Aug 102024
 


Vincent van Gogh Café, le soir, Arles 1888

 

The American Police State Has Murdered the Constitution (Paul Craig Roberts)
‘Free Speech Is An Illusion In The US’ – Tara Reade (RT)
Special Counsel Jack Smith is No Longer in a Hurry (Turley)
Harris’s Big Gift To Trump… If He Uses It (Victor Davis Hanson)
US Hypocrisy on Full Display In Dubious FARA Claims Against Scott Ritter (Sp.)
Maduro Bans X (RT)
Serbian President Says He Received Coup Warning From Russia (RT)
Pentagon Refuses To Rule Out Strikes On Moscow (ZH)
Kiev Regime’s Terrorism Shows Russia Must Go All The Way (SCF)
Putin Relies on Reason which the West Has Abandoned (Paul Craig Roberts)
Mexico Responds To Ukraine’s Request To Arrest Putin (RT)
Australia Being Turned Into ‘51st US state’ – ex-PM Keating (RT)
Third Year of Record Coral Increase on the Great Barrier Reef (DS)

 

 

 

 

Walz Pelosi

 

 

New president

 

 

Trump=energy
https://twitter.com/i/status/1821717762890186925

 

 

Macgregor
https://twitter.com/i/status/1821987048129229051

 

 

 

 

“I have already noticed that alternative news websites are pulling in their horns. Soon we will know nothing.”

The American Police State Has Murdered the Constitution (Paul Craig Roberts)

An American, even a former US Marine and UN weapons inspector, who takes issue with official explanations dear to Washington’s heart, will be accused, as Scott Ritter is, of manipulating the American public “on behalf of the Russian government.” In other words free speech, especially if it is true, is now effectively criminalized despite its Constitutional protection. For many years it has been impossible for many truths to be stated in the print and TV media. The official stories of 9/11, “Covid pandemic,” “Covid vaccine,” Washington’s invasions of Afghanistan and the Middle East, immigration, Israel’s takeover of Palestine, the conflict in Ukraine and others are off limits to skepticism. The alternative Internet media is the only source of information, and now it is being closed down by police state intimidation of Tulsi Gabbard and Scott Ritter and by the destruction of the website Vdare.

The assaults on Donald Trump shows us that not even a President in office is secure from fantastic police state charges. Try to imagine what it means that a New York state judge has set a September date for sentencing the Republican nominee for President seven weeks before the election. Here is real election interference, whereas Trump is being sentenced for interfering in an election by allegedly misreporting a business expense. That such total nonsense can occur in an American court with complicity of an American jury proves that the rule of law is dead and buried in America. Now it has gone beyond the law. It is the Constitution itself that is brushed aside in Washington’s fanatical determination to protect its lies. I have already noticed that alternative news websites are pulling in their horns. Soon we will know nothing.

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“We have the illusion of free speech. We have that illusion of a right to travel. But in reality, it is only allowed if we say what the US wants people to say, otherwise you are at risk..”

‘Free Speech Is An Illusion In The US’ – Tara Reade (RT)

You’re only free to speak your mind in the US if you are saying what the authorities want you to say, RT contributor and former aide to Joe Biden, Tara Reade, has claimed. Reade appeared live on RT on Thursday to comment on the search carried out by federal agents and state police at the home of former US Marine and UN weapons inspector Scott Ritter in New York state on Wednesday. She and Ritter, who is now a journalist, had both been invited to speak at the 27th St. Petersburg International Economic Forum (SPIEF) in June, but “unfortunately the federal agents took him off the plane and confiscated his passport,” Reade recalled. She said Ritter’s passport was never returned to him by the US authorities. “Usually, that indicates that someone is under investigation because they take away your passport,” she said.

The government in Washington has been “going after Scott Ritter for years” since “he spoke out against the war in Iraq and revealed that… the US government lied about the weapons of mass destruction,” the former Biden aide claimed. The persecution of the journalist and commentator – whose views on the conflict between Russia and Ukraine, as well as Israel’s war in Gaza, contrast sharply with those of the White House – is “just a pattern of what you are seeing in the US, which is the surveillance state and authoritative government,” she argued. “We have the illusion of free speech. We have that illusion of a right to travel. But in reality, it is only allowed if we say what the US wants people to say, otherwise you are at risk,” Reade said. She also suggested that, since Kamala Harris replaced Joe Biden as the Democratic presidential candidate last month, the party is “going back to the old Russiagate hysteria.”

Ritter, who is also an RT contributor, described the search of his property as an “act of intimidation” against him. The authorities appear to be “primarily concerned” about his “relationship” with RT and the news agency Sputnik, the journalist said in a video message on Telegram on Thursday. The 61-year-old revealed that FBI agents blamed him for working “on behalf of the Russian government” to manipulate the opinions of the American public. Ritter rejected those accusations as “absurd in the extreme.” He insisted that he was “doing nothing wrong,” and was just “an American citizen, holding my government accountable and exercising the rights given to me by the Constitution.”

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“..a neck-breaking change of direction..”

Special Counsel Jack Smith is No Longer in a Hurry (Turley)

For over a year, Special Counsel Jack Smith has made one element the overriding priority in his prosecution of former president Donald Trump: speed. Smith repeatedly moved to curtail Trump’s appellate rights and demand expedited appeals to try to secure a conviction before the election. In that effort, he found an equally motivated judge in U.S. District Judge Tanya S. Chutkan, who virtually turned her court into a rocket docket to try Trump. Now, in a neck-breaking change of direction, Smith is trying to slow down Chutkan who appears again ready to pull out the stops in this case. After the mandate in the case was returned to her, Judge Chutkan immediately resumed her high-speed scheduling to look at the pre-trial issues after the Court reversed her earlier rulings on the basis of presidential immunity. The past problem with a court making speed the priority is that it does not allow much time to create a record.

The remand will now require Judge Chutkan to do so on the question of what charges and evidence may be barred under the ruling in Trump v. United States. As it has in the past, the Court adopted a three-tiered approach to presidential powers based on the source of a presidential action. Chief Justice John Roberts cited Youngstown Sheet and Tube Co. v. Sawyer, in which the court ruled against President Harry Truman’s takeover of steel mills. In his famous concurrence to Youngstown, Justice Robert Jackson broke down the balance of executive and legislative authority between three types of actions. In the first, a president acts with express or implied authority from Congress. In the second, he acts where Congress is silent (“the zone of twilight” area). In the third, the president acts in defiance of Congress.

In this decision, the Court adopted a similar sliding scale. It held that presidents enjoy absolute immunity for actions that fall within their “exclusive sphere of constitutional authority” while they enjoy presumptive immunity for other official acts. They do not enjoy immunity for unofficial or private actions. Only hours after receiving the mandate, Judge Chutkin scheduled an Aug. 16 conference to lay out the schedule and issues going forward. The former version of Jack Smith would have been delighted. He did not even see the need for the right for an en banc appeal in previously pushing for a pre-election trial. Now, however, Smith is telling Judge Chutkin to slow down already. Smith told the court that “The Government continues to assess the new precedent set forth last month in the Supreme Court’s decision in Trump v. United States. Although those consultations are well underway, the Government has not finalized its position on the most appropriate schedule for the parties to brief issues related to the decision.”

He has asked for a three-week delay to further consider what he wants to do. It is not clear if the press and pundits will now charge Smith with “slow walking” the case. The question is whether Smith is considering a drastic move in light of the calendar and the ruling. There is, of course, always the possibility that he either throws in the towel or opts for a post-election trial. That would certainly go against the grain of Smith, who has always pushed both the law and the calendar to the breaking point. However, as some of us have been arguing for months, he may no longer view a trial as a plausible objective. There is also the possibility that Smith will do something that some of us have discussed over the last year: pare down his case. Smith has always been undone by his appetite. As shown in his 8-0 reversal in his conviction of former Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell, Smith has rarely shown moderation as a prosecutor.

His overloaded criminal complaints created this disaster for his team. In Florida, Smith unwisely loaded up the prosecution with controversial charges on the retention of classified material. It not only triggered difficult challenges but slowed the case to a crawl as the parties dealt with classification laws. Had he proceeded solely on obstruction charges, he might have secured his trial before the election (and before the recent ruling on immunity). Even if the reduced case was heard by the Court on immunity, an obstruction case would have been far stronger for Smith.

The same is true with the D.C. case. Smith loaded up the case to raise the January 6th speech and other issues. Most were unnecessary, but Smith used his press conference to denounce the January 6th riot. A three-week delay will give Smith ample time (in addition to the weeks following the Supreme Court decision) to deliberate. However, it will take roughly a month off the calendar for just internal debate with the election only three months away. So, even with a judge who appears chomping at the bit to resume the fast track to trial, Smith now wants more time. Even before this request, it was hard to see how a trial could be held before the election. Now it seems a virtual certainty that any trial will have to await the results of the election. As I wrote in 2023, the odds were against a federal trial before the election, which would convert the voters into the largest jury in history.

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“..was Harris terrified of leftwing threats from her base that a Shapiro pick would guarantee her 1968-like riots at her Chicago convention?”

Harris’s Big Gift To Trump… If He Uses It (Victor Davis Hanson)

Harris’s selection of Walz at least reveals the left’s full-bore agenda, something that previously her handlers seemed at pains to hide: an overt doubling down on the Biden neo-socialist record that will require a far more vigorous stealth 90-day campaign to camouflage the hard-left record of both Harris and Walz. Minnesota under Walz became merely a smaller version of Gavin Newsom’s California – shameless woke pandering, wars against fossil fuels, fiscal nihilism, thousands fleeing the state, high crime, high taxes, poor services, sanctuary city/pro-illegal alien activism, eroding downtowns of once majestic cities, loud-in-your-face, attack-dog denials of reality, a two-tier state legal system, tolerance of BLM/Antifa/Hamas street violence, and on and on. So Walz is a force multiplier of Harris’s vulnerabilities.

His selection (was Harris terrified of leftwing threats from her base that a Shapiro pick would guarantee her 1968-like riots at her Chicago convention?) did not just reveal the now overt anti-Semitic, anti-Israel nature of the Democratic Party (Shapiro would have likely ensured Pennsylvania’s electoral votes). Her pick also reveals the confidence that the Left has in winning what will be the most flagrant, bait-and-switch 90-day campaign in presidential history. So, the real Harris-Walz campaign messaging will be: ‘In 2024 we have to lie and mislead you about who we are and what we did, so that in 2025 we can govern you in ways you will not like.’ What are the challenges for this weirdest of tickets? Harris, in Biden-fashion, cannot finish a coherent thought. So again, like Biden in 2020, she will retreat and outsource her campaign to the media, while counting on outspending Trump 3-1, and radiating feigned moderation.

She is taking heat for neither yet meeting with a real journalist nor speaking impromptu. But in her defense, to do either might at any opportune moment collapse her stealth campaign, given that to listen to her for 60 seconds off script is to prefer her to remain silent and hidden. And she has confidence in absentia that a bankrupt media will praise her nonexistent elegance, fluency, and articulateness. Walz will customarily serve as a designated hit man for Harris. But he is just as much a liability— a shoot-from-the-hip blowhard, while owning an even more embarrassing leftwing record than Harris. And he is even less discreet. This week Walz introduced himself to the nation as a VP candidate by smearing J.D. Vance with the brazen “couch” lie. And then while foolishly beaming, he doubled-down on his crude slur (“See what I did there?”).

So, he even outdid Harris who had recently called Trump a “predator”—just days before it was disclosed that her married husband earlier had once impregnated his own children’s young nanny and tutor and had never disclosed what followed from his predation. Both will either ignore or lie about their joint opposition to fracking and pipelines; their disgraceful pro-BLM/Antifa advocacy during the lethal and destructive 2020 looting and rioting; their support for open borders and illegal immigration; their woke pandering; and their generic leftwing promotion of the usual high taxes, big government, poor services, and ‘who cares if they flee my state’ arrogance.

The Harris-Walz ticket will also collapse if, horribile dictu, the prior Biden-Harris appeasement of Iran, distancing from Israel, weakening of the military, and loss of deterrence in the next 90 days leads to theater-wide wars on the Ukrainian borderlands or in the Middle East and/or to a recession due to cumulative inflation, high interest, stagnant wages and anemic citizen employment, and unsustainable national debt service.In sum, Trump is very much even in the race. He was given a rare gift by the shunning of Josh Shapiro as Harris’s running mate. That leftwing blunder could energize the Trump campaign—if again he sticks to warning the country of who these two are, what they have done, how they are hiding their real agendas, what they will do if elected, and how they differ from his own presidential record and future agenda. Nothing else matters.

And that means Trump should ignore the now inert and evaporating Biden, refrain from attacking any Republican, stop all recriminations about 2020, avoid race and DEI ambushes, and prep hard and in detail for as many debates as he can obtain. Trump should appear magnanimous and above the fray by compromising with Harris on the debates: one debate now by her rules on ABC, and one by his rules on Fox before early voting begins. Rarely have the Democrats so foolishly gone hard left. And when they did in 1972, 1980, and 1988, Republicans used to know how to use those gifts, expose them, and win landslides despite media and institutional bias. They can do it again, but only if they are as adroit, united, and disciplined as their predecessors once were.

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“..The Wednesday raid also came the same week court documents revealed Hunter Biden took in million from Romanian businessman Gabriel Popoviciu..”

US Hypocrisy on Full Display In Dubious FARA Claims Against Scott Ritter (Sp.)

Under the orders of the US Justice Department, the home of former UN weapons inspector Scott Ritter was raided this week under allegations of violating the Foreign Agents Registration Act. More than two dozen boxes were pulled from his home, including an archive that backed Ritter’s allegations that there were never any WMDs in Iraq in 2003. The US’ latest effort to target Scott Ritter have fully put on display the government’s hypocrisy as it picks and chooses when to stay its hand and when to weaponize the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) against Americans, US attorney John Jackman told Sputnik. The Wednesday raid took place at Ritter’s home in New York as investigators have sought to argue that the former weapons inspector’s journalistic work is being framed at the direction of the Russian government. However, the claims could not be further from the truth.

“FARA, kind of by its very nature, is enforced ambiguously, which leads to very unequal levels of enforcement and basically, you know, there’s potential for it to be weaponized against political speech that the United States, especially our foreign policy establishment, finds problematic,” Jackman told Radio Sputnik’s Fault Lines on Friday. Potential FARA offenders are flagged by the US government if they fall under certain specifications, such as an individual who is documented as having been directed at the sole discretion of a foreign principal. That said, there are exemptions that protect “bonafide” media services, which Jackman noted its exact definition is “somewhat ambiguous.” “I’m looking at the totality of those factors together and these accusations of him acting as a foreign agent and, just on its face, the claims are extremely dubious and uncredible in my view,” Jackman told hosts Jamarl Thomas and Melik Abdul.

“I think this comes down to where they can kind of find these ambiguities in foreign agent laws since it’s been enacted and then also sort of play upon some of the jingoism and fear that the government is really trying to stoke, especially toward Russia but also toward countries in the Middle East as well, which Scott Ritter has been sympathetic to.” Jackman, who also serves as the regular co-host of DD Geopolitics, contrasted the government’s accusations against Ritter to that of the relationship between the Israeli lobby in the US and Congress. “The hypocrisy is so profound,” he said. “The Israeli lobby being able to literally buy [congressional] seats, yet the United States treats all the deference that our media, that our politicians give to Israel, literally the exact propaganda lines that the Israeli government will say to justify, you know, the war and occupation going in Gaza, in the West Bank,” Jackman told Thomas.

“Yet, when it comes to talking about the interests of, you know, other countries or even the sovereign interests of the people in the United States, right, to make sure that our tax dollars are being used in an accountable way that’s going to the infrastructure of this country, rather than going to continue to fuel war and foreign aid in, you know, the tens and hundreds of billions of dollar to countries, like, Ukraine and Israel and Taiwan, for example. So, the hypocrisy to me is just very evident,” the attorney emphasized. The Wednesday raid also came the same week court documents revealed Hunter Biden took in million from Romanian businessman Gabriel Popoviciu in exchange for attempting to exert his influence on the US government during his father’s vice presidency. Additionally, former Trump adviser Kellyanne Conway registered as a foreign agent who would be lobbying on behalf of pro-Ukrainian interests.

Unlike in the Biden findings, where evidence shows an agent-principal relationship had been established between the two parties, that isn’t the case for Ritter. “This is one of the meaningful differences with Scott,” Jackman said “At every turn you know Scott is, what he’s talking about when it comes to his commentary on foreign policy and the work that he’s doing, for example, to organize this anti-war rally and draw attention to the specter of nuclear war has been done under his own volition,” he noted. “Due to his own, you know, freedom of thought and freedom of speech which actually, you know, is very tough to do in this country because it cuts against a lot of financial interests that he could potentially be taking advantage of, right?” “It would be a lot easier in this country, for example, to take advantage of a Ukrainian interest who’s willing to pay you to go on the airwaves and spout Ukrainian propaganda. It would be a lot easier to get that into the mainstream than it would to, you know, take the other side of it in this country, which requires just kind of by its very nature – and you all know – a lot of independence.”

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“Maduro accused the tech mogul of “inciting hatred, fascism, civil war, death, [and] confrontation of Venezuelans..”

Maduro Bans X (RT)

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro has announced a temporary ban on X (formerly Twitter) in the country. The decision followed his war of words with the platform’s CEO, Elon Musk, who has accused Maduro of election fraud. In a televised speech on Thursday, Maduro accused the tech mogul of “inciting hatred, fascism, civil war, death, [and] confrontation of Venezuelans,” as well as violating national laws. The leader added that he has signed a resolution presented by the National Commission of Telecommunications to ban the social media platform for ten days.“Let the plans on social networks to spread violence, hatred… [in] Venezuela from abroad end,” Maduro wrote in a separate post on X. In response, Musk took to the platform to mockingly promise to “singe his [Maduro’s] mustache from space.”

The spat between the Venezuelan leader and the billionaire started in the wake of the country’s presidential election last month, in which Maduro was declared the winner. According to the country’s electoral council, Maduro won about 52% of the vote, while opposition candidate Edmundo Gonzalez received 43%. The opposition disputed the results, arguing that they didn’t match their own tallies, while their backers, including the US, refused to recognize Maduro’s victory. However, other countries such as China and Russia have congratulated the Venezuelan leader on his reelection. Musk has supported the criticism of Maduro, calling him a “dictator” and accusing him of “major election fraud.” “The people of Venezuela have had enough of this clown,” he added, voicing support for the opposition.

The jab drew a sharp response from the Venezuelan president, who blasted the tycoon for allegedly trying to stage a coup and challenged him to a fistfight – a suggestion Musk accepted. The temporary ban on X comes after Maduro claimed to have deleted his WhatsApp messenger from his phone, saying it was being used to threaten Venezuela and spy on its people. He also claimed that TikTok and Instagram were being used to promote “hate” and promised to regulate their use. Maduro will be serving a third consecutive six-year term, after first taking office in 2013 following the death of President Hugo Chavez. Maduro’s previous reelection, in 2018, was also rejected by the US, along with the EU and several Latin American states.

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They want the lithium.

Serbian President Says He Received Coup Warning From Russia (RT)

Russia warned Serbia about a potential coup attempt, President Aleksandar Vucic told journalists on Friday. His statement came a day before an expected protest in the nation’s capital. According to Vucic, Serbia’s Security Intelligence Agency (BIA) is already acting on the leads provided by Moscow. “We received official information from the Russian Federation, information transmitted and brought through official channels,” the president said, adding that the authorities “are dealing with it” and there is no reason to worry. Vucic did not elaborate on where the threat could come from or who might be behind the alleged coup plot. He still maintained that those who “dream” of achieving anything in such a way should know that “they won’t.” “Serbia is moving forward and they cannot and will not stop it,” he added.

Earlier, some Serbian news media outlets reported that the Russian security services allegedly warned Vucic about massive riots that are being prepared in Serbia with an ultimate goal of overthrowing the nation’s leadership. A Serbian ‘Vecernje Novosti’ daily stated earlier on Friday that it obtained a “color revolution handbook” supposedly published for the participants of ecological protests that are expected to be held on Saturday. The content of the “handbook” describes methods reminiscent of “color revolutions” in other nations, the media outlet claimed, adding that the protests in the country are likely to be coordinated from some “centers of power” abroad but did not accuse anyone in particular. The news came as the nation braces for possible ecological protests this weekend. In July, Serbia has become an arena for a standoff between groups of eco-activists and the government over a major lithium mine project. Last month, Belgrade granted the Anglo-Australian mining major Rio Tinto a license to develop a lithium mine in the Jadar region in the western part of the country, which is poised to become the biggest one in Europe, according to Reuters.

