but we’ll get to that. Technology Secretary Liz Kendall, notable only for garnering less than 5% of the vote in the 2015 leadership election, is out there promising “action”:

…they haven’t decided what “action” yet, exactly but it’s definitely going to happen.

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“The French people have been betrayed. In 2027, we will restore a democratic vitality to France by returning power to the peopl..,”

• Le Pen Leads Every Major Rival In New French Presidential Runoff Polling (RMX)

Marine Le Pen would beat every major rival in a second-round French presidential election runoff, according to new polling that hypothesized her eligibility to stand in the election expected in April next year. A Toluna-Harris Interactive poll for M6 and RTL, conducted on May 27, found Le Pen ahead in all three tested runoff scenarios when she is the National Rally candidate. The strongest result came against far-left leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon, with Le Pen taking 67 percent to his 33 percent. She also defeated former Prime Minister Gabriel Attal by 54 percent to 46 percent, and former Prime Minister Edouard Philippe by 52 percent to 48 percent.


The figures are significant because Philippe and Attal are among the most prominent names in the broader Macron-aligned camp, which has long presented itself as the main barrier to a National Rally victory. Le Pen has twice lost runoff elections to Macron, back in 2017 and 2022. Yet the poll suggests that even the strongest establishment contenders would currently fall short against Le Pen in a head-to-head vote.

Le Pen is currently barred from running after being handed an immediate five-year ban from public office, but she has appealed the ruling. A decision on that appeal is expected on July 7. Should she remain unable to run, National Rally president Jordan Bardella is widely expected to become the party’s presidential candidate. That would still leave National Rally in a commanding position. Earlier polling this week showed Bardella leading the first round with 32 percent, well ahead of Philippe on 17 percent and Mélenchon on 16 percent. The same May Odoxa political barometer also showed Bardella beating Philippe in a second-round runoff by 52 percent to 48 percent, reversing the result recorded two months earlier, when Philippe had led by the same margin.

Taken together, the surveys point to a deepening problem for France’s centrist and left-wing parties. Whether the candidate is Le Pen or Bardella, the National Rally is now polling not merely as a first-round protest vehicle, but as a party capable of winning the presidency outright. If Le Pen’s appeal succeeds, she would enter the race as the most formidable candidate in the field. If it fails, Bardella would inherit a political landscape in which the National Rally brand is already ahead of its most likely rivals. On Friday, Le Pen announced her intention, should the National Rally win the presidency, to offer the French public a referendum on mass immigration.

“The French people have been betrayed. In 2027, we will restore a democratic vitality to France by returning power to the people,” she wrote on X.

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“.. create a hemispheric powerhouse ..”

• Mike Steger on President Trump’s American Manufacturing Surge (CTH)

Mike Steger takes less than 20-minutes to walk through a year of President Trump’s multifaceted U.S. manufacturing policy initiatives that have positioned the U.S. economy for a massive surge in growth. Steger recaps several consequential moves by President Trump and his cabinet to fundamentally change economics in the Western Hemisphere. Each point is well delivered and well presented.


Steger then overlays the economic moves with the geopolitical moves in Venezuela (oil), Cuba (communism ended), Mexico (cartels, traffickers and corruption), Canada (globalism confronted) and finally Greenland (a new consulate is created). Put together, Steger notes how all of these moves work together with a massive surge in energy, technology and productivity to create a hemispheric powerhouse within the United States. WATCH:

TIMESTAMPS
00:00 Intro
01:10 Volcker and the Origins of Globalization
02:30 NAFTA and the Collapse of Industrial America
04:05 Liberation Day and the Tariff Battle
05:30 China’s Rare Earth Weapon
06:45 Rebuilding American Industry

08:20 The End of Free Trade Orthodoxy
09:30 Jamieson Greer vs. USMCA
10:40 Why Manufacturing Ecosystems Matter
12:20 Industry, Science, and Technological Progress
13:45 The Republican-Labor Coalition
14:45 Mexico, Cartels, and Economic Sovereignty
15:35 Canada and the Globalist Response
16:10 Fortress America
16:40 Final Thoughts

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“.. dominance built on a crisis is not the same as dominance built on trust ”

• America’s LNG Boom Is Real – But China Is Planning Beyond It (OP)

The Iran war and Hormuz disruption have turbocharged U.S. LNG exports, giving Washington a major short-term energy dominance boost as Asia and Europe scramble for alternative supply. China, however, enters the crisis from a position of greater energy resilience after years of investment in domestic production. The U.S. still has a major long-term opportunity, but sustaining dominance will require turning crisis-driven demand into lasting partnerships.


The Iran war has handed the United States a rare opportunity: a new dawn of energy dominance in an increasingly fractured world. With coordinated US-Israeli strikes disrupting the Strait of Hormuz from late February, roughly 20% of global LNG supply has been stripped from the market since early March. Prices have surged across Asia and Europe. And into that vacuum, American gas has flowed.

The numbers speak for themselves. US LNG exports to Asia jumped sharply in April, with nearly a quarter of all American cargoes heading to a region that simply cannot afford to go dark. Deals are being signed, pipelines planned, and $100 billion in private investment is pouring into liquefaction plants and terminals, putting the US on a trajectory toward 220 MTPA of export capacity within five years. The administration’s energy dominance agenda, backed by promises to streamline permitting, has given producers a powerful political tailwind and reassured global buyers seeking reliability. Washington’s case for American LNG has never been easier to make.

But dominance built on a crisis is not the same as dominance built on trust. And there is a competitor watching this moment very carefully. China entered this crisis in a structurally different position. Two decades of sustained investment in domestic energy production, spanning generation, storage, and distribution, have left Beijing considerably less exposed to the supply shocks rattling Western and Asian markets alike. Its economy has not been immune, but it has been buffered. That resilience has not gone unnoticed by governments scrambling to explain surging energy bills to their populations. While the US capitalises on the immediate demand surge, China is quietly accumulating something more durable: the perception of strategic foresight.

Yet beneath the boom lies a fault line. The conflict has been a short-term windfall for American producers; cash is flowing and the geopolitical case for US LNG writes itself. But the longer the crisis persists, the more urgently governments around the world will prioritise the same fundamental objective: never being held hostage to a single chokepoint again. The Hormuz disruption has concentrated minds in a way that years of energy dialogues have never quite managed. Countries across Asia and Europe are now accelerating plans to diversify supply sources, build strategic reserves, and develop domestic generation capacity across every available technology. The goal is insulation from the kind of shock this war has delivered, and that shift in priorities will outlast the conflict itself, because the memory of this vulnerability will not fade quickly.

This does not mean the window for American gas has closed. The transition to more resilient, independent energy systems will take decades, and reliable LNG from a powerful economy is precisely what energy-hungry Asian economies need throughout that journey. The US has the reserves, the infrastructure, the financial markets, and the geopolitical credibility that no other supplier can currently match. But Washington cannot afford to mistake a crisis-driven demand surge for a permanent structural advantage, because what buyers are ultimately building toward is a system in which no single disruption, whether in the Strait of Hormuz or anywhere else, can send their economies into shock again. The US needs to be architected into that system as an indispensable partner, not treated as an emergency option.

That requires more than competitive pricing and export capacity. It requires the kind of long-term supply relationships, infrastructure partnerships, and government-to-government commitments that turn a transaction into a dependency, the good kind, built on reliability rather than vulnerability. It requires Washington to show up as a strategic partner invested in the energy security of its buyers. And it requires the Iran conflict to reach a resolution that restores stability to global flows, because sustained disruption ultimately accelerates the very diversification strategies that could reduce the world’s reliance on any single fuel source.

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“ Palantir Technology Discovered Within Ukraine Targeting Systems”

• Volodymyr Zelenskyy Appears on Face the Nation (CTH)

Ukraine President Volodymr Zelenskyy appears on Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan, a few days after Russian President Vladimir Putin told media there were no negotiations underway toward any settlement or ceasefire. Simultaneous to this interview, it has now been discovered that American tech company, Palantir, is behind the technology that accompanies Ukraine drone targeting and weapons systems. Video and Transcript Below:



[Transcript] – Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who joins us from Kyiv. Welcome back to Face the Nation, Mr. President.

UKRAINIAN PRESIDENT VOLODYMYR ZELENSKYY: Thank you so much, Margaret.

MARGARET BRENNAN: You have warned that Ukraine has intelligence that Russia is preparing for a new massive attack. This is after Moscow had warned foreign nationals to leave your capital city ahead of expanded strikes. Exactly, what are you bracing for?

PRESIDENT ZELENSKYY: So, first of all, today at night, or tomorrow at night, we will have- we think that we will have big attacks from Russian side using drones, using cruise missiles and ballistic, and we see the preparation always. We see the preparation, by the way- we are thankful to United States and European partners when they share with us intelligence. So, when we know that Russia prepares a big massive attack, definitely, our partners also know, maybe not a lot of details, but we know. So today, of course, I didn’t address yet to my country. I will do it a bit later in the evening, and of course, I will say that our people have to be very, very careful, cautious, and children, and they have to use bomb shelters, because today at night or tomorrow at night, high percent, of course, nobody knows 100% but there is a high percent.

So usually we have, we have each day attack from Russian side on civilians, and of course on battlefield. And two times a week, or two times per 10 days, they have big, massive attacks with ballistic, and etc. Last massive attack, just to understand, it was- some days ago, it was 600 drones, Iranian drones, Shaheds, and they had 35- about 30 plus ballistic missiles. In total it was 90 missiles and more than 600 Iranian drones, so it was very difficult to destroy it. We used all our weapon, what we have, what we produce, and of course we used anti-ballistic missile. This is the biggest deficit for us.

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Complaining

• CNN’s Dana Bash: 250th American Anniversary Should Not be a Joyful Event (CTH)

Armed with a host of narratives against the Trump administration, CNN host Dana Bash confronts Interior Secretary Doug Burgum about his audacity to support Freedom 250 events in Washington DC this year. Apparently, it is not in alignment with the interests of CNN for Americans to celebrate the anniversary of our independence.


Complaining about DC fountains being cleaned; complaining about people not being consulted for their viewpoints to permit the graffiti and filth to remain in place prior to cleaning; complaining that years of environmental studies and municipal hearings did not take place prior to the decision to repair the reflection pool; complaining about saving hundreds of millions by not opening up each restoration process to consultancy fees, studies, public hearings and various bureaucratic indulgency opportunities; a very unhappy Dana Bash confronts Interior Secretary Doug Burgum about his support for President Trump to clean and restore the nation’s capital without consideration for those who prefer things to be a mess.

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“.. the data processing demand behind AI is beyond the scope of financial sustainability..”

• A Conversation About Artificial Intelligence -AI (CTH)

Ironically, I find myself with a grin on my face as I read the recent media reports about how the data processing demand behind AI is beyond the scope of financial sustainability. For several years I have asserted, accurately, the business model for social media was never feasible because the data processing demand needed for the scale of simultaneous users was beyond the capabilities of the revenue side of the equation. I have been told by all the high-horse experts on the matter how wrong I am. However, each story they write about the prohibitive cost of AI proves I was not wrong.


CTH watches the tokenization and subscription fees for various AI model use with the same perspective CTH viewed over a decade of false claims within the financial market that told lies about social media viability and data processing costs. Now, we watch the seemingly exponential growth of AI capabilities and associated costs with the same pragmatic perspective. Robotic pool cleaners were introduced two generations ago. Did the pool cleaner business dry up? No, it expanded. Robotic vacuums broke into the popular household appliance market five years ago, you probably have one, did it eliminate maid services? No, still growing.

AI can now write its own code to generate outputs. Are software developers getting fired? No, demand for software designers and engineers is up 15% in the past year. The mainframe approach, the one AI brain to run all systems, will never work – it is cost prohibitive (see first paragraph – wash, rinse, repeat). Deny this reality at your own investment risk. If needed, politely absorb the ridicule – for it matters not. CTH predicts AI will become a localized and optimized sub-set for each sector of the economy, requiring each major organization and corporation to adopt specific cost/benefit data libraries and networks for use and functionality.

At scale, a thousand coders each working on Gemini, ChatGPT, Anthropic, Grok, etc. will become 100,000+ software designers working inside companies to create personalized, targeted, bespoke AI data systems and networks; each system specifically tailored to the industry or sector of business. The intranet of internets will happen again. Creating and selling AI system networks and integration functions that are personally tailored to highly specific company functions, creates an entirely new sector of the technology industry that has not even begun yet. [There’s an investment opportunity there]


Will AI robots replace some repetitive human functions? Yes, the ice rink Zamboni will likely not have a steering wheel, just an emergency joystick. A reference for a comparative industrial scale Roomba vacuum, or the robotic pool cleaners. However, at scale the robotic industry is slower than human efficiency in almost all sectors that matter; the cost benefit analysis will limit growth. The maid service sector will not be impacted any more than the software developers (see chart above).It is not an issue to fear some AI task efficiencies will grant more time available that will be filled with alternate task capabilities.

Human productivity will increase in certain sectors of the economy, but humans will not lose work opportunities. Blue collar jobs will continue to expand as each of the hardware tools developed will need manufacturing, installation, maintenance and monitoring. The further downstream the worker is from a repetitive function within the [XXXX] industry, the more irreplaceable they become; remember that. As to the bigger picture of fully developed AI and the intersection of information and knowledge; yes, the automation of AI can present an issue. However, all AI concerns can be mitigated so long as multiple, alternative AI systems exist within the larger information realm.

As a nation we need dozens of different AI models each competing within the industry for the best AI product. As long as we have multiple AI systems, alternatives to the hive-mind, we do not need to fear the AI network as a source of information. If we don’t like the AI outputs, we can switch to an alternate AI provider. If the subscription cost of the AI is too high, then as long as we have a competitive market where a lesser expensive, perhaps bespoke, AI option can exist, we should be okay. Let the free-and-fair market decide.

If AI outputs don’t offer empirical truth or real value to the end user, we should be fine as long as consumers have alternative options available. AI providers should be information providers in the same concept as cell phone providers. The key is to have multiple, competing AI systems available for industrial, business, professional and personal use. On the upside of this information worry dynamic -in the pragmatic and optimistic perspective- we have the cost limiting nature of a massive singular AI information network.

A single AI central brain handling over 360 million users at once, all requiring identical responses that update with every tiny change in a multi-trillion datapoint-per-millisecond data stream, is far beyond the capacity of any computational AI system. The costs tied to such a setup are only now becoming clear, and AI business models are starting to fall apart in real time. This is a hard truth that isn’t going to change. Within the AI business, those who can carefully write AI input instructions to achieve maximum value in AI output -industry by industry- will become increasingly more valuable. Those who can train AI to be cost effective -and provide materially beneficial outputs- within their granular sector of business, within each company, will become priceless to the organization. Wage rates will follow competency.

As noted by David Sacks in this segment highlighted below, the one key about AI to emphasize is the need for multiple competing models. If China (hive mind) has their model, and Europe (another hive mind) has their model, and the United States (entrepreneurial competitiveness) has multiple competitive models – we will win and simultaneously we will retain freedom. nWhat we don’t want is a singular AI model to win the support of the United States government and then end up with an AI regulatory system where they start defining terms of “safety” to eliminate information adverse to the interests of the government that regulates it. Both China and Europe will predictably do that.

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Walt had the power of conviction.

• Walt Disney’s Carousel of Progress (Queen)

Jim Griffin, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons

I have a certain affinity for the attractions in the Disney theme parks that have a direct connection to Walt Disney. The Jungle Cruise, Pirates of the Caribbean, and even It’s a Small World (with that song that gets stuck in your head) all had their origins when Walt was still alive. One of the attractions at Walt Disney World that has a direct connection to the man who started it all is about to get a massive makeover, and it’s sorely needed. I’ve said for years that Walt Disney’s Carousel of Progress was in need of an update and some TLC, and it’s finally happening.


Let’s look back at the history of the Carousel of Progress, which ties back to the 1964-65 World’s Fair in New York City. Back in 2014, I wrote about General Electric’s Progressland (see the Flashback link above), which included a bevy of Disney-designed exhibits, including the Carousel of Progress:

But the centerpiece of the pavilion was Walt Disney’s brainchild, now called the Carousel of Progress. Instead of the walk-through theaters of the original Edison Square concept, guests to the Carousel of Progress sat in a round theater which revolved past central stages in which an Audio-Animatronic narrator shared how his family benefited from new electric innovations. (One gossip columnist lamented the fact that she discovered that the show’s narrator was not a real man.) Each of the show’s short acts took place in different decades, from the 1890s to the 1960s. In all, Imagineers designed and built 32 animatronic characters for the show all bearing Walt’s inimitable stamp.

The attraction’s theme song was a crucial part of reflecting what I’ve long called Walt’s optimistic futurism: Walt summoned his go-to songwriters, Richard and Robert Sherman, to pen the perfect tune for the Carousel of Progress. The song had to represent a positive vision for the future, yet it had to be adaptable to the time periods that the show presented. Richard Sherman remembered that the song needed to “tell the story without giving away what’s happening,” while epitomizing “the spirit and the essence of that pavilion.” The result was “There’s A Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow,” a bouyant song that summed up the ideas that Progressland espoused. Buddy Baker arranged the song expertly to fit each era of the Carousel of Progress.

Interestingly enough, GE requested a change to the song in 1974, expressing the thought that the present was more important than the future. The Sherman Brothers wrote a tune called “The Best Time of Your Life” for the Carousel of Progress, but Disney restored the more optimistic “There’s A Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow” in 1994. Side note: Deciding that the present is something to be more enthusiastic about than the future might be the most 1970s thing ever.

Disney updated the narration and the final scene for that 1994 refreshment, although guests have been stuck with a mid-’90s “contemporary” scene for far too long. The 60-year-old animatronics are looking sad, and some of the theater seats are in disrepair. But instead of refurbishments and a single-scene update, Disney is going all out later this summer.

Last year, Disney announced that it was going to include an introductory scene that would bring in Walt himself in an audio-animatronic form as host. There have also been rumors that Tom Hanks will voice the father of the family, who narrates what’s going on in each era, but those are just rumors. What Disney announced this week is that the Carousel of Progress will close in July and reopen in 2027 with a fresh new look and a whole lot more than just the Walt introduction. The format and tone will remain the same — and of course, we’ll hear “There’s a Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow” — but the scenes will be totally different.

Imagineer Chris Beatty writes at the Disney Parks Blog: One of our main goals for this update was to keep the attraction relatable for today’s audiences by featuring eras in which our guests have personal connections. That includes the iconic “There’s a Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow,” which will continue to play as guests transition between scenes. The Imagineers working on this refresh grew up during these decades, so it’s been a real trip down memory lane to revisit the music, fashion, technology, and experiences that helped shape our history all reflected in this family’s story.

Beatty sets the four scenes for the new and improved Carousel of Progress:

Act 1 – the 1960s When the show first opened at the World’s Fair, its story began by looking back about 60 years to the dawn of the new century. Now more than six decades later, this new iteration mirrors that idea, starting 60 years back from today in the 1960s. In the summer of 1969, our Carousel family, along with millions around the world, gather around the television to witness one of humanity’s greatest achievements: the historic moon landing. Filled with awe, the moment captures the spirit of innovation and possibility that has always been — and always will be — at the heart of Carousel of Progress.

Act 2 – the 1980s It’s the ‘80s, where everything bigger is better, and things keep on getting bigger! We pick up with the family on Halloween Night of 1985, and for the first time ever, Sarah is taking center stage. She’ll share how all the new appliances and gadgets are making life easier for the whole family. Speaking of John, we’ll find him out on the porch handing out candy to trick-or-treaters, and poor Uncle Orville can be found in the bathroom with “no privacy around here!”

Act 3 – The New Millennium With the ‘90s drawing to a close, our Carousel family is preparing to ring in the new millennium on New Year’s Eve 1999. Amid the excitement of the countdown to 2000, a new thing called the Internet is bringing John, Sarah, Jimmy and Patty – and the world – closer together than ever before. And if you’re anything like my family, not everyone is making it to midnight. Grandpa has already nodded off before the big countdown, while Grandma sneaks the TV over to wrestling when no one’s looking.

Act 4 – The Possible Future As we reach the end of our show, we see the family one last time in the distant future, in an out-of-this-world home. From a helpful robot assisting with everyday tasks to space travel, the scene imagines a future where extraordinary innovation has become part of life and proves that a beautiful tomorrow is just a dream away.It sounds like the Imagineers are building on that optimistic futurism that Walt built his philosophy on. It’s a nod to the 1964-65 World’s Fair, the early EPCOT concept, and what the original EPCOT Center — especially Horizons, my all-time favorite extinct attraction — became, and I’m here for it.

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Debt Rattle May 15 2026

May 152026
 
 May 15, 2026  Posted by at 9:57 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , , ,  34 Responses »


Camille Pissarro Rue Saint-Honoré in the Afternoon, Effect of Rain 1897


• President Trump Discusses China Visit and Discussion with Chairman Xi (CTH)
• “Fantastic Day” With Xi, 200-Jet Boeing Deal, China Offers Hormuz Help (ZH)
• Iran Proclaims Safe, Toll-Free Passage For 30 Chinese Tankers (ZH)
• The Secretary of State Is Cool (Sarah Anderson)
• US Secretary of State Calls Chinese Military Second Strongest In World (TASS)
• Europe’s Dependence On US LNG Set To Surge (Irina Slav)
• US Wants To Restore Nord Stream & Purchase, At Steep Discount: Lavrov (ZH)
• NATO Chief Wants To Triple Money Flows To Ukraine – Politico (RT)
• Spain Wants An Eu Army: What Would It Mean? (RT)
• Trump Administration Uncovers Massive Welfare, Citizenship Abuses (JTN)
• This Is the Democrats’ Achilles Heel and the Republicans’ Super Power (Moran)
• US Gov’t Settles With Former NYT Reporter in Vaccine Censorship Case (ET)
• Fauci Accused Of Intentionally Burying COVID Lab-Leak Evidence (MN)

 

 

https://twitter.com/MAGAVoice/status/2054756638155006263?s=20 https://twitter.com/CryptoNobler/status/2054841983630225712?s=20 https://twitter.com/EricLDaugh/status/2054734278869602379?s=20

 


 


Let Trump explain himself. Works for Xi.

• President Trump Discusses China Visit and Discussion with Chairman Xi (CTH)

President Trump sits down with Fox News Sean Hannity for an interview immediately following the fast-paced visit in Beijing, China.Hannity asks President Trump for his sense of the greeting and pageantry put on by Chairman Xi at the formal greeting, as well as some general discussion on the topics of a very lengthy talk between Trump administration officials and their Chinese counterparts.


President Trump and Chairman Xi discussed Iran and the current conflict which has impacted the global supply of oil. It should be noted that closure of the Strait of Hormuz in combination with the U.S. control over Venezuela oil production has reversed the dependency dynamic between Russia and China. Prior to oil/gas shortages (skyrocketing prices), and due to Western U.S/EU sanctions, Russia was very dependent on China for supplies and component goods. After oil/gas shortages were triggered by the Iran conflict, China became dependent on Russia for their energy demands. A rather unusual dynamic sitting like an 800lb Gorilla in the corner of the meeting between President Trump and Chairman Xi.

(1) Upon reelection President Trump told all U.S. energy providers to “drill baby drill” and maximize energy production. Trump then deregulated the industry for maximum efficiency: Secretaries Burgum (Interior), Wright (Energy) and Zeldin (EPA).

(2) Trump then meets with Putin in Alaska Aug 15, 2025. Three days later, Aug 18, 2025, Putin restarts Russia’s flagship Arctic project, the LNG export facility via the Northern Route to Asia.

(3) President Trump then signs contracts with Finland for the urgent start of Arctic icebreaking ship manufacturing in the USA and emphasizes the prior conversation about taking over Greenland which infuriates the Danes and EU.

(4) President Trump then triggers the Venezuela operation, captures Nicholas Maduro and -in addition to other benefits- forms a new strategic oil development relationship with the interim Venezuela government. Russia stays silent.

(5) President Trump then triggers Operation Epic Fury against Iran; completely changing the geopolitical landscape that surrounds energy partnerships. Energy flows through the Gulf of Oman are impacted.

(6) President Trump then removes specific sanctions against Russia permitting Russian oil and LNG to be sold (in petrodollars) into the Asian market. Meanwhile, the European Union is forced to increase LNG purchases from the United States.

Sure, it could all be just coincidence… or not. One thing is certain, the FIVE-EYES opposition (Canada, EU, U.K and Australia) do not think all of this downstream benefit that flows to Russia and the USA is coincidental. The FIVE-EYES opposition clearly see all of this as a strategic realignment between the USA and Russia, and they are going to do everything in their power to stop it.

Last point. The next world leader to visit China will be…. wait for it… Vladimir Putin.

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“Trump and Xi agreed that the Strait of Hormuz should remain open to free navigation and that Tehran should not charge a fee to ships using the critical waterway.”<

• “Fantastic Day” With Xi, 200-Jet Boeing Deal, China Offers Hormuz Help (ZH)

Boeing-China Jet Deal
A highly anticipated Boeing jet deal appears to have materialized after the first day of President Trump’s summit with President Xi Jinping. Fox News reports that Trump said Boeing secured an order for 200 “big” jets from China. He said the order was initially for 150, but the final figure will be 200


Trump Says China Will Help On Reopening Hormuz
It is nearly midnight in Beijing, and President Trump is still speaking on the record with corporate media, offering additional insight on the first day of the summit and state banquet with Chinese President Xi Jinping. In comments to Fox News, Trump said Xi offered to help pressure Iran to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, signaling that Beijing may be willing to use its leverage over Tehran.

This comes as energy insiders and traders warn that continued closure of the Strait through the end of the month could spark a worsening energy shock.

Trump also said Xi would not provide weapons to Tehran.

Trump, Xi Put Hormuz, Iran, Trade, Taiwan At Center Of Historic Beijing Summit
President Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping are currently seated at the main table at a state banquet. President Xi called the visit historic, and said U.S.-China ties are “stable” amid talks with Trump’s team.

According to a White House readout, Trump and Xi agreed that the Strait of Hormuz should remain open to free navigation and that Tehran should not charge a fee to ships using the critical waterway.

Beijing also signaled interest in buying more U.S. oil to reduce China’s reliance on crude and crude products transiting the Hormuz chokepoint. This signifies how the U.S.-Iran conflict is rewiring global energy flows.mTrump-Xi talks also covered fentanyl, securing market access for U.S. companies in the mainland market, and increasing Chinese investment in American industries and purchases of U.S. agricultural products. “American enterprises are deeply involved in China’s reform and opening up, a process from which both sides have benefited,” Xi told the leaders of U.S. companies accompanying Trump on the trip. Those CEOs include Tesla’s Elon Musk, Apple’s Tim Cook, Boeing’s Kelly Ortberg, and Nvidia’s Jensen Huang.

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They have to give it to all

• Iran Proclaims Safe, Toll-Free Passage For 30 Chinese Tankers (ZH)

During President Trump’s ongoing state visit to China, he and President Xi Jinping agreed that the Strait of Hormuz must be open for the free flow of energy. They along with their senior officials have expressed agreement that no country can be allowed to exact shipping tolls in the Strait of Hormuz. Following this, Thursday saw Iranian state media proclaim that some 30 Chinese vessels are being allowed safe passage by Iran. Bloomberg also freshly reports, “The vessels were allowed to pass the Strait of Hormuz with the coordination of the Iranian authorities and Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps navy, state TV reports, citing an IRGC naval official.


While it’s as yet unknown or unclear whether the US Navy side of the de facto blockade will also let them pass, Reuters has also reported the following: Iran has begun allowing some Chinese vessels to transit through the Strait of Hormuz following an understanding over Iranian management protocols for the waterway, the semi-official Fars news agency said on Thursday, citing an informed source. In particular the move also follows formal requests by China’s foreign minister as well as Beijing’s ambassador to Iran, with Tehran reportedly agreeing based on safeguarding the two allies’ strategic partnership.

Bloomberg cited the IRGC official as saying of the Iranian protocol for passage, “A new era in the Strait of Hormuz has started as many countries of the world and fleets have accepted that the best, quickest and simplest way for transiting this very important waterway is only though coordination with the IRGC’s naval forces.” This was after Wednesday saw the key milestone of a Chinese supertanker carrying 2 million barrels of Iraqi crude having successfully passed through the Strait of Hormuz, after previously being stranded for more than two months.

Also of note is that the Chinese Cosco Shipping tanker did not have to pay tolls. According to The Wall Street Journal: Lloyd’s List Intelligence data show the Yuan Hua Hu crossed the waterway through the corridor in the north controlled by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. Ship trackers said the vessel switched off its transponder while sailing from an anchorage in Dubai towards Larak, then came back online for a couple of hours before going dark again. Ships crossing through Larak pay an average of $2 million each, according to brokers.

The Yuan Hua Hu is the third Chinese state-owned tanker to leave the Gulf since the start of the war. State Department spokesperson Tommy Pigott emphasized earlier this week that Washington and Beining “agreed that no country or organization can be allowed to charge tolls to pass through international waterways like the Strait of Hormuz.” China imports the bulk of its energy from the Middle East, and while it has amassed substantial crude oil stockpiles that are helping it weather the worst of the crisis – anecdotally over 1.4 billion barrels – restoring normal flows from the Persian Gulf is important for one of the world’s top energy importers.

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Spittin’.

• The Secretary of State Is Cool (Sarah Anderson)

For years, we’ve had the media try to force the idea that certain Democrats were “cool” down our throats. Barack Obama is probably the best example. Turns out, he’s just a guy in mom jeans whose wife likes to go on podcasts and share enough marital gripes to make him sound overly henpecked. They tried with countless others. Eric Swalwell. We all know how that ended up. Turns out he’s less “cool” and more “pervy predator.” (Allegedly.) Gavin Newsom tries very hard himself to remind us he’s cool, but every time he does, he comes across as racist, ridiculous, or just plain out of touch.


For some, however, it’s effortless. I’m talking, of course, about our dear Secretary of State Marco Rubio. Most of y’all who read here regularly know I’m a fan and have been from the beginning of his career. I stuck with him, even when a lot of conservatives didn’t. I was thrilled when Donald Trump chose him as Secretary of State — it was the first breaking news story I got to write when I joined the team here at PJ Media. That’s who I learned so much of my Western Hemisphere foreign policy from over the years. bI say all this to admit that I’m biased. And I don’t know that Rubio is necessarily “cool.” He can actually be kind of dorky. But I’m not even sure that matters.

What does matter is that, while yes, he is a politician and proves that sometimes, he’s also human and relatable in a way that those guys I mentioned above will never be. Now that he’s arguably one of the most important men in the world, the MSM is catching on, and they don’t like it one bit. The biggest example of this is Rubio’s passion for rap music and the fact that he often injects lyrics into his speeches and appearances. He’s been doing this for a while, but the media has, apparently, just figured it out. I’m going to go out on a limb and assume a lot of you in our audience do not care for this kind of music.

Rubio has even joked himself in the past that it’s not really what a lot of conservatives listen to. Personally, I don’t mention it here often, but I’m a huge rap fan, and I think more conservative millennials like myself, who grew up on it in the 1990s, are too, and I think that adds to the secretary’s appeal to my generation. I’ve said before that one reason I always liked him is because I felt he spoke to my generation (even though he’s Gen X and a decade or two older than most of us). But this is not necessarily about his taste in the music. This is just one of many examples.

It’s about how he remains authentic and refuses to back away from his love for it, even if it may not be popular with all of his base. In his 2012 memoir An American Son, Rubio mentions that when he was in sixth grade, while his friends were listening to Van Halen and Ozzy Osbourne, he was discovering Afrika Bambaataa and Grandmaster Flash. He called hip-hop his “guilty pleasure,” and claimed that when he was on the campaign trail, he’d sit with his earphones on and close his eyes and envision winning his initial campaign for the Senate. And apparently his young staff members were always surprised about his musical tastes. Here’s something from the book The Rise of Marco Rubio:

Rubio liked to blast hip-hop on the stereo. ‘He can spit!’ one young staffer marveled to a friend, invoking the slang term for singing rap lyrics. A love of rap wasn’t exactly what they expected from the up-and-coming voice of righteous conservatism. You know, I get in trouble when I talk about that a little bit, because maybe I shouldn’t listen to that anymore, but the music is good, Rubio would later say. ‘[You’ve] just got to sometimes ignore what their politics may be and just enjoy the music.’

Fast forward back to 2026. On January 3, shortly after we captured Nicolás Maduro, Rubio said of Trump always doing what he says he’s going to do, “If you don’t know, now you know.” It’s a line from The Notorious B.I.G.’s — aka Biggie Smalls — 1994 song “Juicy.” The White House actually used it in a social media video last night, featuring Rubio aboard Air Force One, wearing the same Nike jogging suit Maduro wore the night we got him — a total troll move and yet another reason why Rubio is “cooler” than your average Democrat. During a hearing earlier this year, he quoted Coolio’s “Gangsta’s Paradise” when talking about life in Venezuela under the Maduro regime. At a Cabinet meeting in March, he quoted a Public Enemy song, “Welcome to the Terrordome.”

When he filled in for Karoline Leavitt during the White House press briefing last week, he worked in lyrics from Cypress Hill — saying the Iranian regime is “insane in the brain” — and Ice Cube, suggesting the regime should “check themselves before they wreck themselves.” For what it’s worth, Rubio has also said he’s a big EDM (electronic dance music) fan, and we’ve seen proof of that too. Most recently, him DJing a wedding in Florida a couple of weekends ago. My point is that none of this is forced. It’s not for political gain. He is just being who he is. And that’s something very few Democrats are able to do these days.

You can tell it’s a threat to the left because the MSM is starting to speak negatively about it. They see this cool dude whose star is rising at a rapid pace because of relatable things he says and does, who is a strong potential 2028 contender, and who is having fun while doing it. They also see they’ve only got, well, Gavin Newsom in Atlanta telling a predominantly black audience that he’s as dumb as they are, while his wife alienates most of the country with her absurd ideas that boys are bad and Southern conservatives are all hateful bigots.

They know they can’t win elections with that, so they have to send out their barking dogs to try to make Rubio look bad. On The Daily Show last week, they began mocking his use of rap lyrics, saying they’re inappropriate when talking about war. They also declared that rap music is no longer cool. And just look how sad Jake Tapper appears to be over the whole “rap lyric” situation.

https://twitter.com/KarluskaP/status/2052503376638669290?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E2052503376638669290%7Ctwgr%5E4d108a73701bc209eb84e584ad9138c3868f6e45%7Ctwcon%5Es1_c10&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fpjmedia.com%2Fsarah-anderson%2F2026%2F05%2F13%2Fthe-secretary-of-state-is-cool-and-the-msm-is-having-a-meltdown-over-it-n4952802

The Atlantic also recently published an article called “Is Marco Rubio the Happiest Cabinet Member?” On the surface, it sounds like a feel-good puff piece, like something, I don’t know, maybe yours truly would write, but the subheading gives it away: “While his colleagues deal with war and controversy, he’s laughing and talking in rap lyrics.” Laughing? Talking in rap lyrics? It’s criminal! Let’s just lock him up right now. I didn’t read the entire article, but it goes on to list all the supposedly bad things going on in the country, the world, and the Trump administration and declares “In a more normal time, he would seem like just another glad-handing politician. But consider the moment.”

If that’s the worst these people can come up — he laughs, he uses lyrics to make points, he’s enjoying his life — I’d say Rubio is doing much better than most of the current politicians in the U.S. And I, for one, am here for it. As a matter of fact, I’d like to see more.

https://twitter.com/SarahDownSouth/status/2051774945521279461?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E2051774945521279461%7Ctwgr%5E4d108a73701bc209eb84e584ad9138c3868f6e45%7Ctwcon%5Es1_c10&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fpjmedia.com%2Fsarah-anderson%2F2026%2F05%2F13%2Fthe-secretary-of-state-is-cool-and-the-msm-is-having-a-meltdown-over-it-n4952802

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And Russia?

• US Secretary of State Calls Chinese Military Second Strongest In World (TASS)

China has been building up its military at an unprecedented pace over the past decade, making it the second strongest in the world today, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said. “I mean, the pace of growth in the Chinese military over the last 10 years has no precedent. <...> It’s hard to ignore how fast and how big [it’s growing]. <...> They are, right now, the world’s second most powerful military without a doubt,” he said in an interview with NBC News. According to Rubio, Chinese authorities “have ambitions to ultimately be able to project power globally the way the US does now.”
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EU declares itself ready to be fleeced.

• Europe’s Dependence On US LNG Set To Surge (Irina Slav)

The European Union’s dependence on liquefied natural gas from the United States is set to rise significantly, reaching 80% of all LNG imports in two years, the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis has warned. In a report cited by Reuters, IEEFA noted that the European Union already imports significant volumes of U.S. liquefied gas, creating a potentially risky dependence on a single supplier. LNG imports from the United States into the EU accounted for 58% of overall LNG imports. Yet this dependence is only going to increase in the coming years, the outlet said, recommending more wind, solar, and heat pumps as an alternative.


This year, the United States will become the European Union’s biggest supplier of liquefied gas, even as the bloc also gobbles up every ton of Russian LNG it can buy ahead of the 2027 ban on Russian energy imports.The motivation for that ban, in addition to punishment for the war in Ukraine, has been to avoid overwhelming dependence on a single energy supplier, which is what the EU is currently doing with the U.S. Energy commodities are a big part of the trade deal signed last year by President Trump and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.

The deal featured a commitment on the part of the EU to buy $750 billion worth of U.S. energy commodities over a period of three years. The European Parliament earlier this year signaled it has problems with the deal, which angered the U.S. president, and he threatened to hike tariffs on EU goods unless the bloc signs the deal as is. The arrangement elevated American LNG, oil, and refined fuels in Europe’s energy supply mix. The actual supply of so many energy commodities, however, would be physically – and financially – challenging both for the suppliers and the buyers.

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Someone actually mentions Seymour Hersh.

• US Wants To Restore Nord Stream & Purchase, At Steep Discount: Lavrov (ZH)

The Nord Stream pipelines have long slipped from headlines, apart from the occasional whodunnit narratives, and they have remained damaged and offline. The Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 pipeline bombings occurred on September 26, 2022 – but their future fate is still up in the air and being wrangled over, including by Washington. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has alleged that Washington now it wants to buy the part of the pipelines owned by European companies, in order to assert influence and control over European energy.


“Take a look at how the Americans are planning to restore Nord Stream. I am talking about two gas pipelines, and they were blown up,” he told RT in an interview this week. “The Americans under Biden said that these gas pipelines would not work, but now they accuse the Ukrainians of blowing up these two pipelines,” he continued, before noting: “Actually, four pipelines. Three out of four were blown up. The Americans want to buy out the part that was owned by European companies.” He further explained that the US “wants to strike the deal at a price that is 10 times lower than the initial European investments” – according to Russian state media.

He explained that this would be about US control, and the ability to dictate the price of gas – instead of what would have been a prior mutual agreement between Russia and Germany, before the pipelines were sabotaged. “They [the US] openly stated that they wanted to halt gas transit via pipelines from Russia to Europe through Ukraine in order to control these flows as well,” he alleged. Last year ZeroHedge asked Trump directly about who was behind the Nord Stream sabotage op. “If you can believe it they said Russia blew it up,” Trump initially responded at the time.

“Well probably if I asked certain people they would be able to tell you without having to waste a lot of money on an investigation,” the president said. “But I think a lot of people know who blew it up, but I was the one who blew it up originally because I wouldn’t let it be built, and then when Biden got in he allowed it to be built.”

President strongly suggested that based on classified intelligence he knows exactly who was behind the September 26, 2022 covert operation which ended in the Baltic Sea explosions and major leaks which took the vital Russia to Germany natural gas pipelines permanently offline. Of course, with no investigation whatsoever (a serious European inquiry didn’t even begin till the following year), Western mainstream press coalesced around the dubious “Russia bombed their own pipeline!” narrative.

In early 2023, famed journalist and Pulitzer price winner Seymour Hersh published a bombshell report which concluded that the United States blew up the Russia-to-Germany natural gas pipeline as part of a covert operation under the guise of the BALTOPS 22 NATO exercise. Hersh’s report has been subject to a lot of pushback since then, but he’s not backed off this initial reporting and investigation.

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NATO want war. It’s that ssimple.