The project did not sit well with some local farmers and villagers, who argued that the mine would severely pollute the surrounding area. The mine would “free the European Union from reliance on China” in terms of lithium at the expense of Serbians’ health, farmer Zlatko Kokanovic, one of the activists, told Reuters. The government treats the $2.4 billion Jadar lithium project as a major boost for the national economy. The mine could cover 90% of the EU’s needs for lithium, according to Reuters. The protesters demanded the government ban lithium mining in Jadar before August 10 and vowed to announce their next steps at a rally on Saturday. The news came as the nation braces for possible ecological protests this weekend. In July, Serbia has become an arena for a standoff between groups of eco-activists and the government over a major lithium mine project.

Last month, Belgrade granted the Anglo-Australian mining major Rio Tinto a license to develop a lithium mine in the Jadar region in the western part of the country, which is poised to become the biggest one in Europe, according to Reuters. The project did not sit well with some local farmers and villagers, who argued that the mine would severely pollute the surrounding area. The mine would ”free the European Union from reliance on China” in terms of lithium at the expense of Serbians’ health, farmer Zlatko Kokanovic, one of the activists, told Reuters. The government treats the $2.4 billion Jadar lithium project as a major boost for the national economy. The mine could cover 90% of the EU’s needs for lithium, according to Reuters. The protesters demanded the government ban lithium mining in Jadar before August 10 and vowed to announce their next steps at a rally on Saturday.

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“I’m not gonna draw a circular map for you here of where they can and cannot strike.”

Pentagon Refuses To Rule Out Strikes On Moscow (ZH)

The Pentagon on Thursday was asked by a reporter during the daily briefing whether Ukraine forces’ use of American weapons in its ongoing Kursk incursion is “consistent” with US policy of what Ukraine can and cannot do with US weapons. It has become clear that Ukrainian troops are currently using American weapons to attack Russian territory, troops, civilians, and infrastructure. Spokeswoman Sabrina Singh answered without hesitation that “yes it is consistent with our policy” and explained that Washington has supported the need for “crossfire” from Ukraine back across the border onto Russian positions from which it is being attacked, even if that is on Russian territory. She framed what is happening in Russia’s Kursk oblast—an offensive which has entered day four—as ‘defensive’ in nature.

Singh still tried to point out that it remains US policy for Ukraine to avoid striking deep into Russian territory using American arms; however, when pressed about the scenario of a direct attack on Moscow, she simply said: “I’m not going to put a specific range on it” and thus refused to rule it out. But she did caveat that “we still don’t support long-range attacks into Russia.” Singh additionally explained, “I’m not gonna draw a circular map for you here of where they can and cannot strike.” The Kremlin is likely to remain unconvinced when hearing this clear escalation in rhetoric from the Pentagon where attacking the Russian capital is discussed, even if theoretically. Needless to say we have entered incredibly dangerous times in this major proxy war when the Pentagon’s daily press briefing is openly talking about strikes on Moscow.

The Ukrainian cross-border offensive, which may have involved up to 1,000 men, began early Tuesday morning and was led by fast moving armored vehicles, which were able to penetrate up to 10km into Ukraine. Moscow says that it has observed US-supplied equipment being utilized in the attack on Russian soil. A prior Russian Defense Ministry (MoD) statement said, “Video monitoring data shows that Lancet loitering munitions destroyed a US-made Bradley infantry fighting vehicle, a Kazak armored vehicle, a Ukrainian armored personnel carrier and an infantry fighting vehicle in their firing positions.” Newsweek also confirmed based on video evidence. The MoD further said that dozens of armored vehicles breached the border and were operating inside Russia amid a major response to push out the invaders which has included airpower.

As of Friday, the fighting in Kursk is in its fourth day, which is unprecedented for a Ukrainian military incursion inside Russia. Ukraine has simultaneously stepped up its cross-border drone attacks, reportedly hitting an important military airfield in the Lepetsk region, impacting a facility where glide-bombs are stored. According to the latest: Ukrainian drones struck a key military airfield in Russia’s Lipetsk region, as Kyiv continues its largest offensive on Russian soil since the start of the war. Ukrainian forces targeted the airfield in Lipetsk — roughly 300 kilometers (186 miles) from the border with Ukraine — on Thursday night, hitting warehouses and a number of unspecified objects in the vicinity of the airport, Ukraine’s General Staff of Command said in a Google-translated Telegram post. Earlier in the week, the Ukrainian offensive led to the evacuation of thousands of people and a state of emergency being announced in Kursk.

The timing of this high-risk assault is interesting, happening at a time where Ukraine has been on a slow and steady retreat in the Donbass. Ukraine needed something ‘big’ to both distract Russia’s military command from front line operations and as a blow to Moscow’s morale. And now Kiev is pressing the Biden White House to let it use ATACMS long-range missiles to strike deeper into Russia. “This will give them the leverage they need for negotiations with Russia — this is what it’s all about,” Mikhail Podoliak, a senior advisor to President Zelensky, told The Washington Post. On Thursday, Zelensky himself had said Russia needs to “feel” the consequences of its invasion and war. “Russia brought the war to our land and should feel what it has done,” he said.

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“The Western powers incubated the Nazi virus and unleashed its mutated strain in Ukraine..”

Kiev Regime’s Terrorism Shows Russia Must Go All The Way (SCF)

Following the atrocities in Kursk and Belgorod this week, Dmitry Medvedev, a senior member of Russia’s national security council, commented on Moscow’s long-term military objectives, saying: “This is no longer an operation to regain our lands and punish Nazis… We should only stop when we consider it appropriate.” That means, presumably, going all the way to demolish NATO’s Reich regime, a regime that seized power illegally in 2014 through a CIA-orchestrated coup d’état against an elected president. Despite Western media distortions, Ukraine is merely an artificial statelet whose so-called independence in 1991 was a legacy of gerrymandering and territorial horse-trading from the Soviet times. Russia has righteous historical claims to Odessa, the city founded by Catherine the Great, Kharkov, Nikolayev, and indeed Kiev in the same way it has to Crimea, the Donbass, Kherson and Zaporozyhe regions.

The congenital treachery of the Kiev regime and its imperialist patrons make them “agreement incapable”. The betrayal and deception over the Minsk Peace Accords (2015) and the trashing of post-Cold War NATO promises of non-expansion show that any treaties that might be derived are worthless. The terrorist nature of the Kiev regime and its ideological roots in collaboration with the Nazi Third Reich in exterminating Slavic people and the systematic warmongering of the U.S.-led NATO bloc from the early days of the post-1945 Cold War, all show that a modus vivendi is impossible. The idea of Russian territories living peacefully alongside a Ukrainian rump Reich is infeasible. As long as a toxic entity of Ukrainian fascism resides and is sustained by NATO patronage there will always be a national security threat to Russia. The history of defeating Nazi Germany by the Soviet Union only for that enemy to be subsequently resurrected by Western imperialism with the remnants of Ukrainian fascists demonstrates that the disease must be eradicated.

Ukraine has the misfortune of being designated as the spearhead for a U.S.-led imperialist confrontation against Russia. The terrorism that was unleashed after the 2014 coup against ethnic Russian people has only metastasized. Attacking Russian civilians in pre-war Russian territory, targeting civilians on beaches with missiles, targeting nuclear power stations, and spreading the tentacles of terrorism to African nations friendly with Russia as recent attacks in Mali have evinced – all attest to the only way to deal with the Kiev regime. It must be vanquished entirely. Its leaders are bandits with Russian blood on their hands. Russia must crush this criminal entity once and for all – and do an immense favor to the Ukrainian people by liquidating this parasitic tyranny imposed on them by Western imperial masters. Ukrainian men are hiding or fleeing en masse from the regime to escape forced conscription – and certain death on the front lines.

Ultimately, the war in Ukraine is not just against a psychopathic NATO proxy. It is against the Western system of global domination and its NATO war machine. History shows that a negotiated detente is only a stepping stone for more aggression further up the road. The Western powers incubated the Nazi virus and unleashed its mutated strain in Ukraine. Not only does the Kiev Nazi virus have to be eradicated. So too ultimately must the Western imperialist disease that is the progenitor. Russia’s territory is the site of a historic, world-changing confrontation. That confrontation goes all the way back to the heroic battles of the Donbass, Crimea and Kursk against the Wehrmacht in 1943-44 culminating in the present against NATO. After this climactic battle is finally won by Russia, there should be never any repetition. That entails a definitive defeat of the Western imperialism that earlier spawned Nazi Germany and today’s U.S.-led NATO.

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“The liberalism in which Putin believes no longer exists in the West. So why is Putin relying on it?”

Putin Relies on Reason which the West Has Abandoned (Paul Craig Roberts)

Vladimir Putin is an old-fashioned American liberal. He believes in reason, good will, working things out, and agreements despite having zero evidence that any such reciprocating belief exists in the West. Putin’s illusions have caused him and Russia extraordinary difficulties. Russia is currently at war in Ukraine, although Putin still doesn’t seem to realize it, referring to it as a “limited military operation” despite the obvious fact that Russia is at war with NATO which includes the US. It is sad that Putin, a person with good intentions, doesn’t have his counterparts in the Western world. Now it comes to light that the British and Ukrainian governments planned to assassinate both Russia’s President Putin and Defense Minister Andrei Belousov at the Navy Day parade in St Petersburg.

In my columns I have several times mentioned that Putin and Trump are candidates for assassination. The recent attempt on Trump, which has been removed from the “news,” has now been matched by the statement of Russia’s Deputy Foreign Minister, Sergei Ryabkov, on Russian national television that Belousov called US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and squashed the assassination plan, explaining, apparently, that World War III would be the result. Maria Zakharova, spokesperson for the Russian Foreign Ministry said: “There is no doubt that the assassination attempt was planned with the participation of the Anglo-Saxon masters of Kiev.” Still, Putin wants to negotiate the end of the Ukrainian conflict. How precisely do you negotiate with people who are trying to assassinate you?

Dmitry Medvedev, President of Russia during the Putin Interregnum, currently deputy chairman of the Russian National Security Council, seems to have come to a clear vision. Here are his latest words, and one wonders if Putin hears them: “From this moment, the special military operation should become openly exterritorial in nature. We can and should go further into what still exists as Ukraine. To Odessa, Kharkov, Dnepropetrovsk, Nikolaev. To Kiev and further. There should be no restrictions in terms of recognized borders.” In other words, the nonsensical “limited military operation” should be over and done with. It is time to get serious. The liberalism in which Putin believes no longer exists in the West. So why is Putin relying on it? I raise these questions because it appears that the combination of Washington’s provocations and Russian restraint is leading to a terrible war that is in no one’s interest.

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“We cannot do that..”

Mexico Responds To Ukraine’s Request To Arrest Putin (RT)

The President of Mexico Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador has rejected a request by Ukraine to arrest Vladimir Putin, if the Russian leader were to land in the Latin American country this fall for the inauguration of its new head of state. The International Criminal Court (ICC) issued an arrest warrant for Putin last year in connection with the conflict between Russia and Ukraine. Mexico is one 124 nations recognizing the jurisdiction of The Hague-based body. “We cannot do that,” Lopez Obrador replied when asked by journalists during a press conference on Thursday if the Mexican authorities are really going to detain the Russian president. “It is not up to us,” he added, as cited by Reuters.

Izvestia newspaper had reported on the previous day that Mexico had invited Putin to the inauguration this October of its new president, Claudia Sheinbaum. According to the Mexican Embassy in Moscow, the Russian leader will decide whether to attend the ceremony himself or send some other high-ranking official to represent the country. The Ukrainian embassy in Mexico reacted to the news by reminding the country’s government that Putin is wanted by the ICC and by asking it to arrest the Russian leader if he comes. “We are confident that the Mexican government would comply with the international arrest warrant by handing the aforementioned person over to the judicial body of the UN in The Hague,” Kiev’s diplomatic mission said in a statement on Wednesday. It also thanked Mexico City for inviting Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky to the inauguration.

Mexico has taken a neutral stance toward the conflict between Russia and Ukraine, with Lopez Obrador a critic of US military aid to Kiev and of the sanctions imposed on Moscow by the West. The outgoing president’s successor, Sheinbaum, is a close ally and is expected to continue his policies. In March 2023, the ICC formally accused Putin and Russia’s commissioner for children’s rights of “forcible transfer of the population,” referring to evacuations of minors from combat zones amid fighting between Russian and Ukrainian forces. Moscow has dismissed the allegations as false, while also accusing the court of being politically compromised. Russia, which never ratified the 1998 Rome Statute that established the ICC, also pointed out that the UN body had no authority over it.

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“..If we did not have an aggressive ally, like the United States, aggressive to others in the region, there would be nobody attacking Australia. We are better left alone..”

Australia Being Turned Into ‘51st US state’ – ex-PM Keating (RT)

The US is surrounding Australia with military bases under the AUKUS pact, which undermines the country’s sovereignty and makes it a legitimate target for China, former Prime Minister Paul Keating has said. In an interview with ABC on Thursday, Keating, who served as prime minister between 1991 and 1996, voiced strong skepticism about whether his country benefits from being a member of AUKUS – a landmark security partnership between Australia, UK, and the US, which was announced in 2021. The pact, which has been condemned by China, focuses on helping Australia acquire nuclear-powered submarines. Keating argued that by allowing the US to “displace our military” and surround the country with bases, Canberra is essentially giving up its right to determine its foreign and defense policy. Australia will “completely lose” its strategic autonomy as a result, he claimed.

“So AUKUS is really about, in American terms, the military control of Australia,” Keating said, adding that the government of Prime Minister Anthony Albanese is “likely to turn Australia into the 51st state of the United States”. The former prime minister added that the expanded military presence makes the country a target from China’s point of view. “We’re now defending the fact that we’re in AUKUS… If we did not have an aggressive ally, like the United States, aggressive to others in the region, there would be nobody attacking Australia. We are better left alone,” Keating said. The US, he argued, is trying to “superintend” China, with tensions between the two being fueled by a power struggle over the self-ruled island of Taiwan, which Beijing views as part of its sovereign territory. However, Keating argued that the Taiwan situation “is not a vital Australian interest” while China “has no strategic design” on Australia.

The US attitude to Taiwan is comparable to China deciding that Tasmania needed help breaking away from Australia, he said.The former prime minister’s remarks come after Australian Defense Minister Richard Marles and Foreign Minister Penny Wong traveled to Washington for talks about the AUKUS pact, and to discuss a new agreement on the transfer of nuclear material to Canberra as part of its push to acquire domestic-built atomic submarines from the 2030s. China has warned that the AUKUS agreement raises nuclear proliferation risks, adding that it was conceived in the “Cold War mentality which will only motivate an arms race.” Russia has also sounded the alarm about the security situation in the Asia-Pacific, insisting that it “has no place for closed military and political alliances.”

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“..evidence from many years of scientific observation suggests the corals often and quickly recover..”

Third Year of Record Coral Increase on the Great Barrier Reef (DS)

Massive increases in coral across the Australian Great Barrier Reef (GBR) have been reported for 2023-24 making it the third record year in a row of heavy growth. Across almost all parts of the 1,500 mile long reef, from the warmer northern waters to the cooler conditions in the south, coral is now at its highest level since detailed observations began. The inconvenient news has been ignored in mainstream media which, curiously, have focused on a non-story in Nature that claimed “climate change” poses an “existential threat” to the GBR. “The science tells us that the GBR is in danger – and we should be guided by the science,” Professor Helen McGregor from the University of Wollongong told Victoria Gill of BBC News. The existential threat is “now realised” reported the Guardian.

Travelling back from the reality inhabited by the Guardian, it can be reported that last year’s gains were eye-catchingly large. On the Northern GBR, hard coral cover leapt from 35.8% to 39.5%, in the central area it rose from 30.7% to 34%, while in the south it went from 34% to 39.1%. The report is the result of monitoring of hard coral cover reefs from August 2023 to June 2024 by the Australian Institute of Marine Science (AIMS). The percentage of hard coral cover is a standard measurement of reef conditions used by scientists and is said to provide a simple and robust measure of reef health. Similar reports have been published by the AIMS over the last 38 years.

For the first two years of record coral growth, the narrative-driven mainstream media ignored the recovery story. But this year, the suspicious might contend, something had to be done to blunt the sensational news of the stonking rises. Help has come in the form of a paper just published in Nature which uses proxy temperature measurements and climate models to suggest temperatures around the vast reef area are the highest recorded in 400 years. This time period is the blink of an ecological eye-lid given that coral has been around for hundreds of millions of years during periods when temperatures and atmospheric carbon dioxide have been markedly different. Nevertheless, this is said to pose an existential threat despite it being known that sub-tropical corals thrive between 24°C-32°C, and in fact seem to grow faster in warmer waters.

Natural bleaching, when the coral expels algae and turns white, can occur with temporary local temperature changes, but evidence from many years of scientific observation suggests the corals often and quickly recover. Long term changes in water temperature – tiny compared to coral’s optimum conditions – pose no threat, but alarmists concentrate on the bleaching events to warn of possible ecological collapse. The Guardian noted a recent fifth mass bleaching in eight years across the reef, driven, it claimed, by “global heating”. So far, its readers are in the dark as to how this squares with the recent record growth. A decade of mass bleaching, relentlessly catastrophised in the interests of Net Zero by activists in the media, academia and politics, does not appear to have done much harm to the recent growth in the Northern GBR.

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Babies
https://twitter.com/i/status/1821950104229556548

 

 

Brutal

 

 

Kingfu

 

 

Snow leopard
https://twitter.com/i/status/1821889171444883650

 

 

F(r)ens

 

 

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

 

 

 

 

 

Aug 052024
 
 August 5, 2024  Posted by at 8:37 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , ,  85 Responses »


Pablo Picasso Portrait of Ambroise Vollard 1910

 

If You Thought Things Were Bad Under Biden, Just Wait (Moore)
We Reap the Harvest of Lies (Bell)
Guess Who Kamala Harris Blames For Disastrous Jobs Report? (ZH)
Kamala Harris and the Masque of Magical Thinking (Kimball)
What Donald Trump Should Beware of In The Debate With Kamala Harris (Bridge)
Trump Congratulates Putin On ‘Great Deal’ (RT)
Israel and US Stoke the Fire as China Pursues Peace (Manley)
US Sends Forces to Middle East, Fear Catastrophic War Is Imminent (Sp.)
Why is Poland Massing Troops on Frontier With Belarus?
American Jets Spotted Over Ukraine (RT)
Destruction of NATO F-16s Sent to Ukraine Will Boost Russia’s Image (Sp.)
Warren Buffet Unloads Apple Shares (RT)
New York State Supreme Court Blocks Attempt to Pause Migrant Arrivals (ET)
Elon Musk Speculates Civil War ‘Inevitable’ as Violence Sweeps UK (Sp.)
British Rioters Torch Migrant Hotel (RT)

 

 

 

 

Snipers

 

 

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

 

 

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

 

 

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

 

 

Rogan

 

 

 

 

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

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

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

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

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

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

We Reap the Harvest of Lies (Bell)

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Kamala Harris and the Masque of Magical Thinking (Kimball)

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Trump Congratulates Putin On ‘Great Deal’ (RT)

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Why is Poland Massing Troops on Frontier With Belarus?

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

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

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

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

American Jets Spotted Over Ukraine (RT)

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Warren Buffet Unloads Apple Shares (RT)

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

British Rioters Torch Migrant Hotel (RT)

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

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

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

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Tucker coast guy

 

 

Renz

 

 

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

 

 

Cubs

 

 

Moose

 

 

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

 

 

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

 

 

 

 

 

Jul 122024
 
 July 12, 2024  Posted by at 9:18 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , ,  66 Responses »


Pablo Picasso The three dancers 1925

 

Biden Will ‘Never Recover’ And Must Drop Out – Aides to NBC (RT)
Biden Mixes Up Harris & Trump, Zelensky & Putin (Sp.)
Comer Subpoenas Top Biden Handlers To Find Out Who’s Running The Country (ZH)
NATO More Nervous About Biden Than Trump – Politico (RT)
West Sees Zelensky As Cash Cow, to Keep Him in Power ‘For Now’ – Russia (Sp.)
NATO Declaration Is Neoconservative Recommitment to US Hegemony – Sachs (Sp.)
Either NATO or Ukraine -or Both- Must Go – Medvedev (RT)
We are NATO. And We’re Comin’ To Get Ya (Pepe Escobar)
Poland Preparing Military For Full-Scale Conflict, Army Chief Says (ZH)
NATO Countries Closest to Russia Up Defense Spending (ET)
Musk Announces X To Sue Those Behind Advertising Censorship Cartel (ZH)
AOC Files Articles Of Impeachment Against Justices Alito, Thomas (Fox)
LinkedIn, Google Openly Censor Conservatives – Again (Sellers)
Can the West Survive Democracy? (Paul Craig Roberts)
‘My Life’s Work Melting Before My Eyes’ (Scott Ritter)

 

 

 

 

Joe VP
https://twitter.com/i/status/1811002365232755172

 

 

Obama report

 

 

HiMARS

 

 

Tesla

 

 

Eva

 

 

Elon drones

 

 

 

 

 

 

“..The last full cabinet meeting was on October 2 last year..”