• NATO Chief Wants To Triple Money Flows To Ukraine – Politico (RT)

NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte has urged member states to devote 0.25% of their GDP to aid for Ukraine, Politico Europe reported on Tuesday, citing diplomatic sources.Rutte reportedly raised the issue during a closed door meeting of NATO ambassadors late last month. If adopted, the proposal, first floated by Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky last year, would effectively triple aid to Kiev to around $143 billion annually, according to NATO estimates of the allies’ combined GDP cited by Politico.


The proposal is said to be partly motivated by frustration among some countries that they are contributing more support to Ukraine than others. Several allies, including major NATO members France and Britain, reportedly oppose the initiative. The discussions on increasing support for cash-strapped Ukraine come as the country has been rocked by another major corruption scandal allegedly involving figures close to Zelensky.

On Thursday, Ukraine’s top anti-corruption court is expected to rule on whether to detain Zelensky’s former chief of staff, Andrey Yermak, who was named a suspect in a money laundering case involving kickbacks in the energy sector and elite real estate developments outside Kiev. According to the Western-backed National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine (NABU), the suspects, including former Deputy Prime Minister Aleksey Chernyshov, laundered around $9 million through investments in the construction of the Dinastia (Dynasty) residential complex.

Last year, investigators uncovered a $100 million kickback scheme allegedly orchestrated by Timur Mindich, Zelensky’s longtime former business partner, who has been described in the media as his “wallet.” Mindich fled the country to avoid arrest, while several senior officials, including two ministers, resigned.

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““If you are already part of NATO, then you can’t create a separate army. And if you have, like the European army, and then you have the NATO one, then, you know, the ball just falls between the chairs.”

• Spain Wants An Eu Army: What Would It Mean? (RT)

Spain has become the latest European nation to call for the EU to build its own army as opposed to relying on the NATO framework, citing a growing rift with the US. The idea itself, however, has split European NATO members, with many still viewing the US-led military bloc as a preferable defense mechanism. Whatever the outcome of those debates, most NATO nations are engaged in an accelerated militarization campaign costing hundreds of billions of dollars in the long run, citing an alleged Russian “threat.”


The idea of a joint European army harks back to the early days of the Cold War, when in the early 1950s, France pushed for the European Defense Community, which would have brought France, West Germany, Italy, Belgium, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg into a common 100,000-strong European force. The plan received US backing. However, France later balked, fearful of a potential loss of sovereignty and West Germany gaining an oversized role while memories of World War II were still fresh. Still, under Charles de Gaulle, France was highly skeptical of NATO, seeing it as a tool for US dominance in Europe. In 1966, de Gaulle pulled France – which was struggling to cling to the remnants of its colonial empire and superpower status – out of the NATO command structure.

The idea of an EU army has since resurfaced several times, most notably during the Balkan wars and illegal bombing of the former Yugoslavia. While European leaders mostly backed the US-led strikes, the internal dissent was significant, and the campaign showed a humiliating reality for the EU: a security crisis in its own backyard was being handled mostly by the US. During the 2011 Libya intervention, it was much worse. Not only were EU powers dependent on the US doing all the heavy lifting, but the campaign also led to a European fracture. Only France and the UK coordinated the strikes with the US, while Italy was initially opposed to the intervention. Later, France and Italy worked at cross purposes, supporting different sides in the Libyan Civil War.

The EU army debate once again took center stage following the start of the Ukraine crisis in 2014. Amid tensions with Russia, bloc members ramped up military spending and drew joint procurement plans. In 2022, plans were announced to establish a EU Rapid Deployment Capacity – a force of up to 5,000 comprised of personnel from European states with a mandate for missions abroad. Some EU nations, however, have called for a standalone European army with wider authority, citing Washington’s growing unreliability and the need for strategic autonomy.

Who is in favor?
Spain has become the most recent proponent of the EU army idea. On Monday, Foreign Minister Jose Manuel Albares made the case in an interview with Politico, saying, “We cannot be waking up every morning wondering what the US will do next … our citizens deserve better.” He added: “This is the moment of the sovereignty and independence of Europe. The Americans are inviting us to that.” In a thinly veiled allusion to US President Donald Trump, Albares stressed that the EU has to be “free of dependence,” as well as “free of coercion, whether it comes to tariffs or the use of military threat, [or] the consequences of someone else’s decisions.”

While his comments came amid a stark rift with the US over the Iran war, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez called for “a real European army” already in February, stressing that the bloc needs it “not in ten years’ time, but now” and pledged Madrid would contribute all necessary resources. In France, an EU army has long been a personal project for President Emmanuel Macron, who began calling for a “true European army” as early as 2018, arguing the continent could not rely solely on the US. One year later, he famously proclaimed NATO “brain dead,” also citing failure to coordinate efforts with the US. In April, Macron also stressed that the EU’s “objective is not to be the vassals” of the US and China.

In Italy, Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani, who leads the center-right Forza Italia party, has stressed that “if we want to be a peacekeeping force in the world, we need a European army,” describing it as a premise for “an effective European foreign policy.” Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, however, has been more cautious, stating that the issue is not on the agenda, adding that the bloc’s defense should be based on the cooperation of national armies.

Who is against?
EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas has been among the most vocal critics of the concept. In February, she described the idea of a European army as “extremely dangerous,” saying that its proponents “maybe haven’t really thought this through practically.” “If you are already part of NATO, then you can’t create a separate army. And if you have, like the European army, and then you have the NATO one, then, you know, the ball just falls between the chairs.”

In Poland, the bloc’s most aggressive defense spender at 4.7% of GDP in 2025, Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski called the idea “unrealistic because national armies will not merge.” However, he was more sympathetic to a brigade-sized “European legion” comprised of EU citizens or even candidate states, which could be involved in foreign operations short of a confrontation with a near-peer adversary. In Germany, Chancellor Friedrich Merz has pledged to build “Europe’s strongest conventional army,” but has been skeptical of a bloc-wide force due to legal hurdles, arguing that the EU should “focus on the tasks that we need to accomplish now.”

The Baltic states – Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania – have historically been among the most skeptical of EU defense autonomy, fearing it could dilute US commitments. In this vein, outgoing Latvian Defense Minister Andris Spruds has called NATO “irreplaceable.” As for the US, in 2018, Trump strongly opposed the idea of an EU army, dismissing it as “very insulting.” “Perhaps Europe should first pay its fair share of NATO, which the US subsidizes greatly!” he said at the time.

What’s Spain’s beef with NATO?
Spain’s problem is not necessarily with NATO itself, but rather with the current US administration. Madrid has vehemently opposed the US-Israeli war on Iran, and refused to allow its bases to be used for attacks. Trump subsequently called Spain “a terrible ally” and threatened to cut off all trade. The US president encountered similar problems with the rest of NATO members, slamming the bloc as a “paper tiger” and accusing it of “turning their backs on the American people.” Another point of friction was Greenland, which Trump threatened to annex, meeting strong pushback from the EU.

Read more …

“Minnesota’s Somali community just the start ..”

• Trump Administration Uncovers Massive Welfare, Citizenship Abuses (JTN)

The Trump administration’s work to pare back waste, fraud, and abuse in the federal government has reportedly exposed a vast network of taxpayer-fleecing scams, abuses of immigration, and of the citizenship process across all corners of the United States. The story involves resettled refugees soaking up federal paychecks to run home healthcare and childcare businesses, transnational criminal organizations exploiting food benefit programs, and scammers using fake student profiles to make off with millions in federal student loans. It also involves non-monetary forms of fraud, especially in immigration — legal and illegal alike.


Minnesota’s Somali community just the start
The Trump administration’s focus on fraud was originally sparked by new attention on a massive COVID-19-era fraud scheme in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Last year, the number of individuals charged by the Justice Department in the scheme surpassed 70. The defendants, the vast majority of whom are part of the state’s large Somali immigrant community, were accused of systematically defrauding a federally-funded state food program, instead using the proceeds to enrich themselves, as Just the News has extensively reported.

Recent public reports indicate that federally-funded state government programs beyond just Minnesota are ripe for exploitation and fraud. In a sweeping investigation, the Daily Wire and a researcher from the Capital Research Center found that Ohio spent billions of federal dollars on “personal services” payments to home healthcare companies with dubious credentials. These funds are frequently used to compensate individuals for performing non-medical tasks such as cooking, cleaning, and “companionship” for their own family members. Because these services are conducted inside private residences without supervision, it can be difficult to verify actual service delivery.

The investigation found a surge in dubious home health companies that appear to exist solely to bill the government. In Columbus, the reporters found a single windowless office building that houses 94 different companies that have collectively billed taxpayers $66 million over a few years. Many of the business owners lacked medical training or had criminal records, the outlet reported. There is evidence that this type of fraud is specifically encouraged by the way federal government programs are set up. For example, the Office of Refugee Resettlement runs a program that helps new immigrants develop “microenterprises,” like home healthcare companies, “to help generate an income and achieve self-sufficiency.”

Welfare fraud a top priority
The Trump administration has made hunting down this type of welfare fraud a top priority. President Donald Trump signed an executive order earlier this year establishing a national task force to combat such fraud and appointed Vice President JD Vance to lead it. The task force, with help from the Justice Department and other government agencies, has vigorously pursued states where potential fraud has been documented. Last month, it shut down 447 hospices and 23 home health agencies in California after Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Director Dr. Mehmet Oz in January raised concerns about fraudulent hospices in Los Angeles, linking the issue to the Armenian mafia in the area.

California and Ohio were apparently only the tip of the iceberg. On Wednesday, the task force announced that it would be halting $1.4 billion in federal funding for home health and hospice providers across the entire United States. Vance also issued an ultimatum to all 50 states on Wednesday, demanding they show that they are adequately protecting against fraud in federally funded Medicaid programs, or risk losing that funding.

“Today, we are sending, across 50 Medicaid programs, letters that will require them to show that they are effectively and aggressively prosecuting Medicaid fraud in their states,” Vance said at a press conference. “These letters are the first step. The first effort to try to force these states to get serious about prosecuting fraud.” “We’re a generous country. We’re generous people. I love that about this country,” the vice president added. “But part of that generosity is that it extends to our fellow Americans. We cannot give Medicare and Medicaid benefits to everybody all over the world.”

Dr. Oz said this week that there are signs the Medicaid programs were also exploited by foreign governments. “We’ve got Russian government involvement, we believe, in Los Angeles. We’ve got the Chinese government involved in a big fraud ring in New York,” Oz said in an interview with Fox News. “In New York State, the number-one job in the entire state is not retail, it’s not folks working in shops, it’s personal care services. Why? It’s because it’s a jobs program for the state.”

Federal investigators have previously identified foreign exploitation of federal benefits programs. Last month, prosecutors charged five Romanian nationals for their roles in an alleged conspiracy to steal nearly $1 million worth of food assistance benefits in Ohio and California. Last year, another Romanian national was sentenced to ten years in prison for stealing more than 36,000 EBT card numbers in California and New York using skimming devices. He had connections to a Romanian criminal organization, according to prosecutors.

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Something to do with age.

• This Is the Democrats’ Achilles Heel and the Republicans’ Super Power (Moran)

Last month, 12-term Rep. David Scott (D-Ga.) died at the age of 80. He was the fifth Democrat to die in office since Jan. 3, 2025, when the new Congress was seated. Someone is trying to tell the Democrats something (“Yes Lord, we’re listening”). We are, but what about the Democrats? The message is for them, and the “silver ceiling” they’ve placed on running for Congress is about to shatter into a thousand pieces.”In fact, scan the lists of congressional candidates this cycle, and you’ll find a record 80 Gen Z and millennial candidates challenging Democrats aged 65 and older — up from just 24 last cycle,” reports The Hill. “And those young challengers are increasingly outperforming older incumbents in both fundraising and polling, in some cases by double digits.”


These younger Democrats have lots of energy, lots of moxie, and a passel of bad ideas. And they’re coming to Congress in a revolutionary wave. Democratic leaders are holding back the change for reasons that, to them, seem sound. A change so drastic and radical would roil the party, setting off leadership fights and behind-the-scenes brawls for choice committee assignments. Also, while younger Democrats may win primaries in blue districts, how would they fare in the general election? Even some blue districts considered “safe” may end up being competitive.

“There’s a real rift in the ability of Democrats to reach young people and have an authentic message that they are fighting for them when it seems that [older lawmakers] are fighting just to hang on and have another term in Congress,” warned Brian Derrick, co-founder and CEO of a political fundraising platform. “There’s a silver ceiling on what Democrats can achieve while this generation refuses to pass the torch and step aside.” Republicans have their own problems with aging members, but they have taken steps to address that problem in the last two cycles. Speaker Mike Johnson is 54, while other leaders are in their 50s and early 60s.

The current leadership is younger than the previous era, particularly in the Senate, where the departure of leaders in their 80s has dropped the average age of the top brass by nearly a decade. The Massachusetts Democratic primary race is a good example of the Democrats’ problems. Rep. Seth Moulton, a veteran and experienced lawmaker, is running against 80-year-old Sen. Ed Markey. The current leadership is younger than the previous era, particularly in the Senate, where the departure of leaders in their 80s has dropped the average age of the top brass by nearly a decade.

Semafor: “At campaign stops in community town halls to backyard fundraiser barbecues, Moulton is dragging the Democratic Party’s quiet family conversation about age into the light of day, arguing to voters that the stakes of the race are bigger than ideology and speak to the future of the party itself.

“Why does this race matter, beyond Boston or Newburyport?” Moulton asked a crowd of about 200 at Newburyport’s City Hall. “Because it’s a referendum on the future of the Democratic Party. In fact, it’s the last Senate primary before the November midterms. So people are either going to look at the Democratic Party and say: Oh, there they go again, reelecting the same establishment gerontocracy that we just voted against two years ago; or they’re going to say, no, it looks like the Democratic Party is changing. It’s listening.”

Markey isn’t alone. Elderly incumbents across the country who’ve won endorsements from colleagues, labor unions, and progressive organizations are not scaring challengers away. Instead, they’re drawing them – in the form of younger Democrats willing to say the uncomfortable part out loud to voters, whose harsh memories of Joe Biden dooming their 2024 campaign – and of four Democrats dying in their House seats since that election – are still fresh.”

In Connecticut, 77-year-old incumbent Rep. John Larson of the 1st Congressional District lost the party endorsement to former Hartford Mayor Luke Bronin, 46. There’s going to be a primary, but the writing is on the wall for Larson. Bronin won by 10 points at the convention and has outraised the incumbent. “

There’s a reason that so many Americans are starting to support age limits, because it’s just good and healthy to get renewal every once in a while to get some new voices and new perspectives,” Bronin told Semafor. “I’m running because he’s been in elected office for almost half a century, and in Congress for almost 30 years, and he’s part of a Democratic establishment that keeps doing the same thing despite the fact that the world has changed.”

“Moulton and Bronin are seeing some of the same angst in their parts of New England – a non-ideological worry that their party has too many senior citizens in power, and that they should have retired after Donald Trump’s comeback,” says Semafor. The younger Democrats have ideas, but don’t possess the power to make those ideas into law. Many of them have no idea how to proceed. They don’t realize that while some of their ideas sound good and poll well, turning those ideas into law requires an entirely different skill set.

The Hill: Voters are increasingly supporting younger candidates over older incumbents; the only question is whether the party’s older voices want to be seen as a constructive part of the party’s evolution or as the biggest obstacles to its growth.

Voters are proving quick to punish the latter: 78-year-old Rep. Al Green (D-Texas) is trailing 37-year-old challenger Christian Menefee by at least 20 points in his runoff battle. Maine Gov. Janet Mills (D), at 78 years-old, had to suspend her Senate bid in April after voters flocked to the upstart campaign of 41-year-old Graham Platner (D). If older candidates are unwilling to recognize how the party is changing, voters will do the recognizing for them. These younger Democrats are more radical, angrier, and more willing to ditch the Constitution to get what they want. They’re a danger to the republic and a danger to the United States as we know it.

Read more …

Yeah yeah, NYT. Now do the Automatic Earth.

• US Gov’t Settles With Former NYT Reporter in Vaccine Censorship Case (ET)

The U.S. government has reached a settlement with a former New York Times reporter who was kicked off Twitter during the COVID-19 pandemic for posts about vaccines Officials in a settlement agreement dated May 11 and obtained by The Epoch Times said that the government “did in fact violate the First Amendment by exerting substantial coercive pressure on social media companies such as Twitter to suppress disfavored speech like Plaintiff’s,” referring to former New York reporter Alex Berenson.


Officials said they were paying Berenson $150,000 to settle the case, which was filed in 2023 against then-President Joe Biden, Pfizer board member Dr. Scott Gottlieb, and others. In exchange, Berenson moved to dismiss the case. “I’d like to thank the Trump administration for acknowledging the government’s unconstitutional actions against me in 2021 and standing for my First Amendment rights as a journalist and American,” Berenson told The Epoch Times in an email.

The government under President Donald Trump already settled a case raising similar issues and involving multiple states, agreeing not to take actions “to threaten Social-Media Companies with some form of punishment (i.e., an adverse legal, regulatory, or economic government sanction) unless they remove, delete, suppress, or reduce, including through altering their algorithms, posted social-media content containing protected free speech.”

Twitter banned Berenson in 2021 after he wrote in opposition to mandating COVID-19 vaccination because “it doesn’t stop infection or transmission.” Berenson and Twitter settled a different lawsuit arising from the same incidents, with Twitter acknowledging that it should not have banned the journalist. Emails disclosed in other litigation showed that U.S. officials during the Biden administration, as well as Gottlieb, who is also a former commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration, communicated to Twitter executives their view that Berenson’s posts violated Twitter rules and that he should be punished. Berenson said in his lawsuit that the actions violated his First Amendment rights.

A federal judge in 2025 dismissed the suit against Gottlieb, a former White House adviser named Andrew Slavitt, and Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla, concluding that Berenson had not alleged “discriminatory animus” by the individuals. She later threw out the litigation against the government, finding that Berenson did not have standing to bring a First Amendment claim against federal officials. Berenson, in an appeal, said that Twitter’s permanent suspension violated company policy, which required leadership approval, noting internal emails that showed top Twitter executives did not approve the ban. He also said the case should not have been dismissed because he had adequately alleged discrimination.

“Defendants targeted Berenson’s speech by reason of his status as a representative speaking for and to unvaccinated Americans,” the appeal stated. Berenson told The Epoch Times, “I look forward to continuing to pursue Pfizer board member Dr. Scott Gottlieb and chairman Dr. Albert Bourla for their role in the conspiracy to deplatform and silence me.” Lawyers for Gottlieb and Bourla said in a May 11 brief to the appeals court that Berenson’s claims fail in part because unvaccinated Americans do not constitute a recognizable class, undercutting the discrimination allegations. They also said Gottlieb’s communications with Twitter were “noncoercive expressions of opinion on matters of public concern,” and thus protected by the First Amendment.

Read more …

“Anthony Fauci is sitting sipping margaritas somewhere with his multi-million dollar financial success as a result of duping the American people into putting an experimental vaccine into their bodies..”

• Fauci Accused Of Intentionally Burying COVID Lab-Leak Evidence (MN)

A CIA operations officer provided explosive sworn testimony Wednesday before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, accusing Dr. Anthony Fauci of directly intervening in the intelligence community’s review of COVID-19’s origins. James Erdman III, a veteran CIA special operations officer, told senators that in August 2021 the intelligence community was on the verge of concluding the virus most likely leaked from a lab in Wuhan, China. Days later, that position reversed with no clear explanation.


Erdman stated under oath: “Dr. Fauci’s role in the cover-up was intentional. Dr. Fauci influenced the analytical process and findings by leveraging his position to ensure the IC consulted with a conflicted list of curated subject matter experts, public health officials, and scientists.”

He added that intelligence leaders “purposefully downplayed the lab origin” and “knew the virus came from Wuhan but pushed the natural origin narrative anyway.” Erdman testified that CIA scientists had circulated papers noting “all the conditions were present for a lab leak,” yet senior analysts ultimately buried or softened those assessments.

Senator Rand Paul pressed Erdman on the timeline. Paul described the Biden administration’s final moves as a “clean-up operation,” noting: “Scientific analysts concluded multiple times between 2021 and 2023 that a lab leak was the most likely origin of COVID-19. Yet those conclusions never shaped the official narrative… It was not until after the 2024 election that the outgoing Biden administration directed the CIA to issue an assessment not because of new intelligence, but so officials could walk out of the door claiming there was nothing left to find.”

Senator Bernie Moreno (R-OH) demanded accountability. He told the witness: “All these hearings are important. What you said is super critical… But where is the accountability? This is what I hear from my constituents all over Ohio… they want to see the perp walks.” Moreno continued: “Anthony Fauci is sitting sipping margaritas somewhere with his multi-million dollar financial success as a result of duping the American people into putting an experimental vaccine into their bodies or risk losing their jobs. He’s not accountable to anybody.”

Senators Ron Johnson and Rand Paul pushed back after the CIA labeled the public hearing “political theater.” Johnson stated: “This committee needs an apology! This is not political theater. This is what the American people need to see.” Paul added: “Closed-door testimony doesn’t provide oversight. Public testimony provides oversight.”

Fox News reporter Bill Melugin noted the complete absence of Senate Democrats from the Homeland Security Committee hearing, despite several members serving on the panel. One Democrat, Sen. Ruben Gallego of Arizona, walked past the media setup but did not enter the room. Erdman also raised separate concerns about oversight of declassification efforts. He claimed the CIA “took back 40 boxes of JFK and MK-Ultra files” that Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard was reviewing.

The whistleblower further alleged the agency “illegally monitored the computer and phone usage” of investigators working on the COVID-19 origins probe under presidential direction. He said: “These were Americans being spied on illegally while carrying out duties directed by the President and under the authority of the Director of National Intelligence.” The testimony aligns with earlier official reviews of the pandemic’s beginnings.

It builds on the White House’s comprehensive lab-leak assessment released in April 2025 and Department of Defense and Defense Intelligence Agency reports indicating the Biden Pentagon may have suppressed aspects of the origins investigation. It also connects to prior reporting on gain-of-function research and public statements downplaying alternative theories, including pieces examining the experiment that may have started the pandemic. The hearing underscores ongoing scrutiny of how federal agencies assessed and communicated the virus’s origins more than six years after the first cases emerged in Wuhan.

Read more …

 

 

 

 

https://twitter.com/EricLDaugh/status/2054868440762978330?s=20 https://twitter.com/XFreeze/status/2054906460308672707?s=20 https://twitter.com/JoshHall2024/status/2054701571913453926?s=20

 

 

 

 

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Debt Rattle March 20 2026

Mar 202026
 
 March 20, 2026  Posted by at 10:27 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , ,  62 Responses »


Jean-Michel Basquiat In this case 1983


• Netanyahu Declares Iran’s Nuclear Program & Missile Production “Destroyed” (ZH)
• Iran’s Attack On Qatar’s LNG Sends Shockwaves Across Global Energy Markets (ZH)
• US Naval Escort Won’t “100% Guarantee” Tanker Safety In Hormuz (ZH)
• Iran Is Losing. Why Pretend Otherwise? (Ben Shapiro)
• Either Iran or Israel Has to Go (Paul Craig Roberts)
• Where Will The War Take Us? (Paul Craig Roberts)
• Dmitriev Calls Strike on Iran’s South Pars Gas Field Tipping Point (TASS)
• The Coroner is Guilty (John Helmer)
• DNI Tulsi Gabbard Releases 2026 Unclassified National Threat Assessment (CTH)
• Belarus Remains Trump’s Ally Despite US Mistakes — Lukashenko (TASS)
• Murphy’s Law (Jonathan Turley)
• Trump Continues to Expel MAGA’s Best Members (Paul Craig Roberts)
• Kent Tells Tucker: ‘Imminent Threat’ Was From Israel, Not Iran (ZH)
• NASA May Shrink Boeing’s Moon-Mission Role, Push SpaceX (ZH)
• When ‘I Don’t Recall’ Meets a DOJ Subpoena (David Manney)

 


 

https://twitter.com/Skint_Eastwood1/status/2034238638259904836?s=20

 


 

 


 


Just when the protests get too loud, the mission is completed.

• Netanyahu Declares Iran’s Nuclear Program & Missile Production “Destroyed” (ZH)

In a rare wartime press conference, Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu opened with a jab at rumors about his condition: First of all& I m alive.” He went on to claim that Israel and the US are “protecting the entire Middle East& the entire world” – and after 20 days, he asserted: “we are winning, and Iran is being decimated.” Netanyahu further claimed that Iran’s missile and drone stockpiles are being “massively degraded” and “will be destroyed,” framing the campaign as an all-out dismantling of Tehran s capabilities. Bust most importantly he said production capability has been ended.


He further addressed claims Israel dragged the US into war, calling it “fake news” and adding: “Does anyone really think that someone can tell President Donald Trump what to do? Come on.” He praised tight US-Israel coordination: “We are achieving goals in lightning speed” – and said he and Trump “see eye to eye,” adding the world “owes a debt& to President Trump for leading this effort.” He also stated that Israel acted against Pars alone, but that he will hold off on ordering future such attacks without US consent. Netanyahu also said the war will end “much sooner than people think”. And another key aspect to his remarks:

• Iran No Longer Able to Enrich Uranium
ª Iran Lost Ability to Manufacture Missiles US
ª Israel Destroyed Iran s Fleet in Caspian Sea

“What we’re destroying now are the factories that produce the components to make these missiles and ` to make the nuclear weapons that they’re trying to produce,” Netanyahu said, however without providing evidence of the claim. Just before he spoke, Israel’s military said it anticipates the anti-Iran campaign is only half complete.

Iran through its Foreign Minister has made clear on Thursday it will show “zero restraint” if energy infrastructure is targeted again. President Trump on the same day responded to reports the US has sent more troops to the region.

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“Worse Than Nord Stream”.

• Iran’s Attack On Qatar’s LNG Sends Shockwaves Across Global Energy Markets (ZH)

Brent crude futures surged toward $120/bbl, while WTI remained muted around $96/bbl, as Wednesday marked a major escalation in the US-Iran conflict. Israeli fighter jets struck Iran’s giant South Pars gas field with air-delivered munitions, triggering a retaliatory chain reaction in which IRGC forces targeted critical energy infrastructure across the Gulf. Iranian drone and missile strikes caused heavy damage to Qatar’s Ras Laffan LNG hub, while gas plants in Abu Dhabi shut down, Kuwaiti refineries were hit by drones, and Saudi refining assets were targeted. Unlike temporary shipping disruptions in the Gulf waters or the Strait of Hormuz, damage to upstream energy assets, such as production and LNG facilities, is far more serious and could take months or even years to repair, raising the risk of prolonged tight global supply.


Some 20% of global LNG exports originate from Gulf countries, and the latest round of Israeli and IRGC attacks on upstream energy assets shows how the conflict has entered an entirely new phase where energy infrastructure is being directly targeted. Disruptions at Qatar’s LNG facilities threaten to tighten the global gas market, with ripple effects quickly spreading worldwide – across Asia, Europe, and even U.S. gas prices. European natural gas benchmark futures jumped as much as 35% today, pushing prices to more than double their pre-war levels, as traders brace for what only appears to be a prolonged period of disruption from critical LNG hubs that account for a fifth of the world’s total supply.

QatarEnergy warned earlier that LNG facilities inside its Ras Laffan Industrial City were attacked by missiles, “causing sizable fires and extensive further damage.” “This could be a game changer for the LNG industry, akin to the attack on Nord Stream or possibly even worse,” Susan Sakmar, visiting assistant professor at the University of Houston Law Center, said, quoted by Bloomberg. “This is a sudden disruption, with no indication that Qatar could restart anytime soon.” Global Risk Management analyst Arne Lohmann Rasmussen warned, “LNG from Qatar could in principle be offline for months and, in the worst case, for years. For the gas market, the crisis does not end simply because the war ends and the Strait of Hormuz reopens.”

Read more …

“We are collateral damage in a conflict when the root causes have nothing to do with shipping..”

• US Naval Escort Won’t “100% Guarantee” Tanker Safety In Hormuz (ZH)

The paralyzed Hormuz chokepoint is becoming the worst disruption to global energy flows ever, as actual barrels quickly disappear from oil markets, driving prices sharply higher in Asia toward $150 per barrel and potentially setting the stage for demand destruction in the weeks ahead.


President Trump has been attempting to fast-track the reopening of Hormuz by providing naval escorts for tankers and other commercial vessels. However, there are a few problems. First, Western US partners have rejected Trump’s request to send warships to help reopen the strategic waterway, which is plagued by IRGC mines and kamikaze drones. Second, Arsenio Dominguez, secretary-general of the International Maritime Organization (IMO), told the Financial Times in an interview on Tuesday that even if naval escorts materialize in the narrow waterway, they will not provide a “100% guarantee” of tanker safety. “It reduces the risk, but the risk is still there. The merchant ships and seafarers can be affected,” Dominguez said.

The head of the IMO, which sets rules for international shipping, continued: “We are collateral damage in a conflict when the root causes have nothing to do with shipping,” adding that his organization has major concerns about commercial vessels stuck in the Gulf running out of food and supplies for crews. Sending US and allied warships into the narrow waterway, just off the Iranian coast and facing threats from drones, naval mines, and shore-to-ship ballistic missiles, seems like a suicidal mission. “The challenge is going to be dealing with the proximity of the drone launchers and the missile launchers that are going to be along the Iranian coast,” Bryan Clark, an expert in naval operations with the Hudson Institute, told The Hill.

Clark said, “The issue is that you only have a couple of minutes once the launcher comes out before the missiles are going to get on top of you, because you’re only talking about 3 or 4 miles from the shoreline to the transit lane.”mA number of top US partners, including Germany, Spain, and Italy, have no immediate plans to send warships into the waterway. This has only infuriated President Trump, as his administration has voiced frustration with some longstanding allies over their unwillingness to help reopen the strait.

The race to reopen the strait comes as Kpler oil analyst Muyu Xu warned, “The blockade is now the worst disruption to oil flows ever. Actual barrels are now disappearing from global oil markets, which could lead to demand destruction in the weeks to come.”= Three weeks into the US-Iran conflict, tanker activity on the waterway has slowed to a crawl, just about 400,000 barrels per day, compared with the pre-Hormuz-closure average of 14 million barrels per day.

Read more …

Views differ.

• Iran Is Losing. Why Pretend Otherwise? (Ben Shapiro)

Don’t fall for the propaganda. Iran is not holding its own in this conflict. It is being systematically dismantled. One by one, the senior figures of the Islamic Republic have been eliminated: generals, security chiefs and regime power brokers. The country’s leadership has been decapitated at the highest levels, leaving behind a hollowed-out command structure struggling to function.mEven the regime’s attempts at continuity appear shaky. A successor was hastily elevated, but reports suggest instability, absence and internal disarray at the very top. Whatever facade of order Tehran hoped to project has given way to uncertainty and silence.


Meanwhile, the military picture is equally stark. Iran’s command-and-control systems have been fractured. Its missile and drone capabilities — once touted as pillars of deterrence — have been severely degraded. What remains is not a coordinated campaign but sporadic, diminished retaliation.The numbers tell the story. Early volleys of hundreds of missiles have dwindled to scattered launches. Drone deployments have followed the same trajectory. Factories, infrastructure and key facilities tied to these capabilities have been destroyed or heavily damaged. What the regime is able to deploy now appears to be the remnants of what once was.

This is not simply a Western narrative. Even regional observers — some hardly aligned with U.S. interests — have acknowledged the effectiveness of the campaign. Analyses describe a deliberate, phased strategy: first neutralizing air defenses and leadership networks, then targeting the industrial backbone that sustains Iran’s military capabilities. The objective is not just to weaken but to prevent reconstruction.mAnd yet, despite this evidence, a counternarrative persists in parts of the West: that Iran is resilient, that it is outlasting its adversaries, that the outcome remains uncertain. That claim is increasingly difficult to square with reality.

Recent developments underscore the point. Senior Iranian officials once positioned as potential successors have been killed. Key internal security figures — those responsible for maintaining order and suppressing dissent — have also been eliminated. Even localized enforcement mechanisms are now under pressure. What remains of the regime’s response resembles less a strategy and more a reaction — disjointed, limited and increasingly ineffective.So the real question is not whether Iran is losing. The evidence suggests it is.The real question is why so many observers continue to insist otherwise.

Part of the answer may lie in broader geopolitical anxieties: fears of escalation, concerns over regional stability, or skepticism shaped by past conflicts. But those concerns, while understandable, do not change the facts on the ground. There are also looming questions about what comes next. Much attention has been paid to strategic chokepoints like the Strait of Hormuz, though any prolonged disruption there would invite overwhelming international response. More significant, perhaps, is the internal dynamic within Iran itself.

The regime has long relied on force to suppress dissent, as seen in past protests met with lethal crackdowns. But the current moment may be different. With leadership weakened and security structures under strain, the balance between state control and public resistance could begin to shift. If that happens, the future of Iran will not be decided solely by external pressure but by the Iranian people themselves. They have risen before, at great personal risk. The difference now is that the regime they would confront appears more vulnerable than it has in decades. What happens next is uncertain. But one thing is increasingly clear: The narrative of Iranian strength no longer matches the reality.

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I llike PCR. And he has much more experience than me, and I was never in the White House. BUT: the US is not in the Middle East because of Israel, it’s -historically- there to control the price of oil.

• Either Iran or Israel Has to Go (Paul Craig Roberts)

The Iranians have demonstrated that Trump badly misjudged their capability. Trump is now calling on other countries, with little success, to send their warships to help keep open the Strait of Hormuz as the task is too big for the US Navy, and he is cutting deals, or trying to, with Putin and Modi to remove sanctions on Russian oil in exchange for the de-sanctioned oil to be sent to Europe and not to Asia. Trump, or his advisors, have come up with a scheme to invade Kharg Island, which seems more like a suicide mission.


The Iranians are holding firm on one level but without realizing it might be cracking on another. I am not convinced that the Iranians fully understand the situation. For example, Mohsen Rezaee, retired commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard, now a member of the Expediency Discernment Council, said that the “presence of the US in the Persian Gulf has been the main cause of insecurity over the past 50 years.” The end of the war, he said, requires “US withdrawal from the Persian Gulf.”

It seems to me that General Rezaee misunderstands the situation. It is not the American presence per se that is the cause of insecurity. The cause is that the American bases are there to serve Israel. Moreover, the real cause of insecurity for all of the Muslim states is Israel’s Zionist agenda of Greater Israel. Once defined as “from the Nile to the Euphrates,” Israel has recently redefined Greater Israel to be from the “Nile to Pakistan.” The general does not seem to understand that removing the US from the Persian Gulf does not remove the Zionist agenda of Greater Israel. What Iran should be demanding is the disavowal of the Zionist agenda.

Iran’s president, Masoud Pezeshkian, hasn’t a clue either. He says the “Only way to end this war” is to recognize Iran’s legitimate rights, payment of reparations (to Iran) and firm guarantees against future aggression.” He is badly wrong. The war might again be put on pause by Iranian officials who fail to comprehend the situation, but the only way war will end is by Israel renouncing the Zionist agenda of Greater Israel. And that Israel will not do. Iran’s foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, has rejected the talk of peace negotiations. Trump, he says has already twice deceived and sneak-attacked Iran while engaged in negotiations, and Iran will not make the same mistake again.

In actual fact, Iran is making a much worse mistake. The Zionist agenda of Greater Israel is not consistent with the Existence of Muslim Iran (or Turkey and Saudi Arabia). Unless the Zionist agenda is renounced, Iran has no choice but to fight to its own death or to Israel’s death. The fact that Iran has never seized the initiative, has never used its strategic advantage, but has sat on its butt waiting, indeed inviting, an attack, suggests that Iran does not comprehend the Zionist Agenda. Neither do the Americans, the Europeans, or the media. The real cause of the war is simply not mentioned. If Iran doesn’t wise up, Iran risks being lured into another meaningless agreement.

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“Netanyahu does know what to do–nuke Iran, in order to save Israel.”

No, nuking Iran would be the end of Israel.

• Where Will The War Take Us? (Paul Craig Roberts)

I am disappointed that Trump destroyed the MAGA movement by turning it into the MIGA movement and taking America to another war in the Middle East in behalf of the Zionist agenda of Greater Israel. Using the disguise of a “war on terror,” the United States has spent the first quarter of the 21st Century using American blood and American money to destroy countries that were barriers to Greater Israel, a territory that encompasses the Muslim Middle East from the Nile to Pakistan. Iraq, Libya and Syria are no longer functioning Arab states.


Trump and Netanyahu believed that Iran would fall as easily as the others, but that has proved not to be the case. Indeed, it appears that Iran is winning. Iran is winning because Iran was better prepared. Expecting a quick and easy victory, Trump and Netanyahu went to war without sufficient missiles to continue in the combat. One consequence is the destruction of American radar and military bases in the Persian Gulf. Another is the inability of Israel to intercept incoming Iranian missiles, an inability that will intensify as Iran works its way through its older stock of missiles and begins using it’s modern hypersonic ballistic missiles. It is possible that Israel could end up looking like Gaza.

According to news reports one of the Persian Gulf oil city-states that hosts US military bases has requested that the United States depart as US presence no longer provides protection. Possibly the other hosts of American bases will make the same request, in which case the result of Trump’s war for Israel will be the removal of Washington’s presence in the Middle East and a defeat of Washington’s long-term agenda of controlling oil flows from the Persian Gulf.

Trump and Netanyahu seem to have put themselves into a difficult situation. Both face elections this year, elections unlikely to go well if Trump and Netanyahu are losing their war. The US Navy has had to move out of range of Iranian ship-sinking missiles, and Trump has had to call on other countries–China, Japan, South Korea, France, UK–to send warships to aid the US in taking control from Iran of the Strait of Hormuz. This request is a clear statement by the President of the United States of limited American military capability. Trump has had no takers. Trump’s advisors are talking about landing troops on Kharg Island, surely a suicide mission.

In other words, Trump doesn’t know what to do. Netanyahu does know what to do–nuke Iran, in order to save Israel. Aware of this possibility Iran might hold back from victory and go for a settlement in which Washington and Israel agree to normalize relations with the Iranian nation. Such a settlement would not last, because it is incompatible with the Zionist agenda of Greater Israel. Therefore, during the time for which such a settlement might last, Iran would have to develop and deploy nuclear weapons, knowing that otherwise Iran will be struck by Israeli nukes.

So, the outcome of Trump and Israel’s war could easily be nuclear proliferation and a reduction of Israeli and American power in the Middle East. This could be a good thing as both Israelis and Americans would understand that the agenda of Greater Israel has consequences too severe to justify the agenda.m If the Iranian government holds firm and learns from the experience, there could be a silver lining in Trump and Israel’s war. The Zionist agenda would be exposed as too costly and would have to be abandoned both by Israel and Washington.

The weak-willed governments in Moscow and Beijing would see that it is possible, after all, to stand up to Israeli-dominated Washington, and possibly might start standing up to Washington themselves instead of selling out their allies. If so, this would produce the multi-polar world that Russian President Putin talks so much about but negates the possibly of with his craven behavior. Perhaps XI would understand that it is better to have a determined military, such as the one he just purged, than a moderate one that encourages, as Putin does, ever more serious provocations by refusing to acknowledge them as acts of war.

The future of the world depends on whether leaders can reenter the world of reality or stay lost in a more comforting unreality in which they presently operate.

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“Trump stated that Israel would no longer strike facilities of Iran’s South Pars gas field.”

• Dmitriev Calls Strike on Iran’s South Pars Gas Field Tipping Point (TASS)

Special Representative of Russian President for investment and economic cooperation with foreign countries, Chief Executive Officer of Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF) Kirill Dmitriev called the strike on facilities of the Iranian South Pars gas field, which caused a fire, a “tipping point” in a post on X. This is how he reacted to a White House publication citing statements by US President Donald Trump regarding the situation around the gas field. US President Donald Trump stated that Israel would no longer strike facilities of Iran’s South Pars gas field.


The United States knew nothing about the attack, and Qatar was not involved in it in any way or had any idea it was coming, he wrote on Truth Social on Thursday. The American leader believes the Jewish state carried out the strike out of outrage at what was happening in the Middle East. According to Trump, only a small portion of the field’s facilities were damaged. H e emphasized that Israel would no longer strike the extremely important and valuable South Pars gas field unless Iran made an unwise decision to attack a completely innocent party, Qatar in this case.

On Wednesday, the head of the Assaluyeh District administration in Iran’s Bushehr Province reported that a fire had broken out following an attack by Israel and the United States at several facilities in the South Pars gas field. In this regard, Iran’s elite military force, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), said it would attack oil and gas sites in Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Qatar.