Biden Will ‘Never Recover’ And Must Drop Out – Aides to NBC (RT)

US President Joe Biden has no way to recover from the debate disaster and needs to drop out of the race, multiple campaign aides have told NBC News. The 81-year-old Democrat has been under increasing public pressure from the media, senior party members, donors, and celebrity sympathizers to step down after a catastrophic performance in the June 27 debate with Republican challenger Donald Trump. “No one is denying that the debate was a setback,” campaign chair Jen O’Malley Dillon and campaign manager Julie Chavez Rodriguez said in a memo to staff, leaked to NBC on Thursday. “But Joe Biden and this campaign have made it through setbacks before.” Others were more blunt. “He needs to drop out,” one Biden campaign official told NBC, speaking on condition of anonymity.

“He will never recover from this.” “No one involved in the effort thinks he has a path,” said a second campaign aide. Another campaign worker described Biden’s chances of winning the November election as “zero.” Multiple aides have raised concerns that the president’s performance might spill over to down-ballot races, costing Democrats seats in Congress. Biden called into a friendly MSNBC show on Monday and insisted he was “not going anywhere” and that he would be the party’s nominee. However, NBC’s sources said that it was a “widespread” feeling in both the campaign and the party that the Democrats should nominate someone else, such as Vice President Kamala Harris. Meanwhile, CNN has revealed that Biden’s aides have been scripting and orchestrating cabinet meetings in a sort of a stage production.

The last full cabinet meeting was on October 2 last year, according to the outlet. The White House responded by providing a statement from Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack, who called the way the meetings have been run “standard practice for any administration.” CNN sources, however, said that this was definitely not the case under President Barack Obama, when Biden was his vice president. Last week, it was revealed that a Parkinson’s Disease expert has visited the White House at least eight times over the past year. If anyone dares question the president’s health or fitness, however, Biden’s aides “beat the s**t out of” them and insist they “stay on message,” a top Democrat close to Biden’s inner circle told CNN.

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No-one tells him anything apparently.

Biden Mixes Up Harris & Trump, Zelensky & Putin (Sp.)

President Joe Biden said during a press conference after the NATO summit that he would take a neurological exam if his doctors recommended it but so far he has not received such suggestions from his medical team. “If they think I should have a neurological exam again, I’ll do it, [but] no one’s suggesting that to me now,” Biden said on Thursday. Earlier in the press conference, Biden referred to Vice President Kamala Harris as former US President, and his likely opponent, Donald Trump. “I wouldn’t have picked Vice President Trump to be vice president [inaudible] if I think she’s not qualified to be president,” Biden said. When asked how he would respond to the gaffe, which former President Donald Trump had already posted about on social media, Biden would only reply “listen to him [Trump].”

Earlier in the day at a NATO event, Biden similarly mixed up Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and Russian President Vladimir Putin. “And now I want to hand it over to the President of Ukraine who has as much courage as he has determination. Ladies and gentlemen, President Putin,” Biden said to the confusion of the crowd. Biden has been facing calls to end his reelection campaign, including by members of his own party, after an embarrassing performance during a televised debate with Trump. Biden has since been insistent that he will remain in the race, despite a series of high-profile gaffes and disastrous interviews in the weeks since the debate. The press conference was Biden’s first in 2024. He said he will not leave the race unless his team tells him “There’s no way you can win,” but claimed “No one’s saying that. No poll says that.”

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“Key White House staff must come before our committee so we can provide the transparency and accountability that Americans deserve..”

Comer Subpoenas Top Biden Handlers To Find Out Who’s Running The Country (ZH)

The House Oversight Committee subpoenaed three top White House aides on Wednesday, and has demanded that they sit for depositions concerning President Joe Biden’s health – and who’s actually running the country. As Axios reports, Oversight chair James Comer (R-KY) subpoenaed First Lady Jill Biden’s top aide Anthony Bernal, deputy chief of staff Annie Tomasini, and senior adviser Ashley Williams, who the outlet described as “low-profile but very influential” inside the White House. According to Wednesday letters, Comer cites Bernal and Tomasini’s access to the first family’s residence – which White House residence staff found ‘unusual,’ as ‘political staffers often don’t have such access.’

According to one former Biden aide, these three employees – Annie Tomasini, Anthony Bernal, and Ashley Williams – have created “a protective bubble around” President Biden and he is “staffed so closely that he’s lost all independence.” -House Oversight Committee Comer also writes that the committee is “concerned” that each official is “one of several White House staffers who have taken it upon themselves to run the country while the President cannot.” In his letter to Bernal — whose influence extends well beyond the first lady’s office — Comer wrote: The “Committee seeks to understand the extent of Mr. Bernal’s influence over the President and his knowledge of whether the President is personally discharging the duties of his office.” -Axios

Tomasini, a close friend of the Biden family, maintained close relations with Hunter throughout the Obama administration – sometimes referring to him as her “brother,” and often ending emails with “LY” (Love You), according to emails dating from 2010 to 2016. “The White House has shielded three key aides from testifying about President Biden’s mishandling of classified documents and now we’ve learned through reporting these same aides are also seeking to cover up President Biden’s declining cognitive state inside the White House. President Biden is clearly unfit for office, yet his staff are trying to hide the truth from the American people. Key White House staff must come before our committee so we can provide the transparency and accountability that Americans deserve,” said Comer in a statement.

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“..you’re more stressed about whether he will go off script than being excited to listen to the leader of the free world..”

NATO More Nervous About Biden Than Trump – Politico (RT)

The frail state of US President Joe Biden seems to have worried NATO officials at the key Washington summit far more than how the bloc could be drastically changed if Republican frontrunner Donald Trump retakes the White House, Politico reported on Thursday, citing sources. Long-running concerns about the 81-year-old president’s mental state were exacerbated by his shaky debate performance against Trump two weeks ago. Numerous media outlets have described Biden – who often confused words and failed to finish sentences – as “fumbling” and “incoherent.” The debate disaster reportedly left some Democrats scrambling to find a replacement for him, although Biden himself has categorically stated he had no plans to drop out of the race.

Biden is also taking part in the key NATO summit in Washington this week. According to Politico, several European nations have been “alarmed” by the president’s apparent decline and increasingly concerned by or even resigned to the fact that he could lose the November election to Trump, who harbors much more “hostile” feelings towards NATO. Some NATO officials were upset that concerns about Biden had distracted the public from what was supposed to be a celebratory summit, according to the report. “It’s a very weird feeling to be in Europe listening to the president of the United States, and you’re more stressed about whether he will go off script than being excited to listen to the leader of the free world,” one Western official told the magazine. A Politico source noted that “everyone’s focusing on Biden’s appearance” rather than on Trump’s statements about NATO, recalling that the GOP candidate is not much younger than his rival. “We would prefer a more stable situation in the US,” the official added.

While Biden has championed NATO as “the bulwark of global security,” Trump has been much more critical of the bloc. The ex-president has repeatedly blasted NATO allies for failing to pay what he considers a “fair share” of common defense spending. In February, Trump claimed to have told fellow Western leaders that, unless they invest more in defense, when he was in office he “would encourage” the Russians “to do whatever the hell they want.” This prompted rebukes from both the Biden administration and NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg. Earlier this month, Politico also reported that Trump was considering a deal with Russia not to expand NATO to Ukraine and Georgia if he is reelected.

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“..Washington and Brussels would prefer Zelensky to remain in power, as lucrative war profiteering schemes are tied to him. Zelensky’s opponents are advised to exercise restraint “for the time being.”

West Sees Zelensky As Cash Cow, to Keep Him in Power ‘For Now’ – Russia (Sp.)

The Russian Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) has released information obtained from Russian covert operatives, shedding light on the direct involvement of the collective West in the proxy conflict in Ukraine. According to the declassified information, the US State Department and the European External Action Service are worried about the increasing distrust among Ukrainians towards the state institutions of the Kiev regime, as well as towards Volodymyr Zelensky’s rule, which they consider illegitimate. Despite this, Washington and Brussels would prefer Zelensky to remain in power, as lucrative war profiteering schemes are tied to him. Zelensky’s opponents are advised to exercise restraint “for the time being.”

The declassified information also unveils the search for an alternative to Zelensky that is currently underway, with ongoing contacts being maintained with key figures including ex-president Petro Poroshenko (leader of the European Solidarity party), Kiev Mayor Vitali Klitschko, former Ukrainian commander-in-chief Gen. Valery Zaluzhny, and Ukrainian aide Andriy Yermak. In a worst-case scenario, Zelensky may be made the ‘fall guy’ and replaced with one of these potential substitutes. According to the declassified information, the French Defense Ministry is worried about the increasing number of casualties among its citizens in Ukraine. This concern was highlighted by the recent incident in Kharkov on January 16 where ‘dozens’ of French nationals were killed when a temporary deployment point of foreign mercenaries was destroyed by the Russian armed forces. Despite this, a French contingent of 2,000 men is being prepared for deployment to Ukraine.

The FBI, US private military companies (PMCs), and the DEA have ramped up efforts to recruit imprisoned members of Mexican and Colombian drug cartels to fight in Ukraine in return for a full pardon. The first such group numbering several hundred people is to be dispatched to Ukraine in the summer. If the pilot project is successful, it may be extended to include other countries with a high crime rate, according to the declassified information. The declassified information indicates that the United States is attempting to steer the investigation into the May assassination attempt on Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico in a specific direction. Their objective is to present the incident as a lone wolf attack with no connections to foreign entities. This is being done to prevent it from being exposed as an act of targeting individuals with dissenting viewpoints, such as Fico and Hungary’s Prime Minister Victor Orban.

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“..Article 10 of the Washington Treaty, which claims that Russia has no input if NATO expands to surround Russia..”

NATO Declaration Is Neoconservative Recommitment to US Hegemony – Sachs (Sp.)

NATO’s latest joint declaration serves as a stark neoconservative recommitment to US hegemony, Jeffrey Sachs, a world-renowned economist and President of the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network, told Sputnik. “The NATO Declaration is a stark neoconservative recommitment to US hegemony. It calls for NATO to back the ‘rules-based order,’ which is actually the US-based order that is often directly contrary to the UN Charter,” Sachs said. On Wednesday, NATO released a joint Washington Summit Declaration, which outlines the alliance’s efforts to further isolate Russia, bolster the alliance’s security on its eastern flank, increase security assistance for Ukraine, and claim Ukraine is on an “irreversible path” into NATO, among other initiatives. “It describes NATO as a defensive force despite the fact that NATO is repeatedly engaged in offensive regime-change operations, including Afghanistan, Iraq, Serbia, Libya, Ukraine, and others,” Sachs said.

Sachs explains that NATO’s declaration also restates Article 10 of the Washington Treaty, which claims that Russia has no input if NATO expands to surround Russia. Moreover, Sachs said NATO’s joint statement describes its commitment to advanced biotechnologies, which raises concerns of biowarfare. Sachs also pointed out that the declaration shows NATO’s intention to continue to deploy anti-ballistic missiles throughout Europe as it’s previously done in Poland, Romania, and Turkiye, which has directly destabilized the nuclear arms control architecture ever since the United States unilaterally withdrew from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty in 2002. The White House announced earlier that the United States will begin episodic deployments of the long-range fires capabilities of its Multi-Domain Task Force in Germany in 2026. Russian Ambassador to the United States Anatoly Antonov said US plans to deploy intermediate- and shorter-range missiles to Germany pose a direct threat to international security and increase the risks of a missile arms race.

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“..make sure that the ‘irreversible path of Ukraine’ towards NATO ends with either the disappearance of Ukraine, or the disappearance of NATO. Better, both..”

Either NATO or Ukraine -or Both- Must Go – Medvedev (RT)

NATO’s declaration that Ukraine’s eventual membership of the US-led military bloc is “irreversible” means that either the nation or the alliance – and preferably both – should disappear, former Russian president Dmitry Medvedev has said. A joint statement adopted by the leaders of NATO states during a summit in Washington, DC this week expressed support for Ukraine’s “right to choose its own security arrangements,” and declared that it is on an “irreversible path to full Euro-Atlantic integration, including NATO membership.” Russia has consistently said that Ukraine’s accession to NATO would cross a ‘red line’. It cited the expansion of the bloc in Europe as one of the key triggers of the current hostilities with Kiev. “The conclusion is obvious. We have to do everything to make sure that the ‘irreversible path of Ukraine’ towards NATO ends with either the disappearance of Ukraine, or the disappearance of NATO. Better, both,” Medvedev said on Thursday.

The wording of the joint statement, according to media reports, was intended to appease Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky, who has claimed that his nation deserves to be fast-tracked into NATO in gratitude for fighting to supposedly “defend” the West from Russia. But member states, including the US, have made it clear that Ukraine will not be able to join them as a full participant while the conflict remains unresolved. Kiev has signed numerous bilateral security agreements with Western nations in recent months in lieu of guarantees provided for under the NATO Treaty. The most recent pact was finalized with Luxembourg this week. Medvedev, who currently serves as deputy chair of the Russian Security Council, previously called for caution in the event that Kiev made a U-turn and accepted Russia’s conditions for a negotiated peace.

He argued that such a deal, which would include Kiev’s renunciation of its NATO aspirations, could lead to a new coup in Ukraine and an even more radical government eventually seizing power. In that scenario, he said, hostilities would resume and Ukraine’s statehood would be lost for good. But “the enemies of Russia will not go anywhere” and will “gather strength for a new attempt to destroy our country,” Medvedev predicted.

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“..China “cannot enable the largest war in Europe in recent history without this negatively impacting its interests and reputatio..”

We are NATO. And We’re Comin’ To Get Ya (Pepe Escobar)

We are the world. We are the people. We are NATO. And we’re comin’ to get ya – wherever you are, whether you want it or not. Call it the latest pop iteration of the “rules-based international order” – duly christened at NATO’s 75th birthday in D.C. Well, the Global Majority had already been warned – but brains under techno-feudalism tend to be reduced to mush. So a gentle reminder is in order. This had already been stated in the first paragraph of the Joint Declaration on EU-NATO Cooperation, issued on January 9, 2023: “We will further mobilize the combined set of instruments at our disposal, be they political, economic, or military, (italics mine) to pursue our common objectives to the benefit of our one billion citizens.” Correction: barely one million, part of the 0.1% plutocracy. Certainly not one billion. Cut to the 2024 NATO Summit Declaration – obviously redacted, with stellar mediocrity, by the Americans, with the other 31 assorted vassal members duly assenting. So here’s the main 2024 NATO “strategic” trifecta:

• Extra tens of billions of dollars in “assistance” to the upcoming rump Ukraine; the overwhelming majority of these funds will be slushing around the industrial-military money laundering complex.
• Forceful imposition of extra military spending on all members.
• Massive hyping up of the “China threat”.

As for the theme song of the NATO 75 show, there are actually two. Apart from “China Threat” (closing credits), the other one (opening credits) is “Free Ukraine”. The lyrics go something like this: it looks like we are at war against Russia in Ukraine, but don’t be fooled: NATO is not a participant in the war. Well, they are even setting up a NATO office in Kiev, but that is just to coordinate production for a Netflix war series. The outgoing epileptic slab of Norwegian wood posing as NATO Secretary-General – before the arrival of his Dutch Gouda replacement – put on quite a performance. Highlights include his fierce denunciation of “the growing alliance between Russia and its authoritarian friends in Asia”, as in “authoritarian leaders in Iran, North Korea and China”. These malignant entities “all want NATO to fail”. So there’s much work to do “with our friends in the Indo-Pacific”.

“Indo-Pacific” is a crude “rules-based international order” invention. No one across Asia, anywhere, has ever used it; everyone refers to Asia-Pacific. The joint declaration directly blames China for fueling Russian “aggression” in Ukraine: Beijing is described as a “decisive enabler” of the Kremlin’s “war effort”. NATO script writers even directly threaten China: China “cannot enable the largest war in Europe in recent history without this negatively impacting its interests and reputation”. To counter-act such malignity, NATO will expand its “partnerships” with “Indo-Pacific” states. Even before the summit declaration, the Global Times was already losing their cool with these inanities: “Under the hype from the U.S. and NATO, it seems that China has become the ‘key’ to the survival of Europe, controlling the fate of the Russia-Ukraine conflict like a ‘decisive power.’”

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“..it cannot end, it must not end in the victory of Russia because if it happened that way, we will have another war soon because Russia will attack again..”

Poland Preparing Military For Full-Scale Conflict, Army Chief Says (ZH)

NATO officials have announced several major moves which collectively mark a significant escalation with Russia at the annual NATO summit in Washington DC this week. First, President Biden on Tuesday unveiled that the US is sending dozens of anti-air defense systems to Ukraine forces amid stepped-up Russian aerial assaults. Next, a joint statement from Washington, the Hague and Copenhagen confirmed that an initial batch of US-made F-16 jet fighters are en route to Ukraine. This alone marks a massive escalation, given Moscow has already vowed it will target the jets. On Wednesday, yet another ultra-provocative announcement was made aimed at ‘deterring’ Moscow. Poland’s army chief of staff General Wieslaw Kukula called for his country to prepare its soldiers for all-out conflict. “Today, we need to prepare our forces for full-scale conflict, not an asymmetric-type conflict,” General Kukula told a press conference. “This forces us to find a good balance between the border mission and maintaining the intensity of training in the army,” he said.

His ‘border mission’ reference alludes to the ongoing tensions with Belarus, a close Russian ally which forms part of the ‘Union State’. Poland recently implemented its “East Shield” program, a $2.5 billion initiative to beef up defenses along the Poland-Belarus border. Going back to 2021, Belarus has been accused of intentionally flooding the Polish border with Middle East migrants as a form of hybrid warfare. The European Union has charged President Alexander Lukashenko with orchestrating a border crisis in order to bog down Polish troops and border guards. Another issue is that China’s military has kicked off exercises with Belarusian forces in Brest in recent days, which lies within miles of the Polish border. According to more of Wednesday’s Polish military announcement from Reuters,

“Speaking at the same event, deputy defense minister Pawel Bejda said that as of August, the number of troops guarding Poland’s eastern border would be increased to 8,000 from the current 6,000, with an additional rearguard of 9,000 able to step up within 48 hours notice.” Warsaw has also been on a major recruitment campaign toward rapidly increasing the size of its armed forces. This comes at a moment the NATO ‘eastern flank’ country is increasingly hitching its wagon to Ukraine’s fate. The current size of the Polish armed forces is commonly estimated at 190,000 personnel, but Warsaw wants to bolster it to 300,000 troops within a few years. On Monday, President Zelensky met with Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk in Warsaw where the two signed an unprecedented military agreement. Zelensky subsequently highlighted a provision which allows Poland to intercept Russian missiles over Ukraine territory, if they are deemed a threat to Poland and its population.

Poland has throughout the Ukraine war maintained a muscular, hawkish posture toward Russia and has criticized efforts at peaceful settlement at the negotiating table. Just this week Polish President Andrzej Duda reiterated that Ukraine must not cede any territory to Russia in exchange for peace. He said Tuesday, “If there is anyone who wants to give to Russia a piece of Ukrainian land and they are not Ukrainian, then let them give a piece of their land to Russia because it is easy to give away a piece of somebody else’s land.” “I would like this war to end as soon as possible. However, it cannot end, it must not end in the victory of Russia because if it happened that way, we will have another war soon because Russia will attack again,” Duda added.

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“..transforming the fear to preparedness.”

NATO Countries Closest to Russia Up Defense Spending (ET)

The nations on NATO’s easternmost flank are investing record amounts on defense in order to deter further Russian aggression against the region. Defense ministers from Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania gathered on July 9 in Washington to express their dedication to the NATO alliance and encourage other allies to pull their weight when it came to defense contributions. Anything less, they warned, could encourage more violence in Eastern Europe and, possibly, the end of some nations outright. Latvian Defense Minister Andris Spruds said that Russian President Vladimir Putin’s continued targeting of civilians in Ukraine demonstrated a tolerance for “human loss.” Mr. Putin’s “absolute disregard of human life and human dignity,” he said, had to be taken into account when dealing with Russia.

“We are dealing with an aggressive country,” he said during a fireside chat hosted by Politico on the sidelines of NATO’s 75th annual summit. “Russia is an existential threat, and we should be ready for this existential threat for years.” To that end, he added, the international community should prepare to fend off Russian aggression for years to come. It was vital, he said, that NATO “not engage from positions of weakness and appeasement.”

Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania were all governed by the Soviet Union until its collapse in 1991. Now, Mr. Putin has implemented a foreign policy based on uniting the so-called Russian World, including substantial Russian-speaking communities in former Soviet states, which East European leaders fear will lead to conquests beyond Ukraine. As such, Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania have all exceeded NATO’s guideline of spending 2 percent of their GDP on defense to ensure collective deterrence against foreign aggression. Lithuanian National Defense Minister Laurynas Kasciunas said the investments were about “transforming the fear to preparedness.”

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‘perpetrators and collaborators’

Musk Announces X To Sue Those Behind Advertising Censorship Cartel (ZH)

Elon Musk announced on Thursday that social media platform X will sue ‘perpetrators and collaborators’ who have colluded to control online speech, as revealed on Wednesday by an interim staff report released by the House Judiciary Committee. “Having seen the evidence unearthed today by Congress, X has no choice but to file suit against the perpetrators and collaborators in the advertising boycott racket,” Musk wrote on his platform, adding “Hopefully, some states will consider criminal prosecution.” The House report details a coordinated effort by the World Federation of Advertisers (WFA) and its Global Alliance for Responsible Media (GARM) initiative to demonetize and suppress disfavored content across the internet. As we noted on Wednesday, the WFA is a global association representing over 150 of the world’s biggest brands and over 60 national advertiser associations which created GARM in 2019.

This alliance quickly amassed significant market power, representing roughly 90% of global advertising spend, which amounts to nearly one trillion dollars annually. GARM’s Steer Team reads like a who’s who of corporate America, including heavyweights such as Unilever, Mars, Diageo, Procter & Gamble (P&G), GroupM, AB InBev, L’Oreal, Nestle, IBM, Mastercard, and PepsiCo. These corporations not only wield immense economic influence but are now revealed to be leveraging this power to control online discourse under the guise of “brand safety. The Committee report details multiple instances of GARM’s coordinated efforts to influence and censor online content.

Perhaps the most notable example is the recommendation for a boycott of Twitter following Elon Musk’s acquisition. GARM members, including Danish energy company Orsted, were advised to pull their advertising from Twitter, a move that significantly impacted Twitter’s revenue. Internal emails show GARM’s satisfaction with the result, with GARM leader Rob Rakowitz boasting about the impact on Twitter’s financials. “GARM recommended that its members ‘stop all paid advertisement’ on Twitter in response to Mr. Musk’s acquisition of the company. GARM’s internal documents show that GARM was asked by a member to ‘arrange a meeting and hear more about [GARM’s] perspectives about the Twitter situation and a possible boycott from many companies.” -House Judiciary Committee. And now, Musk is going to sue. Though he may want to quit GARM first.

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Way out of her league. It’s all about the immunity verdict.

AOC Files Articles Of Impeachment Against Justices Alito, Thomas (Fox)

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., filed articles of impeachment against Supreme Court Justices Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas on Wednesday, alleging “unchecked corruption.” Ocasio-Cortez threatened to file the articles last week, raising arguments about undisclosed gifts Thomas has received from wealthy conservatives and recent controversies involving Alito’s home and personal politics. “The unchecked corruption crisis on the Supreme Court has now spiraled into a Constitutional crisis threatening American democracy writ large,” Cortez wrote in a statement. “Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito’s pattern of refusal to recuse from consequential matters before the court in which they hold widely documented financial and personal entanglements constitutes a grave threat to American rule of law, the integrity of our democracy, and one of the clearest cases for which the tool of impeachment was designed.”

“Justice Thomas and Alito’s repeated failure over decades to disclose that they received millions of dollars in gifts from individuals with business before the court is explicitly against the law. And their refusal to recuse from the specific matters and cases before the court in which their benefactors and spouses are implicated represents nothing less than a constitutional crisis. These failures alone would amount to a deep transgression worthy of standard removal in any lower court, and would disqualify any nominee to the highest court from confirmation in the first place,” she argued. Ocasio-Cortez’s Wednesday filing includes three articles of impeachment against Thomas and two against Alito. The charges against Thomas involve undisclosed gifts as well as his lack of recusal in cases allegedly involving his wife’s legal and financial interests. The charges against Alito also include failure to disclose gifts and his lack of recusal in cases in which he had “a personal bias or prejudice concerning a party” before the court.

Ocasio-Cortez first threatened an article of soft impeachment following the Supreme Court’s ruling in former President Trump’s immunity case. The ruling in question said a president has absolute immunity from prosecution for “actions within his conclusive and preclusive constitutional authority,” and “presumptive immunity” for official acts in general. The court said there is no immunity for unofficial acts. “The Supreme Court has become consumed by a corruption crisis beyond its control,” Ocasio-Cortez wrote on X following the decision. “Today’s ruling represents an assault on American democracy. It is up to Congress to defend our nation from this authoritarian capture. I intend on filing articles of impeachment upon our return.” The lawmaker argues that Alito was biased in favor of Trump and participants in the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol. She and other critics base the accusation on Alito flying an “appeal to heaven” flag at his home. The flag has been a symbol associated with American independence since before the Revolutionary War.

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Amy Coney Barrett.

LinkedIn, Google Openly Censor Conservatives – Again (Sellers)

Tech companies are once again colluding with Democrats to push disinformation and censor legitimate conservative opinions, this time with the imprimatur of legitimacy conferred by the U.S. Supreme Court that allows them to do so more shamelessly and aggressively than ever. Today’s censorship is being made possible by the letters A, C and B—as in Justice Amy Coney Barrett. While the court’s two other centrists, Justice Brett Kavanaugh and Chief Justice John Roberts, are equally culpable (along with its leftist bloc) in allowing the atrocity that is Murthy v. Missouri, it was Barrett’s name on the majority opinion. And, indeed, her support for the wrong side in several of the court’s other recent landmark cases has raised serious red flags. Pundit Mark Levin speculated recently that Barrrett has already gone the way of Harry Blackmun and David Souter—two Republican-appointed justices who had, by the end of their terms, become some of its most unabashedly left-leaning, likely due to what is sometimes dubbed the “Greenhouse effect” in honor of a former New York Times reporter fond of haranguing the court’s conservatives.

“I’m telling you that Barrett has decided she’s a politician, not a Justice,” Levin noted on a recent podcast, according to Newsweek. By the end of her term, the 52-year-old justice “will have flipped all the way to the left,” he added. With Democrats in Congress and the media exerting immense pressure on conservative justices like Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito, perhaps Barrett, the court’s youngest jurist—who replaced liberal icon Ruth Bader Ginsberg—remains in survival mode, opting to pick her battles carefully. But in the process, she is throwing essential civil liberties, such as First Amendment free-speech rights, under the bus and severely undermining the safeguards that help preserve America’s democratic institutions.

Barrett’s maverick streak made no difference in the recent Fischer and Trump rulings—which sided in favor of conservatives by, respectively, tossing the Justice Department’s overreach on Jan. 6 “obstruction” cases and forcing the D.C. district court to adjudicate whether former President Donald Trump’s 2020 election challenges qualify for presidential immunity. However, the Murthy decision—which found the court’s “wet noodle” wing delivering a win for Big Tech and the Deep State by deciding that the plaintiffs lacked sufficient standing after years of alarming anti-conservative censorship and government collusion on social-media platforms—will continue to have chilling implications for free speech until the right case comes along to overturn it.It effectively gave sites like Google (and YouTube), Facebook (and Instagram), LinkedIn and countless other leftist dominated tech companies carte blanche to continue the sort of egregious suppression of views that many noted in the lead-up to the 2020 election, with Hunter Biden’s laptop becoming the most ignominious example.

In addition to the laptop, the case dealt with the aggressive suppression of COVID skepticism—much of which has borne out as valid, but which continues to be mischaracterized due to the stigma attached by government-backed propaganda that was designed to clear the paths for Big Pharma’s mRNA “vaccines” to get their emergency approval from the Food and Drug Administration. Then there are the questions surrounding the irregularities in the 2020 election—questions that have fueled ongoing suspicions of massive vote fraud and a stolen election, since all of the major public and private institutions colluded to prevent any sort of meaningful presentation of evidence.

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“How can a democracy of morons succeed, even if once it was a world leader before intelligence and reason were schooled out of the American population?”

Can the West Survive Democracy? (Paul Craig Roberts)

As our Founding Fathers knew, Democracy has many problems. One of the larger problems is that one person one vote is a poor way to make governing decisions. One reason is that intelligence is not equally distributed. Another is that interest in the affairs of state is not equally distributed. Some people want to know what is going on and others concentrate on sports and soap operas and scrolling their cell phones in search of entertainment. Yet another reason is that some have a financial or an ideological interest in controlling the explanations that reach the public and serve as a basis for their decisions placed in the ballot box. Still others focus on putting votes in the ballot boxes that the voters themselves did not put there. There is no doubt that democracy stinks. Founding Father John Adams gave us his view:

“Democracy has never been and never can be so durable as aristocracy or monarchy; but while it lasts, it is more bloody than either. Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide. It is in vain to say that democracy is less vain, less proud, less selfish, less ambitious, or less avaricious than aristocracy or monarchy. It is not true. Passions are the same in all men, under all forms of government, and when unchecked, produce the same effects of fraud, violence, and cruelty. When clear prospects are opened before vanity, pride, avarice, or ambition, for their easy gratification, it is hard for the most considerate philosophers and the most conscientious moralists to resist the temptation.” Our Founding Fathers roped in democracy. They limited the vote to male property owners. They limited democracy to the House of Representatives and the suspect Representatives to two year terms.

The Senate was not elected by popular vote but by the vote of state legislatures who were assumed to be male property owners. Our Founding Fathers tried to protect us from democracy, which they regarded as the rule of the ignorant mob. And that is what it is. Nevertheless today it is all we have as a check on the tyranny of government. So today we are forced to defend democracy, which no Founding Father would do. Our Founding Fathers saw democracy as tyranny. But for us today democracy is the last and only check on the tyranny of the power of government institutions created by elites who are not interested in our opinions. From the standpoint of Klaus Schwab, Bill Gates, and Hillary Clinton, American citizens count for no more than Muammar Gaddafi. We are in the way of their power. They are committed to moving us out of their way. That is what the eight-year attack on Trump and his supporters is about. That is why there are 1,000 falsely convicted American patriots in prison and why President Trump faces multiple criminal and civil indictments.

The ruling American Establishment has has put a negative connotation on every explanation that is not the official narrative. Gradually, any challenge no matter how factual to an official explanation is becoming a criminal act. If the Democrats are reelected or can come close enough to being reelected to cover their theft of the election, by 2028 it will be impossible to speak a word of truth in America. The Ruling Elites will have removed Truth out of their way. It is absurd to think that Americans know this. Americans are so indoctrinated and brainwashed that they don’t know anything. A Rasmussen Poll of the American population reveals that despite the outpouring of reports from the world’s top medical scientists that the Covid-19 “vaccine” has killed far more people than the released Covid virus, only one-third of Americans believe that the Covid vaccines are killing people. In other words, Americans are so utterly stupid that they cannot tell the difference between medical science and media propaganda.

With reports coming in every day of only vaccinated athletes in the prime of life suddenly dropping dead on the playing field, with only vaccinated babies having heart attacks, with the new form of turbo-cancer appearing only among the vaccinated, with miscarriages of vaccinated women off the charts, with neurological problems of the vaccinated off the charts, with new forms of blood clots never seen before of the vaccinated, with new diseases never seen before afflicting only the vaccinated, with massive excess deaths in every Covid vaccinated population, with the admissions that the Covid “vaccines” were not protective, with the overwhelming evidence that the “vaccines” are a threat to life and health, still 69% of Americans have no regrets being jabbed. So, what we have is a population, 69% of which is too stupid to be functional in a one person one vote Democracy. These fools can outvote the 33% by two to one. How can a democracy of morons succeed, even if once it was a world leader before intelligence and reason were schooled out of the American population?

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“..official U.S. policy precludes even shaking hands with Russian diplomats..”

‘My Life’s Work Melting Before My Eyes’ (Scott Ritter)

July 16 will mark the 42nd anniversary of the famous “Walk in the Woods” conducted by Paul Nitze and Yuli Kvitsinsky, respectively the U.S. and Soviet lead negotiators for INF talks that, at the time, were stymied. Faced with a calcified recalcitrance on the part of U.S. hardliners, the two men took a walk in the woods outside Geneva, Switzerland, where they outlined possible ways to break the negotiation impasse. The ideas that Nitze and Kvitsinsky came up with never came to pass — neither the U.S. nor the Soviet Union were ready to undertake such drastic actions. But their courageous stab at diplomacy at a time when neither side was talking to the other shook free the rust that had frozen their respective sides, lubricating the machinery of diplomacy, and set in motion the processes that led to Reagan and Gorbachev signing the INF Treaty some five and a half years later.

The key take-away from the Nitze-Kvitsinsky “Walk in the Woods” was that, when it comes to meaningful arms control, success is not immediate. The process of arms control must be seen in the long term. It was also clear that fear fueled consideration of positive outcomes that eventually led to an equitable solution in the form of the INF Treaty. There is no doubt in my mind that within the ranks of the Russian and U.S. diplomatic corps today are two men possessed of the vision and courage of Paul Nitze and Yuli Kvitsinsky who can, if given the opportunity, recreate the magic of the “Walk in the Woods.” That magic helped create the conditions for negotiations that helped pull the U.S. and Soviet Union from the nuclear abyss more than four decades ago. But two hurdles must be crossed first. It is difficult to imagine a U.S. and Russian diplomat walking and talking today when, as Professor Sergey Markedonev, a fellow participant at the Vienna round table pointed out, official U.S. policy precludes even shaking hands with Russian diplomats.

To cross that bridge the U.S. government needs a signal from the American people that such behavior is not acceptable. We need a modern-day version of the June 1982 Central Park million-person rally in support of nuclear disarmament and arms control and against nuclear war. America has an election coming up in November where issues of our collective existential survival as a people and nation are on the line. There is no more existential issue than that of nuclear war. As was the case in June 1982, we, the people of the United States, need to send a collective signal to all who seek to represent us in the highest office of the land, that we will not tolerate policies that lead toward nuclear war. That we insist on policies that promote nuclear disarmament and arms control. That we demand that our diplomats begin talking with their Russian counterparts. I’m tired of watching my life’s work melt before my very eyes. It’s time to rebuild the foundations of our collective survival. To make mainstream the cause of disarmament that once saved us from nuclear Armageddon.

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Frens
https://twitter.com/i/status/1811278890679009583

 

 

More Frens
https://twitter.com/i/status/1811405515492102598

 

 

Baby dolphin
https://twitter.com/i/status/1811470069823930406

 

 

 

 

Batteries

 

 

 

 

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

 

 

 

 

 

Jun 182024
 


Pablo Picasso The blue room 1901

 

Next Stage – The General Staff’s Targets After Putin’s Feint (Helmer)
NYT Docs: Putin Was Willing To Compromise To End War in 2022 (Antiwar)
US Must Be Saved From WWIII – Trump (RT)
If Putin Ukraine Peace Offer Rejected, Next To Be Tougher – Intel Chief (TASS)
NATO In Talks To Put More Nuclear Weapons On Standby – Stoltenberg (RT)
Kremlin Views NATO’s Rhetoric On Putting Nukes On Alert As Escalation (TASS)
Netanyahu Disbands War Cabinet (RT)
The Unites States of Go Figure (Kunstler)
Schumer Plans Vote on Bill to Ban Bump Stocks After Supreme Court Ruling (ET)
British Conservatives Annihilated In Pre-Election Polls (RT)
Elon Musk Slams “Extinctionist Movement” Who See Humans As A “Plague” (MN)
Brain Chips To Replace Cell Phones In Future – Musk (RT)
Tesla Begins Testing Full Self-Driving On Chinese Roadways Ahead Of Rollout (ZH)
Horrors Of Biden’s Lost 85,000 Migrant Children In America (ZH)

 

 

 

 

Jim Rickards @JamesGRickards My latest interview with Steve Bannon on The War Room covers the G7 theft of Russian assets and how Russia will retaliate by putting a lien on $40 trillion at the Euroclear custodian. U.S. can’t think one move ahead. Financial chaos will result.

 

 

Black voters

 

 

Tucker Alex

 

 

 

 

Watters

 

 

 

 

“To think anyone on the other side is trustworthy, or capable of agreement, after all Putin recounted of US aggression, lying, double-dealing, and Ukrainian Nazism, is impossible.”

Next Stage – The General Staff’s Targets After Putin’s Feint (Helmer)

“[Putin’s terms] will obviously not be accepted by the West and their Ukrainian puppets,” wrote Rozhin. “Against the background of the ‘world summit’ [the Burgenstock, Switzerland, meeting on June 15-16] this will indicate that in fact the West is prolonging the war, so these statements [of Putin] are another torpedo in the summit. Russia is thus showing the countries of the Global South that it has offered a world that will be rejected by those who are broadcasting about ‘peaceful summits’…The war will continue. The goals of the SVO [Special Military Operation] will be achieved by military means.” The distinction in the last line is between Kremlin political strategy and General Staff military strategy – this is a distinction which published Russian analyses of the president’s speech and the state propaganda organs avoid identifying. The semi-official Vzglyad quoted Putin’s spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, as characterizing the reaction from the West as “of an unconstructive nature”. No Russian official will say as little as this for the record.

Instead, Vzglyad has mobilized its official sources to patch over the differences between Kremlin strategy and General Staff strategy by emphasizing that Putin is following the latter. “According to [Putin], the West has received a specific condition – either Ukraine will be outside the NATO bloc, or there will be a bold and sharp onslaught that will leave no chance for the enemies. Putin is confident of victory not only over Ukraine, but also over the entire collective West. The proposal was made in order to recall this initiative after the defeat of Ukraine. But Western leaders did not understand Putin, and then they themselves will say that they want peace… But there will be no mercy, tougher conditions will be put forward.” In a second report from academics on the Kremlin-financed Valdai Club roster, Vzglyad claims “the essence of the Russian president’s speech is that the European security system no longer exists and will not be based on the same principles.”

“In addition, the Russian president managed to change the agenda of the Swiss summit…the president’s initiative is capable of transforming the security structures not only of Eurasia, but also in the perspective of the entire planet. In addition, Russia already has really working international institutions in this space: the CIS, SCO, EAEU, CSTO, BRICS, the Union State of Russia and Belarus. All these tools have proven their reliability and suitability in modern conditions.” The Kremlin’s American camp followers have repeated the semi-official line by scratching the difference between tactics and strategy, between feint and purpose. “Notice he’s [Putin] not making a demand about Odessa,” said one. “So Odessa is still off the table…So this is a prelude to the next ramp-up in Russian military operations.”

Russian skeptics, as well as non-Russian military analysts, point out that Putin has repeatedly refused to follow the General Staff’s advice, restricting their proposed military operations to an extent that there is open questioning about his reasons. One source says Putin’s June 14 exposition is “only half-right in blaming the Western ‘globalist liberal elites’ [Putin’s speech] for the current ‘extremely dangerous state of affairs’ [Putin’s speech]. Ultimately, the ideology of liberalism, inferiority complex, and corruption which dominate the oligarch-backed elite in Moscow has played a major role.” This is a reference to the role Putin invited the oil and minerals oligarch Roman Abramovich to play in the negotiations of March-April 2022 in Istanbul; in the negotiations with the Ukrainian delegation, Abramovich was Putin’s personal delegate and he outranked the official Russian negotiators.

There was strong domestic military and political opposition to this at the time in Moscow; there remains suspicion of an attempt to repeat by Putin’s Kremlin staff, represented by Peskov, even now. “He [Putin] cannot be so influenced still as to think the war against Russia via the Kiev regime will stop under the conditions he laid out, nor can he think there are any terms which the US and NATO can be trusted by the Russians to sign. That’s why the Russian Foreign Ministry tabled the terms of a non-aggression and security in Europe requiring the roll-back of NATO’s borders to 1997. That was in December 2021. To think anyone on the other side is trustworthy, or capable of agreement, after all Putin recounted of US aggression, lying, double-dealing, and Ukrainian Nazism, is impossible.”

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Much better deal than available now, and 500,000 Ukrainians still alive.

NYT Docs: Putin Was Willing To Compromise To End War in 2022 (Antiwar)

In April 2022, Ukraine and Russia were on the brink of signing a deal to end the war just weeks after it began. The New York Times published documents showing President Vladimir Putin was willing to make concessions to get an agreement signed. According to the documents, Putin initially sought to have Kiev recognize Moscow’s 2014 annexation of Crimea. However, a draft agreement from April 15, 2022, suggests both parties were prepared to set aside the issue to end the conflict. “Paragraph 1 of Article 2 and Articles 4, 5, and 11 of this Treaty shall not apply to Crimea and Sevastopol,” the document says. In December, Ukrainian negotiator Oleksandr Chalyi explained that an agreement was reached in the spring of 2022, stating the two sides “managed to find a very real compromise. We were very close in the middle of April, in the end of April, to finalize our war with some peaceful settlement.”