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New book.

• The Coroner is Guilty (John Helmer)

This is the first book to expose abuse of power by Australian coroners investigating the cause of death when there is suspicion of medical negligence in the combination of popular prescription drugs – widely used benzodiazepines with treatments for non-life threatening conditions such as vertigo, vestibular migraine, and epilepsy. The book records the evidence of the sudden death of Tatiana Vasilievna Turitsyna, my wife, and of the two years which have followed of forensic investigations to uncover the cause, the role of the treating doctor, then the delay, obstruction, and cover-up by the Coroners Court of Victoria.


Throughout the world this court is the only one of its kind to have been investigated and then prosecuted by the state for abuses of power by the coroners in charge – this is corruption in the law. In 2023 the court was found guilty, sentenced, and fined almost $400,000, but no individual was held culpable. That was the outcome of a plea bargain — a cover-up to keep the evidence secret, the individual coroners blameless, and the penalty paid out of public money from the court budget.

In a presentation that is unprecedented in the practice of Anglo-American law, in Australia and Canada, this book has become the jury book or brief of the case of suspicious, sudden drug death. It is now a model for the international public debate on corruption by the pharmaceutical companies in cahoots with government regulators, the medical profession, judges, and lawyers. This is your summons to serve on the jury.

You, the reader, are called to judge the evidence and the legal argument; and then cast your verdict, not only for the doctor and coroner but also the Supreme Court judge who conducted a trial of his own, dismissing every count of the author’s case, and endorsing the coroner’s decisions without qualification. This is also a textbook on subversion in our lives and deaths. This is how the victims of lethal combinations of drugs are blamed for dying of heart attacks that are judged to be “natural causes” when the evidence that they are nothing of the kind is buried according to the “rules-based international order”. If you are a survivor of a crime of “natural causes”, here’s how to fight for your right, and the right of the dead, to natural justice.

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The Unclassified part is not the most exciting.

• DNI Tulsi Gabbard Releases 2026 Unclassified National Threat Assessment (CTH)

In fulfilling her legislatively mandated annual report called the “National Threat Assessment,” Director of National Intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard, releases the combined intelligence assessment of the U.S. Intelligence Community. Additionally, here is the transcript of DNI Tulsi Gabbard’s statement to the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence:


[TRANSCRIPT] – “I am here today to present the 2026 Annual Threat Assessment, joined by the Directors of the CIA, DIA, FBI and NSA. This briefing is being provided in accordance with ODNI’s statutory responsibility and represents the Intelligence Community’s assessment of the threats facing U.S. citizens, our Homeland, and our interests. nAs President Trump’s National Security Strategy highlights, America is blessed with an enviable geostrategic position, unparalleled assets, resources and a military second to none. Intelligence remains among our sharpest tools in protecting our interests and informing our policymakers and decisionmakers on key national security concerns. In this assessment, we are following the structure of priorities laid out in the National Security Strategy, starting with threats to our Homeland, then shifting to global risks.

The defense of our Homeland is of utmost importance to the American people. Putting America first means committing to an unrelenting vigilance in service of our own citizens, borders, and communities. Recent efforts to bolster Homeland defense have yielded significantly positive results, but challenges persist. For example, President Trump’s strict enforcement of U.S. policies at the U.S. Mexico border and regionally has served as a deterrent and drastically reduced illegal immigration. Based on Customs and Border Patrol data, January 2026’s monthly encounters are down 83.8% compared to January 2025. Encounters declined 79% compared to 2024.

The drivers of migration are likely to continue. Potential worsening instability in countries like Cuba and Haiti risk triggering migration surges. Smugglers who often operate as transnational criminal organizations view chaos as an opportunity for profit and will look to continue to profit from illegal immigration flows. Transnational criminal organizations continue to pose a daily and direct threat to the health and safety of millions of U.S. citizens primarily by producing and trafficking in illegal drugs. Under President Trump’s leadership, fentanyl overdose deaths have seen a 30 percent decrease from September 2024 to September 2025.

Fentanyl potency has also decreased, likely due to disruptions to the production supply chain. U.S. efforts to work with China and India to halt the flow of fentanyl precursor chemicals to North America are demonstrating improvement, but there is more work to be done as there are still tens of thousands of fentanyl-related deaths in America every year.] President Trump’s aggressive efforts to more directly and actively target TCOs and reduce the inflow of fentanyl precursors has already had a significant impact which is likely to continue. (continue reading – pdf) The opening statement is 8-pages in full and can be found by following the ‘continue reading’ link above.

Tulsi Gabbard is doing a solid job as DNI, against formidable opposition from all directions.]“It ought to be remembered that there is nothing more difficult to take in hand, more perilous to conduct, or more uncertain in its success, than to take the lead in the introduction of a new order of things. Because the innovator has for enemies all those who have done well under the old conditions, and lukewarm defenders in those who may do well under the new. This coolness arises partly from fear of the opponents, who have the laws on their side, and partly from the incredulity of men, who do not readily believe in new things until they have had a long experience of them.”
-Machiavelli, The Prince

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I thought he was Putin’s close(st) ally.

• Belarus Remains Trump’s Ally Despite US Mistakes — Lukashenko (TASS)

Belarus remains an ally of US President Donald Trump despite some mistakes made by the US administration, Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko said on Thursday. “I would strongly urge you that we discuss regional problems. Not only the issues surrounding Ukraine, but also global ones. And not only the war in the Middle East,” Lukashenko was quoted by BelTA news agency during a meeting with a US delegation led by Special Envoy for Belarus John Coale at the Palace of Independence.


“I believe my perspective on global issues, especially on the situation in the Middle East, will be important for you, given that you are fighting against our friends. And I am ready to speak frankly on this topic,” the Belarusian president continued. “I would very much like you to convey my perspective to Donald Trump. Although I believe the United States has made certain mistakes, I remain a supporter of your president,” Lukashenko added. Last September, the United States lifted sanctions on the airline Belavia. The US Department of the Treasury issued a general license for financial transactions with Belavia and its subsidiaries.

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Judges doing politics. Under the guise of law.

• Murphy’s Law (Jonathan Turley)

“Anything that can go wrong will go wrong.” That adage, called Murphy’s Law, came to mind this week with the latest injunction issued by U.S. District Court Judge Brian Murphy in Boston. Murphy previously drew national criticism for his efforts to enjoin Trump’s immigration policies, resulting in not one but two rebukes from the Supreme Court. He is now back with an order preventing changes to vaccination policies ordered by Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.


As with his earlier immigration order, the court seems to take the view that anything that can go wrong for the Trump Administration will go wrong for the Administration. At virtually every critical point, the court seems to adopt the harshest possible interpretation against the Administration. Murphy effectively halted, for now, the meeting of Kennedy’s new Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, or ACIP. Kennedy had replaced many members of the ACIP, including some accused of conflicts of interest. However, Murphy found that Kennedy had made arbitrary and capricious decisions in changing vaccine policies and changing the committee membership.

The Trump Administration has been aggressively fighting for executive authority over agencies, boards, and committees. This case could become one of the most significant of these appeals.Judge Murphy basically lambasts Kennedy for attacking good science and scientific methods. His criticism is laden with assumptions about the “correct” answers to questions governing vaccines. There are good-faith objections to Kennedy’s policy changes. However, the question is who is constitutionally vested with the right to make such decisions. That question is particularly prominent in the Murphy opinion. For example, the court rejects the new board members as unqualified in comparison to the prior members.

The court’s rejection of the new board members is largely conclusory. The court offers little indication of who Kennedy might appoint to meet his standards … other than the prior board members placed on the committee during the prior administration. In determining whether Kennedy had a right to reconstitute the committee, the opinion states that “[t]he Court acknowledges that many of the ACIP members have extensive expertise in their chosen fields.” However, it then questions whether they have truly “relevant” experience. The court insists that only six have relevant experience with vaccines.

The rejection of individual advisers shows how the court dismisses countervailing credentials or belittles advisers selected by the Secretary. Take Dr. Raymond Pollak who “is a surgeon, transplant immunobiologist, and transplant specialist who has published more than 120 peer-reviewed works and served as principal investigator on NIH transplant biology grants and numerous drug trials.” That would seem to be someone who could offer unique insights into vaccines and their approval. Yet, while acknowledging some experience, Murphy dismisses him as lacking sufficient experience.

Then there is Dr. Retsef Levi, Professor of Operations Management at the MIT Sloan School of Management, as “a leading expert in healthcare analytics, supply chain and manufacturing analytics, risk management, and biologics and vaccine safety” and note that he has “collaborated with industry stakeholders and public health agencies to develop decision-support models to evaluate biologics and vaccine safety” and co-authored studies examining the association between mRNA COVID-19 vaccines and risks of cardiovascular disease, mortality, and adverse pregnancy outcomes.” He has also published two papers on vaccines. However, Judge Murphy brushes aside that stellar academic record and notes that “both of those [vaccine papers] were published mere months before his appointment.”

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I personally give Trump much more credit than PCR does.

• Trump Continues to Expel MAGA’s Best Members (Paul Craig Roberts)

Trump, again doing the political assassination for the Israel Lobby, is trying to drive American hero US Rep. Thomas Massie out of Congress Three new York Jewish billionaires–Henry Paulson, Miriam Adelson, and Paul Singer–have contributed an enormous war chest for unseating Massie. Trump is contributing his demonization rhetoric: “We got to get rid of this loser. This guy is bad,” Trump said at a rally in Hebron, Kentucky. “He’s disloyal to the Republican Party. He’s disloyal to the people of Kentucky, and most importantly, he is disloyal to the United States of America. And he’s got to be voted out of office as soon as possible.” https://www.unz.com/article/thomas-massie-live-by-the-sword-die-by-the-dagger/


What Trump means is that Massie is disloyal to the Israel Lobby. On Tucker Carlson’s show Massie revealed that every member of Congress has an AIPAC babysitter or handler to make certain the member votes in Israel’s interest. To please Israel, Trump turns on his strongest supporters, such as Massie, Marjorie Taylor Green, and Joe Kent. As Trump does not tolerate dissent, none of his advisers dare to tell him anything. Trump’s schooling as a Jewish-financed New York real estate developer is not leading to anything good. We have an impetuous and unpredictable president with his finger on the button who listens to no one but Zionist Israel.

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“Kent elaborated that Israel was preparing to strike, which would trigger retaliation endangering U.S. personnel – creating the cited “imminent” risk.. “

• Kent Tells Tucker: ‘Imminent Threat’ Was From Israel, Not Iran (ZH)

Joe Kent, former Director of the National Counterterrorism Center who was President Trump’s principal counterterrorism advisor, appeared on Tucker Carlson’s show to explain his side of the story after stepping down from the administration. Kent announced his resignation Tuesday, citing his opposition to the ongoing U.S. war with Iran, and his belief that Iran posed “no imminent threat” to America – while asserting in his resignation letter that his wife died in “a war manufactured by Israel” in a 2019 suicide bombing in Manjbi, Syria.


In this first public interview since resigning, Kent elaborated on his reasons amid reports emerging Wednesday that the FBI is investigating him for allegedly leaking or improperly sharing classified information (a probe that sources say predates his resignation and is being handled by the FBI’s Criminal Division, per several outlets). Early on in the interview, Carlson referenced Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s justification for the strikes – that Iran posed an imminent threat because Israel was preparing to attack Iranian targets, likely prompting Iranian retaliation against U.S. forces. Carlson reframed it bluntly:

Carlson: “So, the imminent threat that the secretary of state is describing is not from Iran. It’s from Israel.” Kent: “Exactly. And I think this speaks to the broader issue: who is in charge of our policy in the Middle East?” Kent elaborated that Israel was preparing to strike, which would trigger retaliation endangering U.S. personnel – creating the cited “imminent” risk. He stated: Kent: “The Israelis drove the decision to take this action, which we knew would set off a series of events because the Iranians would retaliate.”

Kent insisted there was zero U.S. intelligence of Iran planning a direct attack, nearing a nuclear weapon, or posing an immediate homeland threat. He cited Iran’s religious fatwa against nuclear weapons (since 2004) and said the assassinated Supreme Leader Khamenei had moderated the program: Kent: “There was no intelligence that said, hey… the Iranians are going to launch this big sneak attack… There was none of that intelligence.” On nukes: “No, they weren’t [on the verge of a bomb]. They weren’t in June either. The Iranians have had a fatwa – a religious ruling – against the development of a nuclear weapon since 2004… We had no intelligence that it was being disobeyed.”

https://twitter.com/remarks/status/2034418878143484285?s=20


Kent described how dissenting views were sidelined in the lead-up to strikes. Key officials, including himself, were reportedly barred from direct briefings with Trump. He said he spoke personally with the president before resigning – a conversation he described as “very respectful” – but felt staying would mean silencing his warnings. “A good deal of key decision-makers were not allowed to come and express their opinion to the president,” Kent said, adding “There wasn’t a robust debate.”


In an emotionally charged segment, Kent discussed the September 2025 assassination of Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk, whom he knew personally. Kent recounted Kirk’s last words to him in the West Wing in June: Kent (recalling Kirk): “Joe, stop us from getting into a war with Iran.” Kent said Kirk had opposed escalation and faced pressure from pro-Israel donors. He revealed the NCTC had leads on potential foreign involvement but was ordered to halt: Kent: “The investigation that the National Counterterrorism Center was a part of, we were stopped from continuing to investigate… There was still a lot for us to look into… there were still linkages for us to investigate that we needed to run down.”= The official narrative focused on lone gunman Ryan Robinson, but Kent insisted unresolved questions remained.

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We should know what happened when Boeing went from an engineers- to an accountants firm. Probe it. McDonnell Douglas.

• NASA May Shrink Boeing’s Moon-Mission Role, Push SpaceX (ZH)

President Donald Trump’s NASA chief could soon announce Boeing’s diminishing role in returning astronauts to the Moon, while leaning heavily on Elon Musk’s SpaceX rocket company to do the heavy lifting. Boeing’s Space Launch System (SLS), originally the rocket backbone of the Artemis mission, would no longer carry the Lockheed Martin-built Orion crew capsule to the Moon. Under the new plan, SpaceX’s Starship would take the lead.


NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman plans to meet with the companies working on the Artemis program next Tuesday, including Boeing, SpaceX, and Blue Origin, to discuss progress and current paths forward. Sources close to the program said any significant changes could face immediate Congressional scrutiny.”NASA is committed to using the SLS architecture through at least Artemis V, which is necessary to support both human landing system providers, and their associated acceleration plans to return American astronauts to the Moon,” Isaacman said in a statement. “We’re incredibly supportive of both our HLS providers and their plans to accelerate America’s path forward to the moon,” Isaacman added.

If Isaacman does boot SLS from the core rocket during the launch of the Orion crew capsule to the moon, it would be a massive blow to Boeing, which has been mired in setbacks ranging from Starliner capsule issues to SLS launch delays. Notably, Starship still lacks a fully successful orbital flight. The effort to swap SLS for Starship shows Isaacman’s urgent push to accelerate Artemis timelines (target: 2028 landing) after years of delays and cost overruns, with SLS missions costing over $4 billion each.Isaacman has also been weighing alternatives for the HLS on the Moon from both SpaceX and Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin – both of which hold multibillion-dollar contracts to develop Moon landers for Artemis.

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Everyone behind the Steele dossier is walking free.

• When ‘I Don’t Recall’ Meets a DOJ Subpoena (David Manney)

James Comey is back in the spotlight with a familiar flavor. The Department of Justice has issued a subpoena tied to his role in the 2017 intelligence assessment on Russia and the 2016 election. Years passed, but the questions never went away. Now, however, they’ve returned with legal force behind them. The subpoena marks a new escalation after Fox News Digital previously reported that Comey and former CIA Director John Brennan were under criminal investigation related to the probe.Sources at the time said the investigations were examining potential wrongdoing tied to the creation of the 2017 assessment and possible false statements to Congress. Comey, as PJ Media readers know, served as FBI director at the time and played a central role in one of the most consequential investigations in recent political history.


It was an investigation that influenced public opinion, policy debates, and years of political conflict that followed. That assessment referenced the Steele dossier, which a CIA “Tradecraft Review” completed in June under CIA Director John Ratcliffe said “ran counter to fundamental tradecraft principles and ultimately undermined the credibility of a key judgment,” according to Axios, which cited the review.Ratcliffe has since referred Comey and Brennan for possible prosecution, Axios reported. Senior officials from multiple agencies contributed to the document, including John Brennan and James Clapper. The document’s conclusion shaped the early narrative around the election and set the tone for investigations that stretched across years.

The current inquiry focuses on process and accountability. Lawmakers and investigators want clarity on how evidence was gathered, how conclusions were reached, and whether political pressure played any role. Those questions may sound procedural, but they carry serious weight; decisions made during that period affected the credibility of major institutions and the direction of national policy. Comey’s past testimony offers a preview of what may come next. During earlier hearings, he often leaned on phrases that signaled caution or distance. “I don’t recall” appeared many times, and the Fifth Amendment remains a legal option available to any witness under oath. A subpoena raises the stakes because it requires answers, even if those answers arrive carefully measured.

President Donald Trump has long argued that the original investigation carried political bias, a view that continues to shape how supporters interpret the renewed scrutiny. Meanwhile, those on the left maintain that the original findings reflected legitimate concerns about foreign interference. There’s enough daylight between those competing views to power a solar panel for minutes.The legal process will move forward step by step. Testimony, documents, and sworn statements will form the backbone of whatever comes next. Investigators will press for clarity, witnesses will weigh their words carefully, and the outcome will depend less on headlines and more on what can be established under oath.

For Comey, the moment carries both legal and personal weight. His time as FBI director placed him in the center of events that reshaped American politics. The subpoena pulls him back into that same arena, where every answer matters and every pause gets noticed. The country has seen versions of this scene before: a high-profile witness, a charged political backdrop, and a series of questions that reach back years.What happens next depends on how much clarity emerges and how much remains unreachable. In other words, wash, rinse, repeat. If we decide on a drinking game, basing a shot of Buffalo Trace on each time we hear “I don’t recall,” we’ll remember the first 15 minutes of his testimony. Regardless, second verse, same as the first verse.

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Quantum entanglement: It’s already there https://twitter.com/IslanderWORLD/status/2034396591088627889 A car in less than 5 seconds

 

 

 

 

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Debt Rattle February 25 2025

Feb 252025
 
 February 25, 2025  Posted by at 10:46 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , , ,  38 Responses »


Tintoretto The crucifixion of Christ 1568

 

• No Way Out (James Howard Kunstler)
• Liberals Panic Over ‘Politicized’ FBI After Bongino Appointment (ZH)
• Musk Warns Fed Workers – Return To Office Or Be Placed On Leave (ZH)
• Trump Officials Push Back Against Musk Initiative (RT)
• Judge Blocks Education Department, OPM From Sharing Data With DOGE (ET)
• US Adopting ‘Russian Narrative’ – EU’s Kallas (RT)
• EU’s Chief Diplomat Backs Zelensky’s Refusal To Hold Elections (RT)
• Germany Must Become ‘Independent’ From US – Bundestag Election Winner (RT)
• Income Tax vs Tariffs (Paul Craig Roberts)
• Zelensky Has ‘No Chance’ Of Winning A Fair Election – Putin (RT)
• Russia Ready To Work With US On ‘Rare Earths’ – Putin (RT)
• Putin Weighs In On Europe’s Participation In Ukraine Peace Talks (RT)
• The Ukraine War Will Only End On Russia’s Terms, Lavrov Says (ZH)
• EU Spending On Russian LNG Imports Quadruples (RT)
• Xi Backs Russia On Ukraine Peace Efforts – Kremlin (RT)
• West Knew NATO Push For Ukraine Was Risky – Wikileaks (RT)
• UK In Secret Plot To Extract Personal Data From 2 Billion iPhone Users (VF)
• Displaced Disinformation Experts Are Seeking New Opportunities (Turley)

 

 

 

 

Witkoff
https://twitter.com/i/status/1893733497568706786

Transgender

MSNBC: it costs them nothing

Bongino

ID

 

 

 

 

“Mr. Bongino has documented the worst blob crimes of recent years in a series of books that comprehensively presents the entire tapestry of lawlessness in microscopic detail. He knows the whole sordid, epic story, all the names, and all the money trails in every obscure corner of the worst aggregate matrix of scandals in US history. Believe me when I tell you, this is like a death sentence for the blob.”

“The Democratic Party was the political enabling partner in all this sedition and treason and it is hard to see how it comes out of this alive.”

• No Way Out (James Howard Kunstler)

CBS’s 60-Minutes show was at it again Sunday night in the most prime primetime weekend news slot on the old broadcast spectrum — Sunday at 7:00, the power-hour of national mind-fuckery — with blob PR-agent Scott Pelley singing the blues over the systematic disassembly of the rogue bureaucracy. Trouble is, fewer and fewer minds are susceptible to the argument that the blob exists to “save our democracy.” You’re supposed to go boo-hoo because the Department of Justice is under new management. Now get this: since 2015 the Department of Justice and its step-child, the FBI, have devoted their vast and savage powers to manifold acts of sedition, treason, malicious political prosecution, obstruction of justice, suborning perjuries, and countless other abuses of law in an ever-widening gyre of ass-covering operations as year-by-year their crimes multiplied.

RussiaGate was initially a cover-up op for the Clintons’ many acts of mischief and moneygrubbing when Hillary ran for President, just as the Mueller Special Counsel Investigation was a cover-up for the crimes committed by the DOJ and FBI after Hillary lost to Mr. Trump, just as Impeachment #1 was a cover-up for the Ukraine money laundry and its role in RussiaGate, and Impeachment #2 was a coverup for the 2020 election ballot hijinks that got rid of Mr. Trump, and just as the Mar-a-Lago raid was a cover-up to retrieve evidence of all-the-above that Mr. Trump had archived, and just as the flurry of Trump prosecutions in 2024 was the final (and amazingly inept) effort to put the Golden Golem of Greatness out-of-business forever.

But somehow, perhaps an act of Providence, he prevailed over all that adversity, like some paladin out of the ancient myths, and is suddenly back in charge — to the abject horror of all those lawyers and spooks behind the aforesaid ops, now nervously awaiting subpoenas in their Beltway McMansions. You will learn shortly that there is a difference between “justice” based on fraud and fakery and justice served by way of fact-patterns and evidence. And so late Sunday evening after the 60-Minutes pity party, came the pretty astounding news that former Secret Service agent and now podcaster Dan Bongino is appointed Deputy Director of the FBI. Astounding because Mr. Bongino has documented the worst blob crimes of recent years in a series of books that comprehensively presents the entire tapestry of lawlessness in microscopic detail.

He knows the whole sordid, epic story, all the names, and all the money trails in every obscure corner of the worst aggregate matrix of scandals in US history. Believe me when I tell you, this is like a death sentence for the blob. For instance, Mr. Bongino is acutely aware of what went down on J-6, 2021, when a supposed pipe-bomb was “found” at the DNC headquarters, the part it was supposed to play in the larger J-6 op to rid Washington of Mr. Trump, and the lying confabulations of former FBI Director Christopher Wray afterward. Now he is in a position to compel current and former FBI officials to answer questions about that, and much more, from the Crossfire Hurricane scam to the shenanigans in Judge Juan Merchan’s court last summer.

Those investigations will require a whole dedicated division of new FBI agents while Kash Patel attends to the latest grifts uncovered by the DOGE, the threats against public order and safety posed by countless military-aged illegal aliens ushered into the country by “Joe Biden” and Alejandro Mayorkas, the turpitudes of former AG Merrick Garland, and the crimes committed by officials in the CDC, FDA, and other public health agencies around Covid-19, and lingering monstrosities such as the Jeffrey Epstein capers, the huge fortunes mysteriously amassed by US senators and congressmen, the 1960s assassinations of the Kennedys and MLK, the censorship operations conducted by the combined FBI / CIA, State Department, and dark offices of the Pentagon, the theft of US largess given over to Ukraine, and the infiltration of American institutions by China.

The Trump admin knows that it will have to strike hard and fast in all these matters and more. Cases will have to be prepared briskly and removed to federal courts outside the blob-controlled DC district. A great many political figures will have to be taken out of circulation. It will be helpful to finally understand the bizarre capture of the old legacy news media so, for instance, it becomes clear why an outfit such as CBS’s 60-Minutes ended up on the dark side, committed to burying the truth and distorting reality at every opportunity.

The Democratic Party was the political enabling partner in all this sedition and treason and it is hard to see how it comes out of this alive. Expect to see a lemming stampede of resignations out of Congress and the Senate. And some of them, like Sen. Adam Schiff, and Rep. Eric Swalwell could end up in prison. You saw the fear in their public antics the past two weeks as the cabinet confirmations mounted. They know what’s coming. They are desperate, but the power they once wielded is now in other hands. There’s no way out. On a bright note, it was heartwarming to see that Joy Reid got “axed” from her primetime perch at MSNBC over the weekend. (Nobody axed me, but I approve!) She’ll be doing a must-watch farewell show this coming week. Don’t miss it!

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“..you know who should be panicking right now? Adam Schiff…”

• Liberals Panic Over ‘Politicized’ FBI After Bongino Appointment (ZH)

Sunday night’s panic within the FBI has quickly morphed into “utter despair” among liberals, “who had already grown fearful of a highly politicized FBI,” according to (formerly USAID-funded) Politico, which is rich considering that the FBI under Biden spent four years as a “highly politicized” weapon to go after conservatives.

Rolling Stone (of pedo coverup fame), framed Bongino’s appointment with the “bad cops” tag, which is followed by an unhinged screed.

The once-great activist rag writes: “The FBI will officially be headed by two men with no experience in the bureau, and a lot of blind loyalty towards President Donald Trump.” During the first weeks of Trump’s second administration, Bongino has hyped up the president’s power grab and revenge tour against his political opponents. Earlier this month, the radio host urged Trump to ignore a court order blocking the administration’s attempt to place a widespread freeze on federal funding. -Rolling Stone. Terminally TDS’d Stephen King deleted all of his interactions with Bongino:

And you know who should be panicking right now? Adam Schiff…

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It appears that Musk was just weeding out the dead. And see what else pops up. Bit of a coarse way to do it.

• Musk Warns Fed Workers – Return To Office Or Be Placed On Leave (ZH)

The Department of Government Efficiency’s Elon Musk wrote on X early Monday that starting this week, federal workers who fail to return to the office will be placed on administrative leave. “Those who ignored President Trump’s executive order to return to work have now received over a month’s warning,” Musk wrote, adding, “Starting this week, those who still fail to return to office will be placed on administrative leave.” Musk is referring to the “Return To In-Person Work” executive order Trump signed on day one of his second term, which states: “Heads of all departments and agencies in the executive branch of Government shall, as soon as practicable, take all necessary steps to terminate remote work arrangements and require employees to return to work in-person at their respective duty stations on a full-time basis, provided that the department and agency heads shall make exemptions they deem necessary.”

Musk quoted a post by Ralph Norman, US Representative for South Carolina’s 5th Congressional District, who posted a video of his latest interview on Fox News, describing the direct insubordination of some federal workers still refusing to return to the office. On Saturday, Musk wrote on X that federal workers received an email “requesting to understand what they got done last week,” adding, “Failure to respond will be taken as a resignation.” The deadline is Monday. By late Sunday, there was pushback on the ‘accomplishments’ email from several federal agencies, including the Pentagon, FBI, State Department, and various parts of the Intelligence Community… An insider at the Social Security Administration’s headquarters in Woodlawn, Maryland, said Monday will be chaotic as employees rush into the office, given the limited availability of parking spaces. The Department of Government Efficiency’s latest move appears to create harsh working conditions that will make federal workers more inclined to quit voluntarily. As the old saying goes: “Welcome to Serbia.”

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Everyone can feel protected by their department heads. That’s not a bad thing…

• Trump Officials Push Back Against Musk Initiative (RT)

An instruction by Elon Musk, US President Donald Trump’s government efficiency czar, for federal workers to summarize their weekly activities or risk termination has reportedly prompted resistance among senior officials. On Saturday, Musk announced on X that all government employees must outline what work they had done over the week, warning that failure to comply might be interpreted as resignation. Emails sent to the 2.3 million federal workers reportedly requested that five bullet points detailing their activities be submitted by the end of Monday. The Wall Street Journal reported that Musk’s team at the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) devised the request after Trump urged him to “get more aggressive” in targeting perceived waste.

The emails were distributed via the Office of Personnel Management, the federal government’s HR arm. However, some department officials responded by instructing employees to ignore the emails, with directives coming directly from Trump appointees, the New York Times reported on Sunday. Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard ordered her staff not to respond, citing the “inherently sensitive and classified nature of our work.” FBI Director Kash Patel informed employees that the agency “is in charge of all our review processes,” directing them to “pause any responses.” The Pentagon took a similar stance, the newspaper reported, citing an email from Darin S. Selnick, the acting head of personnel. Employees at the Department of Health and Human Services received conflicting guidance regarding Musk’s request.

Musk was appointed as a special official in the Trump administration tasked with cutting waste and fraud from government spending. Critics argue he aims to dismantle significant parts of the federal government, paving the way for a corporate takeover of corresponding functions. Trump has expressed support for Musk’s efforts amid the backlash surrounding the weekly report requirement. Musk downplayed the controversy, calling the email a “very basic pulse check” and sharing a meme that compared his job security threats to vaccination mandates during the Covid-19 pandemic.

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Judges pretending that DOGE is not part of the government.

• Judge Blocks Education Department, OPM From Sharing Data With DOGE (ET)

A federal judge on Feb. 24 blocked two agencies from sharing sensitive information with Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) staff. “The U.S. Department of Education; Denise L. Carter, the Acting Secretary of Education; and their officers, agents, servants, employees, and attorneys are ENJOINED from disclosing the personally identifiable information of the plaintiffs and the members of the plaintiff organizations to any DOGE affiliates,” U.S. District Judge Deborah L. Boardman wrote in a 33-page order. The Office of Personnel Management (OPM) and its employees are also forbidden from disclosing the same information to DOGE workers, the judge said. The temporary restraining order is in effect until March 10 as the case proceeds. It could be extended, converted into a preliminary injunction, or allowed to expire.

The American Federation of Teachers and other groups recently asked the court to block officials with the OPM, U.S. Department of Education (DOE), and U.S. Department of Treasury from conveying sensitive records to DOGE employees. Allowing DOGE access to the records endangers the privacy rights of veterans and other people represented by the groups, the organizations said in their request to the federal court in Maryland. Government lawyers argued that the judge should reject the motion for a restraining order because government officials have not violated the plaintiffs’ privacy.“At the heart of Plaintiffs’ theory is the baseless allegation that ‘DOGE representatives’ at the Defendant agencies are somehow outside the category of federal employees, or outside the category of federal employees in their respective agencies,” the lawyers wrote in a filing.

“Neither criticism withstands scrutiny. The Privacy Act therefore expressly allows disclosure of information protected under that statute in the circumstances of this case.” Boardman said that even if officials have been sharing information only with other government employees, it still violates the plaintiffs’ right to have their sensitive personal information kept private if the employees are not authorized to access the data. “Education and OPM possess a significant amount of detailed information about the plaintiffs’ lives,” the judge wrote. “To say that the plaintiffs suffer no cognizable injury when their personal information is improperly disclosed to government employees would nullify their interest in preventing unlawful government intrusion into their private affairs. The unauthorized disclosure of the plaintiffs’ sensitive personal information is an injury in fact.”

Although plaintiffs cannot receive relief under the Privacy Act, the judge said later, they can under the Administrative Procedure Act, which bars the government from taking steps that are not in accordance with the law. “The plaintiffs have shown that Education and OPM likely violated the Privacy Act by disclosing their personal information to DOGE affiliates without their consent,” Boardman said. The act prohibits agencies from disclosing “any record which is contained in a system of records by any means of communication to any person, or to another agency, except pursuant to a written request by, or with the prior written consent of, the individual to whom the record pertains.”

In addition to the American Federation of Teachers, a union that represents some 1.8 million people, the plaintiffs in the case are the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers, the International Federation of Professional and Technical Engineers, the National Active and Retired Federal Employees Association, and the National Federation of Federal Employees.The order expressly names Adam Ramada, a DOGE employee who said in a declaration filed in the case that he and five other DOGE employees have been working with the DOE to audit contracts, grants, and programs “for waste, fraud, and abuse.” “In addition, we help senior Department leadership obtain access to accurate data and data analytics to inform their policy decisions at the Department,” Ramada said in the filing.

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When she succeeded Borrell, I already said she’d been picked solely for her Russophobia and Putin hatred. Terrible selection criteria.

• US Adopting ‘Russian Narrative’ – EU’s Kallas (RT)

Washington has fallen for “Russia’s narrative,” EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said on Monday. The accusation comes amid recent efforts by Washington and Moscow to begin resolving the conflict. “If [we] look at the messages that come from the US, then it is clear that the Russian narrative is there, very strongly represented,” Kallas told journalists in Brussels, stressing that the bloc is planning to “support Ukraine right now more than ever.” Kallas took office in Brussels as the EU’s high representative for foreign affairs and security policy, replacing Spain’s Josep Borrell in December last year. A pronounced foreign policy hawk who, while she was Estonian prime minister demanded in 2023 that “all business with Russia must stop,” Kallas faced resignation calls over revelations her husband held a 25% stake in a logistics company that provides services in the sanction-hit nation.

Since the Ukraine conflict escalated in February 2022, both the EU and the US have implemented multiple rounds of sanctions in an effort to isolate Russia. The penalties included disconnecting the country from the Western financial system, suspending nearly all trade and energy ties, and freezing Moscow’s foreign reserves—a measure condemned as “theft” by the Kremlin. On Monday, the EU adopted its 16th package of Ukraine-related restrictions, marking the anniversary of the launch of the Russian military operation against Kiev’s forces in February 2022. However, shortly after assuming office in January US President Donald Trump pivoted Washington’s stance on Ukraine. Trump recently claimed that Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky is responsible for the conflict’s escalation, and said that his presence at Washington’s meetings with Russia is unnecessary.

Meanwhile, media reports emerged that US envoys to the G7 and the UN have pushed for more cautious language in official statements, suggesting the use of “Ukraine conflict” instead of “Russia’s war of aggression.” The first meeting of Russian and US officials in three years occurred last week in the Saudi capital of Riyadh. The talks have ignited a backlash within the EU with member states accusing the White House of reopening dialogue with Kremlin without prior consultation and sidelining Brussels from the negotiations.

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No diplomacy.

• EU’s Chief Diplomat Backs Zelensky’s Refusal To Hold Elections (RT)

The EU’s top diplomat Kaja Kallas has announced that she supports Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky’s refusal to hold a presidential election. Although Zelensky’s five-year presidential term expired in May 2024, no new elections have been held, with Zelensky claiming that it is “not the right time,” and citing martial law. Russian President Vladimir Putin has repeatedly said that he no longer considers Zelensky a legitimate head of state. Speaking on Monday ahead of a meeting of EU foreign ministers in Brussels, Kallas said that “there is no need to hold elections” during wartime. She noted the public feud last week when the US president claimed that Zelensky is “a dictator without elections” and accused him of funneling US aid into a “war that couldn’t be won.”

Trump also claimed last week that Zelensky’s approval rating was at 4% and suggested that an election should be called. “He refuses to have elections. He’s low in the real Ukrainian polls. How can you be high with every city being demolished?” Trump said, adding that in the meantime, the US is “successfully negotiating an end to the war with Russia.” Zelensky responded by claiming that Trump is “living in a disinformation space” created by Moscow. In tune with Zelensky, Kallas declared that “it’s clear that the Russian narrative is very strongly represented” in Trump’s statement. She stressed that for any peace deal to be effective, it would need to involve the Europeans and the Ukrainians.

She was referring to recent high-level US-Russian talks in Saudi Arabia, which frustrated the EU. Member states criticized Washington for sidelining Brussels and Kiev during the negotiations. “You can discuss whatever you want with Putin, but if it comes to Ukraine and Europe, then Ukraine and Europe also have to agree to this deal,” Kallas told journalists. Last week, reports suggested that the EU is preparing a military aid package worth at least $6.2 billion for Ukraine. The package is expected to include 1.5 million artillery shells and air defense systems – one of the bloc’s largest military aid commitments since the escalation of the conflict in 2022. Russia considers Zelensky “illegitimate” and recognizes only the Ukrainian parliament and its speaker. Russian officials have warned that any treaties he signs could be challenged and questioned his ability to conclude lasting agreements.

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Germany got stuck in small change. Not enough.

• Germany Must Become ‘Independent’ From US – Bundestag Election Winner (RT)

Germany must gain real independence from the US, Friedrich Merz, the projected winner of Sunday’s parliamentary elections, has said. According to German media, Merz’s Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and its sister party, the Christian Social Union (CSU), are projected to receive 28.5% of the vote, which means that he will likely become the next chancellor.Speaking to reporters on Sunday night, Merz criticized US President Donald Trump’s handling of the Ukraine conflict. “The interventions from Washington were no less dramatic, drastic, and ultimately outrageous than the intervention we saw from Moscow,” Merz told reporters on Sunday night, according to the news agency Deutsche Presse-Agentur.

“The Americans, at least those in the current government, are largely indifferent to the fate of Europe,” he said. The conservative politician went on to argue that Germany must boost its defense and “gradually achieve independence from the US.” “I would have never thought that I would have to say something like that on a TV show,” he said. Trump has demanded that America’s allies in Europe pay “a fair share” in defense spending and contribute more to NATO. He also sidelined Ukraine and the EU when he reversed the Biden administration’s policy of “isolating” Russia and reopened direct talks with Moscow.

One of Trump’s most noteworthy allies, billionaire Elon Musk, has endorsed the anti-immigration Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, which is projected to become the second-largest party in the Bundestag. Trump, nevertheless, has congratulated the CDU on the victory. “Much like the USA, the people of Germany got tired of the no-common-sense agenda, especially on energy and immigration, that has prevailed for so many years,” he wrote on his Truth Social platform.

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Former Assistant Treasury Secretary: “President Trump’s idea of replacing the income tax with tariffs is sound and a great advancement in the restoration of freedom..”

• Income Tax vs Tariffs (Paul Craig Roberts)

Prior to 1913 the US government was financed by tariffs. It was under tariffs, not free trade, that the United States industrialized and became a manufacturing nation. Indeed, the Union invaded and destroyed the Confederacy in order to impose the Morrill Tariff on the South that enabled the North to industrialize. The North could not compete with British industry and required the protection of a tariff. It is extraordinary to me that it has gone unremarked for 112 years that the income tax, which required a constitutional amendment, resurrected slavery. In actuality, white people voted to impose slavery on themselves. Americans did not realize what was happening. The income threshold for being subject to the tax was so high that few qualified to be taxed.

Moreover, the first tax rate was 1% and the progression halted at 7%. To be taxed at 7% you had to have a phenomenal amount of income for those days of more than $500,000, the equivalent of multi-millions today. In the US in the 1900s a person who made $70,000 a year was considered extremely wealthy. When Henry Ford’s innovation of the moving assembly line was introduced in 1913, he raised his workers’ pay from $2.34 per day to $5, producing an annual income of $1,300. Only 3% of the US population was subject to the income tax. Many years ago I wrote an account of how the income tax amendment passed. In Georgia the state legislative leader said Georgia had no objection to the amendment as no one in the state of Georgia had an income high enough to be subject to the tax.

Everyone overlooked that once an income tax was in place, the thresholds could be lowered and the rates raised. By 1918, that is, within 5 years, the top tax rate had jumped to 77%, dropping to 25% in 1925. When the 16th Amendment to the Constitution was passed, slavery was resurrected. Historically, the definition of a free person is a person who owns his own labor. Serfs and slaves did not own their own labor. Serfs were not owned by feudal lords, the the lords had use rights to as much as 30% of a serf’s labor. The labor of an enslaved person belonged to the slave’s owner. An income tax establishes government ownership over part of your labor. How much depends on your income and the tax rate at the time.

If you fail to deliver the government’s share of your income, you are severely punished and can spend many years in prison. Every American income taxpayer is partly enslaved and partly free.A tariff is a tax on consumption, the preferable means of taxation according to the classical economists. It establishes no government ownership rights in your income. An income tax not only gives government a part ownership of your working time, it is also a tax on factors of production — labor and capital. Taxing factors of production reduces economic growth and Gross Domestic Product. It is a counter-productive tax that suppresses output. The substitution of a tariff for an income tax is a pro-growth policy that will produce higher incomes and raise living standards. Free labor is always more productive because you are working for yourself and your family.