Kiev was also willing to accept neutrality with regards to NATO, according to the NYT. Ukraine’s negotiation team proposed a peace deal that would say the country “does not join any military alliances” and “does not deploy foreign military bases and contingents.” The draft deal would have allowed Kiev to sign bilateral agreements with NATO states, as well as become a member of the European Union, but would have required Ukraine’s security partners to lift sanctions on Russia. The Kremlin also sought to protect the rights of millions of Russian speakers living in Ukraine by forcing Kiev to repeal restrictions on the Russian language, and to bar the state from erecting monuments glorifying neo-Nazis and WWII-era Nazi collaborators. As the talks were ongoing, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky was pushed by his Western backers to forgo diplomacy and attempt to forcibly expel Russian troops from his country.

Then-UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson made an infamous trip to Kiev to pressure Zelensky to abandon any peace negotiations, while Washington repeatedly vowed to supply unlimited military aid. The NYT report added details about US pressure on Ukraine to ditch the talks. According to a senior American official familiar with the negotiations, Washington “quietly said, ‘You understand this is unilateral disarmament, right?’” Additionally, the NYT noted that Polish leaders believed the French and German governments might have endorsed the peace agreement and pushed Ukraine to accept it. During a meeting in late March 2022, Poland’s President Andrzej Duda pressured other NATO leaders not to allow Ukraine to sign the Russian proposal.

Some US officials cautioned Ukraine not to trust Russia and warned the talks were merely a military ploy. However, two out of three Ukrainian negotiators who spoke with the NYT believed the Russian proposal was genuine, and one explained Putin had “reduced his demands” over the course of the discussions. Ultimately, decision-makers in Kiev listened to their supporters in Warsaw, London, and Washington and elected to break off the negotiations. More than two years later, the conflict drags on, with Russian forces steadily advancing on major Ukrainian cities despite renewed Western military aid. On Friday, the Russian president extended a public peace offer to Ukraine that is similar to the one nearly agreed to in 2022. However, along with Kiev agreeing never to join NATO and the West lifting sanctions on Russia, the Kremlin is now demanding that Ukraine recognize Moscow’s sovereignty over Crimea and four other Ukrainian oblasts that have been annexed by Russia throughout the two-and-a-half-year-long war.

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“..he has done more damage to the country than the ten worst presidents in US history combined..”

US Must Be Saved From WWIII – Trump (RT)

Former US President Donald Trump has warned of the possibility of a third world war breaking out under the current leadership in Washington, saying that if elected he would reverse course. Speaking at a Turning Point USA campaign event in Detroit, Trump emphasized that he had not started any new conflict during his 2017-2021 presidency, and vowed to work towards restoring peace, particularly in Ukraine, if he wins a second term. Trump claimed that Joe Biden’s “weakness and failure” were putting the US in “grave danger” and “dragging us towards World War III,” suggesting that he has done more damage to the country than the ten worst presidents in US history combined. “We have a lot of problems in this country, on top of that, we could end up in World War III because we have an incompetent leader that should never have been there,” he stressed.

Earlier this month, the Republican also warned that the world could be plunged into a devastating nuclear war due to Biden’s alleged mental decline. Speaking to Fox News host Sean Hannity, Trump suggested that unlike the leaders of Russia, China, and North Korea, Biden is “not at the top of his game” and had never been “the brightest bulb” among US politicians. Trump warned that a nuclear exchange could lead to “world obliteration” and emphasized that the US currently has a leader that is “incapable of even discussing” the issue. During his speech in Detroit, the presidential candidate also criticized the Biden administration for “wasting money at levels never seen before,” particularly when it comes to continued financial support for Ukraine, and called Vladimir Zelensky “the greatest salesman that has ever lived.”

“Every time he comes to our country, he walks away with $60 billion dollars,” Trump said, adding that every time Zelensky receives money, he immediately asks for more. “It never ends,” he stressed, and vowed to have the issue “settled” before he takes office again as president. Previously, Trump has stated that the Ukraine conflict “never would have happened” if he had been president at the time and has said that he would be able to end it “in 24 hours” if he gets another term in November. He has not, however, offered any details as to how he would accomplish that goal.

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Obviously.

If Putin Ukraine Peace Offer Rejected, Next To Be Tougher – Intel Chief (TASS)

The conditions of the next peace proposal for Ukraine if the current one is rejected will be more complex and harsh, Russian Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) Director Sergey Naryshkin said in an interview with TASS. “The conditions on which peace can be achieved and some sort of a peace agreement may be signed will become more complex and tough for Ukraine,” he said, replying to a question as to what will happen if Ukraine refuses Russian President Vladimir Putin’s peace proposal. Earlier, Putin presented new peace proposals on settling the Ukraine conflict, providing for the recognition of Crimea, the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics and the Zaporozhye and Kherson regions as parts of Russia, the establishment of Ukraine’s non-aligned and non-nuclear status as well as its demilitarization and denazification and the lifting of anti-Russian sanctions. The Kiev regime has rejected this initiative.

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“..the only scenario in which they might resort to a nuclear option is if Russia’s very existence is at stake..”

NATO In Talks To Put More Nuclear Weapons On Standby – Stoltenberg (RT)

NATO members are debating putting more of their nuclear weapons on standby mode amid tensions with Russia and China, Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg has said. In an interview with the Daily Telegraph on Sunday, Stoltenberg stated that NATO is in talks about taking nuclear assets out of storage and making them ready to use, since the US-led military bloc must clearly convey to the outside world that it has a strong deterrent potential. ”I won’t go into operational details about how many nuclear warheads should be operational and which should be stored, but we need to consult on these issues,” he said, adding that deliberations are already underway. The NATO chief stressed that while the bloc’s ultimate goal is a world without nukes, “as long as nuclear weapons exist, we will remain a nuclear alliance, because a world where Russia, China and North Korea have nuclear weapons, and NATO does not, is a more dangerous world.”

He voiced particular concern about what he called China’s growing nuclear capabilities, adding that NATO could soon face “something that it has never faced before, and that is two nuclear-powered potential adversaries” – Beijing and Moscow. According to Stoltenberg, the US is also modernizing its nuclear gravity bombs deployed in Europe, and its allies on the continent are also upgrading the aircraft that carry them. This came after Pranay Vaddi, Special Assistant to the US President and Senior Director for Arms Control, said earlier this month that “absent a change in the trajectory of adversary arsenals,” the US would soon reach a point where it would have to increase the number of deployed nuclear weapons.

Western media and officials have repeatedly accused Russia of nuclear saber-rattling amid the Ukraine conflict. However, officials in Moscow have repeatedly said that they have no plans to use nukes against the neighboring country, stressing that the only scenario in which they might resort to a nuclear option is if Russia’s very existence is at stake. At the same time, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov warned last week that Moscow could potentially alter its nuclear doctrine in view of a growing threat caused by “unacceptable and escalatory actions of the US and its NATO allies.”

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“..the Russian president never talks nukes “at his own initiative as he takes the issue seriously..”

Kremlin Views NATO’s Rhetoric On Putting Nukes On Alert As Escalation (TASS)

The recent remark by NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg that the bloc’s allied members are discussing putting their nuclear arsenals on alert is another bout of tensions, Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters. “This is nothing else but an escalation,” Peskov said. Unlike Western officials, the Russian president never talks nukes “at his own initiative as he takes the issue seriously,” the Kremlin spokesman said. “Whenever President [Vladimir] Putin comments on the issue of nuclear arms, he does so, taking someone’s questions or questions from reporters, including foreign ones,” he explained.

Also, the NATO chief’s statement runs counter to the declaration issued following last weekend’s conference on Ukraine in Switzerland, Peskov added. The communique, he said, ruled out such rhetoric as inadmissible. Stoltenberg told The Daily Telegraph in an interview that NATO allies had started consultations on the need to put nuclear weapons on alert, including against the background of China’s plans to increase the number of its nuclear warheads.

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Nothing changes.

Netanyahu Disbands War Cabinet (RT)

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has dissolved the war cabinet overseeing the conflict in Gaza after a key member, retired general Benny Gantz, resigned from the emergency government, according to media reports. The prime minister reportedly announced the move to ministers at a meeting of the cabinet on Sunday. Gantz, a former defense minister without portfolio who entered the war cabinet shortly after the beginning of the conflict with the Palestinian militant group Hamas last October, announced his resignation earlier this month, citing disagreement with Netanyahu’s policies. ”The cabinet was in the coalition agreement with [National Unity MK Benny] Gantz at his request. As soon as Gantz left – there is no need for a cabinet anymore,” Netanyahu said, as cited by local media.

The prime minister is now expected to hold consultations on the Gaza conflict with a small group of ministers, including Defense Minister Yoav Gallant and Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer, who had been in the war cabinet. Shortly after Gantz’s resignation, another minister without portfolio, former IDF Chief of Staff Gadi Eisenkot, also resigned from the cabinet, where he served as one of three observers. Another observer, Knesset member Yechiel Tropper, made the same announcement. Both Gantz and Eisenkot said they resigned due to Netanyahu’s failure to form a strategy for the war in Gaza.

During the government meeting on Sunday, Netanyahu reportedly said, “in order to reach the goal of eliminating the capabilities of Hamas, [I] made decisions that were not always acceptable to the military echelon,” adding, “we have a country with an army and not an army with a country.” The war cabinet was established on October 11, just days after the Israeli-Hamas war broke out following the Palestinian militant group’s surprise attack on southern Israel, in which over 1,000 people were killed and around 250 were taken hostage. The cabinet was chaired by Netanyahu, and included Gantz and Gallant, along with three observers – Dermer, Eisenkot, and Shas party leader Aryeh Deri.

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“Pretend is what actors actually do, you see. They’re really good at it, and your job is to play along, suspend your disbelief. That’s the essence of showbiz.”

The Unites States of Go Figure (Kunstler)

You realize, don’t you, that everything going on around the Ukraine fiasco on the NATO side is completely insane? The folks running the US government — Barack Obama and his witches’ coven — started the whole thing over there in concert with a gang of corporate players (BlackRock, sundry oil-and-gas companies, Haliburton types, arms-makers, bunch of big banks), plus the dastardly WEF for “guidance” (ha!), looking to grab the mineral wealth of Ukraine and, ultimately, of Russia itself. Nice try. Didn’t work out. Tons of money pounded down a rat hole. Now, the chatter is that we (NATO) “can’t afford to lose.” Yeah? But we’re losing. Russia will hold the eastern Ukraine provinces and what’s left in the rest of Ukraine will be a failed state drained of men under sixty able to work at anything, bankrupt, broken. It will take a century, if ever, for Ukraine to recover from all that and the West will have gained nothing.

Anyway, that’s the true prospect. And so, the West’s “solution” to that humiliating quandary appears to be: start a bigger war, right up to and including nukes. That’s good thinking there, Butch, said Sundance. Why the European members of NATO wanted to go along with this nickel-plated clusterfuck is an abiding puzzle of history now, like who exactly bumped off JFK in 1963. Germany, the Euro club’s biggest economy, stood by listlessly while America blew up its supply of affordable natgas (the Nord Stream pipelines), which was an act of war by us against Germany. Apparently, Olaf Scholz went to our CIA station in Berlin for a haircut one day and came out with a lobotomy, staring blankly through the whole affair like a Hinterwälder steer on the killing floor. Meanwhile, goodbye industrial economy! Nice knowing you. Looks like it’s back to the fourteenth century, living on rough black bread, sleeping with the cattle under your house for heat in winter, fighting jihadis inside your town walls. . . .

What is the purpose, you ask yourself, of this new world war we’re itching to start? And why now, exactly? The stupid answers may be the correct ones. To furnish an emergency pretext allowing “Joe Biden” (Barack Obama & Co.) to “postpone” the election? If so, I guess they want a hot civil war even more than WWIII, because that’s what they’ll get. Or is it just to complete the destruction of the USA, turning us into a failed state run by a tranny Mamluk-ocracy? Or is it, as Ed Dowd has averred, to cover up the imminent implosion of the US / Euroland debt debacle? To provide cover for all that, the West held a fake peace conference at a five-star resort in Switzerland last week — flutes of Louis Roederer Cristal Brut with langoustine mousse in puff pastry boats . . . to die for! (and you just might) — and you know how serious the USA was because we sent our ace problem-solver Veep Kamala Harris, who cackled and hee-hawed her way through a session or two and then. . . just. . . split the scene, mysteriously. Russia, was conspicuously not invited, by the way. Whose idea was that?

Mr. Putin marked the occasion by issuing a sane proposal to commence peace negotiations so plain, simple, and straightforward that even “Joe Biden” might have gotten the drift: 1) withdraw Ukrainian troops from Donbas territory that has joined the Russian Federation, and 2) agree that Ukraine not join NATO. The US and NATO instantly rejected it, on grounds unspecified. According to The New York Times own search engine this very morning (June 17), the newspaper hasn’t published a news story on the Ukraine War for the past five days. Go figure . . . . While Veep Kamala Harris was yukking it up over the peace hilarity in Switzerland, “Joe Biden” went to the far more important celebrity fundraiser out in Hollywood, headlined by the likes of actors George Clooney, Julia Roberts, and late-nite snarkist Jimmy Kimmel, that is, certified experts on geopolitical conflict, united in the cause of “saving our democracy” from “the dictator Trump.”

“Joe Biden” declared that Donald Trump was bent on “retribution. . . he’s gonna get back at the people.” Roger that. But I think he meant that Mr. Trump might open some inquiries into how come the Democratic Party and its Intel blob ran one debilitating lawless hoax after another on our country for the past eight years while bankrupting it and destroying the medical system, the legal system, the currency, higher education, and the US military, not to mention jailing thousands on fake criminal charges and letting ten billion alien mutts into the country, many of them jihadis with dubious intentions.But never mind all that. $30-million got raised in Hollywood to continue the game of pretend that “JB” is running for reelection. Pretend is what actors actually do, you see. They’re really good at it, and your job is to play along, suspend your disbelief. That’s the essence of showbiz.

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“.. the high court found that the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) exceeded its authority..”

How is that a “disgraceful decision”?

Schumer Plans Vote on Bill to Ban Bump Stocks After Supreme Court Ruling (ET)

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said he will bring a vote this week on legislation to outlaw bump stocks after the Supreme Court on June 14 struck down a Trump-era ban on the gun accessory. Mr. Schumer, at a June 16 news conference shared by CBS News, said he would bring the bill up for unanimous consent, meaning that only one senator has the power to block the measure. It is almost certain that a Republican senator would move to block the measure. “We’ll see just what Republican MAGAs do: Will they allow it to go forward, or will they cower to MAGA and hurt the American people?” Mr. Schumer said. A 6–3 opinion by the high court found that the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) exceeded its authority when it interpreted a federal firearms statute to outlaw the use of bump stocks.

Bump stocks are attached to the butt end of a rifle, to take advantage of a semiautomatic gun’s recoil to fire more rapidly. “As I warned the Trump administration at the time, the only way to permanently close this loophole is through legislation. Senate Democrats are ready to pass legislation to ban bump stocks, but we will need votes from Senate Republicans,” Mr. Schumer said in a statement on June 14 after the ruling. The ATF in 2018, with the support of President Donald Trump, reversed its earlier position and declared bump stocks illegal in response to the 2017 mass shooting in Las Vegas, in which a gunman used firearms equipped with bump stocks to fire multiple guns more rapidly, killing 60 and leaving hundreds wounded.

Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito filed a concurrence on June 14 that emphasized Congress’s role. “There is a simple remedy for the disparate treatment of bump stocks and machineguns,” he said. “Congress can amend the law—and perhaps would have done so already if ATF had stuck with its earlier interpretation. Now that the situation is clear, Congress can act.” Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, called the Supreme Court decision “deeply disappointing.” “Today’s ruling renews a call for Congress to enact further gun safety legislation,” he wrote on social media platform X. Rep. Maxwell Alejandro Frost (D-Fla.) echoed that, writing on X that the ruling was a “disgraceful decision” that “will result in the death of more Americans, especially children.” Some Republicans saw the ruling as a victory for Second Amendment rights. Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) said on June 16 that any legislation to ban bump stocks might violate the Second Amendment.

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“Winning just 72 seats would be the party’s worst result in its 200-year history..”

British Conservatives Annihilated In Pre-Election Polls (RT)

The UK’s ruling Conservative Party is heading for “electoral extinction,” according to multiple polls published in British media over the weekend. Amid Sunak’s record unpopularity, two polls showed Nigel Farage’s Reform UK party surging to third place. According to an Opinium poll published in The Observer on Saturday, 40% of likely voters said they would choose the Labour Party when they cast their votes on July 4. Another 23% said they would vote Conservative, while 14% said they would back Reform UK candidates, a better result for the anti-immigration party than for the Greens (7%) and Liberal Democrats (12%). A Telegraph poll published the same day showed even more dismal results for Sunak’s party, with 46% of likely voters choosing Labour, 21% Conservative, and 13% opting for Reform UK.

It marks the poorest showing for the Conservatives in a Telegraph poll in five years, while Labour’s 25-point lead is the party’s largest since October 2022, when Conservative Prime MInister Liz Truss stepped down after unveiling a widely-reviled mini-budget. Reform’s share in both polls is its largest since the party’s creation in 2021. A more detailed poll carried out by Survation for the Times showed Labour winning 456 out of 650 parliamentary seats, and the Conservatives hanging on to only 72. By contrast, the Conservatives won 365 seats in 2019, a majority of 80 and at the time their best result since 1987. Winning just 72 seats would be the party’s worst result in its 200-year history. The Conservatives’ previous low point came in 1906, when under the leadership of Arthur Balfour it won 156 seats to the Liberal party’s 397.

Sunak called the election last month, before the publication of economic data showing that inflation was unlikely to fall to his government’s target. Like Truss and Boris Johnson before him, Sunak has presided over an historic decline in British living standards and a rise in energy costs and inflation, both of which soared after the UK cut itself off from Russian fossil fuels in 2022. With three weeks to go until the election, some Conservatives have accused Reform UK and its leader, Nigel Farage, of splitting the right-wing vote. “The only wasted vote is a Conservative vote,” Farage shot back last week, after a separate poll showed Reform as the country’s second-largest party. “We’re heading north and the Tories are heading south,” he continued, declaring that “the people’s revolt is just gathering momentum.”

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“..If humans go extinct or civilisation collapses, whatever policies we may have are irrelevant..”

Elon Musk Slams “Extinctionist Movement” Who See Humans As A “Plague” (MN)

In a recent interview, Elon Musk warned that those who wish to see humanity thrive are in a fight against those with an “extinctionist” philosophy, environmental extremists who see humans as a “plague on the Earth.” Musk was speaking to the Cato Institute about the “implosion of the birth rate,” noting that we should be “very concerned” because it is “accelerating in most countries.” “If there are no humans, there’s no humanity,” Musk simplified, adding “we need to make them somehow.” The Space X owner continued, “In the sort of extreme form of the environmentalist movement, people start to view humans as a plague on the surface of the earth, as a fundamentally bad thing, and with the implication that if all humans disappeared, somehow earth would be better off.”

Musk labeled it “The Extinctionist Movement,” urging that “I think at a fundamental level, you can think of things as a fight between expansionist and extinctionist philosophies.” “That’s what really matters. If humans go extinct or civilisation collapses, whatever policies we may have are irrelevant,” he further asserted. Musk further stressed that civilisation and consciousness will end and everything will be left to robots unless we “have an expansionist philosophy.” “We must seek to go beyond what we’ve done in the past to increase the number of humans,” Musk declared, adding “one way or another, this must happen.” His final message to the world was “Go forth and multiply.” It is a warning Musk has been repeating for some time now.

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He mentions so much, and the author picks out the cell phone? How about “revolutionary treatments for people suffering from various physical disabilities such as paralysis and blindness, as well as illnesses like obesity, autism, depression, and schizophrenia..”?

Brain Chips To Replace Cell Phones In Future – Musk (RT)

Cell phones will become obsolete in the future, being replaced by chips that are implanted directly in the human brain, billionaire tech entrepreneur Elon Musk has predicted. His Neuralink biotech company implanted a brain chip for the first time in 30-year-old quadriplegic Noland Arbaugh back in January. The surgical procedure involved placing the computer chip – which is about the size of a coin – in the region of the brain which controls the intention to move. The chip is then used to “record and transmit brain signals wirelessly to an app that decodes movement intention.” Musk shared his latest prediction in response to a post published on X (formerly Twitter) by a parody account named Not Elon Musk on Sunday. The original message read: “Would you install a Neuralink interface on your brain to allow you to control your new X phone by thinking?”

Musk replied by claiming that “in the future, there will be no phones, just Neuralinks.” In its press release last year, Neuralink said its Precise Robotically Implanted Brain-Computer Interface (PRIME) program aims at developing a “fully implantable, wireless brain-computer interface” that would at first grant people the ability to control a computer cursor or keyboard using their thoughts. It would later pave the way for revolutionary treatments for people suffering from various physical disabilities such as paralysis and blindness, as well as illnesses like obesity, autism, depression, and schizophrenia. In an interview with Joe Rogan in 2018, Musk suggested that Neuralink could also one day allow humans to communicate without using words, and possibly also achieve a state of “symbiosis” with artificial intelligence.