Out-of-date neoliberal economists argue wrongly that tariffs violate free trade and reduce economic growth. In the Lionel Robbins Lecture in 2000, published by the MIT Press, Ralph E. Gomory and William J. Baumol proved that the case for free trade was false and that at best the notion that free trade was mutually beneficial was an occasional special case. Paul Samuelson found their proof convincing, but overall the economists have preferred their free trade indoctrination to the effort it takes to master a new understanding.The information from DOGE of the enormous fraud, abuse, and self-dealing that the US budget contains as a slush fund for insiders and for bribing foreign politicians and overthrowing foreign governments indicates that sufficient reductions are possible to establish a tariff at a reasonable rate. To rescue Americans from the slavery of an income tax would be one the greatest achievements in history. Let’s achieve it.

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“They are equal to zero. Unless, of course, something is grossly rigged, but this is also bad for him – it will be very noticeable..”

• Zelensky Has ‘No Chance’ Of Winning A Fair Election – Putin (RT)

Russian President Vladimir Putin has stated that Vladimir Zelensky has “absolutely no chance” of winning a fair election due to his low approval ratings and the internal political situation in Ukraine. Zelensky’s five-year presidential term expired in May 2024, but he has refused to hold new elections, citing martial law. The question of his popularity was raised last week by US President Donald Trump, who branded Zelensky a “dictator without elections” who is “down at a 4% approval rating.” Speaking on Monday, Putin noted that Zelensky’s popularity is significantly lower than that of potential rival General Valery Zaluzhny, the former commander of Ukraine’s armed forces. In an interview with journalist Pavel Zarubin, Putin suggested that if other political figures backed Zaluzhny, Zelensky’s chances of reelection would be “absolutely zero.”

“They are equal to zero. Unless, of course, something is grossly rigged, but this is also bad for him – it will be very noticeable,” Putin stated. “The fact is that the current head of the Kiev regime is becoming a toxic figure for the Ukrainian armed forces because he gives absurd orders dictated not by military considerations, but by political ones, and it is unclear what they are based on,” Putin said. He added that Zelensky’s leadership had resulted in “unjustifiably large or catastrophic losses,” making him “toxic for society as a whole.” “Therefore, [Zelensky] is a factor in the disintegration of the army, society, and the state. President Trump certainly understands this and is pushing him toward elections,” Putin said, adding that Trump apparently “wants to improve the political situation in Ukraine, consolidate society, and create conditions for the survival of the Ukrainian state.”

Putin has repeatedly said that he no longer considers Zelensky the legitimate head of state. Trump has also recently questioned the former comedian’s leadership, accusing him of mismanaging the conflict with Russia and misusing American financial aid. Zelensky accused Trump of falling for “Russian disinformation,” citing a January poll that allegedly indicated 57% of Ukrainians trusted him. However, data cited by The Economist last week suggested that Zelensky would lose to Zaluzhny by a wide margin if elections were held today, as many Ukrainians are “clearly frustrated with their war leader.” According to Putin, Zelensky – who has banned himself from talks with Moscow – is actively sabotaging any peace process, as it would require lifting martial law, which allows him to remain in power. Without martial law, the country would be compelled to hold elections, a scenario Putin believes Zelensky is determined to avoid.

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Just no American troops…

• Russia Ready To Work With US On ‘Rare Earths’ – Putin (RT)

Moscow is ready to work with Washington in developing rare earth mineral deposits, including in the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics, and Kherson and Zaporozhye regions, Russian President Vladimir Putin has said. The ‘rare earths’ deal US President Donald Trump’s administration is pushing for with Ukraine “doesn’t concern” Moscow, Putin said in an interview with Russia 1 TV journalist Pavel Zarubin on Monday. The actual value of Ukraine’s rare earth mineral deposits remains to be seen, the Russian leader noted. Moscow will be concentrating on its own development of rare earth minerals, given their importance in multiple sectors of the economy, he said. “We would be ready to offer this to our American partners… if they showed interest in working together,” Putin said, stressing that he meant both private and government companies.

As one of the global leaders in terms of its rare earth mineral wealth, Russia is willing to work with international investors in developing its deposits, he said. “This includes the new territories,” Putin added. “Our new historical territories, which were returned to the Russian Federation, also hold significant reserves.” The Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics, and Kherson and Zaporozhye regions joined the Russian Federation following referendums in 2022. While Forbes estimated the total value of mineral deposits of Ukraine at nearly $15 trillion in 2023, nearly half of the total mineral wealth lies in the Russia’s Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics.

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“Europe’s participation in the negotiation process on Ukraine is essential, Russian President Vladimir Putin has said. However, European representatives cannot demand anything from Russia..”

• Putin Weighs In On Europe’s Participation In Ukraine Peace Talks (RT)

Europe’s participation in the negotiation process on Ukraine is essential, Russian President Vladimir Putin has said. However, European representatives cannot demand anything from Russia, he added in an interview published on Monday. Putin commented on last week’s talks in Saudi Arabia, which were focused on restoring trust between Moscow and Washington, and excluded Ukrainian and EU leaders. Putin explained that “to resolve complex and even acute issues”, including the Ukrainian crisis, Russia and the US had to “take the first step”, which is “building trust”. “That is precisely what we were doing in Riyadh. That will also be the focus of our future contacts. Without this, it’s impossible to resolve any issue, especially one as complex and urgent as the Ukrainian crisis. But what do the Europeans have to do with this? This is a matter of bilateral Russia-US relations,” the president said.

Putin also claimed that the Ukrainian crisis itself “was not substantively discussed”, and Moscow and Washington agreed “that we would approach this matter in due time”. In this regard, Russia doesn’t oppose the participation of European representatives, Putin stressed. ”But I want to emphasize that we respect the position of our friends, particularly those within BRICS, who have established a group of peace advocates”, the President said, adding that he has just spoken with his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping, discussing the matter. “He informed me that this [BRICS] group will convene soon in New York to discuss the issue”, Putin said. He emphasized that Moscow is grateful to all its partners “who strive to achieve peace”. “Not only Europeans but other countries as well have the right to participate, and we respect that,” Putin concluded.

The US State Department praised the high-level discussions, calling it a significant step toward resolving the Ukraine conflict. This was the first such meeting since the conflict began in 2022. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, who was part of the delegation, noted that the meeting in Riyadh was initiated by the Russian and US presidents, who also agreed to begin preparations for a summit. Putin has previously said he would be glad to meet with his US counterpart Donald Trump, though he called it too early to name a specific date for a summit. He added that a simple “coffee hour” would not be enough to remedy relations between the two nations, and both sides need to thoroughly prepare. Moscow and Washington nevertheless “do not need any mediators” to sort out their differences, he added.

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“The Europeans continue on the path of a sanctions nosedive, on the path of conviction in the need to continue the war..”

• The Ukraine War Will Only End On Russia’s Terms, Lavrov Says (ZH)

It’s been three full years since the full-on Russian invasion of Ukraine kicked off on February 24, 2022. At this point, it’s become clear to all that Russian forces control the battlefield, amid steady ongoing gains in the Donbass region. Even as talks with the US progress, Moscow has made clear on Monday that it will only accept a peace settlement which “suits” its interests. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov issued the words while on an official visit to Turkey, and warned that European countries are trying to sabotage Trump efforts at peace. He emphasized that Moscow stands ready and willing to negotiate with Ukraine, Europe or “any representatives who in good faith would like to help achieve peace.” “But we will stop hostilities only when these negotiations produce a firm and sustainable result that suits the Russian Federation,” he said alongside his Turkish counterpart Hakan Fidan.

Among the proposals that might stymie progress on negotiations is the possibility of a European army of some 30,000 to patrol a buffer zone inside Ukraine. Moscow has consistently rejected that NATO troops would be present along the war-torn border. Trump himself has shown interest in such a peacekeeping force, especially as US troops would not be part of it. Put Putin will likely fear this is just recipe for another potential future showdown. In separate statements Monday, Putin spokesman Dmitry Peskov on Monday charged Europe with obstructing good faith peace efforts. “The Europeans continue on the path of a sanctions nosedive, on the path of conviction in the need to continue the war,” Peskov said in reaction to the EU imposing a new round of sanctions on Moscow. “This conviction of the Europeans completely contrasts with the mindset of finding a settlement on Ukraine, which we are now doing with the Americans,” he added.

Reuters reviews of the new punitive action: The European Union’s latest sanctions against Moscow include a ban on third-country airlines flying to the 27-nation bloc if they carry out domestic flights in Russia, the European Commission said, opens new tab on Monday. The EU’s 16th sanctions package against Russia includes a ban on primary aluminum imports and the sale of gaming consoles, while also listing a cryptocurrency exchange and dozens of vessels of the so-called shadow fleet used to evade sanctions. At this point both the US and Russian sides plan to continue conducting the talks which began last week in Riyadh. Presumably neither Ukrainian nor European representatives will be at the table for the next rounds. Each side appeared satisfied with how the first engagement went, with the Kremlin hailing the ‘successful’ betterment of relations, which has involved more staff returning to each respective embassy.

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“..in the fourth quarter of 2024, the volume of LNG imported from Russia was 18% higher than in the first quarter of 2021..” “..the value of these imports surged by 274%..”

• EU Spending On Russian LNG Imports Quadruples (RT)

The cost of Russian liquefied natural gas (LNG) purchases for the EU has nearly quadrupled in three years due to soaring prices and increased import volumes, according to Eurostat. Data released on Monday in a report titled ‘EU trade with Russia’, shows that in the fourth quarter of 2024, the volume of LNG imported from Russia was 18% higher than in the first quarter of 2021. Over the same period, the value of these imports surged by 274% due to the energy crisis. European gas prices rose dramatically following the escalation of the Ukraine conflict in 2022, alongside the EU’s commitment to phase out Russian energy dependence. While pipeline gas imports from Russia have mostly ceased due to sanctions and the sabotage of the Nord Stream pipelines, EU nations have continued purchasing record volumes of LNG from the country.

According to Eurostat, Russia’s share of the EU’s LNG imports grew from 11% in Q4 2022 to 22% in the last quarter of 2024. The US remained the bloc’s top supplier, accounting for 36% of its overall LNG imports. In June, Brussels targeted Russian LNG for the first time, banning re-loading operations, ship-to-ship transfers, and ship-to-shore transfers with the purpose of re-exporting to third countries via the EU. The sanctions came with a nine-month transition period. The EU’s 16th package of sanctions, introduced on Monday, further tightened restrictions on Russian energy. However, the bloc stopped short of imposing a full ban on the country’s LNG. According to data by analytics firm Kpler, imports of Russian LNG by EU member states are now at an all-time high.

The bloc has boosted imports of super-chilled fuel from the country following Kiev’s suspension of pipeline gas transit through Ukraine. Ukraine refused to extend a five-year transit contract with Russia’s energy giant Gazprom at the end of 2024, cutting off some EU countries from Russian pipeline gas. Currently, the only remaining Russian pipeline gas reaching the EU flows through the TurkStream pipeline, which runs via Türkiye and Greece. The Eurostat report highlights that EU pipeline gas imports from Russia have continued to decline, dropping by over 60% in volume in Q4 2024 compared to Q1 2021. However, due to soaring prices, the overall value of these imports decreased by only 9% over the three-year period, according to data.

Read more …

“The leaders have stressed that the Russian-Chinese foreign policy tandem serves as a factor of stabilization in world affairs..”

• Xi Backs Russia On Ukraine Peace Efforts – Kremlin (RT)

Russian President Vladimir Putin has told his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping, about Moscow’s latest contacts with Washington, the Kremlin reported on Monday. Beijing has expressed support for the renewed dialogue and new potential for resolving the Ukraine crisis, the statement said. Putin and Xi spoke on the phone to “share opinions on issues of immediate interest” for bilateral cooperation and the global agenda, describing the exchange as “warm and friendly.” “The leaders have stressed that the Russian-Chinese foreign policy tandem serves as a factor of stabilization in world affairs. Its strategic nature is not affected by external influence and does not pose a threat to any third party,” the statement said.

The Chinese description of the phone call said it was requested by Moscow, adding that during the talk, Xi expressed approval of the fact that “Russia and relevant parties have made positive efforts to resolve the crisis.” US President Donald Trump has reversed attempts to “isolate” Russia which were pursued by the previous administration. Now Moscow and Washington are working to restore normal diplomatic relations. Senior officials from both countries have said that this could lead to a resolution of the Ukraine conflict.

Members of the new US government had previously criticized President Joe Biden’s approach, arguing that it pushed Moscow into a position of a “junior partner” with Beijing, harming US interests. Conversely, Russia and China have described their relationship as a “no-limits partnership” based on mutual respect and shared views on how the world should be governed. Moscow and Beijing have criticized the US for allegedly fueling chaos around the world in an attempt to undermine competition.

Read more …

Wikileaks issued a large series of cables. Problem is, they’re all pre-2010.

• West Knew NATO Push For Ukraine Was Risky – Wikileaks (RT)

US and European officials were long aware of the high risk of conflict stemming from Kiev’s NATO ambition, Wikileaks revealed on Monday. Citing a trove of documents it obtained, the publisher detailed how Washington looked for ways to overcome some countries’ opposition to the idea despite warnings from Western envoys.Moscow repeatedly warned the diplomats that Ukraine’s accession to the US-led bloc could trigger a civil war or destabilize the whole region, forcing Russia to make a decision it “does not want to have to face,” according to a 24-minute-long video published by Wikileaks on X. The organization also cited a February 2008 cable from then US ambassador to Moscow William Burns, who warned that Russia saw NATO expansion as a security threat.

“Not only does Russia perceive encirclement, and efforts to undermine Russia’s influence in the region, but it also fears unpredictable and uncontrolled consequences which would seriously affect Russian security interests,” he wrote.That sentiment was shared by some NATO allies in Europe at the time, another document suggests. A 2005 cable documenting a meeting between the then US assistant secretary of state for European and Eurasian affairs, Daniel Fried, and several high-ranking French officials said that Paris was concerned about Ukraine’s NATO trajectory sparking an armed conflict on the continent. “If there remained one potential cause for war in Europe, it was Ukraine,” the document said, citing French presidential diplomatic adviser Maurice Gourdault-Montagne. He cautioned that the US and its allies were intruding upon Russia’s “core zone of interest,” which could provoke a strong response.

Fried acknowledged at the time that Ukraine lacked a national consensus on NATO membership, but dismissed concerns over a violent internal split or Moscow’s reaction. Despite the repeated warnings, Washington still pushed for Ukraine’s entry, and intended to “pursue western integration and NATO enlargement deliberately, but quietly,” while “firmly” disagreeing with Russia, according to a September 2009 cable by the then US ambassador to Moscow, John Beyrle. Russia has consistently cited Ukraine’s aspiration to join NATO and the prospect of the bloc’s military infrastructure appearing in the neighboring state as one of the main reasons for the conflict. Moscow has also repeatedly described it as a “proxy war” against Russia, being waged by the West via Ukraine.

Read more …

X thread by Vigilant Fox.

• UK In Secret Plot To Extract Personal Data From 2 Billion iPhone Users (VF)

They were this close to your “encrypted” data. This story begins when the UK govt hit Apple with a secret gag order, forcing them to either backdoor encrypted data for billions of users or face criminal charges if they refused to comply. Apple couldn’t even talk about it. The order demanded Apple create a vulnerability in its iCloud encryption, which would have given the UK government a back door to financial information, health records, and private conversations—not just of UK citizens but of two billion iPhone users worldwide. Remember, the UK government has already tried to threaten and extradite individuals outside the UK for violating British censorship laws—including US citizens over their online posts. So what happens when governments push to punish you not just for what you say publicly but for what you say privately?

Rather than handing over the data of 2 billion iPhone users to the UK government, Apple chose to pull its Advanced Data Protection (ADP) in the UK—removing the option for UK users to enable encryption. Existing UK users must now disable encryption, and new users won’t have the option at all. US citizens and people in other countries remain unaffected by the UK government’s dystopian push to surveil and censor speech—for now. The UK government was this close to surveilling you, too—but luckily, Sayer Ji, Elon Musk, and The Wall Street Journal exposed this privacy nightmare. In another disturbing development, Imran Ahmed of the CCDH—one of the leading architects of the UK’s war on speech—is being awarded for his Orwellian efforts with a $300,000 prize this May.

@sayerjigmi has put together a petition to oppose this absurd aggrandizement of someone who has worked tirelessly to annihilate personal freedoms and silence dissenting voices. You can sign that petition here: https://change.org/p/urge-elevate-prize-foundation-to-reexamine-award-for-imran-ahmed

Read more …

Entire platoons of Nina Jankowicz’s are spreading across the globe…

• Displaced Disinformation Experts Are Seeking New Opportunities (Turley)

President Trump’s election has brought about mass layoffs among federal employees and contractors, including some who have sued and others who have protested. But one group — that of America’s would-be censors — is taking its cause worldwide. During the Biden administration, a massive industry took root, seeping up billions in taxpayer funds to research, target and combat those accused of misinformation, disinformation and “malinformation.” Although the exact number is uncertain, many trained censors are now facing unemployment. These self-described “disinformation experts” have become the modern equivalent of ronin, the Japanese samurai who found themselves without a master and wandered the land looking for a new use of their skill set. They are finding precisely that calling in academia, not-for-profit groups and, most importantly, Europe.

A speech-regulation industry that was booming under Biden has gone bust under Trump. Over the last four years, massive amounts of money were poured into universities, non-governmental organizations and other groups in an unprecedented alliance of government, academia and corporations. The media lionized many in the industry as “saving democracy” by controlling, targeting and suppressing others’ political speech. Not only did federal agencies fund these efforts, but they also coordinated censorship of groups and individuals with opposing views, even objecting to jokes on the internet. Universities cashed in on this largesse as well. It was popular with most liberal administrators and lucrative for academics. The sudden shutoff of the federal spigot comes as a blow, but it does not mean the speech warriors will simply convert their censor-shields into plowshares.

Many will follow in the footsteps of Nina Jankowicz, briefly the head of a now-defunct disinformation governance board. After the outcry over the board, Jankowicz quickly found her skills were in demand in Europe. Free speech has been in free-fall in Europe for decades. Germany has long enforced a robust system of speech criminalization that began with Nazi symbolism but steadily expanded to include inciteful speech, insults and merely “disinformative” statements. The United Kingdom and France showed the same insatiable appetite for the inexorable expansion of censorship and prosecutions. The European Union has also been ground zero for the anti-free speech movement’s aggressive use of the Digital Services Act, which bars speech that is viewed as “disinformation” or “incitement.”

When it passed over the objections of free speech advocates, European Commission Executive Vice President Margrethe Vestager was perfectly ecstatic, declaring it is “not a slogan anymore, that what is illegal offline should also be seen and dealt with as illegal online. Now, it is a real thing. Democracy’s back.” That is why Vice President J.D. Vance’s recent speech in Munich was so historic. For the free speech community, Vance went into the belly of the beast and denounced the anti-free-speech movement in the heart of Europe. The response to the Vance speech has been nothing short of panic in the anti-free-speech community. Many are assembling in conferences in Europe, including the upcoming World Forum in Berlin. Bill and Hillary Clinton will be in attendance. (I will also be speaking at the conference.)

It was Hillary Clinton who, after Elon Musk purchased Twitter with the pledge to dismantle the censorship system, called upon the EU to force him and others to censor her fellow U.S. citizens. She embraced the infamous Digital Services Act, which seeks to impose a global system of speech control. She has also suggested the arrest of those spreading disinformation. Immediately after the speech, familiar European and American voices denounced Vance and doubled down on the need for Europe to hold the line against dangerous free speech. For the free speech community, there could not be a better place for this debate to unfold. Germany has demonstrated the false claims of the anti-free-speech community over the years. Indeed, you might call their arguments “disinformation.” Vance and others who have challenged the European censorship systems have been attacked as Nazi enablers or sympathizers. Many of those who have fostered this attack are part of the regulator ronin. Others simply repeated the narrative without thought or support.

Read more …

 

 

 

 

Democrat
https://twitter.com/i/status/1893692576659566765

 

 

Gender-affirming

 

 

Ride
https://twitter.com/i/status/1894016982191648775

 

 

Dogs and horses
https://twitter.com/i/status/1893565572555645271

 

 

Tommy

 

 

Ice
https://twitter.com/i/status/1893702373542916265

 

 

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Debt Rattle February 17 2024

Feb 172024
 
 February 17, 2024  Posted by at 9:51 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , ,  57 Responses »


Francisco Goya The Dog 1819-23

 

• Trump Slams Judge After $364 Million Verdict; Vows To Appeal (ZH)
• Trump Responds To Judge Engoron’s Decision (ZH)
• Speed. . . and. . . Action (Jim Kunstler)
• Musk Decries US Government Censorship (RT)
• ‘Want to Get ‘Radicalized’, See Russia’- Scott Ritter (Sp.)
• An Anti-Russian Europe Is a Europe That Destroys Itself (Dionisio)
• Russian Space Nukes and Navalny’s Death… U.S. Psyops Go Ballistic (SCF)
• Ohio Rep. Part of Shadowy Cabal Aiming to Destroy Russia – Scott Ritter (Sp.)
• Russian Media Thrilled By Biden’s LNG “Gift” To Putin (ZH)
• Axis of Resistance: from Donbass to Gaza (Pepe Escobar)
• Why Israel’s War on UNRWA is so Sinister (Cradle)
• Political, Economic Indicators Not Promising for Biden (Gallup)
• How the CIA Destabilizes the World (Jeffrey Sachs)
• Bombing Muslims for Peace (Bill Astore)

 

 

 

 

Tucker Mike Benz

 

 

Fani Maddow

 

 

 

 

FANI Grand Jury Foreman

 

 

 

 

 

 

The judge and AG are essentially saying they know more about banking than the “defrauded” bankers, who made a hefty profit. This will never pass in the Supreme Court.

But: “He is expected to launch an appeal, which would put the verdict on hold until a higher court reviews the case. But if he wants to avoid paying the fine or have personal assets seized while the appeal process plays out, he still has to deposit the full amount to be held by the court within 30 days.”

For people like Letitia James and Fani Willis, “get Trump” is a career move. As promised in their White House talks.

• Trump Slams Judge After $364 Million Verdict; Vows To Appeal (ZH)

New York Judge Arthur Engoron has ordered former President Donald Trump to pay $364 million for allegedly defrauding banks in order to acquire loans and other benefits – loans which the banks themselves testified they were satisfied with after doing their own due diligence. Trump is also barred “from serving as an officer or director of any New York corporation or other legal entity in New York for a period of three years,” while his sons have been barred from serving as New York executives for two years. New York Attorney General Letitia James had sought $370 million from Trump, his company, and its top executives for what she claimed was “repeated and persistent fraud” – which included allegations of falsifying records and financial statements to the tune of as much as $2.2 billion. Trump maintains that his financial statements to banks were conservative, and has called the case a “fraud on me.”

“This is a case that should have never been brought, and I think we should be entitled to damages,” Trump said on Jan. 11. Following Friday’s decision, Trump’s attorneys hit back – calling it “manifest injustice” in a statement. The months-long civil trial included testimony from Trump and his oldest children. The former president was combative in his day on the stand, blasting James as a “hack” and calling the judge “extremely hostile.” Trump repeatedly complained about Engoron before and throughout the trial, and the judge slapped him with a partial gag order after he started blasting the judge’s law clerk as well. Trump’s complaints led to a flood of death threats against the clerk, as well as Engoron, court officials said, and Trump was fined $15,000 for twice violating the order. -NBC News

During the trial, Deutsche Bank executive David Williams, who directly worked on at least one of several loans obtained by Trump over several decades, testified that it’s “atypical, but not entirely unusual” for a bank to internally slash a client’s stated asset values by 50% and approve a loan anyway, as they did with Trump, Bloomberg reported in November. “It just depends on the circumstances,” said Williams, a managing director at the bank. “Deutsche Bank, which loaned hundreds of millions of dollars to Trump for properties in Miami, Chicago and Washington, cut his stated net worth in 2011 and 2012 from about $4.2 billion to $2.3 billion, according to internal bank credit memos. The same documents indicated the bank approved the loans anyway because it expected them to generate a profit based on Trump’s history of successful developments and other criteria.

Trump, who denies wrongdoing and claims the case is politically motivated, is calling to the stand this week four current and former Deutsche Bank employees — including the family’s former private banker Rosemary Vrablic — as part of his defense case, seeking to flip the script on the state’s version of events”. -Bloomberg. The testimony undermined AG James’ premise, that Trump defrauded the German bank. But of course, none of that matters to Engoron – while Trump’s Martyr status just intensified. Expect this decision to be reflected in upcoming polls.

Read more …

“Trump has responded to Judge Engoron’s decision, calling him a “crooked” judge who’s just committed election interference (and much, much more)..”

• Trump Responds To Judge Engoron’s Decision (ZH)

“A Crooked New York State Judge, working with a totally Corrupt Attorney General who ran on the basis of “I will get Trump,” before knowing anything about me or my company, has just fined me $355 Million based on nothing other than having built a GREAT COMPANY. ELECTION INTERFERENCE. WITCH HUNT (more to follow!),” said Trump in a post to Truth Social. “The Justice System in New York State, and America as a whole, is under assault by partisan, deluded, biased Judges and Prosecutors. Racist, Corrupt A.G. Tish James has been obsessed with “Getting Trump” for years, and used Crooked New York State Judge Engoron to get an illegal, unAmerican judgment against me, my family, and my tremendous business. I helped New York City during its worst of times, and now, while it is overrun with Violent Biden Migrant Crime, the Radicals are doing all they can to kick me out….”

And according to the former president, Engoron conspired with New York Attorney General Letitia James. “This Election Interference and tyrannical Abuse of Power by a Crooked Judge and Crooked Attorney General cannot be tolerated. My case was already won in the Appellate Division, and more than 80% of the frivolous claims were wiped out. Yet, as I suspected, and in order to hurt me and the Republican Party politically, Crooked and Corrupt Judge Arthur Engoron ignored his loss at the Appellate Division, and came up with an outrageous $355 Million Dollar fine against me. Using a statute that has never been applied like this before, the Corrupt Judge conspired with the Crooked Attorney General, Letitia James, and punished a liquid and beautiful Corporate Empire that started in New York, and has been successful all around the world…..

“There were no victims, and not one person testified there was any fraud. The actual witnesses established my Net Worth exceeded that reported in my Financial Statements as those Statements never included my most valuable Asset – the TRUMP Brand. The Highly Respected Expert Witness said my Financial Statements were among the best he has ever seen. I paid over $300 Million Dollars in taxes to New York City and State, and they want me gone. They are Crazed Lunatics who are destroying everything in their way. It all starts with Biden’s attacks on his Political Opponent!” Trump also said he’d appeal Engoron’s decision.

“The actual bankers who were involved in the loan transactions testified I was a highly sought-after “whale” of a client with “one of the strongest personal balance sheets” they had ever seen, and I was overqualified for the loans. Those banks earned more than $100 Million Dollars in profits doing business with me and my companies. But to justify his crazed attack on me and my family, this biased, Trump Hating Judge, ignored all this, and even said Michael Cohen told the truth, although Cohen admitted to lying hundreds of times, and lied right in front of the Judge during the trial. This shocking and corrupt Interference in the Free Markets for political gain places every New York business transaction at risk. We must make sure Corrupt Politicians and Judges cannot continue to abuse the power of their office, and violate the public trust. We have already won, and will continue the fight on appeal!”

Read more …

“The reason the lovebirds could take so much time cavorting across the Caribbean and California — vineyard tours featuring “pairings of champagne, chocolate, and caviar,” Ms. Willis testified — is because their Fulton County case was entirely prepped for them out of DC by Mary McCord..”

• Speed. . . and. . . Action (Jim Kunstler)

Have you noticed yet that America has turned into a Coen Brothers movie? Everywhere you look, you see madcap characters disgracing themselves while doing their bit to burn the whole country down. It’s a panoramic extravaganza of everything gone wrong, with slapstick overtones, driving toward an apocalyptic climax — civil war, nuclear war, economic collapse, maybe all three. And all because the people on-screen just can’t stop lying. Yesterday was Fani Willis’s turn, her big scene. The Fulton County, Georgia, DA, wasn’t even scheduled to testify, but she barged into Judge Scott McAfee’s courtroom and seized possession of the witness stand, like it was home-base in a game of ringolevio. This was after the morning vivisection of her boyfriend, the feckless Nathan Wade, testifying to the couple’s fun-filled romantic travels during the months they were supposedly busy constructing a racketeering case against Donald Trump and eighteen others scooped into their dragnet.

The reason the lovebirds could take so much time cavorting across the Caribbean and California — vineyard tours featuring “pairings of champagne, chocolate, and caviar,” Ms. Willis testified — is because their Fulton County case was entirely prepped for them out of DC by Mary McCord, the veteran blob lawyer active in every Get-Trump hoax cooked up since 2016. (And I’d bet cash-money that she had plenty of assistance from Lawfare blobsters Norm Eisen and Andrew Weissmann.) The complex particulars of the case were all teed up, ready to go. All Ms. Willis and her lead prosecutor, Mr. Wade, had to do was get the trial date set, raise the curtain, and follow the script. Alas, the couple got carried away in the raptures of amour and, all of a sudden, we’re in something like The Real Housewives of Atlanta. And then they lied about the details under oath, especially around the money involved. If they are not disqualified from participating in the Trump “racketeering” case — in which their own behavior would be centerpiece evidence of an ineptly tainted and malicious prosecution — and/or if the case is not tossed summarily, then it will have to be removed to another county and most likely delayed until after the 2024 elections. Nice work, Party of Chaos!

That little opéra bouffe is but one sub-plot in the larger scenario. Also this week, the scandal of the century was re-kindled when alt-news reporters Taibbi, Shellenberger, and Gutentag filed the story of how Barack Obama and CIA Director John Brennan, with his chore girls, Avril Haines and Gina Haspel, cooked up the RussiaGate caper and fed it to the FBI, with a major assist from The New York Times, the WashPo, CNN, and other useful idiot news media vectors. All of this had actually been well-documented for years, but the reporters dredged up new corroboration from disgusted blob insiders further clarifying the origins of the hoax. The cast of characters in that part of the big movie has been consistent through eight full years of anti-Trump hysteria and the associated trips laid on our country. Ms. McCord, for instance, was U.S. Acting Assistant Attorney General for National Security during the birth of RussiaGate; later served as counsel to the House Committee that kicked-off Trump Impeachment No. 1 (coordinating the Eric Ciaramella “whistleblower” scam); then became counsel to Rep. Bennie Thompson’s J6 committee investigation, and now turns up as Fani Willis’ legal tutor, and probably also tutor to New York State Attorney General Letitia James and her preposterous Get Trump real estate valuation case under Judge Engoron.

(Alvin Bragg, the Manhattan DA on the Stormy Daniels case against Mr. Trump, was coached by then US Associate Attorney General Matthew Colangelo who was hired out of the DOJ directly into Mr. Bragg’s office for tutoring purposes.) All of this coaching post Jan 20, 2021, was coordinated by the “Joe Biden” White House. Speaking of whom, the evermore spectral “president” was not having a great week either after DOJ Special Counsel Robert Hur painted him into a corner in his final report as either too demented to face charges in the purloined documents case (and, by inference, not mentally capable to be president), or else a criminal trafficking in top secret documents he was not authorized to possess as Senator and Veep. Looks like that puts an end to “JB’s” game of pretending to run for reelection (that is, lying about it) and leaves the Democratic Party holding a flaming bag of dog doo-doo.

Read more …

Musk is paying good attention to what happens to Trump: “How far will they go to stop me?”

• Musk Decries US Government Censorship (RT)

Tesla CEO Elon Musk has claimed that his foray into social media – buying the former Twitter (since renamed X) and trying to make it a bastion of free speech – made him and all of his businesses targets for constant attacks by governments and their censorship allies. “The public still doesn’t understand even a tiny fraction of the power of the censorship-government-industrial complex,” Musk said on Friday in a post on X. “As predicted, my companies and I came under relentless attack the moment the censorship of this platform was lifted. How far will they go to stop me?” The US billionaire made the comments in response to a post by podcast host David Sacks, who warned that “regime Democrats” are working every day to undermine Americans’ free-speech rights and freedom from political persecution.

Musk also agreed with a suggestion that his political enemies are “just getting started” after winning a Delaware court ruling late last month voiding his $56 billion compensation package at Tesla. Musk, who heads several other companies, has previously claimed that he’s at “quite significant” risk of being killed. His father, Errol Musk, said in an interview last September that he feared his son could be assassinated by a “shadow government” because of the influence he wields. Ranking as America’s richest man with a fortune estimated by Forbes at over $200 billion, Elon Musk has been hit with a flurry of legal attacks and negative media coverage since buying Twitter for $44 billion in October 2022 and vowing to end censorship on the platform. Advertiser boycotts cut into X’s revenue, and President Joe Biden’s administration sued Musk’s SpaceX company for allegedly discriminating against refugees in its hiring practices.

Biden reacted to the Twitter takeover by suggesting that Musk should be investigated by the federal government. Asked whether Musk could jeopardize US national security, the president told reporters, “I think that Elon Musk’s cooperation and/or technical relationships with other countries is worthy of being looked at.” Under its previous ownership, Twitter was among the social media platforms that helped Biden win the 2020 US presidential election by censoring a bombshell report on alleged influence-peddling in Ukraine and China by his family. Republican lawmakers have accused the FBI of colluding with Twitter executives to squash the report. Musk also released internal Twitter documents exposing government involvement in the censoring of speech regarding the Covid-19 pandemic. “Thank God for Elon Musk for allowing to show us and the world that Twitter was basically a subsidiary of the FBI, censoring real medical voices with real expertise that put real American lives in danger because they didn’t have that information,” US Representative Nancy Mace said last year.

Read more …

“Russia is a nation, not a city. And the Russians love their country..”

• ‘Want to Get ‘Radicalized’, See Russia’- Scott Ritter (Sp.)

The knives are out for Tucker Carlson in the Washington establishment and the legacy media as he continues to debunk myths and stereotypes about Russia with a series of videos about life in the capital in the midst of the West’s sanctions ‘total war’. In the latest of a series of clips posted to his internet channel about his experiences from his eight-day stay in Russia, Carlson praised Moscow’s grocery prices. “I went from amused to legitimately angry,” Carlson said after purchasing a week’s worth of groceries for the equivalent of about $105 US. “Coming to a Russian grocery store, the ‘heart of evil’, and seeing what things cost and how people live, it will radicalize you against our leaders. That’s how I feel, anyway – radicalized,” Carlson said after dragging US leaders through the mud for “wrecking people’s lives” through “filth and crime and inflation.”

The independent conservative journalist’s comments sparked immediate outrage from detractors, with neocon Republican lawmaker Thom Tillis echoing Hillary Clinton, blasting Carlson as a “useful idiot” and mocking him for suggesting Russia “is so much better than the US with all those cheap groceries and lavish subway stations.” Another neocon group, ‘Republicans Against Trump’, blasted Carlson as a “Kremlin propagandist” and accused him of running a program called “Russia is awesome, the US is crap.” The hate was echoed by establishment media, with the USA Today publishing a column suggesting Tucker should do “everything he can to get his followers to move to Russia.” MSNBC host Chris Hayes immediately jumped in to suggest that the discrepancy in grocery prices is the result of America being a “rich country” and that “if you are an american [sic] and go to a country that is poorer, things will be cheaper there.”

Others suggested Tucker’s experiences were unique to Moscow, and that he would see something different if he went to “real Russia” outside the “Potemkin village” Russian capital. “It’s like a modern day equivalent of John Reed’s classic ‘10 Days That Shook the World’ – ‘8 Days That Radicalized Tucker Carlson’,” former UN weapons inspector Scott Ritter told Sputnik of Carlson’s eye-opening experiences during his visit to Russia. “We all saw the interview with Vladimir Putin, over 1 billion of us, and we’ve seen Tucker Carlson’s video clips of his experience in Moscow, the Moscow Metro, shopping in a Moscow market, a visit to the Russian McDonald’s [equivalent]. Everything that Tucker Carlson said is true, 100%. The Metro is an amazing place, clean, it’s a work of art. There is no food shortage in Moscow. Yes, Russian fast food is not only as tasty as its American equivalent, but because of the GMO laws, yes, Tucker, you should have asked that question, healthier,” Ritter said.

Pointing to those dishing out of hate Carlson’s way and claiming his experiences were somehow “fake,” Ritter, who has traveled to Russia extensively over the past year, Ritter assured that he has “been to the rest of Russia,” and could confirm that what the former Fox News host saw in Moscow could be observed in other Russian cities as well. “In May, when I made my first visit to Russia since the collapse of the Soviet Union, the first city I landed in wasn’t Moscow. It was Novosibirsk. Now is Novosibirsk is brilliantly lit up as Moscow? No, it’s not a city of 13 million. It’s not the capital of the Russian Federation. It’s not the center of commerce for Russia. But Novosibirsk is the third largest city in Russia and the largest developing economy. You know, when you go to a supermarket in Novosibirsk, it’s every bit as well stocked as those you will find in Moscow. Why? Because Russia is a modern state.

Russia is a state that has the ability to transport food products throughout the great expanse of the nation. Russia is not Moscow. Russia is a nation of over 150 million people who live with the same level of modernity as the rest of the world,” Ritter said. “In Novosibirsk, I saw a people who live their lives just like everybody else – [with] a public transportation system that’s clean, efficient, streets that are clean, efficient. Why? Because throughout Russia, the Russian people care about their cities as much as the residents of Moscow care about theirs. Russia is a nation, not a city. And the Russians love their country,” he added.

Read more …

“Russia did everything it could to free itself from US domination in the terrible 1990s, and Ukraine did everything it could to integrate itself under US control, mainly from 2004 onwards..”

• An Anti-Russian Europe Is a Europe That Destroys Itself (Dionisio)

According to Syrsky, the new commander-in-chief of Kiev’s troops, the lives of Ukrainian soldiers are the most important thing the army has. An assumption that was only made when it became obvious to everyone that there was no chance of victory in a direct fight against Russia. As long as it was possible to feed the idea that „Ukraine was beating Russia“, when it was Russia that had the initiative — and never lost it — the lives of Ukrainian soldiers were worth little. Men — and some women — in their hundreds of thousands were thrown into muddy trenches, poorly fed and with ammunition in short supply, against an opponent who never lacked anything.

The fact is that when the Kiev forces had combat capability — not to be confused with „the ability to win“ — the official communication was that „Ukraine was winning the war“; when it became clear that the cost of fighting the Russian forces was so high that it could not be sustained, the pro-Kiev media, financed by Uncle Sam’s NGOs and primary sources of Western official information, began to say „Ukraine cannot lose the war“; when it could no longer be hidden that the „counter-offensive“ had failed and with it, the hopes — fanciful — of a Kiev victory, we moved on to the „Ukraine and Russia are in a stalemate“ phase. The Ukrainian reality, under the Kiev regime, is characterized by always being in direct contradiction with the Russian reality and, coincidentally, with the concrete observable reality. This is why the relationship between the two realities is an invaluable dialectical example from a pedagogical point of view.

While living with Russia, Ukraine has become one of the world’s greatest powers. There is not, and never has been, a successful Ukraine without Russia on its side. Vladimir Putin did not lie about the fact that Russia has always helped Ukraine. For those who don’t know, it wasn’t out of any kind of adventurism that the Donbass was annexed to the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic. In 1917, Ukraine was an eminently rural and de-industrialized region of the Russian empire, so, in 1918, in order to guarantee conditions for the territory’s development and, in this way, a more harmonious development of the nascent Soviet state, the Donbass became part of the Ukrainian Socialist Republic, as a way of guaranteeing the progress of the newly formed homeland.

The truth is that, in 1991, Ukraine had more than 50 million inhabitants, one of the largest armies in Europe (perhaps the second largest), an enviable military-industrial complex, a highly qualified, talented and productive population, capable of revealing itself in all aspects of human life, from the arts to science, from agriculture to sport. After surviving many tensions imposed from outside and introduced by the usual suspects, in 2004-2005, the Orange Revolution accelerated the process of creating an anti-Russia. The idea was not new and had already crossed the minds of people linked to the Austro-Hungarian Empire and beyond. From then on, the balance of power between the Russian-speaking and Russian-sympathetic peoples and the peoples who had become „Russian-phobic“ began to reverse and, gradually, the anti-Russian forces began to infect the entire territory, gradually conquering new strongholds, from the outskirts of Galicia to the center of Kiev.