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) granted approval for the first chip implantation trial last May. Several weeks after the procedure in late January, Musk reported that the man had made a “full recovery with no ill effects that we are aware of,” and was capable of moving a computer mouse around the screen “by just thinking.” However, in May, Neuralink acknowledged that it had encountered certain issues after tiny wires implanted in the brain were dislodged out of position. Nevertheless, the FDA gave the green light for a second human trial, the Wall Street Journal reported last month. The next experiment, which is reportedly slated for June, will feature a modified procedure, whereby a chip will be implanted deeper into the brain to prevent it from retracting. According to the media outlet, another eight people are expected to take part in further trials by the end of the year.

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Wow. That’s fast.

Tesla Begins Testing Full Self-Driving On Chinese Roadways Ahead Of Rollout (ZH)

Beijing recently ‘greenlighted’ Tesla the ability to roll out its driver-assistance system, known as “Full Self-Driving,” or FSD. A new report suggests Tesla is testing vehicles equipped with FSD on city streets and highways in the world’s largest car market. Reuters cited a report from the government-backed Shanghai Observer that said ten Tesla vehicles with FSD are being tested ahead of what could be a much larger planned rollout later this year. Elon Musk has been strategically paving the way for an FSD rollout in China in recent months. His surprise visit to China on April 28, where he met with top Chinese officials, including Premier Li Qiang, clearly indicated Tesla’s deepening ties with China.

One day later, on April 29, news broke in US corporate media that Tesla would partner with Chinese tech giant Baidu for mapping and navigation software to support FSD, including satisfying regulators about data security and privacy requirements. Other reports said top Chinese officials gave Musk the greenlight to roll out FSD in some limited capacity. In May, Reuters reported that Tesla was preparing to register FSD with Chinese authorities for a planned rollout later this year. Chinese state media also stated that Tesla had begun building a Megapack factory in Shanghai. The larger rollout of FSD in China will be a golden opportunity for Tesla to expand revenue streams amid the worldwide slump in EV sales. Also, this allows them to better compete with local rivals in China.

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“If this happened under former President Trump, CBS, ABC, NBC, and other media outlets would be running 24/7 specials about the horrific situation..”

Horrors Of Biden’s Lost 85,000 Migrant Children In America (ZH)

One of Muckraker.com’s journalists has taken to X, revealing an upcoming report set to expose the shocking reality behind some of the 85,000 migrant children who vanished under the Biden administration’s first term. Muckraker wrote on X that one government insider has supplied them with a “list of addresses where some of the 85,000 missing alien children have been delivered under the Biden administration.” In the video, a Muckraker journalist stood outside an abandoned Amityville, New York house. He said this is one of the thousands of addresses the government insider has provided them, adding this home with boarded-up windows allegedly had two migrant children delivered to a sponsor living at the house. “Our upcoming report will expose the horrors of the Biden administration’s unaccompanied children program,” Muckraker wrote on X.

Leftist corporate media outlets have barely covered that the Health and Human Services Office of Refugee Resettlement has lost more than 85,000 migrant children in Biden’s first term. If this happened under former President Trump, CBS, ABC, NBC, and other media outlets would be running 24/7 specials about the horrific situation. All the American people hear are crickets from leftist corporate media outlets, more focused on rainbow June month than actually caring about missing children. It is disappointing and another reason why distrust in leftist corporate media is soaring as ratings implode. In recent weeks, “Fox and Friends Weekend” co-host Rachel Campos-Duffy asked Trump in an interview about the missing migrant children situation and what he would do if reelected.

“So in just this year, fiscal year 2024, there’s been 74,000 unaccompanied children that have come across the border. In 2023, get this number, 137,275. You know, you’ve seen the images of these children … and the Joe Biden administration has lost 80,000 of them. No one can track, no one knows where they’re at … Will you commit, will the Trump administration commit to finding these children, to finding them and returning them to their families? To their countries? Because many of them have been lost into sex trafficking. It’s heartbreaking. Will you commit to that?” Campos-Duffy asked the former president.

Trump responded: “Yeah, I would do that. Sure, adding, “I haven’t been asked that question, but the answer is yes. It’s a simple answer. Many of them are dead. They have done such a bad job.” Trump also spoke with Dr. Phil about the situation, in which he said, “Can you imagine if that were Trump that had 88,000 missing children…” What Trump is referring to is corporate leftist media would be railing against him if he were president right now for the missing children. Muckraker did not provide a release date on the report: “Stay tuned, you do not want to miss what’s next.” If the climate cultists and woke zombies across the West redirected their wasted energy from rainbow parades to actually addressing human trafficking, perhaps real progress in tackling this crisis could be made.

Read more …

 

 

 

 

Kansas AG Pfizer

 

 

Turandot
https://twitter.com/i/status/1802646620015579338

 

 

Whenever I see Optimus, I just keep thinking: Joe Biden moves very energy efficient.
https://twitter.com/i/status/1802678186611777681

 

 

Horse

 

 

Baby turtle

 

 

Baby rhino

 

 

Elephants

 

 

Pride
https://twitter.com/i/status/1802658014249328657

 

 

 

 

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

 

 

 

 

 

Jun 172024
 


Edward Hopper Cape Cod morning 1950

 

Putin’s Peace Initiative Last Chance To Save Ukrainian State – Medvedchuk (TASS)
Putin’s Peace Proposals on Ukraine Are ‘Golden Opportunity & Lifeline’ (Sp.)
A Proposal, A Last Chance, An Ultimatum (SCF)
Zelensky Set The Trap That Threatens To Destroy Us (Dionísio)
Ukraine ‘Peace Summit’ Is ‘Animal Farm’ – Medvedev (RT)
Polish President Calls For ‘Decolonization’ of Russia (RT)
US Tried to Provoke China Into Attacking Taiwan – Xi (Sp.)
The Changing Nature Of Nuclear Deterrence (Malinen)
Europe’s Elections as a Mirror (Patrick Lawrence)
Musk Says “Eliminate Electronic Voting Machines” (ZH)
Biden-Trump Debate Rules Revealed (RT)
Biden “Losing Focus”, “Worst He’s Ever Been” (MN)
AI is Digital Control, You’ve Been Warned – Catherine Austin Fitts (USAW)
Judges Named for Assange Appeal (Lauria)

 

 

 

 

Elon multiply
https://twitter.com/i/status/1802120341768089711

 

 

 

 

Amnesty

 

 

Wisdom

 

 

Meloni

 

 

 

 

 

 

This may be Putin’s final peace plan. Better consider it.

“This is a concentration camp for the Ukrainian people, with everyone wanting to flee except the gang that is criminally reigning..”

Putin’s Peace Initiative Last Chance To Save Ukrainian State – Medvedchuk (TASS)

The peace initiative of Russian President Vladimir Putin is the last chance to preserve the Ukrainian state, Viktor Medvedchuk, the former leader of the Opposition Platform-For Life party now banned in Ukraine, told TASS in an interview. “The new peace initiative of Vladimir Putin is the last chance to preserve the Ukrainian state. Ukraine at present with its illegitimate president, the regime adversary to the people, legal nihilism and the Nazi state ideology cannot be considered to be the state anymore,” the politician said. “Vladimir Putin suggests returning the state to Ukrainians, making it neutral, sovereign, demilitarized and denazified,” Medvedchuk said.

“The peace proposals returns not only the peace to Ukraine but also rights of Ukrainian citizens criminally overturned by the regime of [Vladimir] Zelensky,” he stressed. Ukraine at present “cannot exist without huge external borrowings. This is actually a bankrupt country, a black hole for the Western economy,” Medvedchuk noted. “This is a concentration camp for the Ukrainian people, with everyone wanting to flee except the gang that is criminally reigning,” he added. On June 14, Russian President Vladimir Putin named conditions for settlement of the situation in Ukraine, including withdrawal of the Ukrainian army from Donbass and Novorossiya and refusal of Kiev to join NATO.

Read more …

“It is to be expected that the West will do everything possible to prevent Ukraine from accepting Russia’s peace initiatives..”

Putin’s Peace Proposals on Ukraine Are ‘Golden Opportunity & Lifeline’ (Sp.)

Kiev should agree to the preconditions for peace talks laid out by Russian President Vladimir Putin, otherwise its position both in the combat zone and at the negotiating table will only get much worse, Persio Gloria de Paula, an expert at the Naval War College in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, told Sputnik. “One should bear in mind that Ukraine is suffering both hardware and personnel losses. For the first, it relies on its patrons in the West, while to replenish the second it will need to push through increasingly stringent mobilization and lower the conscription age,” he remarked. At the same time, the Russian proposal poses a challenge to Kiev and its sponsors on the eve of the so-called peace summit in Switzerland. “This calls into question the goals and effectiveness of a summit which is not attended by all the sides involved,” Persio Gloria de Paula said.

The conditions laid out by President Putin to resolve the Ukraine conflict are “a golden opportunity both for Kiev and the European countries to begin negotiations,” Iranian political scientist Emad Abshenas told Sputnik. “Of course, as expected, Russia insists on its key demands,” he noted, including a neutral, non-nuclear status for Ukraine, “as well as guarantees of independence, rights, freedoms and interests of the Russian-speaking population of the country.” He singled out Putin’s remarks that these fundamental parameters along with Ukraine’s demilitarization and de-Nazification were broadly agreed on during the Istanbul negotiations in 2022. However, on Western countries’ orders, Kiev ultimately rejected these conditions, the expert said. It is to be expected that the West will do everything possible to prevent Ukraine from accepting Russia’s peace initiatives, said Unver Sel, chairman of the Federation of Crimean Tatar Culture Societies of Turkiye.

Once again, settlement of the conflict will be delayed. When asked if the West will claim responsibility for what is currently happening in Ukraine, the pundit said:“It is naive to hope that the West will suddenly acknowledge its responsibility. This did not happen in Yugoslavia, Iraq, Afghanistan, or Syria… The West will continue to behave like a spoiled child who does not understand the consequences of his actions, and acts solely based on his own selfish goals.”

Read more …

“The Ukrainians will only have to bear the burden of a slow, long and bloody defeat. And NATO, the sponsor of the spectacle of death, will be responsible for every life lost on the battlefield.”

A Proposal, A Last Chance, An Ultimatum (SCF)

While the Kiev regime and its supporters continue to organize the “peace summit” in Switzerland, the Russian Federation is advancing its plans to bring a real end to the conflict. For Moscow, the conditions for peace or war are clear: either Ukraine recognizes the territories already liberated as Russian and promises neutrality, or the responsibility for the bloodshed from now on will lie entirely with NATO. Russia has never been in any kind of “rush” in this conflict. With less and less casualties, an overwhelmingly economic growth, and having the opportunity to destroy NATO military software and neutralize foreign mercenaries, there is no reason for the Russians to want to quickly end hostilities. The Russian initiative to put forward peace terms is due to a sincerely humanitarian concern, since, unlike the Kiev neo-Nazi junta, decision-makers in the Kremlin see the Ukrainian people as a sister nation and a vital part of Russian civilization.

Since February 2022, Russia has constantly offered peace terms in accordance with the update of its strategic interests. Before the referendums for the union of the New Regions with the Russian Federation, Moscow’s demand was limited to the recognition of Donetsk and Lugansk as independent countries – there was not even any interest in reintegrating them into Russia at the time. It was Western interventionism in the peace negotiations and the fascist government’s subservience to NATO that prevented an agreement from being reached in the early stages of the special military operation. The lack of guaranteed recognition for Donetsk and Lugansk led the war to continue and motivated these regions to ask to return to their eternal home (the Russian Federation).

Then Ukrainian insistence on boycotting the normalization of life in Crimea led Russia to also reintegrate Kherson and Zaporozhye. For now, the four New Regions and Crimea (already reintegrated ten years ago) are Russia’s only formal territorial demands. The only thing Russia is asking for in addition to that is a guarantee of neutrality and demilitarization so that its civilian areas are not attacked, which Ukraine can provide simply by promising not to seek NATO membership. Obviously, Zelensky will not be able to accept the agreement proposed by Putin. Firstly, because he is a puppet who only obeys NATO orders. Furthermore, NATO has not yet managed to open another front to maintain its proxy war against Russia. The anti-Russian lobby in Moldova is still not enough to move aggression against Transnistria or Gagauzia, while in Georgia the Parliament said “no” to foreign saboteurs.

Without another flank, NATO will not allow any negotiations in Ukraine. Kiev will have to keep fighting, even if it is very close to reaching the “last Ukrainian”. And from this perspective, Putin’s proposal becomes an ultimatum. The last chance was given to end this war with “only” half a million Ukrainians dead and 25% of the (former) Ukrainian territory liberated. With the obvious Ukrainian rejection, it is clear that there will be an update of these interests. Only the Russians will be able to say how much more territory they will demand from now on. The Ukrainians will only have to bear the burden of a slow, long and bloody defeat. And NATO, the sponsor of the spectacle of death, will be responsible for every life lost on the battlefield.

Read more …

“Now, to finance the war effort, the illegitimate Zelensky [..] is preparing to sell what he still has left..”

Zelensky Set The Trap That Threatens To Destroy Us (Dionísio)

Bandera’s Ukraine, which has been furiously privatizing its remaining state properties left to it by Russia and the USSR, already has a large part of its valuable black lands in the hands of Blackrock, Monsanto and other U.S. interests. These are joined by energy, mining, agro-industrial and real estate ownership. Now, to finance the war effort, the illegitimate Zelensky, who is currently usurping the position of president (I can already see the meaning of that kiss from von der Leyen, the usurpers recognize each other), is preparing to sell what he still has left. The exigencies from the IMF and from financial agreements with the European Union always require privatizations and the businesses in question are, in some cases, important natural monopolies.We all know who will profit most from the purchase of these state assets. The U.S. will get the best share, but the United Kingdom, Germany, France, in that order, will also get their “fair share”.

If the Hotel Ukraine is the most famous asset of all those announced in this new package, here is a list, which the Kiev regime itself says is a “large privatization”. Energy companies, Port of Odessa, mining sector, distilleries, heavy machinery factories, such as a locomotives factory…The most serious thing about all this, the most tragic thing for all of us, is that the sale of the country to the interests of the United States and the West is not innocent and goes far beyond a simple act of corruption or handing over the country to foreign interests. Consciously or unconsciously, the acquisition of large and profitable properties, by large Western corporations, constitutes a very important step towards worsening the conflict and one that I believe goes unnoticed by many good people, normally concentrated in the specifically military aspect. In these cases, the military aspect is nothing more than the peak of the Iceberg, which hides all the complexity of economic relations that, at the base, constitute the reason for everything that is happening.

Recourse to the military happens when relationships at the base become irreconcilable. Zelensky, certainly aware that the war can only be won with the direct entry of the U.S., even if we all have to lose it (in wars everyone loses) for him to win it, as he hands over his country to the oligarchies that support the American political apparatus, will know how important it is, the control of Ukrainian properties, by those powerful interests. What better way to protect access to the Black Sea than by handing over the Port of Odessa to Western interests? History tells us that Western corporate interests, especially the United States, protect their assets, even if, to do so, they have to invade countries and occupy them. Consequently, Zelensky knows that the greater the dominance of American corporations in Ukraine, the greater the likelihood of worsening the conflict and direct U.S. entry.

Read more …

“According to an earlier Bloomberg report, Biden skipped the summit because it overlapped with a campaign fundraiser in California..”

Ukraine ‘Peace Summit’ Is ‘Animal Farm’ – Medvedev (RT)

The Swiss-hosted Ukraine ‘peace summit’ has turned out to be an erratic and dysfunctional event whose participants have no clue what they are doing there, former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has said. The June 15-16 conference at the Burgenstock Hotel near Lake Lucerne focuses on three points of Vladimir Zelensky’s ‘peace formula’, including prisoner exchanges and nuclear and food security. The plan calls for Russia to withdraw from all territories claimed by Kiev, but has been dismissed by Moscow as divorced from reality. Russia was not invited to the event. President Vladimir Putin has argued that it is simply an attempt by the West to create the illusion of a global anti-Russian coalition and distract attention away from the root causes of the conflict.

Writing on Telegram on Sunday, Medvedev, who is currently the deputy chairman of Russia’s Security Council, compared the summit to George Orwell’s ‘Animal Farm’. The novel, which is considered to be a veiled reference to the Stalin-era Soviet Union, reflects on how ideals of equality and freedom can become distorted and betrayed after a ruthless leader takes over. The ex-Russian president said the Swiss event is “pure surrealism” and that “none of the participants in the ‘peace forum’ know what they are doing there and what their role is.” He went on to say that the Swiss “shepherd boys” invited only “trustworthy animals,” including a “crazy puny swine” and his sidekick, as well as “a flock of slow-witted Western Alpine sheep blithely bleating about peace, as well as a pack of European chained dogs to guard the livestock.” Medvedev did not specify who these remarks were directed at. According to the former president, the ‘dogs’ are “barking and spitting poisonous saliva” to maintain order, which he said is warranted since the “sheep often bleat out of place and confuse the memorized statements.”

In an apparent reference to US President Joe Biden, he said the flock is led by “an elderly, weak-minded owner” suffering from “progressive dementia.” He added that the US, instead of sending Biden, sent “a soft-headed deputy who… said a phrase learned by heart and quickly went home,” referring to Vice President Kamala Harris. ”To sum it up, the grazing of cattle in the Alps is just a sad pile of poop that is burning up taxpayers’ money,” Medvedev said. According to an earlier Bloomberg report, Biden skipped the summit because it overlapped with a campaign fundraiser in California ahead of the presidential election this November. Zelensky criticized the US president’s absence, suggesting it “would only be met with applause by Putin.” A number of Western officials have acknowledged that the Ukraine conflict cannot be resolved without Moscow’s participation in talks.

Read more …

“..over 190 ethnic groups that speak more than 270 languages and dialects..”

Polish President Calls For ‘Decolonization’ of Russia (RT)

Polish President Andrzej Duda has called for the “decolonization” of Russia, claiming that ethnic minorities should break away from Moscow’s rule and form their own states. Russia is one of the most diverse countries in the world and comprises over 190 ethnic groups that speak more than 270 languages and dialects, according to the government. Speaking at the so-called “Peace for Ukraine” conference in Switzerland on Sunday, Duda described Russia as a “prison of nations.” The country is “home to almost 200 ethnic groups,” which “became the residents of Russia as a result of methods used in Ukraine today,” the Polish leader claimed, referring to the conflict between Moscow and Kiev.

“Russia remains the largest colonial empire in the world, which, unlike European powers, has never undergone the process of decolonization and has never been able to deal with demons of its past,” Duda stated. “As a member of the international community, we have to finally say – there is no [space] for colonialism in the modern world.” Poland has been one of the most vocal proponents of aid to Ukraine since Russia launched its military operation in the neighboring state. According to the Polish media, Duda’s main mission in Switzerland was to “highlight the scale of the Russian threat.”

Earlier this year, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk suggested his country’s readiness to potentially host US nuclear weapons, which Moscow called a “provocation” and “deeply hostile policy.” Russian President Vladimir Putin has repeatedly stated that Moscow has no intention of attacking NATO members and has dismissed claims to the contrary as scare tactics. In August 2023, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova wrote an op-ed for the Izvestia newspaper, condemning “the crimes of colonialism” committed by the West and arguing that Western overseas possessions, such as France’s New Caledonia, Britain’s Gibraltar, and US’ Guam, are modern-day “colonies.” She insisted that “the free world will undoubtedly win, and the process of decolonization will be completed.”

Duda
https://twitter.com/i/status/1802051162373550439

Read more …

“..continues to pursue the one-China policy and does not support Taiwan’s independence.”

US Tried to Provoke China Into Attacking Taiwan – Xi (Sp.)

Chinese President Xi Jinping has repeatedly underscored that the Taiwan issue in China-US relations is a major red line that must not be crossed. Beijing has also urged Washington to stop sending “erroneous signals” to Taiwanese separatists. Xi Jinping warned Ursula von der Leyen about Washington’s attempts to provoke Beijing into attacking Taiwan, the Financial Times reported. China’s president delivered the cautionary message in April 2023 both to the European Commission president and officials in his own country, according to insiders. The gist of Xi’s warning was reportedly that the Biden administration was trying to goad the People’s Republic of China (PRC) into invading Taiwan, but the Chinese leader would not be taken in that easily.

When delivering the warning last year, Xi purportedly added that a conflict with the US would dismantle many of his country’s impressive achievements and undercut the stated goal of achieving a “great rejuvenation” by 2049. The report laid emphasis on the fact that if true, this would have been the first known case of Xi Jinping making such a claim to a foreign leader. There has been no comment specifically on the report from either the Chinese Embassy in Washington or von der Leyen’s spokesperson.