From then on, what would be the imported „solution“ to fill Ukraine’s lack of national identity began to take shape. As a country that had never existed until 1918, and only became fully independent in 1991, Ukraine had to create a national identity in order to guarantee its existence. Not an easy thing to do in a country built up by ruler and square in successive waves of annexation. The induced „choice“ was to turn Ukraine into an „anti-Russia“. Everything Russia would be, Ukraine would have to be the opposite.

It’s clear to see that this „choice“ would have to be induced, since in the case of a country with the same language, or languages with the same root (for those who separate „Ukrainian“ from „Russian“), with the same religion, culture and national past, the natural choice would never be antagonism, since one and the other thrived on a symbiotic relationship. And this relationship was mutually fruitful right up until the moment when Russia did everything it could to free itself from US domination in the terrible 1990s, and Ukraine did everything it could to integrate itself under US control, mainly from 2004 onwards. The chronological succession leaves no doubt: Russia freed itself from American tutelage during the late 90s and early 2000s, Ukraine embraced it from 2004 onwards.

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“..The U.S. media have claimed (preposterously) that if the military aid is not supplied then Ukraine’s defeat could result in American troops being deployed to prevent Russian rampaging across Europe.”

• Russian Space Nukes and Navalny’s Death… U.S. Psyops Go Ballistic (SCF)

The claims about Russian space-based nuclear weapons unraveled to become a joke. Fortunately, the death of Western-sponsored dissident Alexei Navalny then occurred to enable Western media to go into a frenzy of anti-Russia headlines. First up was the scaremongering story about Russia allegedly developing a space-based nuclear weapon. Initially, it was dramatically trailed as posing a serious national security threat to the United States. Despite the sensational reporting, the story quickly became a laughingstock. Even some U.S. lawmakers dismissed it as “bullshit” and a blatant attempt by the Biden White House and intelligence agencies to push Congress into passing a new mega military aid bill for Ukraine worth $61 billion.

We’ll get to the Navalny story in a moment. But let’s just first parse the orchestration of the alleged Russian space nukes. The drama began on Wednesday when Mike Turner, the Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee (a dodgy source if ever there was one), made public appeals to President Joe Biden to declassify intelligence on “a serious threat to national security”. Turner is a Republican member of the House of Representatives but he is a close ally of the Democrat White House in terms of keenly supporting military aid to Ukraine. The latest bill passed the upper chamber of the U.S. Senate the day before, February 13, but it is unlikely to be approved by the House where many Republican lawmakers are staunchly opposed to it.

Accompanying the “concerns” of the intel committee chairman Turner, media outlets then vented anonymous US intelligence sources “revealing” that the national security threat was from Russian nuclear weapons allegedly under development for destroying American communication satellites in space. The White House then “confirmed” the intel the next day, February 15. It was a flagrant put-up job. But the Biden administration sought to tamp down any public panic by saying that the threat was not imminent and the alleged Russian satellite-killing weapon had not been deployed in orbit, nor would there be any danger to Earth. (So, what was all the fuss about?)

Ironically, derisive comments from incredulous U.S. lawmakers were also echoed by the Kremlin. The latter’s spokesman, Dmitry Peskov made a similar assessment that the Biden administration was playing tricks to push through the military funding package for Ukraine. That bill has been delayed since the end of last year. The Biden administration has been cajoling Congress for months to vote it through. After the Senate finally passed the bill this week, President Biden put pressure on the House, saying that “history is watching you”. The bill has been exalted as having existential importance in defeating “Russian aggression” in Ukraine. The U.S. media have claimed (preposterously) that if the military aid is not supplied then Ukraine’s defeat could result in American troops being deployed to prevent Russian rampaging across Europe.

The American public, as with the European public, has become increasingly skeptical about the relentless funneling of taxpayer funds and weapons to Ukraine. Many citizens in the West – a majority, according to polls – have become critical of fueling a bloody war for the dubious cause of “defending democracy” in a regime dominated by NeoNazis. At a time of deep social and economic hardship in the U.S. and Europe, the Western public is rightly disdainful of hundreds of billions of dollars and euros being wasted on death and destruction and also being siphoned off by a corrupt cabal in Kiev. The $61 billion in military aid to Ukraine is just the latest tranche that Washington is seeking to throw at the black hole of its proxy war against Russia – a war that is really all about defeating Russia as a geopolitical obstacle to U.S. hegemony. Another driver is the massive profits that taxpayers are subsidizing the military-industrial complex at the rotten heart of Western capitalism.

Navalny

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“There’s no ammunition left. There’s nothing left. Ukraine has got nothing.” “And he [Turner] knows he’s looking at it, saying ‘it’s over, game set match – Russia, they win,’” he added.“

• Ohio Rep. Part of Shadowy Cabal Aiming to Destroy Russia – Scott Ritter (Sp.)

Ohio Representative Mike Turner (R-OH) made waves this week when he warned of an alleged “serious national security threat” to the United States. The supposed risk was soon revealed to be Russian in nature, with a media cycle quickly emerging over the danger of alleged “space nukes” the country could detonate to disable US satellite communications. The timing of the revelation raised eyebrows as Turner had visited Ukraine just days ago as part of a Congressional delegation in solidarity with the country’s embattled President Volodymyr Zelensky. Turner’s claims also come as the Biden administration struggles to continue funding the US-backed Ukrainian proxy war, with key Republicans blocking a compromise bill with aid for Kiev and Tel Aviv.

Former UN weapons inspector and whistleblower Scott Ritter joined Sputnik’s Fault Lines program on Thursday to discuss the latest Russophobic hysteria, speculating Turner is part of a secret group of lawmakers and intelligence officials hellbent on undermining Russia at any cost. “There’s a cabal,” claimed Ritter, who was shunned in Washington after defying intelligence claims of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction during the George W. Bush administration. “Turner is… part of the cabal of people that view this Ukrainian conflict [as] not about defense of democracy – knock off this nonsense – it’s about defeating Russia, the strategic objective of the United States by using Ukraine as a proxy in a conflict against Russia.”

“You’ve heard everybody say this, ‘we’re killing them without losing a single American, we’re weakening Russia, we’re creating the conditions to destroy Russia, to collapse Russian society, to bring down [Russian President] Vladimir Putin,’” noted Ritter. “He believes that this is a good thing. He believes that’s the direction the United States should be going. And he understands that Ukraine right now is in freefall. Their military is being slaughtered on the battlefield. The Americans have no clue what’s happening on the battlefield right now.”

Ukraine has faced declining fortunes in the Donbass conflict since the spectacular failure of the country’s vaunted “counteroffensive” last year. In recent days Russian forces have achieved an advantage in the city of Avdeyevka, where for months they’ve endured a stalemate with Ukrainian troops. Shortages in ammunition have undermined Ukrainian reinforcements in the past weeks, allowing Russia to break down Kiev’s foritifications. “The Russians aren’t losing anywhere,” said Ritter. “Maybe in the Black Sea they lost a ship, big deal, but on the ground, they’re routing Ukraine. There’s no ammunition left. There’s nothing left. Ukraine has got nothing.” “And he [Turner] knows he’s looking at it, saying ‘it’s over, game set match – Russia, they win,’” he added. “‘Therefore, we need to make people understand the consequences of a Russian victory.’”

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“Pravda argued that Germany will eventually have to return to buying Russian gas because it will have no other choice..”

• Russian Media Thrilled By Biden’s LNG “Gift” To Putin (ZH)

This week, President Vladimir Putin praised President Joe Biden as a more experienced and predictable president than Donald Trump, hoping the 81yo president “with a poor memory” wins a second term. Meanwhile, Trump made remarks during a campaign rally Wednesday night in South Carolina on Putin’s comments: “He’s just said that he would much rather have Joe Biden as president than Trump. Now that’s a compliment. A lot of people said, ‘Oh, gee, that’s too bad.’ No, no, that’s a good thing.” Democrats spent years framing Trump as ‘Putin’s puppet,’ but the actions by Biden, essentially handing over the global energy kingdom to Moscow by halting permits for new liquefied natural gas (LNG) export projects in Texas, is a stark reminder of why Putin prefers the elderly and weak president. Last month, the Wall Street Journal editorial board called Biden’s LNG export license halt “an election-year gift to Russia and Iran.” And the editorial board is out with another piece titled “Biden’s LNG ‘Gift’ to Vladimir Putin.”

This latest note by the editorial board points out how Russian media is “thrilled” by Biden’s LNG gas export ban: “Now it is not Russia, but the United States that wants to bring the Germans to their knees,” gloated the Russian newspaper Pravda after the Energy Department imposed a moratorium on permits for new LNG export projects last month. Pravda argued that Germany will eventually have to return to buying Russian gas because it will have no other choice, and it may be right. They cite another Russian media outlet: RedDigest, a Russian-based news source, also predicted Europe will need to buy more Russian gas and be forced to pay a higher price. “The EU may well turn to Moscow for additional supplies. Of course, there will be no talk of any discounts,” a Feb. 3 article sneered. Mr. Biden’s LNG embargo will leave Europe more vulnerable to Mr. Putin’s energy blackmail.

And another: Bloknot, a pro-war Russian media outlet, accused the U.S. of scheming to replace Russian gas and then pulling the rug from under Europeans. “A brilliant scam: how the States fooled Europe with gas,” read a Bloknot headline. RT (formerly Russia Today) gloated that Mr. Biden’s “very timely decision to ban LNG exports” was a “gift to Russian leader Vladimir Putin.” In a separate note, WSJ said Biden’s attempt to punish Texas over the border dispute is part of a campaign by wealthy donors – including the Rockefeller family – to pressure the government into shifting away from LNG. Why are America’s elites and an elderly president with a “poor memory” giving Putin the keys to the global energy kingdom under the guise of ‘climate change’?

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“Scratch the veneer of who’s in power in Kiev and Tel Aviv, and who pulls their strings, and you will find the same puppet masters controlling Ukraine, Israel, the US, the UK, and nearly all NATO members..”

• Axis of Resistance: from Donbass to Gaza (Pepe Escobar)

During my recent vertiginous journey in Donbass tracking Orthodox Christian battalions defending their land, Novorossiya, it became starkly evident that the resistance in these newly liberated Russian republics is fighting much the same battle as their counterparts in West Asia. Nearly 10 years after Maidan in Kiev, and two years after the start of Russia’s Special Military Operation (SMO) in Ukraine, the resolve of the resistance has only deepened. It’s impossible to do full justice to the strength, resilience, and faith of the people of Donbass, who stand on the front line of a US proxy war against Russia. The battle they have been fighting since 2014 has now visibly shed its cover and revealed itself to be, at its core, a cosmic war of the collective West against Russian civilization.

As Russian President Vladimir Putin made very clear during his Tucker Carlson interview seen by one billion people worldwide, Ukraine is part of Russian civilization – even if it is not part of the Russian Federation. So shelling ethnic Russian civilians in Donbass – still ongoing – translates as attacks on Russia. He shares the same reasoning as Yemen’s Ansarallah resistance movement, which describes the Israeli genocide in Gaza as one launched against “our people”: people of the lands of Islam. Just as the rich black soil of Novorossiya is where the “rules-based international order” came to die; the Gaza Strip in West Asia – an ancestral land, Palestine – may ultimately be the site where Zionism will perish. Both the rules-based order and Zionism, after all, are essential constructs of the western unipolar world and key to advancing its global economic and military interests.

Today’s incandescent geopolitical fault lines are already configured: the collective west versus Islam, the collective west versus Russia, and soon a substantial part of the west, even reluctantly, versus China. Yet a serious counterpunch is at play. As much as the Axis of Resistance in West Asia will keep boosting their “swarm” strategy, those Orthodox Christian battalions in Donbass cannot but be regarded as the vanguard of the Slavic Axis of Resistance. When mentioning this Shia–Orthodox Christianity connection to two top commanders in Donetsk, only 2 kilometers away from the front line, they smiled, bemused, but definitely got the message. After all, more than anyone else in Europe, these soldiers are able to grasp this unifying theme: on the two top imperial fronts – Donbass and West Asia – the crisis of the western hegemon is deepening and fast accelerating collapse.

NATO’s cosmic humiliation-in-progress in the steppes of Novorossiya is mirrored by the Anglo–American–Zionist combo sleepwalking into a larger conflagration throughout West Asia – frantically insisting they don’t want war while bombing every Axis of Resistance vector except Iran (they can’t, because the Pentagon gamed all scenarios, and they all spell out doom). Scratch the veneer of who’s in power in Kiev and Tel Aviv, and who pulls their strings, and you will find the same puppet masters controlling Ukraine, Israel, the US, the UK, and nearly all NATO members.

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“I =srael’s allegations are not based on any evidence. They are instead part of a classified plan prepared in advance by Israel’s foreign ministry to destroy UNRWA..”

• Why Israel’s War on UNRWA is so Sinister (Cradle)

The UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) is facing the gravest existential crisis in its 74-year history, as funding cuts by several western countries come on top of ongoing atrocities perpetrated by Israel in Gaza. The UN agency is unique in being the only one dedicated to a specific group of refugees in specific areas, and the only relief organization that operates a full-fledged educational system. UNRWA is also the only organization mandated to work in Gaza and distribute aid to the two million people currently trapped and starved in the besieged enclave. To compound these challenges, the occupation wants to see it dismantled. In January, Israel alleged that Palestinian members of UNRWA’s staff participated in the resistance’s Operation Al-Aqsa Flood on 7 October, leading the US and 18 other nations to swiftly suspend funding for the organization.

The suspensions were met with shock, as UNRWA plays a key role in providing food and medicine to starving Gazans struggling to survive Israel’s siege and bombardment of the coastal enclave. However, Israel’s allegations are not based on any evidence. They are instead part of a classified plan prepared in advance by Israel’s foreign ministry to destroy UNRWA. It believes that UNRWA “works against Israel’s interests” by perpetuating the dream of the right of return of Palestinian refugees and the idea of armed struggle against occupation. The foreign ministry plan leaked to Israel’s Channel 12 on 28 December, set out a three-stage process to eliminate UNRWA in Gaza, using the Hamas-led resistance operation as a pretext:

First, prepare a case alleging UNRWA’s cooperation with Hamas; second, reduce UNRWA’s field of activity and find replacement service providers; and third, transfer UNRWA’s responsibilities to another entity. Channel 12 noted that Israel wants to move slowly, given that the US government sees UNRWA as crucial to humanitarian efforts in Gaza. The foreign ministry is seeking to gradually build the case for ousting the organization as part of the discussions on “the day after” the war – should Hamas be dismantled. According to a report by The New York Times, the “sequence of events” that led the US to suspend UNRWA funding began on 18 January when Amir Weissbrod, a deputy director general at the Israeli Foreign Ministry, met with Philippe Lazzarini, the head of UNRWA in Tel Aviv.

Weissbrod showed Lazzarini a dossier from Israeli intelligence claiming that 12 UNRWA employees had participated in the 7 October attacks. After the meeting in Israel, Lazzarini made no effort to confirm the validity of the claims. Instead, he flew to New York to meet with UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres and immediately began firing the employees, a UN official said. The Guardian reported that Lazzarini was later asked in a press conference if he had looked into whether there was any evidence for the allegations presented to him by Weissbrod. “No,” Lazzarini replied, “the investigation is going on now.” Lazzarini said he made the “exceptional, swift decision” due to “the explosive nature of the claims,” rather than any evidence. Lazzarini said he did not even read the dossier himself because it was in Hebrew. Instead, Weissbrod “was reading this and translating for me,” he said.

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Better grow the economy, Joe.

• Political, Economic Indicators Not Promising for Biden (Gallup)

Several key indicators of the 2024 election environment indicate that President Joe Biden faces an uphill climb to win a second term. His job approval rating, Americans’ satisfaction with how things are going in the country and their confidence in the economy are below the levels associated with successful reelection bids in recent elections. While Democrats hold a slight edge in national party identification and partisan leanings, that advantage is smaller than what it has been in past presidential elections won by Democratic incumbents. In less direct measures of the electoral environment, Americans are more inclined to say that they are worse off financially, that it is harder to buy things and that the U.S. is as respected throughout the world as it was before Biden took office.

Biden’s fate will ultimately be determined by whether Americans’ views on these metrics improve over the course of the year (as they did for Bill Clinton in 1996 and Barack Obama in 2012), stay the same or get worse (as they did for George H.W. Bush in 1992 and Donald Trump in 2020). Incumbent job approval is arguably the best predictor of reelection success. Presidents with approval ratings of 50% or higher close to Election Day have all been reelected. All but one president with a sub-50% approval rating lost, the exception being George W. Bush. He won reelection with a 48% approval rating in Gallup’s final 2004 preelection poll taken in late October. However, he registered multiple 50% readings earlier in the month and had a 51% approval rating among likely voters in that final survey.

Among the approval ratings that did not carry incumbents to victory, Trump’s 46% approval rating is the highest and Gerald Ford’s 45% is close behind. The inauspicious ratings descend from there, all the way down to 34% for George H.W. Bush. Biden’s 41% job approval rating, the lowest among incumbents in January of an election year, puts him in a precarious spot. It has not been unusual for incumbents to be below the 50% threshold this early on. But Biden’s reelection may depend on his ability to boost his numbers close to that threshold, something Clinton, Obama and Richard Nixon were able to do but Trump and Ford were not. Other presidents, including George W. Bush, George H.W. Bush and Jimmy Carter, saw significant declines in approval during their fourth year in office.

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“..Given Burns’ stature and diplomatic accomplishments, perhaps he would support the urgently needed accountability..”

• How the CIA Destabilizes the World (Jeffrey Sachs)

Once in a while, a former U.S. official spills the beans, such as when Zbigniew Brzezinski revealed that he had induced Jimmy Carter to assign the CIA to train Islamic jihadists to destabilize the government of Afghanistan, with the aim of inducing the Soviet Union to invade that country. In the case of Syria, we learned from a few stories in the New York Times in 2016 and 2017 of the CIA’s subversive operations to destabilize Syria and overthrow Assad, as ordered by President Barack Obama. Here is the case of a dreadfully misguided CIA operation, blatantly in violation of international law, that has led to a decade of mayhem, an escalating regional war, hundreds of thousands of deaths, and millions of displaced people, and yet there has not been a single honest acknowledgment of this CIA-led disaster by the White House or Congress.

In the case of Ukraine, we know that the U.S. played a major covert role in the violent coup that brought down Yanukovych and that swept Ukraine into a decade of bloodshed but to this day, we don’t know the details. Russia offered the world a window into the coup by intercepting and then posting a call between Victoria Nuland, then U.S. Assistant Secretary of State (now Under-Secretary of State) and U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Geoffrey Pyatt (now Assistant Secretary of State), in which they plot the post-coup government. Following the coup, the CIA covertly trained special operations forces of the post-coup regime the U.S. had helped bring to power. The U.S. government has been mum about the CIA’s covert operations in Ukraine. We have good reason to believe that CIA operatives carried out the destruction of the Nord Stream pipeline, as per Seymour Hersh, who is now an independent reporter. Unlike in 1975, when Hersh was with the New York Times at a time when the paper still tried to hold the government to account, the Times does not even deign to look into Hersh’s account.

Holding the CIA to public account is of course a steep uphill struggle. Presidents and the Congress don’t even try. The mainstream media don’t investigate the CIA, preferring instead to quote “senior unnamed officials” and the official cover-up. Are the mainstream media outlets lazy, suborned, afraid of advertising revenues from the military-industrial complex, threatened, ignorant, or all of the above? Who knows. There is a tiny glimmer of hope. Back in 1975, the CIA was led by a reformer. Today, the CIA is led by William Burns, one of America’s long-standing leading diplomats. Burns knows the truth about Ukraine, since he served as Ambassador to Russia in 2008 and cabled Washington about the grave error of pushing NATO enlargement to Ukraine. Given Burns’ stature and diplomatic accomplishments, perhaps he would support the urgently needed accountability.

The extent of the continuing mayhem resulting from CIA operations gone awry is astounding. In Afghanistan, Haiti, Syria, Venezuela, Kosovo, Ukraine, and far beyond, the needless deaths, instability, and destruction unleashed by CIA subversion continues to this day. The mainstream media, academic institutions, and Congress should be investigating these operations to the best of their ability and demanding the release of documents to enable democratic accountability. Next year is the 50th anniversary of the Church Committee hearings. Fifty years on, with the precedent, inspiration, and guidance of the Church Committee itself, it’s urgently time to open the blinds, expose the truth about the U.S.-led mayhem, and begin a new era in which U.S. foreign policy becomes transparent, accountable, subject to the rule of law both domestic and international, and directed towards global peace rather than subversion of supposed enemies.

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“..Think of them as being possessed by a monomania for war akin to my urge to play with toy soldiers. The key difference? When I played at war, I was a wet-behind-the-ears 10 year old..”

• Bombing Muslims for Peace (Bill Astore)

Like many American boys of the baby-boomer generation, I played “war” with those old, olive-drab, plastic toy soldiers meant to evoke our great victory over the Nazis and “the Japs” during World War II. At age 10, I also kept a scrapbook of the 1973 Yom Kippur War between Israel and its various Arab enemies in the Middle East. It was, I suppose, an early sign that I would make both the military and the study of history into careers. I recall rooting for the Israelis, advertised then as crucial American allies, against Egypt, Syria, and other regional enemies at least ostensibly allied with the Soviet Union in that Cold War era. I bought the prevailing narrative of a David-versus-Goliath struggle. I even got a book on the Yom Kippur War that captivated me by displaying all the weaponry the U.S. military had rushed to Israel to turn the tide there, including F-4 Phantom jets and M-60 main battle tanks. (David’s high-tech slingshots, if you will.)

Little did I know that, in the next 50 years of my life, I would witness increasingly destructive U.S. military attacks in the Middle East, especially after the oil cartel OPEC (largely Middle Eastern then) hit back hard with an embargo in 1973 that sent our petroleum-based economy into a tailspin. As one jokester quipped: Who put America’s oil under the sands of all those ungrateful Muslim countries in the Middle East? With declarations like the Carter Doctrine in 1980, the U.S. was obviously ready to show the world just how eagerly it would defend its “vital interests” (meaning fossil fuels, of course) in that region. And even today, as we watch the latest round in this country’s painfully consistent record of attempting to pound various countries and entities there into submission, mainly via repetitive air strikes, we should never forget the importance of oil, and lots of it, to keep the engines of industry and war churning along in a devastating fashion.

Right now, of course, the world is witnessing yet another U.S. bombing campaign, the latest in a series that seems all too predictable (and futile), meant to teach the restless rebels of Iraq, Syria, Yemen, and possibly even Iran a lesson when it comes to messing with the United States of America. As the recently deceased country singer Toby Keith put it: Mess with this country and “We’ll put a boot (think: bomb) in your ass.” You kill three soldiers of ours and we’ll kill scores, if not hundreds, if not thousands of yours (and it doesn’t really matter if they’re soldiers or not), because… well, because we damn well can! America’s leaders, possessing a peerless Air Force, regularly exhibit a visceral willingness to use it to bomb and missile perceived enemies into submission or, if need be, nothingness. And don’t for a second think that they’re going to be stopped by international law, humanitarian concerns, well-meaning protesters, or indeed any force on this planet. America bombs because it can, because it believes in the efficacy of violence, and because it’s run by appeasers.

Yes, America’s presidents, its bombers-in-chief, are indeed appeasers. Of course, they think they’re being strong when they’re blowing distant people to bits, but their actions invariably showcase a distinctive kind of weakness. They eternally seek to appease the military-industrial-congressional complex, aka the national (in)security state, a complex state-within-a-state with an unappeasable hunger for power, profit, and ever more destruction. They fail and fail and fail again in the Middle East, yet they’re incapable of not ordering more bombing, more droning, more killing there. Think of them as being possessed by a monomania for war akin to my urge to play with toy soldiers. The key difference? When I played at war, I was a wet-behind-the-ears 10 year old.

Read more …

 

 

 

 

On purpose

 

 

Donuts

 

 

 

 

Jaguar
https://twitter.com/i/status/1758482520239214824

 

 

Pelican

 

 

Newborn dolphin
https://twitter.com/i/status/1758471327562809740

 

 

Goats Jump

 

 

 

 

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

 

 

 

 

 

Debt Rattle September 26 2023

Sep 262023
 
 September 26, 2023  Posted by at 8:10 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , ,  43 Responses »


SalvadorDali Girl At The Window 1925

 

• Zelensky’s Failed Visit to US Shows ‘End is Coming’ for Ukraine (Sp.)
• Zelensky’s Wife Unsure If He Will Seek Reelection (RT)
• Ukraine To Surrender On Moscow’s Terms Or Cease To Exist – Duma Speaker (TASS)
• How to Prevent a Third World War (Sp.)
• Slouching Towards Beelzebub (Kunstler)
• Canada Saluting A Ukrainian Nazi Was No Coincidence (Eva Bartlett)
• How Canada Became a Safe Haven for Ukrainian WWII-era Nazis (Sp)
• Hillary Clinton Claims Russia Seeks to Meddle in 2024 Election (Tweedie)
• EU to Rely on US LNG ‘For Decades’ (Sp.)
• Diamonds Aren’t Forever For The Belgians – War Against Russia Instead (Helmer)
• War of Economic Corridors: the India-Mideast-Europe Ploy (Pepe Escobar)
• The ‘Last Man’ Teleology and the Fall of the West (Alistair Crooke)
• Senator Menendez Broke the ‘Goldilocks Rule’ of Corruption (Turley)
• Scientists ‘Shocked’ And ‘Alarmed’ At What’s In The mRNA Shots (Barnett)

 

 

 

 

Tucker

 

 

 

 

GOPUkr

 

 

American troops in Ukraine?

 

 

Effective
https://twitter.com/i/status/1706178028018008199

 

 

 

 

CIA Covid

 

 

USGovLie

 

 

 

 

Hmmm. Let’s see it first.

• Zelensky’s Failed Visit to US Shows ‘End is Coming’ for Ukraine (Sp.)

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s lackluster receptions in Washington and at the UN in his trip to the US last week, and inability to achieve major objectives, shows that his moment has passed and the end is near for Kiev, experts told Sputnik. Zelensky visited Washington on Thursday for the second time since Russia launched its special military operation. Unlike his Democratic predecessor Nancy Pelosi, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy declined Zelensky’s request to address a joint session of Congress. It also came as the lower congressional chamber is struggling to pass a short-term spending plan to avoid a government shutdown at the end of the month, with continued financial support for Kiev being one of the sticking points among Republicans.

Biden did announce a new security package for Kiev, although it did not include the ATACMS long-range missiles Zelensky sought. However, according to media reports, Biden during the visit informed Zelensky that the US will send a small number of ATACMS to Ukraine for the first time. A White House National Security Council spokesperson declined a Sputnik request to confirm and comment. Retired US Army Lt. Col. and international consultant Earl Rasmussen, former Vice President of the Eurasia Institute, said Ukraine’s leader failed to achieve many objectives during his trip to the US, including isolating Russia at the Security Council and securing greater international support. Nor did he receive a strong reception from US Congress, Rasmussen observed. One would assess the US adventure as one absent of excitement and a definite disappointment, Rasmussen continued.

“There were no mass pro-Ukrainian or anti-Russian demonstrations in New York or Washington. The UN Assembly Hall was at best half full for his presentation, which seemed more based on an alternative universe,” Rasmussen told Sputnik. “Essentially this visit was a non-event with even The New York Times publishing a critical article the day before his appearance in the UN. Coincidence? Likely not.” This all comes to mean one thing – a reality that Ukraine should grasp by now, Rasmussen said. “The end is rapidly coming both for Zelensky and Ukraine,” Rasmussen said. “A military defeat is near… The question is do we seek a settlement and end the killing, or do we escalate more to try to prolong the conflict and as a result see even more lives lost and an increased chance of direct conflict.”

Former Pentagon analyst Chuck Spinney speculated that Zelensky might even be realizing his chance to rally the West behind his cause once again has come and gone. “I think Zelensky’s phony ‘Churchillian Moment’ has passed,” Spinney told Sputnik. “His body language suggests that he knows he is losing touch with his audience.” Nicolai Petro, who serves as a professor of political studies at the University of Rhode Island, said Zelensky’s trip to the United States revived public interest in the issue of Ukraine, but that he had to endure complaints from some of his sponsors about Ukraine’s lack of military success and corruption. “Alas, there is little that can be done about either of these,” Petro said. “The fact that lax oversight controls over funding and military shipments to Ukraine predictably resulted in a significant percentage of it disappearing was not revealed yesterday – sources in the White House were aware of it in April 2022 and CBS News reported on it in August 2022.” The widespread corruption that guaranteed the waste and misuse of US and NATO-supplied weapons systems would likely continue unabated, Petro predicted.

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His safe way out?

• Zelensky’s Wife Unsure If He Will Seek Reelection (RT)

Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky might not run for reelection next year, his wife, First Lady Elena Zelenskaya, told CBS’ Face the Nation on Sunday. The difficulties of organizing elections amid a military conflict, with millions of eligible voters scattered all over the surrounding continents, might influence her husband’s decision on whether to run again, Zelenskaya said. She added that she would nevertheless “support him whatever decision he takes.” “It will also depend whether our society would need him as a president, if he will feel that Ukrainian society would no longer wish him to be the president, he will probably not run,” she added, admitting that she was uncertain of her husband’s intent.

While Zelenskaya claimed she “didn’t fully endorse” his first attempt at the presidency, she acknowledged that a second try would be “not as scary” due to the couple’s experience. She called the moderator’s question – about how she would feel if Zelensky launched a reelection bid – a “difficult” one. The Ukrainian head of state visited the US last week to meet with President Joe Biden and other leaders, coming back with a pledge of “up to $325 million” for “critical security and defense needs” from the White House, after reportedly warning American lawmakers that Kiev may lose to Russia otherwise. Washington has reportedly handed over $75 billion to Kiev in the last two years, with most of that – $46.6 billion – being military aid.

A survey published earlier this month revealed nearly eight in 10 Ukrainians blame Zelensky for the rampant corruption that plagues their country – another reason the president might be apprehensive about running for reelection. He has also complained about weakening Western support as well, using an interview with the Economist to denounce his unfaithful erstwhile benefactors as closet Russia supporters and threaten them with losses in their own elections if Kiev succumbs militarily, and social problems, should the millions of Ukrainian refugees scattered throughout Europe get unruly.

Ukrainian martial law prohibits elections, and Ukrainian security officials recently acknowledged to the Washington Post that a vote would be essentially impossible with most of the population deployed on the front lines or living outside the country. However, Kiev is facing increasing pressure from the West to at least maintain the appearance of a functioning democracy, a demand the government cannot afford to dismiss outright given the degree to which it is financially dependent on American and European largesse. In June, Zelensky acknowledged a vote could only take place after the conflict was settled, only to reverse course in August and say it was possible – as long as he got an additional $135 million.

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“Ukraine has lost 53.7% of its population since 2014..”

• Ukraine To Surrender On Moscow’s Terms Or Cease To Exist – Duma Speaker (TASS)

Ukraine is fated either to capitulate on Moscow’s terms or cease to exist as a state, Vyacheslav Volodin, speaker of the Russian State Duma (lower house of parliament), said. “When speaking about the conflict in Ukraine, [US President Joe] Biden, [NATO Secretary General Jens] Stoltenberg and other Western officials have started calling it ‘a war of attrition.’ They have put huge amounts of money into militarizing the Kiev regime. Where has it gotten them? The simple facts are these: the West is experiencing weapons and ammunition shortages, people in Europe and the US have lost trust in politicians, and the Kiev regime’s counteroffensive has failed,” Volodin stated.

According to him, the outcome of the “war of attrition” also includes economic problems in Europe and the US, a lack of manpower for the Ukrainian armed forces, and ultimately bankruptcy and demographic disaster for Ukraine. “These seven facts speak for themselves: Ukraine will cease to exist as a state unless the Kiev regime capitulates on Russia’s terms,” Volodin stressed. “More than 10.5 million people have fled Ukraine. Another 11.2 million residents of Crimea, Sevastopol, the Donetsk and Lugansk people’s republics and the Zaporozhye and Kherson regions decided to join Russia. Ukraine has lost 53.7% of its population since 2014,” the State Duma speaker highlighted.

Volodin noted that, in June, then-British Defense Minister Ben Wallace stated that Western countries had run out of stockpiles of those weapons that they could send to Kiev from their own national arsenals. Biden, in turn, admitted in July that the decision to provide Ukraine with cluster munitions had been driven by the fact that stocks of conventional ammunition were exhausted. “The approval ratings of EU and US leaders have hit historical lows. The share of people who disapprove of their leaders’ performance stands at 57% for Biden, at 69% for [French President Emmanuel] Macron, and at 72% for [German Chancellor Olaf] Scholz. The majority of people in the United States and European countries oppose weapons supplies to Ukraine,” the Duma speaker added.

In addition, the senior lawmaker emphasized that the NATO-backed Ukrainian military had suffered huge troop and equipment losses, while “the lack of achievements has disappointed [Kiev’s] Western sponsors.” “The economies of the Eurozone countries are going through a recession. The costs of Ukraine’s militarization have forced Germany to cut benefit payments to poor families. France has reduced the number of beneficiaries; people in need no longer receive food packages and reimbursements for drug costs. International agencies have downgraded the United States’ long-term investment rating as they expect the financial situation in the country to worsen in the next three years,” Volodin said.

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“..the moral, political, intellectual, social, and economic multi-level crisis plaguing the bulk of the collective West.”

• How to Prevent a Third World War (Sp.)

The unfolding Ukraine crisis could be a prologue for a larger and more dangerous conflict, according to Russian political scientist Sergei Karaganov. “In Ukraine, we have finally stood up to the United States/West, but we have so far let them grab the initiative in matters of escalation,” Karaganov wrote in his new article. “They continuously expand and deepen their aggression by supplying increasingly deadly and dangerous weapons.” This situation is further aggravated by the evident degradation of Western elites, according to the political scientist. He particularly referred to “the moral, political, intellectual, social, and economic multi-level crisis plaguing the bulk of the collective West.” “It will only get worse in the foreseeable future,” warned Karaganov.

“Each new call from Western leaders is more foolish, reckless, and ideologically charged than the previous one, making it more dangerous for the world. They are consciously fuelling the disintegration of their societies by promoting anti-human values.” Meanwhile, modern information technology and the internet has become a convenient tool for demonization and manipulation of public perceptions. “Even now, to fight the hated Russians, hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians are being sent to their deaths,” wrote the scholar. “Clearly, many more are dying from the collapse of infrastructure and healthcare. These victims are either completely forgotten or deliberately downplayed. Clearly, there is an even worse attitude toward demonized Russians. Russophobia has reached almost unprecedented proportions, perhaps comparable to how the Nazis viewed Slavs and Jews.”

This is happening against the backdrop of a broken dialogue system and the collapse of the arms control system, which, while not always useful and sometimes even harmful in the past, at least provided channels of communication between leading military powers, according to Karaganov. Meanwhile, a global realignment is underway with the West waging a “desperate final battle to preserve its dominance,” as per the Russian scholar. “A seismic shift is taking place in global geopolitics, geostrategy, and geoeconomics, and it is gaining momentum. New continents are rising, and global problems are worsening. The emergence of new sources of friction and conflicts is inevitable,” he wrote. Amid this unprecedented rapid redistribution of global power from the West to the global majority, Russia has become historically designated as “its military and political core,” according to Karaganov.

[..] “Humanity is facing an existential challenge to prevent the inexorably approaching catastrophe of the Third World War within the next decade or so by forcing the West, primarily the United States, to step back and adapt to the new reality. To achieve this, we need to compel their ‘deep state’ to refresh, as much as possible, the ruling elites, whose low quality does not meet the challenges facing humanity today. The falling West may drag everyone along, including its deep state,” he highlighted. To that end, Western elites should once again realize that nuclear armageddon poses a real threat to the world, according to the scientist.

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“Never in history has such a move into tyranny been fronted by such an embarrassingly un-charismatic empty vessel..”

• Slouching Towards Beelzebub (Kunstler)

From early on, our government lied about the safety of the vaccines, at the same time that they lied and confabulated about the origins of the Covid-19 virus. They continue lying about all of this to this day even as they appear to prepare for a replay of a pandemic. Now that the weekend is over, you will not read about any of this in The New York Times. Why is that? I will offer my theory: that newspaper’s business model, based on pages and pages of print advertising, is completely broken and it is on financial life-support from the CIA and / or DARPA, probably facilitated by private sector cut-outs laundering the money. That’s how dishonorable the flagship of the US news media is.

And, of course, there is the added layer of government-directed censorship, also through private sector cut-outs, that is aimed at suppressing the truth about Covid from every angle, especially the vaccines. Doesn’t all of this look rather sinister? Choose one of two possible explanations: 1) the Covid-19 episode from the beginning was a fantastic fiasco of blundering incompetence by hundreds of officials from many agencies plus elected leaders, and at every stage was made worse by additional incompetent actions aimed at concealing massive chains of prior misdeeds producing more misdeeds resulting in the wholesale collapse of authority in our country. In other words, an epic clusterfuck.

Or 2) The entire Covid episode is a chain of crimes committed deliberately with malicious intent to kill and injure large numbers of people while contriving to deprive the survivors of their basic liberties and their property. Because identical events are seen in all the other nations of Western Civ, it would be reasonable to infer some kind of coordination managed by a supervisory force or entity. What we see is a globalist coalition formed of the World Economic Forum (WEF), the World Health Organization (WHO), The European Union (EU), the United Nations (UN), the pharmaceutical industry, the “Five Eyes” intel alliance, the global banking establishment, The Democratic Party, and scores of well-endowed non-governmental agencies such as the George Soros constellation of councils and foundations. What else is unseen?

One conspicuously strange element of the whole picture is the phantom leadership of the supposed world hegemon USA in the figurehead, “Joe Biden.” Never in history has such a move into tyranny been fronted by such an embarrassingly un-charismatic empty vessel. Never in our country’s history have our affairs whirled in such a mystifying flux of bewildering forces. Even our Civil War was a more straightforward clash of interests. Events are moving quickly now. They’re setting up the steam-table for that banquet of consequences.

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“There are even monuments honoring Nazi collaborators and Ukrainian Insurgent Army criminals still standing in Canadian cities..”

NOTE: Trudy saying he didn’t know who the guy was is nonsense. He met him the day before.

• Canada Saluting A Ukrainian Nazi Was No Coincidence (Eva Bartlett)

The stomach-churning scene of the Canadian parliament giving a standing ovation three days ago to a former Waffen SS Nazi has by now made the rounds on the internet. During Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky’s visit to Canada, and following his predictably bombastic pan-handling speech, House Speaker Anthony Rota went on to gush praise over a Ukrainian-Canadian in parliament that day: Yaroslav Hunka, a World War II-era Nazi, calling him “a Ukrainian hero, a Canadian hero” and thanking him for his service. Two days later, Rota issued an apology for lauding the man, saying he had “recognized an individual in the gallery” and had subsequently become aware of “more information which causes me to regret my decision to do so.”

Just to be clear – since Rota was not – the individual he meekly referred to was Yaroslav Hunka, and the information which made Rota remorseful was that Hunka had been a voluntary member of 1st Galician Division of the Waffen SS – you know, the one accused of mass murdering Poles, Jews and Ukrainians in Ukraine and Poland, as well as committing other atrocities. Whereas Rota claims he was unaware of Hunka’s service as a Nazi, given that he had also praised Hunk for fighting “for Ukrainian independence against the Russians,” one can assume this is the service he referred to. In his apology, Rota stated, “no one, including fellow parliamentarians and the Ukraine delegation, was aware of my intention or of my remarks before I delivered them.”

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s office denied any knowledge of Hunka and his Nazi service, stating, “The Speaker had his own allotment of guest seating at Friday’s address, which were determined by the Speaker and his office alone.” Whether Trudeau (and his Stepan Bandera-sympathizing deputy PM Chrystia Freeland) knew about Yaroslav Hunka or not, the question remains: why was he never brought to justice? He, or any of the other 2,000 SS Nazis Canada reportedly took in in the years following WW2. Having been accepted as anti-communist refugees with little to no scrutiny, these suspected war criminals and collaborators have been allowed to live out the rest of their days in peace, and most of them have done so openly under their own names, as the Simon Wiesenthal Center has repeatedly reported.

There is much to be said about Canada’s history with Ukrainian Nazis. Not only did it take them in after WW2, but the government-backed Ukrainian Canadian Congress, which, until recently, listed Nazi-collaborator veterans organizations as members, as well as government-funded Ukrainian ‘youth centers’ that celebrate Nazi collaborators like Stepan Bandera and Roman Shukhevich. There are even monuments honoring Nazi collaborators and Ukrainian Insurgent Army criminals still standing in Canadian cities. Canada has also supported modern-day Nazis in Ukraine itself, by training members of the neo-Nazi Azov Battalion on Canadian soil, although Canadian corporate media has in recent years attempted to downplay this.

Radio Canada reported in April 2022 that the Canadian Armed Forces, “did contribute to the training of soldiers of the Azov regiment in 2020, to the point where this unit is now boasting of being able to train its own soldiers according to Western standards.” The Ottawa Citizen, writing about this report, cited a 2017 briefing by Canada’s Joint Task Force Ukraine as saying, “Multiple members of Azov have described themselves as Nazis.” In November 2021, the same Ottawa Citizen journalist wrote about Canadian officials meeting with leaders from the Azov Battalion in June 2018. Canadian officers and diplomats, “did not object to the meeting and instead allowed themselves to be photographed with battalion officials despite previous warnings that the unit saw itself as pro-Nazi.”

Hunka
https://twitter.com/DD_Geopolitics/status/1706215091878744123

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“When the news of her relative’s true past leaked out, Ottawa immediately characterized it as a “Russian disinformation” campaign aimed at “destabiliz[ing] Western democracies..”

• How Canada Became a Safe Haven for Ukrainian WWII-era Nazis (Sp.)

Before World War II, Ukrainian Canadians were among the most tightly knit, pro-labor, pro-Moscow, and anti-fascist migrant communities living in the True North Strong and Free. That began to change after the war and the arrival of thousands of Ukrainian Nazi collaborators wanted for war crimes across Eastern Europe. This is their story. The scandal over the Canadian parliament’s move to honor Ukrainian Waffen SS veteran Yaroslav Hunka continues to swirl, with Canada’s opposition leader, Poland, Jewish groups, Russia and the United Nations demanding accountability. Hunka, 98, was in attendance during Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s address to the House of Commons last Friday, and was introduced to lawmakers as a veteran of the “struggle for Ukrainian independence against the Russians during the Second World War.” He received a standing ovation from the legislature.

It soon emerged that the former soldier carried out his “struggle for Ukrainian independence” as a member of the infamous 14th Waffen Grenadier Division of the Nazi SS, also known as 14th SS-Volunteer Division Galicia. Formed in 1943 and made up mostly of ethnic Ukrainians, the Wehrmacht-subordinated fighting formation was recruited from among fascist radicals, and was responsible for the mass murder of anti-fascist and communist Ukrainians, Red Army troops, anti-fascist partisans, and Polish, Jewish, Russian and Slovak civilians. Between 1943 and its surrender to the Western allies in May 1945, 14th SS-Volunteer Division Galicia rampaged through Eastern Europe. It was used for “police actions” against Polish and Soviet partisans in western Ukraine and eastern Poland, deployed to wipe out up to hundreds of civilians at a time in the Polish settlements like Huta Pieniacka, Podkamien, Chodaczkowo Wielkie, Prehoryle, Smogligow, and Borow, and thrown into meat grinders against the Red Army (where it took heavy losses approaching 75 percent during brutal fighting at Brody, Lvov region in July 1944).

The remnants of the division were evacuated and deployed in Slovakia in the late summer of 1944 to put down the Slovak National Uprising, and then sent to suppress partisan operations in Yugoslavia in January 1945. In March 1945, the formation retreated to Austria, taking heavy losses while trying to hold back Soviet forces in and around Graz during the desperate closing months of the war. Ukrainian fascist forces later incorporated into the division also took part in the suppression of the Warsaw Uprising between August and September of 1944, although the division itself did not take part. [..] The scandal surrounding Hunka is not the first of its kind. In 2017, independent media outlet Consortium News was attacked by Canadian authorities after revealing that Chrystia Freeland, the senior Trudeau cabinet member then serving as Canada’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, had attempted to cover up her grandfather Mykhailo Khomiak’s past as an editor of a Nazi newspaper in occupied Poland during WWII.

Canadian media later followed up on the allegations, confirming the information, and revealing that Freeland not only knew of her grandfather’s dark past, but helped edit an academic article in the Journal of Ukrainian Studies by her uncle, John-Paul Kimka, professor emeritus at the University of Alberta, in the 1990s a bid to whitewash the Nazi propagandist’s activities. When the news of her relative’s true past leaked out, Ottawa immediately characterized it as a “Russian disinformation” campaign aimed at “destabiliz[ing] Western democracies,” with Freeland claiming her grandparents fled the war in 1939 as “political exiles with a responsibility to keep alive the idea of an independent Ukraine.” After the escalation of the Ukrainian crisis in early 2022, Freeland, now deputy prime minister, got into more trouble after tweeting (and after public outrage deleting) a photo of herself holding a banner sporting the colors of the notorious fascist militant formation known as the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (Ukrainian acronym UPA), along with the UPA’s slogan “Slava Ukraini” (lit. “Glory to Ukraine”).

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I’m not terribly unpopular. That can’t be it. People love me.

• Hillary Clinton Claims Russia Seeks to Meddle in 2024 Election (Tweedie)

Failed presidential runner Hillary Clinton has repeated her discredited claims of Russian interference in US elections. Clinton dusted off the 2016 ‘Russiagate’ conspiracy theory she used to explain her defeat by Donald Trump in an interview with MSNBC’s Jen Psaki — the former White House press secretary renowned for her inability to answer journalist’s questions. Psaki claimed that Russian President Vladimir Putin had “interfered in our elections in the past” — directly contradicting the findings of special counsel John Durham’s inquiry that the claim was “uncorroborated” — and asked Clinton if she feared it would happen in 2024. “I don’t think, despite all of the deniers, there is any doubt that he interfered in our election, or that he has interfered in many ways in the internal affairs of other countries, funding political parties, funding political candidates, buying off government officials in different places,” Clinton claimed.

Her tone became increasingly paranoid as she went on. “He hates democracy. He particularly hates the West and he especially hates us,” Clinton ranted. “And he has determined that he can do two things simultaneously. He can try to continue to damage and divide us internally, and he’s quite good at it.” The former secretary of state and senator, the wife of disgraced ex-president Bill Clinton, even believed that Putin had a personal grudge against her. “Part of the reason he worked so hard against me is because he didn’t think that he wanted me in the White House,” Clinton complained. “Part of the challenge is to continue to explain to the American public that the kind of leader Putin is.” She then reeled off a series of unproven allegations against the Russian president, including that he was responsible for the deaths of opposition figures and journalists — and interfered in the 2016 US elections to ensure she lost to Trump.

“I fear that the Russians will prove themselves to be quite adept at interfering, and if he has a chance, he’ll do it again,” Clinton concluded. Durham’s report, finally released in June 2023, found that former Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) Director James Comey’s operation Crossfire Hurricane probe — oddly named after a Rolling Stones lyric — was founded on “raw, un-analyzed and uncorroborated” intelligence and should never have been launched. It said the FBI was guilty of misconduct and was in need of reform, but did not lay individual blame on any of the numerous officials involved — from Comey to Peter Strzok and Lisa Page, two agents entwined in an extra-marital affair at the federal agency.

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Brussels sold out the EU.

• EU to Rely on US LNG ‘For Decades’ (Sp.)

The European Union’s much-touted self-harming intention to diversify from Russian natural gas means it will be forced to rely on America’s liquefied natural gas (LNG) for decades to come, the bloc’s top energy official has admitted. The EU’s ambitious climate goals and pledge to phase out fossil fuels are also likely to be shoved on the back burner, as Ditte Juul Jorgensen, director general for energy at the European Commission, told a media report that the bloc’s reliance on exports of US LNG was not going away any time soon. While the official touted “conservation” and more renewable energy, such as wind and solar, as the “instruments” at the disposal of the EU that would allow it to survive another energy crisis in the coming winter, she added: “We will need some fossil molecules in the system over the coming couple of decades. And in that context, there will be a need for American energy,” said Jorgensen in an interview in New York.

Last year, when Brussels cobbled together package after package of sanctions targeting Russia over Ukraine, anyone with a clear understanding of the energy needs of the 27-member bloc could have foreseen that it was backing itself into a corner. The EU’s proclaimed decision to wean itself off Russian gas, along with “net zero carbon emissions by 2050” goals were a tough act to follow through on. Sure enough, now, for all intents and purposes, Brussels will continue to consume expensive US LNG beyond the end of the decade, to the frustration of politicians and environmental campaigners. Brussels waded into an agreement with the administration of US President Joe Biden in March 2022 to “work toward the goal of ensuring, until at least 2030, demand for approximately 50 billion cubic metres (bcm) of additional US LNG.” At the time, the pact was struck on the basis that it was consistent with EU and US shared climate goals.

“We aim to reduce this dependency on Russian fossil fuels and get rid of it. This can only be achieved through… additional gas supplies, including LNG deliveries,” EU Commission head Ursula von der Leyen said at a joint news conference with Joe Biden at the time. Jorgensen’s new statements will help European buyers “clear the path forward” now, the report added, citing initial evidence of reluctance to sign deals with US suppliers past the 2030 deadline. America’s LNG exports to EU member states surged more than twofold last year, reaching 56 bcm in 2022. Just a year before that, the shipped amount had been 22 bcm annually. There has been an echo of frustrated voices from some European politicians complaining that US LNG contracts are fraught with risks to the EU’s climate goals. But the reality is that US LNG companies are signing increasingly more long-term supply deals with Europe. Thus, America’s largest LNG exporter – Cheniere Energy – has struck a deal for two contracts with Europe-based Equinor and BASF to ship 2.55mn tons annually far into the 2040s.

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“Russian production is less than demand in developing countries.”

• Diamonds Aren’t Forever For The Belgians – War Against Russia Instead (Helmer)

[..] the US-NATO blockade of the Russian tanker trade is Napoleonic in the obviousness of the miscalculation; it is also Napoleonic in the magnitude of losses on the NATO side — and the acceleration of profits on the Russian side. In today’s new episode, the battleground is the diamond trade based in Antwerp, Belgium. Almost $14 billion worth of diamonds are imported annually for cutting, polishing, and trading there, and about the same value is exported. In their rough form, most of the diamonds in the Belgian market have been mined in Russia, and either sent direct to the Antwerp diamond market, or indirectly through India. Most of the diamonds exported from Antwerp have been going to India, United Arab Emirates (UAE), and Israel. The Israeli diamond processing business exports mostly to the US jewellery market.

The diamond trade in Europe has traditionally been a Jewish operation; until the Germans arrived in 1940 that was based in Amsterdam, Netherlands, for four hundred years. German race hatred wiped out the Jews of Amsterdam; Belgian race hatred for Russians is about to wipe out the Antwerp diamond market. The Jewish business is about to become an Arab one. As one Antwerp diamantaire described the situation, “if the Belgian government thinks it’s giving the finger to the Russians, all that will happen is that the diamond on that finger will move, and the finger will be what Dubai will be pointing.” Martin Rapaport’s price sheet for the trade in Tel Aviv and New York reports that in Belgium “sentiment [is] very low. Serious concerns for coming months.

0.50 and 1 ct. [carat] diamonds especially weak due to sluggish US orders. Many hope holiday activity will kickstart trading. Uncertainty surrounds Russian diamonds as fresh sanctions loom.” Rapaport, a dual Israeli-American citizen and self-reported “world’s largest and most trusted marketplace for diamonds & jewelry”, has been promoting fresh sanctions against Russian diamonds to cut the volume of Russian rough in the global market; these have been causing diamond inventories to overflow, diamond prices to fall, and Israeli margins to shrink. “Russia was the wild card in 2022. Whereas it was assumed the sanctions imposed in February by the US on Russian-sourced diamonds would lead to shortages, the goods continued to enter the market — propping up polished inventories.”

[..] “The G7 countries account for about 80-90 million carats of diamond consumption per year. As for India and China, this figure is at the level of 60 million carats. That is, the Group of Seven is ahead in this area, but taking into account the fact that Russia produces about 40 million carats annually, India and China can take all this volume. As for the possible restrictions in this industry, I think the situation will be similar to similar sanctions against oil, which is now being quietly sold to India and China, albeit at a certain discount to the world price. As far as I understand, after cutting, it is quite difficult to separate diamonds of Russian origin from other stones. But if, after all, technology will somehow control the process of selling diamonds, then the Russian Federation, taking into account the capacity of the markets, can really send supplies to developing countries. Russian production is less than demand in developing countries.”

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“..dangling an enticing Divide and Rule carrot that promises Things That Cannot Be Delivered..”

• War of Economic Corridors: the India-Mideast-Europe Ploy (Pepe Escobar)

The India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor (IMEC) is a massive public diplomacy op launched at the recent G20 summit in New Delhi, complete with a memorandum of understanding signed on 9 September. Players include the US, India, UAE, Saudi Arabia, and the EU, with a special role for the latter’s top three powers Germany, France, and Italy. It’s a multimodal railway project, coupled with trans-shipments and with ancillary digital and electricity roads extending to Jordan and Israel. If this walks and talks like the collective west’s very late response to China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), launched 10 years ago and celebrating a Belt and Road Forum in Beijing next month, that’s because it is. And yes, it is, above all, yet another American project to bypass China, to be claimed for crude electoral purposes as a meager foreign policy “success.”

No one among the Global Majority remembers that the Americans came up with their own Silk Road plan way back in 2010. The concept came from the State Department’s Kurt Campbell and was sold by then-Secretary Hillary Clinton as her idea. History is implacable, it came down to nought. And no one among the Global Majority remembers the New Silk Road plan peddled by Poland, Ukraine, Azerbaijan, and Georgia in the early 2010s, complete with four troublesome trans-shipments in the Black Sea and the Caspian. History is implacable, this too came down to nought. In fact, very few among the Global Majority remember the $40 trillion US-sponsored Build Back Better World (BBBW, or B3W) global plan rolled out with great fanfare just two summers ago, focusing on “climate, health and health security, digital technology, and gender equity and equality.”

A year later, at a G7 meeting, B3W had already shrunk to a $600 billion infrastructure-and-investment project. Of course, nothing was built. History really is implacable, it came down to nought. The same fate awaits IMEC, for a number of very specific reasons. The whole IMEC rationale rests on what writer and former Ambassador M.K. Bhadrakumar deliciously described as “conjuring up the Abraham Accords by the incantation of a Saudi-Israeli tango.” This tango is Dead On Arrival; even the ghost of Piazzolla can’t revive it. For starters, one of the principals – Saudi Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman – has made it clear that Riyadh’s priorities are a new, energized Chinese-brokered relationship with Iran), with Turkey, and with Syria after its return to the Arab League.

Moreover, both Riyadh and its Emirati IMEC partner share immense trade, commerce, and energy interests with China, so they’re not going to do anything to upset Beijing. At face value, IMEC proposes a joint drive by G7 and BRICS 11 nations. That’s the western method of seducing eternally-hedging India under Modi and US-allied Saudi Arabia and the UAE to its agenda. Its real intention, however, is not only to undermine BRI, but also the International North-South Transportation Corridor (INTSC), in which India is a major player alongside Russia and Iran. The game is quite crude and really quite obvious: a transportation corridor conceived to bypass the top three vectors of real Eurasia integration – and BRICS members China, Russia, and Iran – by dangling an enticing Divide and Rule carrot that promises Things That Cannot Be Delivered.

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How did Brzezinski and Fukuyama ever become so influential?

• The ‘Last Man’ Teleology and the Fall of the West (Alistair Crooke)

As is well known, the Mackinder ‘Pivot of History’ doctrine (1904) of ‘he who controls the Asian heartland controls the world’ was cemented into the U.S. zeitgeist as the unassailable doctrine that a united Heartland – which might challenge the U.S. – must never be allowed. To which Brzezinski, President Carter’s National Security Adviser, added that the Ukraine, by virtue of its divided national identities, entwined in old complexities, should be seen as the hinge around which heartland power revolved: ‘Absent Ukraine, Russia would never become the heartland power; but with Ukraine, Russia can and would’, Brzezinski averred. Well, that was the idea – to mobilise fierce Ukrainian ultranationalism versus a weak Russia, and put them to fight each other.

But the evolution of the ‘Brzezinski doctrine’ – quite surprisingly – segued into a series of western mythological errors: First, that Russia was easily defeated in Afghanistan, by a few lightly armed jihadists (not true). Secondly, that the Soviet Union and its satellites were overthrown by ‘Revolutions from Below’ (also not true). And thirdly, that a powerful U.S. Security-State ‘Leviathan’ could ensure U.S. hegemony (through mounting ‘Revolutions from Below’). Brzezinski’s prime intent may originally have been to keep Russia and China divided from each other. But the Soviet Union’s sudden implosion (unrelated to Afghanistan) was crafted narratively to lend credence to Francis Fukuyama’s End of History and the Last Man meme. After the Cold War and the Soviet communist empire’s collapse, the American political, cultural and economic model was widely held to be the ‘Last Man Standing’.

‘Afghanistan’ also fostered the myth of Islamic insurgents as the ideal solvents for ‘backward’ states needing new western, forward-thinking leaders. (It was Brzezinski who persuaded Carter to insert Islamic radicalism into Afghanistan to undermine the Russian-supported, socialist Najibullah). ‘Afghanistan’ effectively was the pilot for the ‘Arab Spring’ – a global ‘house-cleaning’ that, it was claimed, would end vestiges of earlier Soviet influence, and create new stability. The excitement in neo-con circles was palpable. And America’s Cold War success was attributed (apart from western culture’s ‘genetic’ advantages) to the empowerment of the military-security apparati. In theory, the end to the Cold War might have been an opportunity to return to the U.S. Founders’ original principles of distance from European conflicts and of caution toward military and security Leviathans.

The Soviet implosion seemed a harbinger of global tensions vented; pressures released. But then, ‘something’ extraneous, out-of-the-blue, happened; something that in a stroke, reversed the logic of the Cold War expected ‘peace dividend’ by “invigorating the military-security state to new heights”, Gordon Hahn notes. The power of the military-security state began, from this point onward, to be deployed abroad – in the service of the globalising cultural war. What had happened was ‘9/11’. But then a new ‘twist’ took America away, on an entirely different path. Barack Obama infused new energy into the military-security state. The Obama administration however, was not so much motivated by overseas hegemony (though not opposed to it). The focus though was on bringing forward the cultural revolution underway in the U.S. What had happened? And how is Ukraine connected to this?

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“..Menendez pursued gifts with a reckless abandon, endangering others whose corruption was more circumspect..”

• Senator Menendez Broke the ‘Goldilocks Rule’ of Corruption (Turley)

In 2010, I defended a federal judge, Thomas Porteous, in his impeachment trial, against charges that he had taken gifts and misused his office for personal gain. The curious thing about Senate trials is that you have a jury composed of people you could strike for cause in a real court. Menendez was among those sitting in judgment of Porteous, but he wasn’t just another face in the Senate crowd — he stood out. It was like arguing a piracy case with Captain Jack Sparrow sitting on the jury. Menendez himself would later go on trial in 2017 in a major bribery and fraud case involving luxury gifts allegedly exchanged for official favors. Most of us expected the worst when, during jury deliberations, one juror asked the court, “What is a senator?” Menendez dodged the bullet. The jury hung and the Justice Department dropped all charges.

Now Menendez has been slapped with a massive new bribery indictment. The facts are all too familiar, with a long list of lavish gifts allegedly made in exchange for favors. The indictment details gold bars, hundreds of thousands of dollars, furnishings and other gifts. His wife was allegedly actively involved in this corruption conspiracy and is also facing criminal charges. During the Porteous trial, I noted that, at the time of the underlying acts, the senators themselves were accepting free lunches. It was not until later that the rules changed on such gifts. Menendez now stands accused of accepting a host of gifts at that time, including an $8,000 free flight in October 2010, in addition to luxury trips to Paris and a Caribbean villa.

Yet Menendez still demanded the conviction of Porteous, even though the judge was never charged with bribery, and free lunches and the other gifts would not be enough to even register with Menendez. The question is whether this level of corruption is now enough for Democrats. California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) recently suggested a type of Goldilocks rule for corruption. He warned that people in Washington had better be careful if they want to crack down on the Biden family’s influence-peddling. “If that’s the new criteria, there are a lot of folks in a lot of industries — not just in politics — where people have family members and relationships and they’re trying to parlay and get a little influence and benefit in that respect. That’s hardly unique.” It would appear that the question is not corruption, but when a little corruption is “just right.”

If these allegations against Menendez are proven, then he violated Washington’s Goldilocks rule. It would mean that Menendez pursued gifts with a reckless abandon, endangering others whose corruption was more circumspect. Consider the timeline: It would mean that during the Porteous trial, Menendez was allegedly accepting gifts while condemning and removing from office a judge accused of receiving gifts. Later, after the jury hung in his first corruption trial, Menendez (according to the Justice Department) almost immediately started taking gifts from new sources. In a town known for a certain finesse in influence peddling, Menendez broke with industry custom by allegedly accepting direct items like gold and a car. This is classic bribery stuff. There was no labyrinth of shell companies and accounts — just crude old-school corruption, with cash stuffed in clothing and gold bars squirreled away for a rainy day.

Read more …

“..under the Gene Technology Act (2000) definition, the DNA contamination is a genetically modified organism (GMO)..”

• Scientists ‘Shocked’ And ‘Alarmed’ At What’s In The mRNA Shots (Barnett)

Early in 2023, genomics scientist Kevin McKernan made an accidental discovery. While running an experiment in his Boston lab, McKernan used some vials of mRNA Pfizer and Moderna Covid vaccines as controls. He was ‘shocked’ to find that they were allegedly contaminated with tiny fragments of plasmid DNA.McKernan, who has 25 years’ experience in his field, ran the experiment again, confirming that the vials contained up to, in his opinion, 18-70 times more DNA contamination than the legal limits allowed by the European Medicines Agency (EMA) and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). In particular, McKernan was alarmed to find the presence of an SV40 promoter in the Pfizer vaccine vials. This is a sequence that is, ‘…used to drive DNA into the nucleus, especially in gene therapies,’ McKernan explains.

This is something that regulatory agencies around the world have specifically said is not possible with the mRNA vaccines. Knowing that the contamination had not been disclosed by the manufacturers during the regulatory process, McKernan raised the alarm, posting his findings to Twitter (now X) and Substack with a call-out to other scientists to see if they could replicate his findings. Other scientists soon confirmed McKernan’s findings, though the amount of DNA contamination was variable, suggesting inconsistency of vial contents depending on batch lots. One of these scientists was cancer genomics expert Dr Phillip Buckhaults, who is a proponent of the mRNA platform and has received the Pfizer Covid vaccine himself. In September of this year, Dr Buckhaults shared his findings in South Carolina Senate hearing.

‘I’m kind of alarmed about this DNA being in the vaccine – it’s different from RNA, because it can be permanent,’ he told those present. ‘There is a very real hazard,’ he said, that the contaminant DNA fragments will integrate with a person’s genome and become a ‘permanent fixture of the cell’ leading to autoimmune problems and cancers in some people who have had the vaccinations. He also noted that these genome changes can ‘last for generations’. Dr Buckhaults alleges that the presence of high levels of contaminant DNA in the mRNA vaccines ‘may be causing some of the rare but serious side effects, like death from cardiac arrest’. He added, ‘I think this is a real serious regulatory oversight that happened at the federal level.’ Dr Buckhaults’ concerns are shared by McKernan, who presented his findings to the FDA in June.

At the time of writing, McKernan had not received any response from the FDA on the matter. Dr Buckhaults said in the Senate hearing that he had emailed his findings to the FDA, but he had not received a response either. In Australia, the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) maintains that Covid vaccines cannot alter a person’s DNA. A spokesperson for the TGA stated, ‘The mRNA in the vaccines does not enter the nucleus of cells and is not integrated into the human genome. Thus, the mRNA does not cause genetic damage or affect the offspring of vaccinated individuals.’ They also said, ‘All batches of Covid vaccines distributed to Australians have been tested for the presence of contaminants including residual DNA template levels.’

However, a legal case filed in the Australian Federal Court in July of this year alleges that the TGA is not the appropriate regulator of Covid mRNA vaccines because, under the Gene Technology Act (2000) definition, the DNA contamination is a genetically modified organism (GMO). The plaintiff, Victorian doctor and pharmacist Dr Julian Fidge, is seeking an injunction to stop Pfizer and Moderna from distributing their mRNA Covid vaccines because they never obtained a license from the Office of the Gene Technology Regulator (OGTR), which is the agency that oversees all GMO related products. The TGA did not require tests for genotoxicity or carcinogenicity before providing provisional approval and, eventually, full registration of both the Moderna and Pfizer Covid vaccines.

OGTR guidance strongly suggests such tests should be undertaken where there exists a risk of harm to human health. McKernan, who provided expert advice on the case, agrees that the DNA contamination in the mRNA vaccines fits the Australian legal definition of a GMO. But there is also a second component of the mRNA vaccines that fits the definition. That’s the mRNA itself, which is actually modified RNA wrapped in lipid nanoparticles (LNPs). The case argues that this ‘LNP-mod-RNA complex’ falls under the legal definition of a GMO and that, like the DNA contamination, it has the capacity to enter the cell nucleus and integrate into the human genome.

Read more …

 

 

 

 

Hoof

 

 

 

 

Drink my house
https://twitter.com/i/status/1706211277100536040

 

 

PianoElephant

 

 

 

 

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

 

 

 

 

 

Debt Rattle August 31 2023

Aug 312023
 
 August 31, 2023  Posted by at 9:24 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , ,  45 Responses »


Pablo Picasso The Dream 1932

 

• US Headed For ‘Hot War’ With Russia – Tucker Carlson (RT)
• Biden Looks to Prevent Future President From Ending Ukraine War (Antiwar)
• Trump Vows To Lock Up Political Enemies If He Returns To White House (G.)
• Ukraine’s Fate Sealed Long Before Failing Counteroffensive (Scott Ritter)
• Ukraine To Review All Draft Exemptions – Zelensky (RT)
• French Troops Reportedly Given Until September 3 to Withdraw From Niger (Sp.)
• Coup In Gabon, Situation In West Africa A Big Issue For Europe – Borrell (RT)
• EU Imports Of Russian LNG Leap By 40% Since Ukraine Invasion (G.)
• Expanded BRICS Set to De-Dollarize the World, Control Global Energy Supply (ET)
• What if Biden Backs Out of the Race? (RCW)
• Majority of Voters Are Skeptical of Possible Biden Impeachment (Manley)
• Hunter Biden Helped Plan State Dinners During Dad’s VP Days (Sp.)

 

 

 

 

One thing you can not do today is not watch the Tucker Carlson interview. I picked some snippets AND the full interview.

“They can’t lose. They will do anything to win. So how do they do that? They’re not going to do COVID again…They’re going to go to war with Russia is what they’re going to do. There will be a hot war between the United States and Russia within the next year…They need to declare war footing in order to assume war powers in order to win. I believe that and I think all the evidence suggests that’s true.”
https://twitter.com/i/status/1696853567942819962

 

 

 

 

https://twitter.com/i/status/1696842931372429744

 

 

Full interview:

 

 

 

 

Rogan Anthony


https://twitter.com/i/status/1696969298407772388

 

 

Yeadon

 

 

 

 

“..the American empire is in freefall right now – and we’re going to lose the US dollar, and when that happens we’re going to have real poverty here, like Great Depression-level poverty.

And it comes from this war..”

• US Headed For ‘Hot War’ With Russia – Tucker Carlson (RT)

The US proxy war against Russia is likely to become an open war within the next year, former Fox News host Tucker Carlson said on Wednesday. The ruling Democrats need the war to keep power and too many Republicans are willing to go along, he added. “They will do anything to win,” Carlson said in an hour-long interview with radio host Adam Carrolla. He argued that another coronavirus lockdown is unlikely, as too many people would refuse to comply, so “they’re going to go to war with Russia, that’s what they’re going to do.” “There will be a hot war between the US and Russia in the next year,” Carlson said. “I don’t think we’ll win it.” “We’re already at war with Russia, of course, we’re funding their enemies,” he added.

The US has allocated over $130 billion for Kiev over the past 18 months for weapons, military equipment, ammunition, and the salaries of government officials. “I think that could easily happen,” the former cable TV host continued. “I think we could ‘Tonkin Gulf’ our way into it, where all of a sudden missiles land in Poland, ‘The Russians did it! Our NATO ally has been attacked! We’re going to war’! I can see that happening very easily.” In August 1964, the US fabricated an incident with the North Vietnamese navy in the Gulf of Tonkin as a pretext to deploy ground troops in South Vietnam. The scenario Carlson described already happened as well, when a Ukrainian air-defense missile struck a village across the Polish border last November, killing two local civilians.

Warsaw and Washington were quick to debunk Kiev’s claim that it had been a Russian strike, however. Carlson argued that the US could “force a peace in Ukraine tonight” by cutting off Kiev’s funding. “Otherwise, and I would bet my house on it, we are going to war with Russia,” he said. “And, of course, the stakes are everything. Life on the planet. These are the two biggest nuclear arsenals in the world, facing off against each other.” The US has “already lost control of the world – the American empire is in freefall right now – and we’re going to lose the US dollar, and when that happens we’re going to have real poverty here, like Great Depression-level poverty.

And it comes from this war,” Carlson told Carolla. He added that most Americans may not be able to see that, but it’s “super obvious” when one leaves the US, even for a short while. Moreover, he argued, the US “crushed” the German economy “when the Biden administration blew up Nord Stream” last September, and its Ukraine policies have done a lot to undermine Western Europe, Washington’s only real ally in the world. Carlson has just returned from Hungary, where he took part in a conference and interviewed Prime Minister Viktor Orban for his new show on X, formerly Twitter. Carlson made Elon Musk’s social media platform his new home after Fox News canceled his top-rated evening show in April, for reasons that have never been made public.

Read more …

The naked power of Raytheon.

• Biden Looks to Prevent Future President From Ending Ukraine War (Antiwar)

The Biden administration is working to reach a deal with Ukraine for long-term military support to keep backing the war with Russia that would be difficult for a future president to exit, The Wall Street Journal reported on Tuesday. The effort is part of a commitment made by G7 nations at the recent NATO summit in Vilnius to negotiate their own bilateral security deals with Ukraine. Besides the G7 nations, 18 other countries have agreed to provide long-term military support for Kyiv. The idea of the long-term commitment is to show Russia that it can’t wait out the Biden administration. The Journal report reads: “Western officials are looking for ways to lock in pledges of support and limit future governments’ abilities to backtrack, amid fears in European capitals that Donald Trump, if he recaptures the White House, would seek to scale back aid.” Trump, who escalated US involvement in Ukraine during his term by taking the step to provide Javelin missiles, has said he would end the Ukraine war within “24 hours” if elected in 2024.

The former president is the current frontrunner for the Republican nomination. The Journal report acknowledged that the Biden administration could not legally bind a future president from exiting a deal with Ukraine, but Republican hawks in Congress could make it difficult. During his time as president, Trump withdrew from the Iran nuclear deal, but the majority of Republicans in Congress supported exiting the agreement. A US official told the Journal that one proposal being considered for Ukraine would be a memorandum of understanding (MOU), which would not require congressional approval. President Biden has previously floated the idea of an “Israel model” for Ukraine. The US provides Israel with $3.8 billion in military aid each year under a 10-year MOU but does not provide mutual defense guarantees. The Journal report said that French officials have suggested military aid commitments for Ukraine should be over a four-year period.

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“Do you regret not locking [Clinton] up? And if you’re president again, will you lock people up?” Trump said: “The answer is you have no choice, because they’re doing it to us.”

• Trump Vows To Lock Up Political Enemies If He Returns To White House (G.)

Donald Trump says he will lock up his political enemies if he is president again. In an interview on Tuesday, the rightwing broadcaster Glenn Beck raised Trump’s famous campaign-trail vow to “lock up” Hillary Clinton, his opponent in 2016, a promise Trump did not fulfill in office. Beck said: “Do you regret not locking [Clinton] up? And if you’re president again, will you lock people up?” Trump said: “The answer is you have no choice, because they’re doing it to us.” Trump has encouraged the “lock her up” chant against other opponents but he remains in considerable danger of being locked up himself. Under four indictments, he faces 91 criminal charges related to election subversion, retention of classified information and hush-money payments to a adult film star. He denies wrongdoing and claims to be the victim of political persecution. Trials are scheduled next year.

Earlier this month, Politico calculated that Trump faced a maximum of 641 years in jail. After the addition of 13 racketeering and conspiracy charges in Georgia, Forbes upped the total to more than 717 years. Trump is 77. Both sites noted, however, that if convicted, the former president was unlikely to receive maximum sentences. Nor would convictions bar Trump from running for president or being elected. On that score, Trump dominates national and key state polling regarding the Republican presidential nomination. In his Tuesday interview on BlazeTV, Trump also said he “never hit Biden as hard as I could have” while in office. Trump’s first impeachment concerned attempts to find dirt on rivals including Biden, related to politics and business in Ukraine. Now, in Congress, Trump’s Republican allies are threatening to impeach Biden over unsubstantiated allegations connected to his surviving son, Hunter.

Trump told Beck that Biden was behind the indictments against him. In fact, all were brought by prosecutors independent of the White House: 44 by the justice department special counsel Jack Smith, 34 by the Manhattan district attorney, Alvin Bragg, and 13 by Fani Willis, the district attorney of Fulton county, Georgia. Trump also claimed “the woman that I never met, that they accused me of rape, that’s being run by a Democrat, a Democrat operative, and paid for by the Democrat [sic] party”. That was a reference to civil claims brought by E Jean Carroll, a writer who says Trump sexually assaulted her in New York in the 1990s. Earlier this year, Trump was found liable for sexual abuse and defamation and fined about $5m. A second trial is due next year.

The judge in the case has said Trump has been adjudicated a rapist. Also facing investigations of his business affairs, Trump said Democrats and other opponents were “sick people … evil people”. The twice impeached, four times indicted, 91 times charged ex-president also told Beck he “always had such great respect for the office of the president and the presidency”.

Read more …

“..the Ukrainian high command will be confronted with the reality that they will need to order a general retreat to more defensive positions..“

• Ukraine’s Fate Sealed Long Before Failing Counteroffensive (Scott Ritter)

While Ukraine, with the support of its NATO allies, has accrued sufficient military capacity to engage in concerted military operations against Russia since the counteroffensive began in early June, the reality is that this effort is unsustainable. In short, Ukraine has reached the end of its tether. While the tactical situation along the line of contact with Russia fluctuates daily, and Ukraine has been able to achieve some limited success in certain areas, the cost that comes with these successes has been so high that Ukraine lacks not only the ability to exploit these successes, but is in danger of not being able to maintain a military presence along the entirety of the frontline sufficient to hold back any concerted Russian offensive operations.

The heavy casualties suffered by Ukraine, combined with the failure of the counteroffensive to breach even the first line of the prepared Russian defenses, have prompted the Ukrainian army to commit its strategic reserve into the fight. This reserve, consisting of some of the best trained and equipped forces available to the Ukrainians, was meant to exploit the advances made by the initial offensive operations. The fact that the strategic reserve has been committed to achieve objectives that all preceding attacking units had failed to accomplish only underscores the futility of the Ukrainian effort, and the inevitability of its ultimate defeat.

The collapse of Ukrainian military cohesion along the line of contact with Russia is occurring even as the last vestige of the Ukrainian counteroffensive bleeds itself white in the fields of Zaporozhye. Because of battlefield losses suffered by Ukraine in the months leading up to the initiation of the June counteroffensive (mainly, but not exclusively, in the Battle for Artemovsk), Ukrainian forces were stretched thin as units were reshuffled along the front to replace those that had been depleted in battle. As the counteroffensive floundered, military resources were withdrawn from other sectors of the front to make up for the losses.

This thinning of the Ukrainian lines provided opportunities for the Russian forces, leading to major advances in the vicinity of Kupyansk. As Ukrainian losses continue, this thinning will only become more prevalent, creating gaps in the Ukrainian defenses which can be exploited by a Russian military which has upwards of 200,000 well-trained, well-equipped reserves which have yet to be committed into the battle. This cause-effect relationship will continue, since Ukraine has no more reserves available to replace battlefield losses which will continue to accrue all along the line of contact. Eventually, the Ukrainian posture will be unsustainable, and the Ukrainian high command will be confronted with the reality that they will need to order a general retreat to more defensive positions—perhaps as far back as the right bank of the Dnepr River—or face the inevitability of the total destruction of their army.

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“Earlier this week, mobile operator Kievstar mentioned “400,000 heroes” who had “gone to eternity” in a charity drive, before quickly deleting the post.”

• Ukraine To Review All Draft Exemptions – Zelensky (RT)

The National Security and Defense Council (NSDC) of Ukraine decided on Wednesday to review every single draft exemption issued since the start of the conflict with Russia, citing widespread corruption. “All cases where [exemption] decisions are clearly groundless and illegal should be dealt with by law enforcement,” President Vladimir Zelensky announced after the NSDC meeting. The council also decided to fully digitize the entire Armed Forces database and revise the criteria for determining fitness for military service, to prevent “manipulation”and give field commanders more opportunities to find appropriate roles for soldiers. NSDC head Aleksey Danilov said that Ukraine is rolling out a “newly approved” plan for further mobilization, calling up as many men as it may need to continue the fighting.

Zelensky sacked the heads of all enlistment offices in early August, after the Ukrainian Security Service (SBU) announced the discovery of a “widespread conspiracy” to forge health exemptions by military-medical commissions in 11 regions of the country. The conspirators allegedly charged up to $6,000 for fraudulent papers, which draft-dodgers then used to leave the country. The government in Kiev has ordered several waves of conscription since the hostilities with Russia escalated in February 2022. In late June, recruitment centers in several regions stopped sending individual summons, issuing blanket notifications to all men of military age instead.

After Zelensky’s purge of enlistment commissioners, the Financial Times reported that some fraudulent exemptions could cost up to $10,000, and that almost 20,000 Ukrainians have been caught trying to dodge the draft, citing official government figures. The BBC spoke of a widespread social media movement to help the draft-dodgers, with groups with as many as 100,000 members offering tips, tricks and other assistance. Meanwhile, photos posted on social media in recent months have shown cemeteries across Ukraine rapidly filling up, due to the death toll of the grinding offensive against Russian strongholds in the south. Earlier this week, mobile operator Kievstar mentioned “400,000 heroes” who had “gone to eternity” in a charity drive, before quickly deleting the post.

Read more …

Only…They can’t fire at them and give France an excuse to invade..

• French Troops Reportedly Given Until September 3 to Withdraw From Niger (Sp.)

Niger’s National Council for the Safeguard of the Homeland (CNSP) has reportedly demanded the complete withdrawal of French troops from the West African country by September 3. Earlier in the day, Saudi media reported the CNSP had announced the annulment of all security and military agreements with France. By the end of the week, supporters of the pullout are going to stage an indefinite protest against the presence of the French military in Niger. Some residents have reportedly demanded that the authorities cut water and power supply to the French base, as well as halt food deliveries.

Last week, the Nigerien Foreign Ministry called on French Ambassador Sylvain Itte to leave the country within 48 hours. Paris said it took note of Niger’s request to the ambassador, but noted Niger’s military leadership has no authority to make such decisions. On July 26, Niger’s presidential guard ousted and detained President Mohamed Bazoum. The guard’s commander, Gen. Abdourahmane Tchiani, proclaimed himself the president of the caretaker CNSP-led government. Most Western countries as well as ECOWAS condemned it. In early August, ECOWAS adopted a plan for a potential military intervention in Niger.

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“..how we can improve our policy in respect with these countries..”

Decades too late.

• Coup In Gabon, Situation In West Africa A Big Issue For Europe – Borrell (RT)

European Union defense ministers will meet to discuss the situation in the Central African state of Gabon, after soldiers of the former French colony announced earlier that they had assumed control, the bloc’s foreign-policy chief Josep Borrell said on Wednesday. “If this is confirmed, it is another military coup which increases instability in the whole region,” Borrell said, during a meeting of EU defense ministers in the Spanish city of Toledo reported-on by Reuters. A group of Gabonese soldiers appeared on national television in the early hours of Wednesday, saying they had dissolved state institutions and canceled the results of the country’s disputed elections.