[..] The FT report comes amid heightened US-China tensions. Beijing has referred to the Taiwan issue as a “red line” that must not be crossed in its relations with Washington. “We will not turn a blind eye to the separatist activities of forces advocating ‘Taiwan’s independence’ and the connivance and support [of these forces] by outside forces,” Xi Jinping was quoted by the Xinhua news agency as telling US President Joe Biden during a phone conversation in April. Biden, in turn, reportedly said that the US does not support Taiwan’s independence and is not planning to enter into a conflict with China. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken echoed these statements, telling Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi that the United States “continues to pursue the one-China policy and does not support Taiwan’s independence.”

Read more …

“According to how history is currently written..”

The Changing Nature Of Nuclear Deterrence (Malinen)

When I was around eight years old, my baby-sitter let me watch a documentary on nuclear war. Unsurprisingly, it shook me to the core. It’s kind of hard to know what went on in her head, but those images of nuclear detonations never left my head. Looking back at it now, this ‘incident’ starts to make sense, kind of. This is because over the decades I’ve read a lot on nuclear deterrence and on nuclear war simulations. I have had this graving to understand nuclear warfare and deterrence basically throughout my adult-life. Cuban Missile Crisis in October 1962 became something of a case study on nuclear deterrence to me. This was in no small part because of the magnificent movie, Thirteen Days (published in 2000), documenting the crisis through the eyes of President Kennedy and the White House. I have also had the privilege to grow with a highly objective lecturer of history, my mother, who has always questioned the current knowledge on history.

One of her best quotes is, “According to how history is currently written”. It summarizes all you need to understand about research of history. We simply do not know all the facts and politics plays a major role on how history is being written. In the movie Thirteen Days, there’s a scene where Bobby Kennedy (played memorably by Steven Culp) and Special Advisor Kenneth O. Donnell (always great Kevin Costner) arrive to Russian (Soviet) embassy, where they are burning secret documents in preparation for an evacuation. I vaguely remember that I would have talked with my mom about this scene and that she would have confirmed that such a thing (burning of documents) actually happened, but I cannot vouch for that. In any case, it was a beautiful movie trick, intensifying and underlining the gravity of the situation the world faced. Unfortunately, we are very close of such a situation, again.

During the Cuban crisis, the ‘Doomsday Clock’, kept by the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, was set to seven minutes to midnight. Currently, it stands at 90 seconds to midnight, closest to midnight it ever has, and I am expecting that it will be moved to 60 seconds to midnight during the next 12 months. While the Bulletin, quite unnecessarily, recently mixed “climate change” to the setting of the clock, the unprecedented warning on the close proximity of a nuclear holocaust should be taken extremely seriously. I have been pondering the growing nuclear threat since basically the onset of Ukrainian conflict in early 2014. It has become very pervasive in my thinking during the past few weeks mostly due to strikes of Ukraine to Russian early-warning system. During my academic studies, I have taken two courses in game theory. One during graduate and the other during post-graduate studies. During those courses, I read also on game theoretical simulations of nuclear warfare.

I cannot help to think that I did this, because of the misjudgement of my baby-sitter all those years ago. Past week, I started to build game theoretical model on a tactical nuclear first strike to understand the situation better. In this entry, which is likely to start a short series on nuclear deterrence and war, I go through the basic building blocks of modern nuclear deterrence starting from tactical nuclear weapons. Then I explain the foundational principle of nuclear deterrence, mutually asserted destruction, or MAD, and lastly I go through the weak spots of modern nuclear deterrence. All detailed information on nuclear weapons and deterrence is based on recent research by several scholars, only few of which I will detail (link) here. My model describes in more detail, why deterrence is so close of failing, and I return to that later. In the conclusions I also comment the recent steps of escalation, i.e., the Russian flotilla just off the Floridan coast and fresh U.S. sanctions to Russian financial sector.

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“..the “center” liberal authoritarians speak of as some kind of sacred space..”

Europe’s Elections as a Mirror (Patrick Lawrence)

The E.U. Parliament, to get straight a few basic details, is one strut of the three-legged stool of which the union is made: The unelected technocrats are in Brussels, the unelected central bankers are in Frankfurt, and the elected legislature is in Strasbourg. Belgium, Germany, and France: The distribution of institutional power in this way is meant as a display of the Continent’s hard-won unity. The catch here, and the reason I and many others got off the E.U. bus years ago, is that the lawmakers in Strasbourg are essentially powerless. Yes, you had inspired MEPs such as Claire Daly and her colleague Mick Wallace, both Irish (and you have to love Daly’s lilting brogue). They made use of the legislative chambers in Strasbourg to articulate principled positions on Gaza, Ukraine, and other such questions, but there has never been any question of the E.U. Parliament having the power to legislate the union’s direction.

Parenthetically, Daly and Wallace were voted out of office in last week’s elections. The E.U. is as it has long been—an undemocratic institution atop which sit neoliberal ideologues and austerian central bankers, technocrats who take no interest in the democratic process or the wishes of the E.U.’s citizenry. Readers may recall the brutality with which Brussels and Frankfurt had Athenians eating out of garbage cans nine years ago to protect the interests of bond investors holding Greek sovereign debt. That was the E.U. in action, the E.U. that has perverted the worthy vision of its postwar founders.

When we look at the polls held June 6–9 across the Continent, we must recognize a certain paradox. The MEPs elected will have little power, as European voters know better than anyone, but it was precisely to protest the corruption of European democracy that these voters delivered so severe a blow to mainstream parties and the Brussels technocrats from whom they are virtually inseparable. The outstanding question in the European capitals now is whether the profound animosity evident in last week’s election results will carry over to national polls due in political seasons to come. Figures such as Emmanuel Macron think that in legislative contests that will have actual consequences, unhappy voters will pull back from the brink: The E.U. vote as an acting out, let’s call this reasoning. I am not sure the French president is right about this. The conditions that produced last week’s E.U.–wide results are clearly leading to a substantial migration away from the “center” liberal authoritarians speak of as some kind of sacred space.

Read more …

“The risk of being hacked by humans or AI, while small, is still too high.”

Musk Says “Eliminate Electronic Voting Machines” (ZH)

Elon Musk on Saturday suggested that electronic voting machines should not be used in elections, as “The risk of being hacked by humans or AI, while small, is still too high.” Musk was responding to the recent news that Puerto Rico is ‘reviewing’ their contract with Dominion Voting Systems after a ‘software issue’ caused machines supplied by the company to miscalculate vote totals, according to the country’s elections commission. According to AP, vote counts reported by Dominion machines were lower than paper counts in some cases, and some machines reversed totals or reported zero votes for some candidates. “The concern is that we obviously have elections in November, and we must provide the (island) not only with the assurance that the machine produces a correct result, but also that the result it produces is the same one that is reported,” said Padilla. The island nation used more than 6,000 Dominion voting machines in their June 2 primary.

The company claims that the software issues stemmed from the digital files used to export the results from the primaries. The President of Puerto Rico’s House of Representatives, José Varela, has Dominion’s back – calling for Padilla to appear at a public hearing on Thursday to address the issues. “We cannot allow the public’s confidence in the voting process to continue to be undermined as we approach the general elections,” he said. “The problems called to mind the island’s botched 2020 primaries, when a lack of ballots at some centers forced the government to reschedule voting in a first for the U.S. territory. On June 2, Puerto Rico held primary elections to select gubernatorial candidates for the pro-statehood New Progressive Party and the Popular Democratic Party, which supports the island’s territorial status. In a surprise upset, Jenniffer González, Puerto Rico’s congressional representative, beat Gov. Pedro Pierluisi in the primary held by the New Progressive Party. Meanwhile, Puerto Rico Rep. Jesús Manuel Ortiz defeated Sen. Juan Zaragoza in the primary held by their Popular Democratic Party. Both parties reported hundreds of ballots showing inaccurate results, with the PNP reporting over 700 errors and the PPD pointing to some 350 discrepancies. These inaccuracies affected ballots for positions including governor, mayor and resident commissioner.” -AP

Following the discrepancies, the elections commission conducted a full vote tally and audited paper receipts from hundreds of ballot-counting machines – after which Ombudsman Edwin García Feliciano called the incident a “threat” to the island’s electoral system, and called on the governor and the island’s federal control board that oversees the island’s finances to establish a plan to improve election security. “All planning is based on resolving emergencies, including unlikely ones,” said García Feliciano, adding “But predictable circumstances, which are well known to the public, cannot be addressed by improvisation and in a rush.” The island’s general election will be held in November, where citizens will choose a new governor and local representatives. Meanwhile in Georgia, a federal judge ruled in February that Georgia’s electronic voting machines had issues related to security and transparency – yet she declined to immediately halt the use of said machines.

Despite identifying several problems with the state’s election system, US District Judge Amy Totenberg allowed Georgia to continue using the current electronic voting system while acknowledging the plaintiffs’ concerns about the risks to the integrity of the voting process. Also meanwhile; In March, Headline USA reported that during defamation lawsuit between Dominion Voting Systems and former Overstock.com CEO and Donald Trump supporter Patrick Byrne, one of Byrne’s attorneys, Stephanie Lambert, who was later arrested, leaked evidence that foreign nationals remotely accessed voting machines used in Michigan in the 2020 elections. In February of 2022, top officials at a U.S. federal cybersecurity agency are urging a judge not to authorize at this time the release of a report that analyzes Dominion Voting Systems equipment in Georgia, arguing doing so could assist hackers trying to “undermine election security.”

Read more …

“Let’s see if Joe can make it to the stand-up podium.”

Biden-Trump Debate Rules Revealed (RT)

US President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump will get two breaks when they face off in a CNN debate this month, and will not be allowed to talk to their campaign staff during the event, the network has announced. Biden and Trump agreed last month to a live debate at CNN’s studio in Atlanta, Georgia on June 27. The debate, the first head-to-head showdown of the 2024 election season, will be moderated by CNN hosts Jake Tapper and Dana Bash, with no studio audience present. CNN released a host of further details on Saturday. According to the network, both candidates will stand at podiums chosen by a coin toss, and will not be allowed any props or pre-written notes. Biden and Trump will both be given a pen, a pad of paper, and a bottle of water. Each candidate’s microphone will be muted while the other speaks, and the 90-minute debate will be punctuated by two commercial breaks, during which Biden and Trump are forbidden from interacting with their campaign staff.

The debate was organized after months of challenges from Trump, who said in March that he would face off against Biden “any time, anywhere, any place.” After multiple non-committal responses, Biden released a video message last month calling on Trump to “make my day, pal.” Biden and Trump agreed to the CNN debate on June 27 and an ABC News debate on September 10, while Trump has also called on his opponent to accept two more debates – on Fox News and NBC News – before November’s election. Trump and Biden debated twice before the 2020 election, with both candidates proclaiming victory. In the runup to this year’s debates, Trump has repeatedly ridiculed his 81-year-old opponent’s propensity for verbal gaffes and slip-ups. “Crooked Joe Biden is the worst debater I have ever faced – he can’t put two sentences together,” Trump said in a statement last month. “Let’s see if Joe can make it to the stand-up podium.”

Meanwhile, Biden told ABC News this month that he intends to let Trump “say what he thinks,” betting that the American public will be shocked by the former president’s “off the wall” comments. The CNN debate is open to any candidate who has received at least 15% support in four separate national polls and is registered on ballots in enough states to reach the 270 electoral vote threshold to win the presidency. Only Trump and Biden satisfy these requirements at present, although independent candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has received 15% in three polls and is on the ballot in six states worth 89 electoral votes. Earlier this week, Kennedy claimed to have collected enough signatures for ballot access in 22 states, totaling 304 electoral votes.

Read more …

“I hear now we’re sitting at tables. I don’t want to sit at a table.” “I said, ‘No, let’s stand.’ But they want to sit at a table..”

Biden “Losing Focus”, “Worst He’s Ever Been” (MN)

A report quoting insiders at the G7 summit this past week has warned that Joe Biden struggled to focus at the meeting of world leaders in Puglia, Italy. According to one source, Biden is “the worst he’s ever been,” with attendees from other delegations saying it was “embarrassing.” As we highlighted, Biden was seen wandering off like a dementia patient and looking perpetually confused. The footage of Biden prompted mocking headlines.

Biden also skipped the dinner later in the evening, before returning to the US. Of course, the Biden campaign claims it’s all “lies” and the footage of him was “taken out of context.” Biden’s campaign spokesperson Adrienne Elrod described the headlines and reports as “disinformation” and suggested that social media platforms should prevent it from being shared. It has also been reported that the debate between Biden and Trump scheduled for June 27 will see the pair seated at tables at the request of Biden’s campaign. Trump told the hosts of the Cats & Cosby Show last month “I hear now we’re sitting at tables. I don’t want to sit at a table.” “I said, ‘No, let’s stand.’ But they want to sit at a table,” Trump further remarked, adding “So we’ll be sitting at a table as opposed to doing it the way you should be, in my opinion, in a debate.”

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“..artificial intelligence takes off on its own, and it starts functioning in a way it makes no sense. . . . and it’s just lying. It’s just making stuff up and lying. It’s literally like it’s under demonic possession.”

AI is Digital Control, You’ve Been Warned – Catherine Austin Fitts (USAW)

Catherine Austin Fitts (CAF), Publisher of The Solari Report, financial expert and former Assistant Secretary of Housing (Bush 41 Admin.) is sounding the alarm about Artificial Intelligence (AI) and how it will impact your world in very negative ways. It’s all in a new report called “The AI Revolution: The Final Coup d’Etat.” CAF explains, “This is a very serious look at Artificial Intelligence and how it’s going to be used to implement control. . . . This past week, there was this huge open board meeting at OpenAI. There were board members put there to make sure OpenAI and its products were in alignment with the best interests of the human race. Some of them got booted out. Now, we see the former head of the NSA (National Security Agency) get put on the board. I just realized it today, and I had not realized it before. Edward Snowden just tweeted out and said you should never use any of these products, which include ChatGBT. Snowden also said, ‘You have to understand where this is going. You have been warned.’

“The AI Revolution” also warns that AI “. . . will alter the prospects for a free society, even free will. . . and . . . attempt to seed the idea human-only decision-making will become a rarity and, in time, cease to exist.” Don’t think sophisticated AI is some idea that is far into the future. AI is here now, and CAF points out, “I just see more and more companies using this type of technology to institute financial fraud and make money from financial fraud in their pricing. . . . You also have thousands of companies to track you for their benefit. . . . It is trying to extract data from you to accomplish whatever its goal is. . . . It’s like a swarm of invisible locusts that are all trying to surveil and track, and none of them are trying to optimize your life and give you a free and inspired life. They are just trying to get their piece.”

AI will also be used to ignore and break all laws. After all, it’s robotic and can’t be held accountable. CAF says, “By removing moral obligations and legal and obedient respect for laws, the speed at which you can do evil is extraordinary. . . . One of my concerns, and I have said this for many years, I think this kind of technology allows interdimensional intelligence to act as material reality so that, literally, demonic intelligence can have far more influence and impact in our world. It operates at such high speed, and then you combine that with the payment systems in the financial system. . . the things that can go wrong are phenomenal. One of the main problems that we have seen in the past year is artificial intelligence takes off on its own, and it starts functioning in a way it makes no sense. . . . and it’s just lying. It’s just making stuff up and lying. It’s literally like it’s under demonic possession.”

CAF says, no matter what, “AI can’t beat God.” And instead of worshiping Jehovah and Jesus (like you should), the creators of AI want you to trust whatever this tech tells you to do. CAF says, “They want an AI Religion Revolution.” Don’t buy into this crap because AI is a disaster for humanity and your freedom. CAF thinks the Democrats will be forced to replace Joe Biden come November, and she explains why. Now, more than ever, CAF thinks physical gold and silver are good investments. She encourages people to expand the use of cash. CAF thinks two of the best weapons against this sort of artificial intelligence used for control and tyranny is to enforce the US Constitution and, above all, do not lose your faith in God the Father and Christ Jesus.

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“the same who granted Assange a rare victory last month..”

Judges Named for Assange Appeal (Lauria)

The judges in Julian Assange’s two-day appeal hearing on July 9-10 are the same who granted Assange a rare victory last month: his right to appeal the Home Office’s extradition order to the United States. Justices Jeremy Johnson and Victoria Sharp granted Assange the right to appeal on only two of nine requested grounds, but they are significant: 1). his extradition was incompatible with his free speech rights enshrined in the European Convention on Human Rights; and 2.) that he might be prejudiced because of his nationality (not being given 1st Amendment protection as a non-American). However the denial of his rights in an American courtroom would go beyond the First Amendment to all of his U.S. constitutional rights, according to the 2020 U.S. Supreme Court ruling in USAID v. Alliance for Open Society International Inc., which says that a non-U.S. citizen acting outside the U.S. has no constitutional protections at all.

The United States was unable to provide assurances that the European equivalent of his constitutional rights would be protected, required under British extradition law. That raises hopes for Assange in his appeal. Assange has been imprisoned in London’s notorious Belmarsh Prison for more than five years on remand pending the outcome of his extradition. He has been charged in the United States for publishing classified documents that revealed prima facie evidence of U.S. state crimes. CN has received an award and many accolades for our coverage of the Julian Assange case. We will be inside the courtroom and outside the Royal Courts of Justice in London for both days of the hearing, bringing you the latest news, analysis and commentary.

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Hooker

 

 

Hitchens

 

 

King

 

 

Linden

 

 

Swim rabbits

 

 

Dachs

 

 

Dog tree

 

 

Humpback

 

 

 

 

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Jun 162024
 


Edward Hopper Summer interior 1909

 

Americans Must Criticize Our Corrupt Courts (Holloway)
Connecticut Bar Association Warns Critics of Trump Prosecutions (Turley)
The Corruption of Attorney General Merrick Garland (Turley)
DOJ Won’t Pursue Criminal Contempt Charges Against Garland (ET)
US Supreme Court Could Be Key Election Issue: ‘They’ve Grown Too Powerful’ (G.)
Jeffrey Sachs Blames US ‘Irresponsibility’ For Ukraine Crisis (RT)
Putin’s Peace Offer ‘Not Serious’ – Scholz (RT)
Rejection of Putin’s Peace Offer ‘Exposes’ NATO’s Proxy War in Ukraine (Sp.)
‘We Must Go After Everything Russian’ – UK’s Cameron (RT)
G7 Countries Could Lose $83 Billion If Russia’s Assets Confiscated (Sp.)
G7 Demands $486 Billion From Russia (RT)
Two Summits… Elitist Warmongering G7 And Peacemaking Multipolar BRICS (SCF)
Russian Wine Boom Follows The War (Helmer)
Putin On Seized Assets: “Despite All The Trickery, Theft Is Still Theft” (ZH)
Trump Vows To End ‘Gender Insanity’ In Schools (RT)

 

 

 

 

Trump votes

 

 

Vivek
https://twitter.com/i/status/1801839172467990616

 

 

Chamath

 

 

Trump 1980
https://twitter.com/i/status/1801692215170973746

 

 

Orban

 

 

Putin Eurasia

 

 

Fanny

 

 

Tucker Alex

 

 

 

 

“Prosecutors Got Trump, But They Contorted the Law.”

Americans Must Criticize Our Corrupt Courts (Holloway)

In the wake of his conviction in a New York court, President Trump has complained that the process was rigged against him, that the whole proceeding was a corrupt effort to persecute him with a view to influencing the 2024 presidential election. In response, many of his opponents have criticized him for undermining public confidence in our system of criminal justice and thus harming our democracy—a criticism that has been magnified by many in the media. These critics, however, are missing the point and undermining a principle that is in fact essential to preserving our republic: namely, that criticism of the justice system when it errs or overreaches is necessary to preserving freedom under the rule of law. Those who founded our nation were aware of this necessity. Alexander Hamilton, representing the defendant in the famous libel case People v. Croswell, warned that “the most dangerous, the most sure, the most fatal of tyrannies” operated “by selecting and sacrificing single individuals, under the mask and forms of law, by dependent and partial tribunals.”

“Against such measures,” Hamilton continued, “we ought to keep a vigilant eye and take a manly stand. Whenever they arise, we ought to resist, and resist till we have hurled the demagogues and tyrants from their imagined thrones.” No sensible American would look back on these remarks and think that, by them, Hamilton was undermining democracy. Hamilton’s great rival, Thomas Jefferson, acted on a similar view. As president, Jefferson pardoned publishers who had been convicted under the Sedition Act of 1798. Jefferson’s course of action here was inseparable from his belief that the Act was unconstitutional and that the courts of the United States had made themselves party to serious injustices by convicting defendants under it. Indeed, the pardoning power is included in the United States Constitution, and in many state constitutions, and is used routinely, precisely because prosecutors and courts can make mistakes and sometimes even willfully abuse their power over the lives and liberties of citizens.