The move came after Gabon’s longtime leader, Ali Bongo, was declared the winner of last week’s presidential election, giving him the green light to govern for a third term. The soldiers denounced the “irresponsible, unpredictable governance” of Bongo, claiming his 14 years in office had resulted in a “deterioration in social cohesion that risks leading the country into chaos.” The coup in Gabon is the latest in a series of military takeovers in Africa in recent years, coming just weeks after soldiers seized power in Niger. The new military rulers in Niger, another former French colony, have refused to release ousted President Mohamed Bazoum and restore democratic rule, despite pressure from the 15-nation West African Regional bloc, ECOWAS.

The regional authority has activated a standby force for a military intervention backed by France, which it has threatened to use against the coup leaders in Niamey if diplomatic efforts fail. Mali and Burkina Faso, both military-ruled countries, have warned against armed action directed at their counterparts in Niger. While expressing concern about the situation in Gabon, which has a population of nearly 2.5 million, Borrell stated that coups in other parts of the continent are “a big issue for Europe.” “The whole area, starting with Central African Republic, then Mali, then Burkina Faso, now Niger, maybe Gabon, it’s in a very difficult situation and certainly the [EU] ministers… have to have a deep thought on what is going on there and how we can improve our policy in respect with these countries,” he said.

https://twitter.com/i/status/1697003725531779096

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Ha! Ha! Sanctions.

• EU Imports Of Russian LNG Leap By 40% Since Ukraine Invasion (G.)

EU imports of Russian liquified natural gas (LNG) have increased by 40% since the invasion of Ukraine despite efforts to cut down supplies. Member states have bought more than half of Russia’s LNG on the market in the first seven months of this year, according to analysis of data by Kpler, which tracks marine and tanker traffic. Spain and Belgium, which acts as major gateways for LNG supplies to the bloc, have emerged as the second and third-biggest customers of Russian LNG respectively after China. “EU countries now buy the majority of Russia’s supply, propping up one of the Kremlin’s most important sources of revenue,” said Jonathan Noronha-Gant, a senior fossil fuel campaigner at the anti-corruption group Global Witness, which did the analysis.

Europe’s pipeline gas flows from Russia have fallen to historic lows since the invasion last year as countries wean themselves off it, but to make up for the shortfall shipments of cooled LNG from all over the world, including Russia, have surged and are not subject to any EU sanctions. EU countries bought 22m cubic metres of Russian LNG between January and July 2023, compared with 15m during the same period in 2021, Global Witness said. “Buying Russian gas has the same impact as buying Russian oil. Both fund the war in Ukraine, and every euro means more bloodshed. While European countries decry the war, they’re putting money into Putin’s pockets,” Noronha-Gant said. “These countries should align their actions with their words by banning the trade of Russian LNG that is fuelling both the war and the climate crisis.”

Spain and Belgian said the numbers did not reflect national purchasing but the fact that their ports were major gateways for the rest of the continent. European leaders spent 2022 reducing their reliance on Russian energy and trying to build alternative supplies after the country’s president, Vladimir Putin, closed off the gas taps to Europe. The EU imposed sanctions on imports of Russian oil and coal after Moscow’s forces invaded Ukraine in February last year. It also banned Russian entities from storing gas in the bloc and prohibited most new investments in the Russian energy sector. Fears of winter blackouts led to people in many countries being asked to turn down their heating thermostats by 1C and night-time illumination of public buildings across the bloc, including the Eiffel Tower, was stopped. In some cities street lights were turned off after midnight to save energy.

Read more …

Irreversible.

• Expanded BRICS Set to De-Dollarize the World, Control Global Energy Supply (ET)

“The expansion of BRICS has made it clear that the de-dollarization of the international finance system is inevitable.” This view, from economist William Gumede—who’s also executive chairperson of the Democracy Works Foundation in South Africa—has been echoed around the world since BRICS leaders announced the expansion of the bloc on Aug. 24 at a summit in Johannesburg. Current BRICS members are Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. In January, BRICS—originally established in 2009 to represent the world’s strongest emerging market economies—will add Argentina, Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to its ranks. Mr. Gumede, one of South Africa’s leading academics and thought-leaders, has been researching the potential impacts of de-dollarization since 2014.

He told The Epoch Times the average per capita GDP of the G7 economies was currently six times that of BRICS economies. But, the unexpectedly swift expansion of BRICS would increase the trade bloc’s share of the global economy much faster than earlier predictions. “These forecasts did not take into account that BRICS would expand its membership very quickly. A larger BRICS will mean the world will increasingly use U.S. dollars less,” he said. Mr. Gumede said the bigger BRICS alliance would eventually rival the Group of Seven (G7) large industrial economies of the United States, European Union, United Kingdom, France, Japan, Italy, and Canada, which together are home to 16 percent of the world’s population and account for 62 percent of the global economy.

Welcoming the new members in Johannesburg last week, Brazil’s President Lula da Silva said their addition would mean BRICS would represent 46 percent of the global population and 37 percent of the world GDP. The expansion means BRICS now consists of some of the globe’s largest oil producers: Russia, Saudi Arabia, UAE, and Egypt. Nigeria, another major oil exporter, is set to join when the bloc gets even bigger, probably at its next summit in Russia in 2024. “BRICS is going to dominate the world’s energy supply,” said Mr. Gumede. “The strength of the U.S. dollar is also partially based on the currency as underpinning oil trade—the so-called petrodollar—and members of OPEC settle their accounts in U.S. dollars.

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Look at the phrasing:

“One candidate who is already running, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., would stay in the race, trading on his family name rather than his conspiracy-fueled ideas.”

• What if Biden Backs Out of the Race? (RCW)

President Biden has declared he’s running for a second term, but it’s far from certain he actually will. His infirmity and low poll numbers raise serious doubts. His physical decline shows when he walks or climbs the stairs of Air Force One. His cognitive decline shows when he refuses to hold press conferences or answer even the simplest questions, like how he feels about the devastating fires in Maui. His decline in the public’s estimation shows when pollsters ask Americans how they’re doing. Four out of five answer, “Not good. Not good at all.” Voters also say they don’t want another general election choice like the last one. So many votes in 2020 were negative ones “against the worse candidate,” not in favor of the better one. They don’t want another grudge match between two unpopular candidates.

Biden’s dismal poll numbers form a somber backdrop for his reelection campaign. That backdrop is even darker now that his health problems are so visible. These mounting problems may not prevent him from running, but they do lessen the chances. True, he keeps saying he is running. But, like all politicians, he may be deceiving the public or himself. The biggest “tell” is that Biden is avoiding the very things active candidates do. He’s not campaigning. He’s not attending a lot of small events with big donors. He’s not running ads. He’s not using the White House’s bully pulpit to address the nation on our challenges and his response to them. Still, those signs are not definitive. Biden might be lying low because the Republicans are fighting among themselves. Why get in their way? Better to wait until late autumn to ramp up his campaign.

He might be unsure if he really is running, uncertain if he is up to the arduous task, physically and mentally. Or he might have already decided, privately, that he will not run but is delaying the announcement since it would immediately turn him into a powerless lame duck. At this point, it’s impossible to know what he has decided. He might not know himself. But it is well worth considering the implications if Biden limits himself to one term and waits until late fall or early spring to make the announcement. The first implication is that a late withdrawal favors some Democratic candidates over others. It favors those with high name recognition, existing campaign operations, and the ability to fund expensive national efforts, either from outside donations or their own pockets.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom has already established his campaign-in-waiting and can raise lots of money, especially from big donors in his home state. Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker is a billionaire who can fund his own run and has begun setting up a national team. Michigan’s Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, by contrast, would be several steps behind and would need to raise a lot of money quickly to become a viable candidate. So would Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar, Colorado Gov. Jared Polis, Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, or others who might step into the wide-open race. One candidate who is already running, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., would stay in the race, trading on his family name rather than his conspiracy-fueled ideas.

[..] The second consequence of a Biden withdrawal would be a fight over the future of Kamala Harris. She is the least popular vice president in polling history, and for good reason. Voters think she’s incompetent, inauthentic, and inarticulate, an empty-calorie word salad without any policy achievements. She’s the living embodiment of the “Peter Principle,” where people keep getting promoted until they reach their level of incompetence.

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Given GOP’s track record…

• Majority of Voters Are Skeptical of Possible Biden Impeachment (Manley)

A poll published on Wednesday has revealed that a majority of American voters (56%) see a possible impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden as more of a partisan political stunt than those (38%) who view it as a “serious effort to investigate important problems.” At least 53% of Independents who responded to the poll also agreed that an impeachment inquiry would be more of a political stunt. The poll was conducted by Public Policy Polling and commissioned by the Congressional Integrity Project, both groups of which lean Democrat. Some 37% of those who responded to the poll said they were Democrat, while 32% said they were Republican and 31% said they were Independent. About 88% of Biden voters said an impeachment of the president would be a “partisan political stunt” while just 20% of former US President Donald Trump’s voters said the same. When grouped politically, 81% of Democrats held this view, while 30% of Republicans said the same. Another 73% of Trump voters, and just 7% of Biden backers said the impeachment inquiry would be a “serious effort to investigate important problems.”

The survey then asked respondents whether Republicans should still move to impeach Biden if “no evidence is found” in the investigation. In response, 61% said they should not impeach him, while 32% said they should, and 7% said they were not sure. “MAGA Republicans’ impeachment promises are nothing more than a partisan political stunt designed to hurt President Biden, and the American people know it,” said Leslie Dach, a senior adviser for the Congressional Integrity Project. “Republicans have failed to find a single shred of evidence of wrongdoing by President Biden and voters see right through their partisan games.” A possible impeachment investigation in Biden appears to be on the horizon for Congress as summer comes to a close. Last week, US House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) said he would launch an impeachment inquiry in September should the Biden administration fail to turn over documents he believes are tied to an alleged bribery scheme involving his family.

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Seating his donors…

• Hunter Biden Helped Plan State Dinners During Dad’s VP Days (Sp.)

A number of emails obtained from the US National Archives and Records Administration revealed more than 1,000 emails between the office of then-Vice President Joe Biden and his son Hunter Biden’s advisory firm Rosemont Seneca Partners, America First Legal said in a statement. “We obtained new docs from our lawsuit against the National Archives revealing over 1,000 emails between Rosemont Seneca and the Office of Vice President,” the statement said on Wednesday. “The vast majority of these emails consisted of direct communications between Rosemont Seneca employees, including Hunter Biden, and the Office of the Vice President.”

The emails contradict Joe Biden’s claims that there was a wall between personal and government business, the statement said, underscoring that Hunter Biden was “intimately involved in planning for high-profile White House events” despite lacking any official role. One of the findings revealed that Hunter Biden took part in planning a 2011 luncheon with Chinese officials, arrival ceremony with the then German chancellor, 2012 state dinner with UK dignitaries, 2013 state luncheon with Turkish officials and a state dinner with French officials in 2014. The “Biden name” was used to gain access to the White House for Rosemont Seneca and their associates, the statement said, detailing a December 2013 incident in which a lobbyist “reached out” to Hunter’s business partner for last-minute tickets to a Christmas tour of the White House.

Read more …

 

 

 

 

Sean Penn
https://twitter.com/i/status/1696950646979670408

 

 

 

 

Quail
https://twitter.com/i/status/1696789527984025741

 

 

Octopus

 

 

Cheetah

 

 

 

 

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

 

 

 

 

 

Debt Rattle March 27 2023

Mar 272023
 
 March 27, 2023  Posted by at 8:55 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , ,  50 Responses »


René Magritte The seducer 1953

 

• Us ‘Shoots Itself In Foot’ By Limiting Use Of Dollar – Putin (TASS)
• Russian Economy Will Remain Balanced – Medvedev (RT)
• China Could Be ‘Safe Haven’ Amid Banking Turmoil – Citi (RT)
• China and Russia Top List Of States With Largest Trade Surplus (RT)
• What You Must Know About Russia & China, But Were Afraid To Ask (Lukyanov)
• Seizing Russian Assets Is ‘Challenging’ – EU Task Force Head (RT)
• Russia To Make Three Times More Ammo Than West Promised Kiev – Putin (RT)
• The United States Is 13 Years Behind In Ammunition Production – NYT (Y!)
• Berlin Weans Itself Off Russian Gas To Become US LNG Addict – German MP (RT)
• UN Security Council To Vote On Nord Stream Sabotage Draft Resolution (TASS)
• US Becoming A ‘Banana Republic’ – Trump (RT)
• The Donald Trump Problem (Chris Hedges)
• Global South Solidarity Is The Key To Lifting Up Central America (Blankenship)
• Italians Refuse to ‘Eat Ze Bugs’ (DS)
• Agatha Christie Novels Reworked To Remove Potentially Offensive Language (G.)
• Eminent Oxford Scientist Says Wind Power “Fails on Every Count” (DS)

 

 

 

 

Putin 23 years
https://twitter.com/i/status/1639900503592120320

 

 

 

 

Putin Mariupol

 

 

Mayor

 

 

 

 

Tucker Thorp

 

 

 

 

Macgregor

 

 

Yellen
https://twitter.com/i/status/1639895094471057408

 

 

 

 

“We would use the dollar, but they do not let us..”

• Us ‘Shoots Itself In Foot’ By Limiting Use Of Dollar – Putin (TASS)

The United States does damage to itself by limiting the use of the dollar for situational reasons, Russian President Vladimir Putin said on the Rossiya-24 news channel on Saturday. “They saw off the branch they’re sitting on – I’ve been reiterating that – by limiting the use of the dollar based on momentary, situational considerations of political nature. They are harming themselves, and we might even add, they shoot themselves in the foot,” Putin said in an interview with journalist Pavel Zarubin. According to Putin, the United States’ claims that Russia is encroaching on the dollar are not true. “We would use the dollar, but they do not let us,” he explained. “How can we make payments? In a currency that is acceptable to our partners. The yuan is one of these currencies, especially since it is used by the International Monetary Fund.”


The Russian president emphasized that after the Russian gold and foreign currency reserves were frozen, all the countries in the world have wondered how reliable their US partners are. “And they have come to the conclusion that they are not reliable,” he noted. Putin underlined that Russia’s partners were happy to agree on payments in the yuan. “Do you know that the Middle Eastern oil-producing countries have announced they want to use the yuan for settlements? We will be gradually expanding this and will be expanding [the use] of the reliable currencies,” he said. Putin stated that now the dollar has certain advantages, compared to limitations on other currencies. “However, each country is determined to strengthen its national currency, and all the countries will strive to do so. Therefore, no doubt, it is a big mistake on the part of the US authorities that they restrict settlements in dollars around the world for the countries they do not like for some reason,” the Russian president concluded.

Putin dollar

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“..the EU is increasing its dependence on Beijing much faster than Moscow is..”

• Russian Economy Will Remain Balanced – Medvedev (RT)

Russia’s economy will not be reduced to the defense industry alone, despite the ongoing conflict with Ukraine and Western sanctions, former President Dmitry Medvedev told journalists on Sunday. Imbalances in the economy will not be allowed to develop, he said, adding that the country is unlikely to suffer the fate of the Soviet Union. “There is currently no threat of economic militarization in a way, in which it existed [in the USSR] in the 1970s and 1980s,” Medvedev said. The former president argued that the Soviet Union had given too much priority to the defense industry. To avoid such an imbalance, “priorities just need to be set correctly and major macroeconomic indicators monitored,” he added.

Russia does actually need to boost its defense industry, he admitted, adding that it is necessary to “lay the groundwork for the future” even after the Ukraine conflict ends. However, taking such steps will not affect other economic sectors, he believes. The USSR lacked a market system and also the strong consumer goods sector that modern Russia has, Medvedev said, adding that had the West imposed sanctions against the USSR at that time, “we would have had a hard time.” Now, Russia’s “market does not feel any colossal downturns even despite the sanctions,” the former president said. He particularly lauded Russia’s agriculture sector, saying that not only does it allow Russia to meet its own food supply needs but also enables it to “feed others.”

Russia has also managed to keep national inflation rate lower than in many European nations, Medvedev said. “They instigated this campaign, started to fight us and now some nations have an inflation rate of between 15% and 20%,” he said, noting that inflation in Russia is on track to come in at 6% in March and subsequently drop to 4%. Earlier on Sunday, Russian President Vladimir Putin also highlighted that the EU is increasing its dependence on Beijing much faster than Moscow is. RIA Novosti reported in March that Russia and China also topped the list of nations with the biggest trade surpluses last year.

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One year into increasing sactions, Russia is balanced, China is a safe haven.

• China Could Be ‘Safe Haven’ Amid Banking Turmoil – Citi (RT)

The unfolding banking crisis in the US and Europe, which has shattered investor confidence in the Western financial system, could highlight China as a “relative safe haven,” economists at Citi said in a note seen by CNBC. The Chinese economy could see accelerated expansion this year, giving the country a “hedge” for growth while economies in the US and Europe face heightened risk of financial disruption, according to the note. “We have long been discussing our view that China can be a major growth hedge this year – if anything, recent global banking stresses perhaps have strengthened this thesis,” a team led by Citi’s Chief China economist Xiangrong Yu reportedly stated.

“China could at least be a relative ‘safe haven’ given its growth premium, financial soundness, policy discipline and the new political economy cycle,” the economists argued. They pointed to the recent decision by the People’s Bank of China (PBoC) to cut its reserve requirement ratio (RRR), saying the move showed “reassurance of policy support amid global volatilities.” The regulator reduced the ratio for almost all banks by 25 basis points last week, with the move widely viewed as an attempt of ensuring liquidity in the banking system. “Perhaps taking lessons from what the US has been going through in recent years, the PBoC has been prudent in easing even during the pandemic era and may quickly switch to a wait-and-see mode once growth is back on track,” the analysts wrote.

They also noted the Chinese government’s restructuring earlier this month as part of the effort to ease financial risks. According to CNBC, Citi also expects to see the onshore yuan strengthening against the US dollar as soon as September, which would bring the renminbi to its strongest levels since April last year. “With the unintended and undesirable from aggressive interest rate hikes surfacing abroad, capital inflows into China could resume after they reopen trade if the recovery thesis plays out and political rerating is steadily ongoing,” Citi concluded.

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“Both countries broke their own records in 2022, with China’s trade surplus surging 30% to an all-time high of $877.6 billion..”

• China and Russia Top List Of States With Largest Trade Surplus (RT)

China and Russia became the world leaders in trade surplus last year, according to calculations by RIA Novosti based on data from the national statistical services of both countries. A trade surplus is an indicator of a positive balance of trade, where a country’s exports exceed its imports. Traditionally, by showing that local currency and resource inflow exceeds outflow, a surplus serves as an indicator of a healthy economy. Both countries broke their own records in 2022, with China’s trade surplus surging 30% to an all-time high of $877.6 billion. The country exported approximately $3.59 trillion worth of goods, a growth in export value of about 7% compared to the previous year. Imports, meanwhile, grew by only 1.1%, to roughly $2.72 trillion.

Russia increased its surplus 1.7 times over the year to a record $333.4 billion, claiming the second place among major economies. The country’s total exports reached $591.4 billion, up 19.9% from 2021. The surge was driven by the rise in energy sales, which made up the bulk of Russia’s foreign exports and reached $383.73 billion, a 42.8% year-on-year increase. Imports, however, slid 11.7% against the previous year to $259.1 billion. Analysts attribute the drop in imports to Western sanctions on Russia, combined with Moscow’s efforts toward self-sufficiency and import substitution measures. Saudi Arabia, which posted its highest trade surplus since 2012 at $221.3 billion, ranked third, followed by Norway, Australia and Qatar.

Germany saw its figure drop 2.4 times to $85.34 billion, slipping to the seventh spot from the second place a year earlier. Canada, meanwhile, became the absolute leader in terms of growth, with its number jumping 4.8 times throughout the year, to $17.45 billion. According to the data, the only country that was able to move from a deficit to a surplus in trade at the end of last year was Nigeria. Overall, 26 major economies recorded a surplus in 2022, compared to 32 economies a year earlier. The study was conducted by RIA Novosti on the basis of data from the national statistical services of the globe’s 60 largest economies, which had disclosed trade results for January-December 2022 as of mid-March.

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“..when it comes to preparedness for adverse changes and shocks (let’s call it state endurance), Moscow is probably in the lead, but Beijing’s room for maneuver in global politics is now much greater.”

• What You Must Know About Russia & China, But Were Afraid To Ask (Lukyanov)

So much has been said about Xi Jinping’s visit to Russia last week, that the descriptive genre has been exhausted. What is needed instead is either details on specific aspects or some sort of in-depth socio-cultural analysis. That will no doubt be done by specialists in those areas, so we will confine ourselves here to brief answers to the most frequently asked questions. Are Russia and China allies? Both countries have limited experience of alliances and are not really inclined towards this form of relationship. Such a declaration implies a commitment and, more importantly, a limitation of one’s own interests and capabilities in favor of the other state. If it is reciprocal, it is fine – and can be mutually beneficial – but the dominant attitude in both Chinese and Russian political logic is freedom of action and maximum sovereignty. As a result, both Moscow and Beijing shy away from describing their relationship as an alliance, preferring more fluid phrases. This has happened again. It should be noted, however, that the expressions used by Xi come perhaps as close to the idea of an alliance (as is possible in Chinese culture) without using the term.

Is the relationship equal? The question of equality is largely arbitrary – it is not clear how to measure it. There is no formal hierarchy in relations between Russia and China, and in principle there cannot be such a system. It is difficult to compare the weight. China is, of course, much more powerful economically, and now also in many technological respects. However, Russia is a major military and political power in its own right. Indeed, when it comes to preparedness for adverse changes and shocks (let’s call it state endurance), Moscow is probably in the lead, but Beijing’s room for maneuver in global politics is now much greater.

The question could be posed differently: who needs it more, and who should therefore do more to strengthen ties? At first glance, Russia would seem to need it the most – no matter how well you do, an acute conflict with a group of the world’s most successful and influential states significantly limits your options. Thus, they need to be compensated by other partners which are no less important and therefore able to impose conditions. The most powerful of them all is China. This is true, but there is another side to it. Beijing has finally realized that the time of peaceful and comfortable development is over. It is China that the United States sees as its main adversary for decades to come, and the pressure on it will only increase. Beijing has no more solid and reliable partner than Moscow; there is simply no other candidate. And the importance of such a relationship will continue to grow. Traditional Chinese pragmatism works in our favor.

Putin axis
https://twitter.com/i/status/1639999920391311362

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“..the EU’s “freeze and seize task force..”

• Seizing Russian Assets Is ‘Challenging’ – EU Task Force Head (RT)

The EU working group that deals with the issue of confiscating frozen Russian assets will have to be “innovative” in approaching the task, Swedish diplomat and head of the EU’s “freeze and seize task force,” Anders Ahnlid, told AFP on Friday. According to Ahnlid, “it is a challenge to find legal means that are acceptable” to expropriate the assets in order to use them for the reconstruction of Ukraine, which is the task force’s plan. He noted that precedents for such actions are rare, one of the few being the seizure of Iraqi assets by the US at the end of Saddam Hussein’s regime. “Hopefully, we can achieve results during Sweden’s EU presidency [which ends in June]… But these are complicated matters. There will be short-term and long-term aspects of what we’re doing,” the diplomat warned, adding that his working group will have “to be a bit innovative in order to move forward.”

He noted that the task force is still trying to determine “which assets are we talking about and where are they.” There are two types of assets – state property that belongs to the Russian government and private assets. The former mostly refers to nearly $300 billion in Russia’s foreign currency reserves, which have been frozen by the West. According to Ahnlid, they are easier to seize legally. The latter, however, are much harder to identify and can be seized only in a few cases, for instance when they can be proven to be the proceeds of a crime. The diplomat says the task force may decide not to confiscate these assets permanently, but only seize income or interest on the capital. sAhnlid is not the first to point out the difficulties surrounding the plan to confiscate Russian assets. The Swiss government, for instance, has been opposed to the move, saying last month that it would violate international agreements and Switzerland’s constitution.

US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen has also been openly skeptical, warning that apart from legal obstacles, such a step could be considered a precedent jeopardizing faith in the Western financial system and the dollar. According to her, countries could become reluctant to keep money in US banks, fearing that their funds could be seized as well. Many analysts also point out that the move could put European and American assets at risk, as they could also be in danger of being confiscated in case of an international dispute. Moscow, meanwhile, has repeatedly called the freezing of its assets “theft,” and warned of countermeasures should Western states attempt to take Russian-owned funds and redirect them to Ukraine.

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And you can’t easily ramp that up..

• Russia To Make Three Times More Ammo Than West Promised Kiev – Putin (RT)

Russia is set to drastically increase its munitions production, President Vladimir Putin has said, adding that Western arms shipments to Kiev will only delay the inevitable outcome of the Ukraine conflict. In an interview with Russia 1 TV aired on Saturday, Putin was asked to comment on Western plans to support Ukraine with a million additional artillery shells. While describing the amount as “very considerable,” the president stated that according to Moscow’s data, the US is currently producing 14,000-15,000 artillery shells a month, while the Ukrainian military uses up to 5,000 shells each day. “Next year… [the US plans] to produce as much as 42,000, and 75,000 in 2025.”

However, Putin said that Moscow’s forces have been using far more munitions than Ukraine, and that the Ministry of Defense and the General Staff “even had to introduce certain limitations.” “Russia’s output level and its military-industrial complex are developing at a very fast pace, which was unexpected by many,” he said. While multiple Western countries will provide Ukraine with munitions, “the Russian production sector on its own will produce three times more ammunition for the same period of time,” according to the president. Putin also noted that the Western “instigators” of the conflict plan to send more than 400 tanks to Ukraine.

“The situation here is the same as with the ammunition. During that period, we will produce and modernize over 1,600 [tanks],” he said, adding that the total number will exceed Ukraine’s by more than three times. Putin stated that the arms shipments to Ukraine are of concern to Russia only because they constitute “an attempt to prolong the conflict” and will “only lead to a bigger tragedy and nothing more.” The president’s comments come after former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, who now serves as deputy chairman of the Security Council, stated this week that Moscow has rapidly boosted military production despite the Western sanctions and claims that Russia is running out of weapons.

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Hmmmm, make more or use less?! Their choice is obvious.

• The United States Is 13 Years Behind In Ammunition Production – NYT (Y!)

The United States’ commitment to support Ukraine against the Russian invasion appears to have rattled the stability of the domestic stockpile of missiles and munitions. The Biden administration has promised — as part of $33 billion sent in military aid for the besieged country so far — a US Patriot air-defense system will be sent to Ukraine, along with over 200,000 rounds of artillery, rockets, and tank rounds. In fulfilling those promises, The New York Times reported the US has sent Ukraine so many stockpiled Stinger missiles that it would take 13 years of production at recent capacity levels to replace them. The Times added that Raytheon, the company that helps make Javeline missile systems, said it would take five years at last year’s production rates to replace the number of missiles sent to Ukraine in the last ten months.

Currently, the US produces just over 14,000 rounds of 155mm ammunition every month — and Ukrainian forces have previously fired that many rounds in the span of 48 hours, The Washington Post reported last month. US officials in January proposed a production increase up to 90,000 rounds of 155mm ammunition each month to keep up with demand. “Ammunition availability might be the single most important factor that determines the course of the war in 2023,” US defense experts Michael Kofman and Rob Lee wrote in December for the Foreign Policy Research Institute, adding that Ukraine will depend on international stockpiles and production for access to the ammunition it needs.

The United States has rarely seen production shortages in ammunition and missiles to the degree the country currently faces. While there was a brief precision missile shortage in 2016 following fights in Libya and Iraq, The Times reported, the US has largely been engaged in short-term, high-intensity fights such as the Persian Gulf War, or prolonged, lower-intensity missions like the war in Afghanistan, which allowed for the stockpile to be rebuilt as needed. Now, as tensions rise among global superpowers, production and munition limitations in the US — caused by supply chain shortages, as well as Cold War-era reductions in capacity, The Times reported — have become of grave concern among defense professionals.

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At a much higher cost. Economy driven by ideology. Deadly.

• Berlin Weans Itself Off Russian Gas To Become US LNG Addict – German MP (RT)

The sabotage of the Nord Stream natural gas pipelines has turned Germany’s dependence on Russian natural gas into an addiction to liquefied natural gas (LNG) from the US, a member of the German Bundestag, Andrej Hunko, has said. Germany has paid heavily for last year’s explosions on the pipelines, which were built to deliver cheap natural gas from Russia, The Left party politician told China’s Global Times newspaper in an interview on Thursday. He noted that the sabotage left Berlin without an option to “choose which gas is better and cheaper and which is ecologically better.” “Before, it was a decision under political pressure, whether to use gas or not. But now there is no infrastructure to use gas,” and “this is the biggest impact,” Hunko said.

Germany used to meet up to 40% of its demand with gas from Russia. Last year, Berlin managed to reduce its reliance on the fuel from the sanctioned country by replacing it with imports of LNG from the US, “which is by far more expensive and worse from an ecological point of view,” according to Hunko. The politician said the explosions were an act of an “economic war” targeting not only Germany but the entire EU. The Nord Stream 1 pipeline, which runs under the Baltic Sea and carried natural gas from Russia to Germany, along with the newly built but never used Nord Stream 2, were ruptured by underwater bombs last September, rendering them inoperable. “Who benefits from this? It’s clear. It’s mainly the countries that export the gas to Germany; it is mainly the US,” Hunko said, adding: “this means not only higher prices for gas for the German population, but also a problem for German industry.”

Prior to the conflict in Ukraine, Germany was already experiencing economic difficulties due to a shortage of qualified personnel and muted productivity growth. Skyrocketing energy prices have since dealt a serious blow to the economy which is based on low energy prices and exports, Hunko noted. He warned that the surging cost of energy and raw materials, and the resulting restraints on investment, are forcing some major businesses to leave the country as “it is no longer as interesting for big companies to stay in Germany”. Some businesses have already migrated to the US, the politician said, arguing that this indicates an economic competition between the US, Germany and Europe.

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Provoke US into using its veto power.

• UN Security Council To Vote On Nord Stream Sabotage Draft Resolution (TASS)

The UN Security Council will vote on Monday on a Russian-Chinese draft resolution on an international investigation into the sabotage of the Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 pipelines. Voting is expected to be held after 15:00 (22:00 Moscow time). The text of the draft proposes UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres to establish an international independent commission to conduct a comprehensive, transparent, and impartial investigation of all aspects of the act of sabotage on the Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 gas pipelines, including identifying the perpetrators, sponsors, organizers, and their accomplices. Guterres is expected to appoint experts to this commission. If the resolution is passed, he must make recommendations for its establishment within 30 days.

The document also encourages countries conducting their own investigations to fully collaborate with the commission and share information with it. The document urges these nations to share information with other interested parties as well. Russia prepared the first version of the Nord Stream resolution at the end of February, but did not immediately bring it to a vote, instead inviting Security Council members to discuss the document. Three sets of consultations have been held since. According to TASS sources within the world organization, there is no general agreement on Russia’s suggested document, which means it will most likely not be adopted. A resolution must be backed by at least nine Security Council members in order to be adopted.

Any of the permanent members may veto it, but only if the necessary number of votes is obtained to pass the document. If the resolution receives eight votes and the United States votes against it, it means that the veto was not used. However, if the document receives nine or more votes, voting against it will result in the use of the veto power. “It’s not about the number of votes; it’s about the way they vote,” according to Vasily Nebenzya, Russia’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations. Previously, Western countries claimed that Russia was isolated and did not have the Security Council’s support, because it opposes the UN Security Council’s initiatives on Ukraine, while the rest of the Council’s members either back it or abstain.

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“Justice will only be done once we have thrown this repulsive political class the hell out of office..”

• US Becoming A ‘Banana Republic’ – Trump (RT)

Former President Donald Trump told his supporters on Saturday that President Joe Biden is turning the US into a “banana republic,” and promised to throw the “repulsive political class the hell out of office” if re-elected next year. Trump, who is reportedly facing arrest over campaign finance charges in New York, held his first campaign rally ahead of the 2024 election in Waco, Texas, on Saturday. Speaking to a crowd of several thousand people, Trump reiterated his long-held belief that the charges against him – as well as the prosecution of the January 6, 2021, rioters – are a Democrat-orchestrated plot to keep him out of office and criminalize his supporters.

“The Biden regime’s weaponization of law enforcement against their political opponents is something straight out of the Stalinist Russia horror show,” he declared, calling Biden’s America “a third-world banana republic.” “From the beginning it’s been one witch hunt and phony investigation after another,” Trump asserted, adding “it’s no coincidence that the deep state is coming after me even harder since I pledged to swiftly end the war in Ukraine.” Trump has claimed for months that if elected, he would be able to achieve a settlement to the conflict within 24 hours. He has not elaborated further on how he would achieve this, but has blamed the conflict on “all the warmongers and ‘America Last’ globalists” in the Pentagon, State Department, and other organs of the national security establishment and “deep state.”

“Justice will only be done once we have thrown this repulsive political class the hell out of office,” he told the crowd in Waco on Saturday. Trump made a number of campaign promises at the rally, vowing to boost domestic energy production, phase out imports from China, end funding for “critical race theory and transgender insanity” in schools, and use state, federal, and military resources to “carry out the largest domestic deportation operation in American history.” “Eisenhower did it, so we don’t have to feel so bad,” Trump quipped, referring to the removal of more than a million illegal immigrants by Dwight D. Eisenhower’s administration in the early 1950s under ‘Operation Wetback.’

Trump is currently leading most polls to take the Republican nomination in 2024, with Florida Governor Ron DeSantis in second place by between two and 30 points. While DeSantis has not declared his candidacy, Trump devoted a portion of his speech at Waco to attacking his potential opponent. Referring to DeSantis as “DeSanctimonious,” Trump took credit for the governor’s political career, and condemned him for shutting down his state at the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic.

Read more …

Hedges talks about all the court cases vs Trump, but fails to say what weight they have.

• The Donald Trump Problem (Chris Hedges)

As was the case with Nixon, the most serious charges Trump may face involve his attack on the foundations of the two-party duopoly, especially undermining the peaceable transfer of power from one branch of the duopoly to the other. In Georgia, Trump could face very serious criminal charges with potentially lengthy sentences if convicted, likewise if the federal special prosecutor indicts Trump for unlawful interference in the 2020 election. We won’t know until any indictments are made public. Yet, the most egregious of Trump’s actions while in office either received minimal media coverage, were downplayed or lauded as acts carried out in defense of democracy and the U.S.-led international order.

Why hasn’t Trump been criminally investigated for the act of war he committed against Iran and Iraq when he assassinated Iranian Major General Qassem Soleimani and nine other people with a drone strike in Baghdad airport? Iraqi Prime Minister Adel Abdul-Mahdi condemned the strike and told his parliament that Trump lied in order to get Soleimani exposed in Iraq as part of peace talks between Iraq, Iran and Saudi Arabia. Iraq’s parliament passed a resolution demanding that all foreign troops leave the country, which the U.S. government proceeded to reject. Why not prosecute or impeach Trump for pressuring his secretary of state to lie and say that Iran wasn’t complying with the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, known as the Iran nuclear deal? Trump ultimately fired him and resumed unilateral, devastating and illegal sanctions against Iran, in violation of international law and quite possibly domestic U.S. law.

Why wasn’t Trump impeached for his role in the ongoing attempts to engineer a coup and overthrow the democratically elected president of Venezuela? Trump declared a previously unknown right-wing politician — and would-be coup leader — Juan Guaido to be the true Venezuelan president and then illegally handed him control of the Latin American country’s U.S. bank accounts. The illegal U.S. sanctions that have facilitated this coup attempt have blocked food, medicine and other goods from entering the country and prevented the government from exploiting and exporting its own oil, devastating the economy. Over 40,000 people died between 2017 and 2019 due to the sanctions, according to the Center for Economic and Policy Research. That figure is certainly higher now.

Nixon, like Trump, was not impeached for his worst crimes. He was never charged for directing the CIA to destroy the Chilean economy and back a far-right military coup that overthrew the democratically elected left-wing government of Salvador Allende. Nixon wasn’t brought to justice for his illegal, secret mass bombing campaigns in Cambodia and Laos that killed hundreds of thousands of civilians, and his government’s role in the slaughter of Vietnamese people, resulting in at least 3.8 million killed according to a joint report from Harvard University and the University of Washington and even higher casualties according to investigative journalist Nick Turse. Nixon wasn’t held accountable for what then-President Lyndon Johnson privately blasted as “treason” when he discovered that the yet-to-be-elected Republican candidate for president, and his future National Security Advisor, Henry Kissinger, were deliberately and illegally sabotaging his peace negotiations in Vietnam, ultimately prolonging the war for another four years.

Read more …

China has substantially raised its profile in America’s backyard.

• Global South Solidarity Is The Key To Lifting Up Central America (Blankenship)

Honduran President Xiomara Castro caused a stir in the media when, on March 14, she remarked that she instructed her foreign minister to re-establish diplomatic ties with China. This was met with strong approval in Beijing while Honduran Foreign Minister Enrique Reina reiterated that his nation is seeking “all the mechanisms that the international relationship serves for the interests of the people” and that his nation must “cooperate with the largest nations in the world.” But, of course, the move was met with disgust in Washington, which, through its dated “Monroe Doctrine” that places the Western Hemisphere firmly in the US sphere of influence, sees itself as the overlord of Latin America. For example, US Senator Bill Cassidy said on Twitter that Honduras was moving closer to China “while the world is moving away” and that “the Honduran people will suffer because of [Castro’s] failed leadership.”

To be fair, the US sure knows a thing or two about the suffering of Hondurans and other Central Americans, locking them and their children in cages as they flee destitution to the US. Washington has also orchestrated numerous coups that have devastated the region. At the same time, China has a record of helping Central American nations, including Nicaragua, which recently re-established ties with Beijing. In February, China and Nicaragua agreed to step up their negotiations on a mutually beneficial free trade agreement and to advance the development of bilateral ties. To get a sense of this importance, I spoke to acclaimed American journalist Benjamin Norton at that time, who lives in Nicaragua and has been extensively covering China-Nicaragua ties. He told me that “the trade negotiations between Nicaragua and China are an important step in the deepening of South-South cooperation and the construction of a multipolar world.”

According to Norton, “historically the United States has treated Latin America in general, and Central America in particular, as its colonial property. The US militarily occupied Nicaragua three times and for decades propped up a brutal right-wing military dictatorship which imposed austerity on its population and sent all exports to the US for pennies on the dollar.” Norton noted that in 2018 the US again “sponsored a violent coup attempt against Nicaragua’s democratically elected Sandinista government. When the putsch failed, Washington responded with economic warfare, imposing several rounds of aggressive unilateral sanctions, such as the devastating NICA Act, while pushing for a financial blockade.” He noted that these sanctions are illegal under international law and “have done significant damage to the Nicaraguan economy, hurting working-class Nicaraguans.”

Honduras

Read more …

“It’s fundamental that these flours are not confused with food made in Italy..”

• Italians Refuse to ‘Eat Ze Bugs’ (DS)

Our WEF overlords may want us to ‘eat ze bugs’ and be happy, but Italians are having none of it, as their Government has banned the use of insect flour in pizza and pasta. The Times has more: “The growing use in cooking of flour made from crickets, locusts and insect larvae has met fierce opposition in Italy, where the Government is to ban its use in pizza and pasta and segregate it on supermarket shelves. In a sign of fear that insects might be associated with Italian cuisine, three Government ministers called a press conference in Rome to announce four decrees aimed at a crackdown. “It’s fundamental that these flours are not confused with food made in Italy,” Francesco Lollobrigida, the agriculture minister, said.


Packed with vitamins, proteins and minerals, flour made from crickets is increasingly seen as an ecological way to obtain nutrients, and the market is forecast to reach $3.5 billion by 2029. The EU has already authorised foods made from crickets, locusts and the darkling beetle larva. In January mealworm larvae was added to the list. All four insects are cited in the Italian decrees, which will require any products containing them to be labelled with large lettering and displayed separately from other foods. “Whoever wants to eat these products can, but those who don’t, and I imagine that will be most Italians, will be able to choose,” Lollobrigida said.” When historians look back and wonder what thwarted the Great Reset, perhaps the Italian refusal to ruin their beloved pasta and pizza will be seen as the catalyst.

Read more …

We need something akin to seed banks, where original literature is stored for future generations.

• Agatha Christie Novels Reworked To Remove Potentially Offensive Language (G.)

Several Agatha Christie novels have been edited to remove potentially offensive language, including insults and references to ethnicity. Poirot and Miss Marple mysteries written between 1920 and 1976 have had passages reworked or removed in new editions published by HarperCollins to strip them of language and descriptions that modern audiences find offensive, especially those involving the characters Christie’s protagonists encounter outside the UK. Sensitivity readers had made the edits, which were evident in digital versions of the new editions, including the entire Miss Marple run and selected Poirot novels set to be released or that have been released since 2020, the Telegraph reported.

The updates follow edits made to books by Roald Dahl and Ian Fleming to remove offensive references to gender and race in a bid to preserve their relevance to modern readers. The newspaper reported that the edits cut references to ethnicity, such as describing a character as black, Jewish or gypsy or a female character’s torso as “of black marble” and a judge’s “Indian temper”, and remove terms such as “Oriental” and the N-word. The word “natives” has also been replaced with the word “local”.

Among the examples of changes cited by the Telegraph is the 1937 Poirot novel Death on the Nile, in which the character of Mrs Allerton complains that a group of children are pestering her, saying that “they come back and stare, and stare, and their eyes are simply disgusting, and so are their noses, and I don’t believe I really like children”. This has been stripped down in a new edition to state: “They come back and stare, and stare. And I don’t believe I really like children.”

Read more …

“..the infrastructure around wind and solar will not only fail, “but will cost trillions, trash large portions of the environment and be entirely unnecessary..”

• Eminent Oxford Scientist Says Wind Power “Fails on Every Count” (DS)

It could be argued that the basic arithmetic showing wind power is an economic and societal disaster in the making should be clear to a bright primary school child. Now the Oxford University mathematician and physicist, researcher at CERN and Fellow of Keble College, Emeritus Professor Wade Allison has done the sums. The U.K. is facing the likelihood of a failure in the electricity supply, he concludes. “Wind power fails on every count,” he says, adding that governments are ignoring “overwhelming evidence” of the inadequacies of wind power, “and resorting to bluster rather than reasoned analysis”. Professor Allison’s dire warnings are contained in a short paper recently published by the Global Warming Policy Foundation.

He notes that the energy provided by the Sun is “extremely weak”, which is why it was unable to provide the energy to sustain even a small global population before the Industrial Revolution with an acceptable standard of living. A similar point was made recently in more dramatic fashion by the nuclear physicist Dr. Wallace Manheimer. He argued that the infrastructure around wind and solar will not only fail, “but will cost trillions, trash large portions of the environment and be entirely unnecessary”. In his paper, Allison concentrates on working out the numbers that lie behind the natural fluctuations in the wind. The full workings out are not complicated and can be assessed from the link above. He shows that at a wind speed of 20mph, the power produced by a wind turbine is 600 watts per square metre at full efficiency.

To deliver the same power as the Hinkley Point C nuclear plant – 3,200 million watts – it would require 5.5 million square metres of turbine swept area. It is noted that this should be quite unacceptable to those who care about birds and other environmentalists. Of course, this concern does not seem to have materialised to date. Millions of bats and birds are calculated to be slaughtered by onshore wind turbines every year. Meanwhile, off the coast of Massachusetts, work is about to start on a giant wind farm, complete with permits to harass and likely injure almost a tenth of the population of the rare North Atlantic Right whale. When fluctuations in wind speed are taken into account in Allison’s formula, the performance of wind becomes very much worse. If the wind speed drops by half, the power available falls by a factor of eight.

Almost worse, he notes, if the wind speed doubles, the power delivered goes up eight times, and the turbine has to be turned off for its own protection. For eight days at the end of the month, power generation slumped, presumably, says Allison, because the wind speed halved. The 8.8 GW daily loss over the period was noted to be 1,000 times the capacity of the world largest grid storage battery at Moss Landings in California. When it comes to the enormous batteries needed to store renewable power, Allison notes the problems with safety, as well as mineral shortages. Batteries will never make good the failure of offshore wind farms, even for a week, and he points out they can fail for much longer than that.

Read more …

 

 

 

 

Led by Donkeys
https://twitter.com/i/status/1639689865238306816

 

 

 

 

Sunak
https://twitter.com/i/status/1639966313417261056

 

 

Cybertruck

 

 

Sleep seal
https://twitter.com/i/status/1639979941608542209

 

 

Baby jaguar

 

 

The Big fight
https://twitter.com/i/status/1639940131762077700

 

 

 

 

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Diplomacy Is In Short Supply

Nov 202022
 
 November 20, 2022  Posted by at 2:20 pm Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , ,  9 Responses »


Ivan Aivazovsky Sea channel with lighthouse 1873

 

 

I suggest we have three “pairings” of people. In Russia, there’s Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and his spokeswoman Maria Zakharova. In the US, we have Secretary of State Antony Blinken and White House spokeswoman Karine Jean-Pierre. In the EU, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Josep Borrell. Of course, there’s also President Biden and Putin; the EU has no president, it only has von der Leyen. Likewise, you at times see Russian and American Defense misters, but the EU doesn’t have one of those either. It sort of makes do with Borrell.

For the three pairings, the job titles are different, but these are the people you see talking most when Ukraine is the topic. Certainly Lavrov, but also Zakharova, are diplomats. Blinken and Borrell like to call themselves that, but they are obviously not. The job of a true diplomat is to always leave channels open to talk with everyone, and never condemn or speak ill of, anyone -in public. It’s bad manners. But Blinken is a neocon who’s been cheering on various US invasions for 30 years, and that disqualifies him from diplomacy. As for Jean-Pierre, let’s not even discuss her. We don’t want to insult Zakharova by even trying to make a comparison.

Von der Leyen and Borrell have the disadvantage that their power is not genuine. They have never been elected to their posts, other than by a small group of insiders that are easily controlled. Moreover, the EU has no army, it depends 100% on the US, so independent decisions are out of the question. The EU is talking again about its own army, and even about building its own fighter jet, but each would cost at least 10 years, and thus be useless in the current situation.

Perhaps that’s why Von der Leyen and Borrell talk more, and more aggressively, than the others. But with that talk, along with the sanctions they have made the bloc’s policy, they have brought a lot of misery to the people in their member countries. Of course, they claim this is inevitable, and it’s all Russia’s fault, but that is merely a claim. Just like the idea that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine was totally unprovoked. That practically no country outside the “collective west” think it’s true says a lot.

And the next colossal and fully unnecessary blunder appears to come next week, when the European parliament is poised to declare Russia a “Terrorist State”. What they hope to achieve by that, who knows? Bragging rights? Diplomats don’t do those. Even the US refuses to go there, because “none of these efforts at keeping some kind of potential negotiations open would be possible if the US slapped a ‘terrorist state’ label on Russia.” The ‘terrorist state’ label comes straight from Zelensky, and the EU appears set to still follow him closely. While the US is creating some distance from him. The talk in Turkey last week between the US and Russian intelligence chiefs should not be overlooked. And yes, that’s right, the EU doesn’t have an intelligence chief.

When Zelensky and Poland tried to lure the US into a NATO war against Russia in reaction to the “missile over Poland”, the US for the first time said a firm “NO”. A turning point? It’s the US making clear they will not enter the war. Because as Lidia Misnik wrote: ‘The US Won’t Sacrifice Chicago For Warsaw’ What’s more, as Batiushka said, “In Kiev, Warsaw, the Baltics and in London, they should remember what the Americans did to [Saddam] Hussein and Bin Laden. They are quite capable of doing the same again, pulling the plug on them all.”

 

 

The best thing to do for the EU would be to get rid of both Borrell and von der Leyen, and adopt a less antagonistic and more diplomatic position vs Russia, but that may be hard to achieve, given the power structure in Brussels. Still, there must be a few French and German real diplomats left. But, ironically (?!), the US may not agree. They may want for the EU to continue it’s self-destructive path for a while, at the same time that the US washes its hands clean(er). European pain is American gain in many ways. Just look at EU purchases of weapons and LNG. Once Europe freezes over, this will not be a viable attitude, but for now…until Christmas…

From RT via Azerbaycan:

Borrell’s Ideas Deepen EU Divisions – Moscow

The EU’s policies towards Moscow promoted by foreign policy chief Josep Borrell only deepen the divisions in the bloc, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said on Saturday. Earlier this week, the top EU diplomat proposed six points to serve as guidelines for diplomacy towards Russia amid the Ukraine conflict. Commenting on Borrell’s plans, Zakharova said that while it is “too soon” to speak about what it may entail, Moscow “does not harbor any illusions” about the bloc’s political thinking. “Unfortunately, the ideas which are being sold to EU members by… Borrell do not contain even a hint of the EU’s strategic vision [regarding Russia].”

“They only work to deepen the … divisions in Europe,” the spokeswoman stated, adding that the EU has not proposed any measures to solve the numerous problems in bilateral relations. Revealing his six-point plan, Borrell described the stand-off with Russia as a “geopolitical battle,” and insisted that the EU should, among other things, isolate Russia internationally, hold it accountable for its alleged misdeeds, while cooperating with the bloc’s partners and supporting civil rights groups. While trying to root out any alternative points of view, the EU has fully embraced the idea of isolating Russia, Zakharova said, adding that “this is hopeless and will only impose costs on EU countries and their citizens, who are forced to pay out of their own pockets for the strategic blunders of their politicians.”

“It’s emblematic that most global capitals are not ready to follow … Brussels, which, in its medieval logic, is bringing the world back to the age of schism, high walls, and besieged fortresses,” she said. Her comments come as EU countries face protests over high energy prices and surging costs of living, which have been worsened by the sanctions on Russia. In late October, thousands of Czech citizens rallied in Prague to decry the rampant inflation, while calling on the government to begin direct talks with Moscow over gas imports.

EU member state Hungary has repeatedly spoken out against the sanctions. Earlier this month, Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto claimed that they “have failed” and have only backfired on the EU and damaged the economy. Following the start of Moscow’s military operation in Ukraine in late February, relations between the EU and Russia deteriorated rapidly as Western countries imposed unprecedented sanctions on Moscow. In June, Kremlin Press Secretary Dmitry Peskov claimed that EU-Russian ties had frayed to the point that it would be difficult to damage them any further.

 

 

You can just about watch the EU under the present “leadership” commit hara kiri in real time.

From Zero Hedge:

European Parliament Set To Designate Russia A “Terrorist State”

The European Parliament has prepared a resolution recognizing Russia as a “terrorist state” – to be subject of a vote held during a session in Strasbourg next week, according to a spokesperson’s briefing at a Friday news conference. The largely symbolic resolution was drafted by the center-right European People’s Party (EPP) and cites Russia’s “intimidation and destruction of Ukrainians as a nation,” according a draft previously seen by Euronews. The political blocs Renew Europe and the European Conservatives and Reformists are also said to be backing a formal declaration which could come as early as next Wednesday.

While not legally binding, the resolution can be used for the EU to slap further sanctions on Moscow, and can create momentum for other countries like the UK to adopt the ‘terror state’ label for Russia. However, the UK has so far resisted these calls from some individual British politicians and officials. So far, the Baltic countries of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania have been the first to legally recognize Russia as a terrorist state. The Biden administration has also thus far resisted some isolated Congressional calls to do so, as the Kremlin has warned such a measure would destroy all ties and communications. It would make negotiated settlement in Ukraine almost an impossibility.

So far it’s especially been the Pentagon which has sought to keep an open line of communications. The CIA director William Burns was also in Turkey this week meeting with this Russian intelligence counterpart. But none of these efforts at keeping some kind of potential negotiations open would be possible if the US slapped a ‘terrorist state’ label on Russia. The US is also chiefly interested in pursuing prisoner swaps, with citizens like Brittney Griner now serving long prison sentences.

There are things shifting and moving, especially on the US side. It’s very much the question if that will happen fast enough for the people of Europe, who will be cold, and Ukraine, who will be cold and in the dark..

 

 

 

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Debt Rattle October 30 2022

Oct 302022
 
 October 30, 2022  Posted by at 8:00 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , ,  59 Responses »


Balthus Girl at the window 1955

 

• Americans Support Quick Diplomatic End To War In Ukraine (ReSt)
• ‘Russia Will Lose The Energy Battle,’ Says IEA Chief Fatih Birol (EN)
• Russian Energy ‘Will Never Return’ – IEA (RT)
• US LNG Cannot Replace The Russian Natural Gas That Europe Has Lost (OP)
• Putin: “The Situation Is, To A Certain Extent, Revolutionary” (Escobar)
• ‘Massive’ Drone Attack On Black Sea Fleet – Russia (BBC)
• Russia Suspends Its Participation In Grain Deal (RT)
• British Navy Involved In Nord Stream 2 ‘Terrorist Attack’ – Russia (RT)
• German Bailout Of Struggling Energy Giant May Reach €60 Billion – BBG (RT)
• Orbán Says Hungary Is ‘Exempt’ From The Conflict (Dalos)
• Japan Unveils Massive Spending Package (RT)
• GM “Paused” Ads on Musk’s Twitter (WS)
• Writers, Publishers, Editors Call for Termination of Barrett Book Deal (Turley)
• UN Seeks $4 to 6 Trillion Per Year to Address Climate (Mish)

 

 

“Tough times never last but tough people do.”
~Robert H. Schuller

 

 

 

 

Tucker fair fight

 

 

 

 

 

 

Clare Daly

 

 

 

 

Twitter just reinstated Peter McCullough, but there’s more:

Senator Ron Johnson @SenRonJohnson:
“Hearing Dr. Peter McCullough has been stripped of his medical certifications. On what basis did this occur? He has dedicated his life to saving others. This is outrageous and must be reversed.”

 

 

 

 

You read this, you think: a voice of reason. But they still have to resort to blatant lies: “The poll’s release comes after Vladimir Putin doubled down on Russia’s war in Ukraine by mobilizing reserves and issuing threats to use nuclear weapons after recent gains by the Ukrainian military near the country’s eastern border with Russia.”

Putin mentioned nukes exactly once, and that was long before Ukraine’s “recent gains”. It was also not a threat. It was a statement.

• Americans Support Quick Diplomatic End To War In Ukraine (ReSt)

Nearly 60 percent of Americans would support the United States engaging in diplomatic efforts “as soon as possible” to end the war in Ukraine, even if that means Ukraine having to make concessions to Russia, according to a new poll. The survey, conducted by Data for Progress on behalf of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, also found that a plurality (49 percent) said the Biden administration and Congress have not done enough diplomatically to help end the war (37 percent said they had). The poll’s release comes after Vladimir Putin doubled down on Russia’s war in Ukraine by mobilizing reserves and issuing threats to use nuclear weapons after recent gains by the Ukrainian military near the country’s eastern border with Russia.


Moscow has also recently orchestrated referendums in some Russian-controlled areas of Ukraine on whether citizens there want to secede and become part of the Russian Federation, leading experts to believe that regardless of the outcome, Putin plans to illegally annex parts of Ukraine. The survey also found that 47 percent said they support the continuation of U.S. military aid to Ukraine only if Washington is involved in ongoing diplomacy to end the war, while 41 percent said they would support aid regardless of whether the United States is engaged in negotiations. Just six percent said Russia’s war in Ukraine is among the top three most important issues facing the United States today, with the top three being inflation (46 percent), jobs and the economy (31 percent), and gun violence (26 percent).

Read more …

Fatih Birol has been issuing nonsense for many years. That’s precisely why he’s kept his job all this time.

But it’s very simple: if you have all the “energy”, you cannot lose the battle for it.

• ‘Russia Will Lose The Energy Battle,’ Says IEA Chief Fatih Birol (EN)

Russia will lose the energy battle it is waging against the West, according to Fatih Birol, the executive director of the International Energy Agency (IEA). “Just before the invasion [of Ukraine], about 65% of the Russian total gas exports went to Europe and 55% of the Russian oil export went to Europe,” Birol told Euronews on Friday afternoon. “Europe was by far the largest market, the largest client for Russia, and Russia lost this client forever. The biggest client.” Birol’s comments appeared to refer to the retaliatory action that the European Union has taken in response to the Ukraine war: a near-total oil embargo of Russian gas and a highly expensive push to diversify gas suppliers, mainly through liquefied natural gas (LNG).

Asked if Russia could replace European clients with other regions, Birol said that would not be easy because “a big chunk” of Russian gas originates in Western Siberia and then flows to Europe via pipelines. Building brand-new pipelines to China or India could take up to 10 years, he predicted, and a significant amount of technology and investment. “You are not selling onions in the market, you are selling natural gas. It’s a different business,” Birol said. “So to replace the natural gas exports to Europe with Russia is, in the short term, a pipe dream.” But Russia is not the only country going through troubled times. In his interview with Euronews, recorded at the IEA’s headquarters in Paris, Birol spoke of an international crisis of unprecedented scope and reach, wreaking havoc in all corners of the world.

“We are in the middle of the first truly global energy crisis. Our world has never, ever witnessed an energy crisis with this depth and with this complexity,” he said. “In the 1970s, we had an oil crisis, but it was only oil. Now we have oil, natural gas, coal, electricity. The reason is very simple: Russia, the country that invaded Ukraine, is the largest energy exporter of the world.” Birol described Europe as the “epicentre” of the storm and characterised its decades-long reliance on cheap Russian fuels as a “mistake” at the root of the present crisis. The IEA chief predicted the continent will be able to make it through the upcoming winter with just some “economic and social bruises” and no major damage — but only if the winter “is not too long and not too cold, and if there are no major surprises.”

Birol, however, expressed greater concern about the 2023-2024 winter, citing three key factors: Europe’s absence of Russian gas, China’s economic recovery and tighter conditions in the LNG markets. “In the next few years, we have to be ready [to deal] with volatile and high energy prices and we have to find solutions,” he said. “But to be very frank, this winter is difficult and next winter may be even harder.”

Read more …

More Birol.

• Russian Energy ‘Will Never Return’ – IEA (RT)

Russia may “never” regain its position in the global energy market due to Western sanctions in response to the country’s military operation in Ukraine, the International Energy Agency (IEA) said in its yearly World Energy Outlook, published on Thursday. The events in Ukraine are prompting a wholesale reorientation of global energy trade, leaving Russia with a much diminished position.All Russia’s trade ties with Europe based on fossil fuels had ultimately been undercut by Europe’s net zero ambitions, but […] now the rupture has come with a speed that few imagined possible … Russian fossil fuel exports will never return – in any of our scenarios – to the levels seen in 2021,” the agency said. It predicts that Russian oil and gas revenues will drop by more than half in the coming years, from around $75 billion last year to less than $30 billion in 2030.


Western sanctions prompted Russia, which previously supplied around 20% of the globe’s fossil fuels, to reorient its energy exports toward Asian markets, but according to the IEA the country is unsuccessful in finding markets for all of the flows that previously went to Europe. Longer term prospects are weakened by uncertainties over demand, as well as restricted access to international capital and technologies to develop more challenging fields and LNG projects, the agency explained. Overall, according to the IEA the world is facing a crisis of unprecedented depth and complexity in terms of energy, with a profound reorientation of international energy trade already underway. The agency predicts that the energy crisis is likely to force countries to speed up their energy transition, as solar and wind power, as well as electric vehicles, are deemed less vulnerable to political crises and sanctions than fossil fuels.

Read more …

Not even close.

• US LNG Cannot Replace The Russian Natural Gas That Europe Has Lost (OP)

Europe cannot rely solely on imports of U.S. LNG to offset the pipeline gas supply it will have lost from Russia when it starts rebuilding inventories after the end of this winter, according to BloombergNEF. So far this year, American LNG has been crucial in meeting demand in Europe, which is scrambling for gas supply and willing to pay up for spot deliveries, outbidding most of Asia. The United States is shipping record volumes of LNG to Europe to help EU allies and nearly 70% of all American LNG exports were headed to Europe in September, according to Refinitiv Eikon data cited by Reuters. However, the significant drop in Russian gas supply this year occurred only in June, meaning that Europe could still stock up on some Russian gas earlier this year.

Ahead of the 2023/2024 winter, however, the gap in gas supply in Europe will be much wider without Russian gas. Europe will not be importing much Russian gas—or none at all if Russia cuts off deliveries via the one link left operational via Ukraine and via TurkStream—compared to relatively stable imports from Russia in the first half of this year, before Moscow started gradually cutting volumes via Nord Stream in June until shutting down the pipeline in early September. “The year-on-year increase is not sufficient to offset a total cut in Russian piped supply with under half of these volumes met by LNG increases,” BNEF analyst Arun Toora said.

“The good news is that Russia looks close to having played its last card in terms of gas leverage over Europe. However Europe’s challenges will not disappear with the daffodils next spring,” London-based consultancy Timera Energy said in a winter gas market outlook at the beginning of October. Without most of the Russian gas supply, Europe will likely need to offset around 40 bcm of additional lost Russian flows next year. LNG alone cannot meet this volume, considering a lack of new global liquefaction capacity in the short-term, including in the U.S., limited further demand elasticity in Asia, and European regasification capacity constraints. Therefore, European demand will need to fall, Timera Energy said.

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“Putin in fact did nail where we are: on the edge of a Revolution.”

• Putin: “The Situation Is, To A Certain Extent, Revolutionary” (Escobar)

[..] the heart of the matter at Valdai is its 2022 report, “A World Without Superpowers”. The report’s central thesis – eminently correct – is that “the United States and its allies, in fact, no longer enjoy the status of dominant superpower, but the global infrastructure that serves it is still in place.” Of course all major interconnected issues at the current crossroads were precipitated because” Russia became the first major power which, guided by its own ideas of security and fairness, chose to discard the benefits of ‘global peace’ created by the only superpower.” Well, not exactly “global peace”; rather a Mafia-enforced ethos of “our way or the highway”.

The report quite diplomatically characterizes the freezing of Russia’s gold and foreign currency reserves and the “mop up” of Russia’s property abroad as “Western jurisdictions”, “if necessary”, being “guided by political expediency rather than the law”. That’s in fact outright theft, under the shadow of the “rules-based international order”. The report – optimistically – foresees the advent of a sort of normalized “cold peace” as “the best available solution today” – acknowledging at least this is far from guaranteed, and “will not halt the fundamental rebuilding of the international system on new foundations.” The foundation for evolving multipolarity has in fact been presented by the Russia-China strategic partnership only three weeks before imperially-ordered provocations forced Russia to launch the Special Military Operation (SMO).

The Valdai report duly acknowledges the role of Global South medium-sized powers that “exemplify the democratization of international politics” and may “act as shock absorbers during periods of upheaval.” That’s a direct reference to the role of BRICS+ as key protagonists. On the Big Picture across the chessboard, the analysis tends to get more realistic when it considers that “the triumph of ‘the only true idea’ makes effective dialogue and agreement with supporters of different views and values impossible by definition.” Putin alluded to it several times in his address. There’s no evidence whatsoever the Empire and its vassals will be deviating from their normative, imposed, value-laden unilateralism.

As for world politics beginning to “rapidly return to a state of anarchy built on force”, that’s self-evident: only the Empire of Chaos wants to impose anarchy, as it completely ran out of geopolitical and geoeconomic tools to control rebel nations, apart from the sanctions tsunami. So the report is correct when it identifies that the childish neo-Hegelian “end of history” wet dream in the end hit the wall of History: we’re back to the pattern of large scale conflicts between centers of power. And it’s also a fact that “simply changing the ‘operator’ as it happened in earlier centuries” (as in the US taking over from Britain) “just won’t work.” China might harbor a desire to become the new sheriff, but the Beijing leadership definitely is not interested.

And even if that happened the Hegemon would fiercely prevented it, as “the entire system” remains “under its control (primarily finance and the economy).” So the only way out, once again, is multipolarity – which the report characterizes, rather vaguely, as “a world without superpowers”, still in need of “a system of self-regulation, which implies much greater freedom of action and responsibility for such actions.” Stranger things have happened in History. As it stands, we are plunged deep into the maelstrom of complete collapse. Putin in fact did nail where we are: on the edge of a Revolution.

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“..in recent days, Kyiv has accused Moscow of deliberately delaying the passage of ships, creating a queue of more than 170 vessels.”

How does a massive attack solve this?

• ‘Massive’ Drone Attack On Black Sea Fleet – Russia (BBC)

Russia has accused Ukraine of carrying out a “massive” drone attack on the Black Sea Fleet in the Crimean port city of Sevastopol. The attack began at 04:20 (01:20 GMT) and involved nine aerial and seven marine drones, Russian officials said. At least one warship is said to have been damaged in the strikes. Ukraine has not yet acknowledged the incident. Ukrainian troops have been successfully retaking territory occupied by Russians recently. Russia has replied by launching large-scale attacks on Ukrainian infrastructure, particularly on the country’s energy grid. Mikhail Razvozhaev, the Russian-installed governor of the Sevastopol, said Russia’s navy had repelled the latest attack. The strikes were the “most massive” on the city since Russia launched the invasion of Ukraine in February, Russian state media quoted the governor as saying.

He said that all unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) had been shot down and no “civilian infrastructure” had been damaged. At least one vessel sustained minor damage, the Russian Ministry of Defence said. “In the course of repelling a terrorist attack on the outer roadstead of Sevastopol, the use of naval weapons and naval aviation of the Black Sea Fleet destroyed four marine unmanned vehicles, three more devices were destroyed on the internal roadstead,” a statement from the ministry read. Russia also claimed the ships targeted on Saturday morning were involved in ensuring the “grain corridor” as part of the international initiative to export agricultural products from Ukrainian ports.

The agreement, brokered by the UN and Turkey, allowed Ukraine to resume its Black Sea grain exports, which had been blocked when Russia invaded the country. It was personally negotiated by the UN secretary general and celebrated as a major diplomatic victory that helped ease a global food crisis. But Russia complains that its own exports are still hindered, and has previously suggested it might not renew the deal. In recent days, Kyiv has accused Moscow of deliberately delaying the passage of ships, creating a queue of more than 170 vessels.

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“Russia “is suspending its participation in the implementation of agreements on the export of agricultural products from Ukrainian ports..“

• Russia Suspends Its Participation In Grain Deal (RT)

Moscow has halted its compliance with a grain deal with Kiev, brokered by the UN and Türkiye, after Ukraine launched a major drone attack on ships involved in securing safe passage for agricultural cargo, the Russian Defense Ministry announced on Saturday.In a post on its Telegram channel, the ministry said Russia “is suspending its participation in the implementation of agreements on the export of agricultural products from Ukrainian ports”. It explained that the move was prompted by “a terror attack” against the ships of the Black Sea Fleet and civilian vessels involved in ensuring the security of the grain corridor. The ministry also alleged that the bombing was organized with the involvement of British military.

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Still no investigation results. Top secret.

• British Navy Involved In Nord Stream 2 ‘Terrorist Attack’ – Russia (RT)

Britain’s Royal Navy played a part in orchestrating and staging the sabotage of the Nord Stream gas pipelines in the Baltic Sea, the Russian Defense Ministry said on Saturday. The accusation follows the Russian Foreign Ministry’s claim that NATO conducted a military exercise during the summer, close to the location where the undersea explosions occurred. Writing on its official Telegram channel, the ministry alleged that Royal Navy operatives “took part in planning, supporting and implementing” a “terrorist attack” to blow up the gas pipelines on September 26. According to the Defense Ministry, the same British operatives were involved in the training of Ukrainian military personnel who recently attacked ships of Russia’s Black Sea fleet, which were implementing a grain deal between Russia and Ukraine, brokered by the UN and Türkiye.

The pipelines, which were built to deliver Russian natural gas directly to Germany, abruptly lost pressure on September 26, following a series of underwater explosions off the Danish island of Bornholm. Both Western countries and Russia sounded the alarm about the incident, with Moscow denouncing it as a terrorist attack and calling for an investigation into the matter. In late September, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova noted that this summer, NATO conducted military drills not far from Bornholm, which featured intensive use of “deep-sea equipment’’. Earlier this month the Wall Street Journal, citing German officials familiar with the investigation, reported that the blasts which damaged the pipelines were caused by sabotage.

While the officials stopped short of naming the culprit, they were said to be “working under the assumption that Russia was behind the blasts.” Moscow has repeatedly denied that it had anything to do with the incident. Meanwhile, Sky News has cited a UK defense official as saying Nord Stream 1 and 2 could have been damaged by a remotely detonated underwater explosive device. At the time, the broadcaster said the pipelines might have been breached by mines lowered to the seabed, or explosives dropped from a boat or planted by an undersea drone.

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At some point, someone will say that is an awful lot of money to keep a bunch of neo-nazis in power.

• German Bailout Of Struggling Energy Giant May Reach €60 Billion – BBG (RT)

Berlin is getting ready to boost financial aid to Uniper, the country’s largest gas supplier, which has been brought to the brink of insolvency due to rising energy prices, Bloomberg reported citing sources familiar with the matter. According to the report, the government may up the aid to €60 billion ($60 billion). The plan comes as the company’s financial situation is quickly worsening due to growing wholesale gas prices prompted by diminishing flows from Russia. Uniper’s adjusted net loss for the first nine months of the year reportedly amounted to €3.2 billion ($3.2 billion). And if gas prices do not subside, which is unlikely due to the approaching winter and the subsequent growth in demand, the government will have to spend twice as much to bail out the energy giant than previously expected.

German authorities announced plans to nationalize Uniper last month as part of efforts to keep the energy industry afloat amid the crisis. Uniper has been promised around €31 billion in aid from Berlin’s €200 billion energy aid package. In exchange, the government will acquire a 98.5% stake in the firm, which effectively means its full nationalization. The law cementing the deal is reportedly scheduled to be confirmed by the German Senate on Friday, and the funds could be transferred to Uniper next week, Bloomberg sources said. In an interview with Bloomberg, German Deputy Finance Minister Florian Toncar said Berlin will do all in its power to ensure Uniper remains operational but did not comment on the size of the aid.

“Uniper is a crucial company for the gas supply in Germany, otherwise we wouldn’t jump to such high stakes,” he was cited as saying. While European benchmark gas futures have fallen about 70% from their August highs on nearly full storage and liquefied natural gas (LNG) deliveries, gas prices remain around three times higher than the five-year average. According to Uniper, the company is forced to pay much more for gas now than it did for the pipeline supplies from Russia.

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The Guardian found an anti-Orban Hungarian.

• Orbán Says Hungary Is ‘Exempt’ From The Conflict (Dalos)

The invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022 will go down in the annals of European history. Russia’s undeclared war has cast an almost apocalyptic shadow. And it has dramatically altered the relationships that had prevailed between east and west since the collapse of the USSR. Whenever or however this armed conflict ends, it will undoubtedly take a long time for a new peace-guaranteeing equilibrium to be established. At the very least, the European Union and Nato now have to reckon with a hostile power on their borders and to prepare for a new phase of the cold war. Hungarians voted in general elections just weeks after the invasion, in April, and it seems reasonable to assume that the war next door had an influence on the result.

Given the climate of fear that the devastating “special military operation” created, Hungarians voted to keep Viktor Orbán’s Fidesz in power rather than risk an untested six-party coalition. This assumption also underlies Orbán’s response, which is to stay out of the conflict to the point of being “exempted”, a position that has been condemned as a betrayal by Hungary’s western allies. Hungary refuses to allow arms shipments destined for Kyiv to transit Hungarian territory and blocks the extension of EU sanctions against Russia to the energy sector. This latter stance is intended to enable an already controversial Russian-Hungarian project to build a nuclear power plant on the Danube (Paks II) to go ahead unaltered. The exemption clearly goes too far, even if Hungary does have special interests that merit consideration.

It has a 136km (84-mile) border with Ukraine and there are roughly 150,000 ethnic Hungarians living in the Transcarpathian oblast in south-west Ukraine, many of them married to Ukrainians. It should be remembered that, while in purely geographical terms, Hungary stayed the same after 1989: the former Hungarian People’s Republic now borders five countries that owe their statehood to the end of the USSR and the dissolution of larger, multi-ethnic entities. To the south, the collapse of the former Yugoslavia led to the creation of Serbia, Croatia and Slovenia. Its northern border is no longer with the former Czechoslovak Socialist Republic but with Republic of Slovakia and independent Ukraine. What now connects most of these newer political entities with Hungary, and indeed its old neighbours, Romania and Austria, is EU membership.

Serbia is on the waiting list, Ukraine has been awarded candidate status. But in the 1990s, all these countries made the transition to parliamentary democracy, during which the rivalries between the various political groups played out openly and, not infrequently, violently. Every twist and turn and every internal conflict in these republics still affects Hungary’s interests because of the Hungarian minorities living there: 1.5 million in Romania, 500,000 in Slovakia, 300,000 in Serbia, 16,000 in Croatia, 15,000 in Slovenia and 150,000 in Ukraine.

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Japanese govt bonds are bought by the BOJ AND the citizens. A closed loop.

• Japan Unveils Massive Spending Package (RT)

The Japanese government has announced an economic package worth around 39 trillion yen (nearly $270 billion) to support the economy amid rising inflation and a weakening national currency, broadcaster NHK reported on Friday. The package includes local and central government spending, and is “aimed at overcoming rising prices and reviving the economy… to protect people’s livelihoods and businesses,” Prime Minister Fumio Kishida told reporters in Tokyo. The government plans to lower utility bills to help households save an equivalent of $19 a month on electricity and $6 a month on gas, according to Kyodo News.


Inflation in Japan has seen its sharpest increase in 40 years, with core consumer prices in Tokyo, a leading indicator of nationwide figures, rising 3.4% in October from a year earlier, according to official figures. The increase has been attributed to rising energy, raw material and food prices amid the economic fallout of the conflict between Russia and Ukraine, as well as other factors, the Kyodo News said. The Bank of Japan, however, has been swimming against the global current of increasing interest rates as it kept its short-term interest rate at -0.1% on Friday. Last week, the Japanese yen fell to its weakest level against the dollar since August 1990, having lost more than a fifth of its value against the greenback this year alone.

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“..Twitter, is owned as of yesterday by the CEO and largest shareholder of Tesla. And the automakers that compete with Tesla, and are getting their clocks cleaned by Tesla, are now finding themselves advertising on Elon Musk’s platform.”

• GM “Paused” Ads on Musk’s Twitter (WS)

Automakers spend lavishly on advertising, and they advertise heavily in the social media. But now, one of the social media platforms, Twitter, is owned as of yesterday by the CEO and largest shareholder of Tesla. And the automakers that compete with Tesla, and are getting their clocks cleaned by Tesla, are now finding themselves advertising on Elon Musk’s platform. And when you think about it, that’s kind of a hoot. No one likes to advertise on a competitor’s platform, for all sorts of reasons, but particularly because on a social-media platform, the competitor gathers the consumer tracking data and can get important insights into current and potential customers and their reactions to the products and ads – without even passing on those insights to the automaker.

Advertising on a competitor’s social media platform is a particular problem because of the vast amount of user data that those platforms collect – data on your customers and potential customers that you may actually not see yourself, unless the platform decides to share it with you. General Motors is the first automaker out the gate: It announced on the first day after Musk closed the acquisition of Twitter that it “paused” its paid advertising on Twitter. “We are engaging with Twitter to understand the direction of the platform under their new ownership. As is normal course of business with a significant change in a media platform, we have temporarily paused our paid advertising. Our customer care interactions on Twitter will continue,” GM said in a statement emailed to CNBC.

Stellantis, which owns the Chrysler, Dodge, Jeep, and Ram brands, among a bunch of other brands, tweeted this morning via its Citroën account, pointing specifically at the issue: “Hello to the social media platform owned by one of our competitors.” This isn’t about advertisers’ concerns, if any, with Musk’s potential content moderation policies. Musk already tried to soothe those fears with his open letter, addressed to advertisers, that was suddenly full of lovey-dovey language, posted on Twitter, of course. “In addition to adhering to the laws of the land, our platform must be warm and welcoming to all.” And he said, “I very much believe that advertising, when done right, can delight, entertain, and inform you.” And he said, “Twitter aspires to be the most respected advertising platform in the world that strengthens your brand and grows your enterprise.”

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“The focus of the letter is the fact that Barrett voted with the majority in the Dobbs decision to overturn Roe v. Wade.”

• Writers, Publishers, Editors Call for Termination of Barrett Book Deal (Turley)

We have been discussing the rising support for censorship on the left in the last few years. Silencing opposing views has become an article of faith for many on the left, including leading Democratic leaders from President Joe Biden to former President Barack Obama. What is most distressing is how many journalists and writers have joined the call for censorship. However, even with this growing movement, the letter of hundreds of “literary figures” this week to Penguin Random House is chilling. The editors and writers call on the company to rescind a book deal with Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett because they disagree with her judicial philosophy. After all, why burn books when you can simply ban them?

The public letter entitled “We Dissent” makes the usual absurd protestation that, just because we are seeking to ban books of those with opposing views, we still “care deeply about freedom of speech.” They simply justify their anti-free speech position by insisting that any harm “in the form of censorship” is less than “the form of assault on inalienable human rights” in opposing abortion or other constitutional rights. Yet, the letter is not simply dangerous. It is perfectly delusional. While calling for the book to be blocked, the writers bizarrely insist “we are not calling for censorship.” While the letter has been described as signed by “literary figures,” it actually contains many who are loosely connected to the “broader literary community” like “Philip Tuley, Imam” and “Barbara Hirsch, Avid reader.” It also includes many who are simply identified by initials or first names like “Leslie” without any stated connection.

Nevertheless, there are many editors and publishing figures who list their companies (including HarperCollins, Random House and other companies) and university presses (including Cambridge, Harvard, Michigan Northwestern, Oxford) with their titles in calling for censorship. The list speaks loudly to why dissenting or conservative authors find it more difficult to publish today. These are editors who are publicly calling for banning the publication of those who hold opposing views from their own. It also includes academics like Ignacio Leopoldo Götz Römer, Stessin Distinguished Professor Emeritus, New College of Hofstra University and Carole DeSanti, Elizabeth Drew Professor of English Language and Literature, Smith College (and former VP and Exec Ed, PenguinRandomHouse).

The focus of the letter is the fact that Barrett voted with the majority in the Dobbs decision to overturn Roe v. Wade. Barrett has been the singled out in the past due to her judicial philosophy (which is shared by many federal judges and millions of citizens). Her home has been targeted and activists have published school information on her young children. Recently, Rhodes College alumni sought to strip references to Barrett from the college because they disagree with her views. Her college sorority was even forced to apologize for simply congratulating her for being one of a handful of women to be nominated to the high court. No attack appears to be beyond the pale for media or the left. Barrett sat through days of such baseless attacks on her character, but even had to face attacks referencing her children. Ibram X. Kendi, the director of the Center for Antiracist Research at Boston University, claimed that her adoption of two Haitian children raised the image of a “white colonizer” and suggested that the children were little more than props for their mother.

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We’re rich!

• UN Seeks $4 to 6 Trillion Per Year to Address Climate (Mish)

The Guardian reports UN finds ‘no credible pathway to 1.5C in place’: “The UN environment report analysed the gap between the CO2 cuts pledged by countries and the cuts needed to limit any rise in global temperature to 1.5C, the internationally agreed target. Progress has been “woefully inadequate” it concluded. Current pledges for action by 2030, if delivered in full, would mean a rise in global heating of about 2.5C and catastrophic extreme weather around the world. A rise of 1C to date has caused climate disasters in countries from Pakistan to Puerto Rico. If the long-term pledges by countries to hit net zero emissions by 2050 were delivered, global temperature would rise by 1.8C. But the glacial pace of action means meeting even this temperature limit was not credible, the UN report said. A study published this week found “large consensus” across all published research that new oil and gas fields are “incompatible” with the 1.5C target.”

What Would It Cost? Hooray! Only $4 trillion to 6 trillion per year. “A global transformation from a heavily fossil fuel- and unsustainable land use-dependent economy to a low-carbon economy is expected to require investments of at least US$4–6 trillion a year,” stated the UN report (page 26 of 132).
Q: US$4–6 trillion a year for how many years?
A: Based on figure ES.6 (lead chart) least eight years.
Q: What Percent of GDP?
A: 4 to 9 percent for developing countries, and 2 to 4 percent for developed countries. And developing countries will gladly fork over up to 9 percent of GDP every year for eight years. Yeah, right. Meanwhile, the EU is burning more trees and coal. Burning trees is magically deemed environmentally neutral.

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Elephant drum
https://twitter.com/i/status/1586018731385397248

 

 

 

 

Steller’s sea eagle
https://twitter.com/i/status/1586251819071590400

 

 

 

 

Good boi

 

 

 

 

Lyrebird

 

 

 

 

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