These dangers are also recognized in federal law. Title 18 of the United States Code prohibits and punishes “deprivation of rights under color of law.” By its very terms this provision acknowledges that sometimes those entrusted with the administration of justice are themselves guilty of behaving lawlessly and abusively. The United States Department of Justice’s website observes that this provision may be applied not only against “police officers, sheriff’s deputies, and prison guards” but also, as appropriate, against “judges, district attorneys,” and “other public officials.” This important provision is itself an acknowledgment by the government that all the proceedings of our justice system are not entitled to uncritical acceptance.

Everyone conversant with American history knows that the problem of politicized and corrupt abuses of the justice system has not disappeared in the modern era, that it continues to rear its ugly head precisely when political passions run high and communities are inflamed against leaders for whom they harbor deep animosities. In the 1960s, Alabama state authorities brought Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. to trial on charges that he had committed perjury in relation to his tax filings. This prosecution was a transparently cynical attempt to deprive an important American political and social movement of its most effective leader. In that case, however, even the Alabama jury, composed exclusively of white men, perceived the abusive character of the case and returned an acquittal. Afterwards, Dr. King thanked the jury for their “fair, honest, and just verdict” and commended the Alabama judge for the “high and noble manner” in which he had conducted the case.

If criticism of prosecutors and courts is permissible and necessary in certain circumstances, the only important question at present is whether such criticism is justified in the case of President Trump’s New York conviction. Would it be reasonable for impartial Americans today to echo Dr. King’s words and congratulate the Manhattan jury for a “fair” verdict and commend Judge Merchan for his “high and noble” handling of the case?For an answer to that question, we need not rely on Trump or his aggrieved supporters. We need only look to the evaluation of respected CNN legal analyst and former federal prosecutor Elie Honig, writing in New York Magazine: “Prosecutors Got Trump, But They Contorted the Law.”

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“Americans must criticize our corrupt courts“ vs are not allowed to.

Connecticut Bar Association Warns Critics of Trump Prosecutions (Turley)

I have previously denounced overheated rhetoric and share the concern over how such rage rhetoric can encourage violence. After the verdict, I immediately encouraged people not to yield to their anger, but to trust our legal system. I believe that the verdict in New York may ultimately be overturned. I also noted that I do not blame the jury but rather the judge and the prosecutors for an unfounded and unfair trial. Of course, the concern over rage rhetoric runs across our political spectrum. While rarely criticized in the media, we have seen an escalation of reckless rhetoric from the left. For example, Georgetown Law Professor Josh Chafetz declared that “when the mob is right, some (but not all!) more aggressive tactics are justified.” My concern is not with the plea for lawyers to take care that their comments do not encourage such “aggressive tactics.” The problem is the suggestion that lawyers are acting somehow unprofessionally in denouncing what many view as a two-tier system of justice and the politicalization of our legal system.

Like many, I believe that the Manhattan case was a flagrant example of such weaponization of the legal system and should be denounced by all lawyers. It is a return, in my view, to the type of political prosecution once common in this country. For those lawyers who view such prosecutions as political, they are speaking out in defense of what they believe is the essence of blind justice in America. What is “reckless” to the Connecticut Bar is righteous to others. Notably, the bar officials did not write to denounce attacks on figures like Bill Barr or claims that the Justice Department was rigging justice during the Trump years. Likewise, the letter focuses on critics of the Trump prosecutions and not the continued attacks on conservative jurists like Justice Samuel Alito. It has never published warnings about those calling conservative justices profanities, attacking their religion, or labeling them “partisan hacks” or other even “insurrectionist sympathizers.” Liberal activists have been calling for stopping conservative jurists “by any means necessary.”

In Connecticut, Sen. Richard Blumenthal has warned conservative justices to rule correctly over face “seismic changes.” That did not appear to worry the bar. Likewise, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer also declared in front of the Supreme Court “I want to tell you, Gorsuch, I want to tell you, Kavanaugh, you have released the whirlwind, and you will pay the price.” The letter goes further and suggests that lawyers should speak publicly in support of trials like the one in Manhattan, a view that ignores the deep misgivings over the motivations and means used in New York to target an unpopular figure in this city. You have the top bar officials calling on lawyers to take a public position that is opposed by many lawyers and citizens in defending the integrity of these prosecutions. Imagine the response if the Idaho bar called on its lawyers to speak out against these cases and declared that it is reckless or unprofessional to defend them.

I expect that, in the very liberal bar of Connecticut, the letter is hardly needed. Indeed, this letter is likely to be quite popular. Yet, I would have thought that bar officials would have taken greater care to respect the divergent opinions on these trials and the need to avoid any statements that might chill the exercise of free speech. Ironically, the letter only reinforced the view of a legal system that is maintaining a political orthodoxy and agenda. These officials declare that it is now unprofessional or reckless for lawyers to draw historical comparisons to show trials or to question the motives or ethics underlying these cases. They warn lawyers not to “sow distrust in the public for the courts where it does not belong.” Yet, many believe that there is an alarming threat to our legal system and that distrust is warranted in light of prosecution like the one in Manhattan.

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“Garland’s tenure as attorney general has shown a pronounced reluctance to take steps that would threaten President Biden..”

The Corruption of Attorney General Merrick Garland (Turley)

Garland’s tenure as attorney general has shown a pronounced reluctance to take steps that would threaten President Biden. He slow-walked the appointment of a special counsel investigating any Biden, and then excluded from the counsel’s scope any investigation of the massive influence peddling operation by Hunter Biden, his uncle and others. However, it is what has occurred in the last six months that has left some of us shaken, given our early faith in Garland. I have long been a critic of Garland’s failure to order a special counsel to look into the extensive evidence of corruption surrounding the Bidens. As I stated in my testimony in the Biden impeachment hearing, there is ample evidence that Biden lied repeatedly about his knowledge of this corruption and his interaction with these foreign clients. However, a more worrisome concern is the lack of consistency in these investigations.

First, Special Counsel Robert Hur found that Biden knowingly retained and mishandled classified material. However, he concluded that Biden’s age and diminished faculties would make him too sympathetic to a jury. It was less sympathetic than pathetic, given that this is the same man who is running for re-election to lead the most powerful nation on Earth. More importantly, Garland has not made obvious efforts to reach a consistent approach in the two cases by dropping charges based on the same crimes by Trump in Florida. Second, Garland has allowed Special Counsel Jack Smith to maintain positions that seem diametrically at odds with past Justice Department policies. This includes Smith’s statement that he will try Trump up to (and even through) the next election.

It also includes a sweeping gag order which would have eviscerated free speech protections by gagging Trump from criticizing the Justice Department. While Garland has said that he wants to give the special counsels their independence, it falls to him to protect the consistency and values of his department. Garland’s most brazenly political act has been the laughable executive privilege claim used to withhold the audiotape of the Hur-Biden interviews. The Justice Department has not claimed that the transcript is privileged, but only that the audiotape of Biden’s comments is privileged. This is so logically disconnected that even CNN hosts have mocked it.

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“..DOJ policy not to prosecute officials for contempt of Congress when they don’t comply with subpoenas due to a presidential claim of executive privilege..”

DOJ Won’t Pursue Criminal Contempt Charges Against Garland (ET)

An official from the Department of Justice (DOJ) told House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) in a letter that Attorney General Merrick Garland will not be prosecuted for contempt of Congress because his refusal to hand over audio recordings of President Joe Biden’s interview with a prosecutor did not amount to a crime. In the letter, which was obtained by several media outlets, the DOJ official said that Mr. Garland’s refusal to comply with a subpoena demanding audio records of an interview that special counsel Robert Hur conducted with President Biden in his investigation into the president’s alleged mishandling of classified documents “did not constitute a crime.”

“Consistent with this longstanding position and uniform practice, the Department has determined that the responses by Attorney General Garland to the subpoenas issued by the Committees did not constitute a crime, and accordingly the Department will not bring the congressional contempt citation before a grand jury or take any other action to prosecute the Attorney General,” Carlos Felipe Uriarte, an assistant attorney general, wrote in the letter. The letter also cited DOJ policy not to prosecute officials for contempt of Congress when they don’t comply with subpoenas due to a presidential claim of executive privilege.

[..] The refusal to pursue contempt charges against Mr. Garland comes after the House voted on June 12 to hold him in contempt for failing to comply with the subpoena to turn over the tapes.The House resolution, which passed in a mostly party-line 216–207 vote, came amid a months-long standoff between Republicans and the DOJ over the production of the audio recordings of President Biden’s two-day interview with the special counsel. House Republicans have said that they want to obtain the recordings to verify Mr. Hur’s assertions that President Biden couldn’t recollect certain facts during the interview. They have alleged that a two-tiered justice system exists because Mr. Hur opted to not charge President Biden while former President Donald Trump faces multiple charges in connection with his own classified documents probe.

Mr. Hur, who faced criticism from Democrats and the White House for remarks on the president’s cognitive capacity in his report, didn’t recommend charges against President Biden, in part because of his ailing memory. “At trial, Mr. Biden would likely present himself to a jury, as he did during our interview of him, as a sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory,” the special counsel wrote in his 388-page report, which found that President Biden “willfully retained and disclosed classified materials” when he was a private citizen after the end of his term as vice president during the Obama administration.

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Uber-left Guardian leads the anti-SCOTUS chorus. They’re not too powerful, they’re just not left-wing enough.

US Supreme Court Could Be Key Election Issue: ‘They’ve Grown Too Powerful’ (G.)

Look at me, look at me,” said Martha-Ann Alito. “I’m German, from Germany. My heritage is German. You come after me, I’m gonna give it back to you.” It was a bizarre outburst from the wife of a justice on America’s highest court. Secretly recorded by a liberal activist, Martha-Ann Alito complained about a neighbour’s gay pride flag and expressed a desire to fly a Sacred Heart of Jesus flag in protest. This, along with audio clips of Justice Samuel Alito himself and a stream of ethics violations, have deepened public concerns that the supreme court is playing by its own rules. The Democratic representative Jamie Raskin has described a “national clamour over this crisis of legitimacy” at the court. A poll last month for the progressive advocacy organisation Stand Up America suggests that the supreme court will now play a crucial role in voters’ choices in the 2024 election. Nearly three in four voters said the selection and confirmation of justices will be an important consideration for them in voting for both president and senator in November.

Reed Galen, a co-founder of the Lincoln Project, a pro-democracy group, said: “The idea that these guys act as if they are kings ruling from above, to me, should absolutely be an issue. It was always Republicans who said we hate unelected judges legislating from the bench and we hate judicial activism. That’s all this stuff is.” Public trust in the court is at an all-time low amid concerns over bias and corruption. Alito has rejected demands that he recuse himself from a case considering presidential immunity after flags similar to those carried by 6 January 2021 rioters flew over his homes in Virginia and New Jersey. Justice Clarence Thomas has ignored calls to step aside because of the role his wife, Ginni, played in supporting efforts to overturn Donald Trump’s loss to Joe Biden in 2020.

Ethical standards have been under scrutiny following revelations that some justices failed to report luxury trips, including on private jets, and property deals. Last week Thomas, who has come under criticism for failing to disclose gifts from the businessman and Republican donor Harlan Crow, revised his 2019 form to acknowledge he accepted “food and lodging” at a Bali hotel and at a California club.These controversies have been compounded by historic and hugely divisive decisions. The fall of Roe v Wade, ending the nationwide right to abortion after half a century, was seen by many Democrats as a gamechanger in terms of people making a connection between the court and their everyday lives.There are further signs of the debate moving beyond the Washington bubble. Last week, the editorial board of the Chicago Sun-Times newspaper argued that, since the court’s own ethics code proved toothless, Congress should enact legislation that holds supreme court justices to higher ethical standards.

The paper called for the local senator Dick Durbin of Illinois, who is chair of the Senate judiciary committee, to hold a hearing on the issue. Maggie Jo Buchanan, managing director of the pressure group Demand Justice, said: “It’s important to keep in mind that, even though debate among members of Congress would lead you to believe that court reform is a polarising issue, it really isn’t. For years we have seen broad bipartisan support for basic supreme court reforms such as ethics. “A broad bipartisan consensus exists that they’ve grown too powerful, that they have too much power over laws and regulations. That’s shared among nearly three-fourths of Americans, including 80% of independents, so the demand is there and this isn’t something where it’s Democrats versus Republicans in the sense of real people. The American people want change and want to check the judiciary.”

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“This isn’t rocket science… Leave a little space in-between the major powers.”

Jeffrey Sachs Blames US ‘Irresponsibility’ For Ukraine Crisis (RT)

The West could have easily prevented the catastrophic Ukraine conflict, which had been brewing for many years, by abandoning its many escalatory policies including NATO expansion, according to Jeffrey Sachs, the president of the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network. In an interview with Going Underground host Afshin Rattansi on Saturday, Sachs, a prominent expert on post-Soviet economies who served for more than a decade as Special Adviser to the UN Secretary-General, claimed that the Ukraine conflict represented the “utter failure” of US diplomacy. He said that G7 countries, particularly the US, “grew into a lot of arrogance,” in believing that they could do whatever they wanted. This approach, Sachs argued, has drawn the world into three major geopolitical crises, including the Ukraine and Gaza conflicts, while fueling Sino-US tensions over Taiwan.

”The US is… an irresponsible actor in all three of those events. When it comes to Ukraine, the irresponsibility is that this war could have been easily avoided… by NATO by declaring clearly [that it] will not expand into Ukraine,” he said. He also chided Western politicians and media for claiming that the Russian military operation in Ukraine was “unprovoked.” Sachs recalled that it had been preceded by numerous “provocations,” including several waves of NATO expansion, the Western-backed coup in Kiev, and the West’s failure to pressure Ukraine to implement the Minsk agreements. The now-defunct deal sought to end the bloodshed in the two Donbass republics by giving them a special status within the Ukrainian state.

The economist also suggested that the West could have easily ended the conflict early on, as Moscow and Kiev had largely worked out a preliminary peace deal during talks in Türkiye, which revolved around Ukraine’s neutrality. However, according to Sachs, then UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson “swooped in” and advised Kiev against the agreement, a claim denied by Johnson. “This was a terrible piece of advice… and a dreadful, awful miscalculation,” Sachs said, adding that it had resulted in hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian deaths. He alleged that the US wants Kiev to “fight to the last Ukrainian” instead of helping to negotiate “the basic point” of Ukraine’s neutrality. “This isn’t rocket science… Leave a little space in-between the major powers.”

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Scholz says “not serious”; Stoltenberg says “not a proposal made in good faith.” But it is, and they know it. Moreover, Russia is tired of coming up with these proposals.

Putin’s Peace Offer ‘Not Serious’ – Scholz (RT)

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz has dismissed Russian President Vladimir Putin’s new proposal to achieve a lasting peace between Moscow and Kiev, branding the overture a ploy to distract the global community from the Swiss-hosted Ukraine ‘peace summit.’ Speaking to the country’s top diplomats on Friday, Putin signaled that Russia “will order a ceasefire and start negotiations” as soon as Kiev completely withdraws its troops from the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics, Kherson and Zaporozhye Regions. The four regions overwhelmingly voted to join Russia in referendums in the fall of 2022. Neither the West nor Kiev recognized the votes. Other conditions for a lasting peace, according to Putin, include Ukraine’s neutral status, a pledge not to seek to acquire nuclear weapons, “demilitarization” and “denazification,” and respect for the rights of the Russian-speaking population.

All of those points should be fundamentally recognized at the international level, followed by the removal of Western sanctions against Russia, the president said. However, in an interview with the broadcaster ZDF on the sidelines of the G7 summit in Italy on Saturday, Scholz stated that “everyone knows that it is not a serious proposal,” suggesting that “it has something to do with the peace conference taking place in Switzerland.” He also claimed that the initiative revealed that Putin was after “the classic, realistic conquest of land.” In similar remarks, the proposal was dismissed by Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky, who branded it “nothing different than other ultimatums that he has made before.” NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg also claimed that “this is not a proposal made in good faith,” adding that it would require Kiev to “give up significantly more land” than Russia currently controls.

Putin’s new peace overture comes ahead of the Swiss-hosted conference on Ukraine this weekend. The event is expected to revolve around Zelensky’s ten-point ‘peace formula,’ which demands that Russia, among other things, withdraw from all territories claimed by Kiev. Moscow has rejected the initiative as detached from reality. According to Zelensky, the ‘peace summit’ will focus only on three points of Kiev’s plan: prisoner exchanges, and nuclear and food security. Putin has dismissed the conference as a Western trick to create the illusion of a global anti-Russian coalition, distract attention from the roots of the conflict, and boost Zelensky’s claim to legitimacy after his presidential term expired last month.

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“Trump may come in there and say, ‘hey, Putin offered a deal.’ People want a deal. Now the mainstream media will call him a Russian bot, but 94% of Americans want it.”

Rejection of Putin’s Peace Offer ‘Exposes’ NATO’s Proxy War in Ukraine (Sp.)

Russian President Vladimir Putin reiterated the country’s conditions for an end to the Ukraine conflict during a lengthy address at the country’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs Friday. Moscow’s central demands are the same as those put forth during previous rounds of negotiations sabotaged by the United States: Ukraine must become a neutral state not aligned with Western powers’ crusade against the Russian nation. Additionally, Kiev must be demilitarized and de-Nazified, Putin stated, and the country must formally renounce plans to join NATO. The offer was rejected almost as soon as it was extended, leading Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova to jokingly ask whether it had even yet been translated into Ukrainian. “With such statements they want to deprive the citizens of Ukraine of a real chance for peace,” said the Russian official. But a deeper analysis of the conflict and its history reveals why a peaceful resolution remains so elusive.

Sputnik’s The Critical Hour program hosted a series of guests to discuss the Russian president’s proposal, breaking down the context of the Ukraine crisis and Western elites’ deep-seated interest in its continuation. Anti-Russian sentiment has been on the rise in the West for a number of years, with the emergence of the Russiagate narrative alleging Moscow’s influence in the 2016 US presidential election representing a key acceleration of this trend. The conspiracy theory, widely promulgated by Western intelligence agencies in mainstream media, laid the groundwork for the Cold War-esque narrative that Russia once again represents an existential threat to the West’s purported democratic values and, by extension, to the West itself. Former President Barack Obama had announced a “pivot to Asia” just a few years prior, stressing the importance of responding to China’s ascendance as a major world power.

Meanwhile, the strengthening of Sino-Russian relations under Chinese President Xi Jinping helped solidify the formation of a geopolitical bloc countering US hegemony, a dynamic that has intensified with the growth of the BRICS economic alliance. The United States has become increasingly intent on challenging this counter-hegemonic force and undermining Russia in particular. The launch of Russia’s special military operation in the Donbass finally gave the US an excuse to confront Moscow militarily, with Western media portraying Russia as a belligerent imperialist power. But the claim bore little resemblance to reality. “We need to remember that Russia did not want to have to invade Ukraine,” noted Margaret Flowers, a peace activist and editor at the website Popular Resistance. “They tried and tried and tried to warn and say, ‘look, here’s what you need to do. Stop killing the ethnic Russians. Stop threatening to join NATO and take our security interests seriously, and the West refused to do that over and over again.”

Former Washington Post bureau chief Jon Jeter argued that Western elites still oppose any lowering of tensions between Russia and Ukraine as they remain intent on denying Moscow a victory. “I would be surprised to see any real discussion of this in the mainstream United States news media, or certainly at the White House itself,” Jeter said of Putin’s peace proposal. Independent journalist Caleb Maupin agreed that Western media would continue to help undermine any rapprochement with Moscow. “A recent poll showed 94% of Americans want exactly what Putin just offered, which is a diplomatic end,” he noted. “Trump may come in there and say, ‘hey, Putin offered a deal.’ People want a deal. Now the mainstream media will call him a Russian bot, but 94% of Americans want it.”

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UK gov’t is about to fall.

‘We Must Go After Everything Russian’ – UK’s Cameron (RT)

The West must show Moscow that it stands “completely” behind Ukraine by sanctioning everything Russian, Britain’s foreign secretary David Cameron has said. Cameron spoke at a press conference in London as British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s government announced new sanctions against Russia. His remarks were published on Friday, by the Italian daily Corriere della Sera.“We will show [Russian President Vladimir] Putin that we are completely behind Ukraine: we will chase the money and the oil, we will stop the gas, we will stop the ships, we will do everything we can to stop the Russian war machine and show Putin the folly of his actions,” Cameron told the Italian outlet The UK is “hunting” companies that do business with Russia “all over the world,” he said. “We will sanction companies in China, in Türkiye, in Kyrgyzstan, even in Israel, that we believe are supplying dual-use material” to Russia, he added.

Of special concern to Cameron was the so-called shadow fleet of tankers delivering Russian oil in defiance of the G7 “price cap” and the Western embargo. The UK has used its dominance in the global shipping insurance industry to blacklist all Russian vessels, hindering the deliveries of everything from oil to food – but blaming Moscow for it. Faced with Ukrainian setbacks on the battlefield, the US and the UK launched another wave of sanctions against Russia this week, expanding their definition of Moscow’s war effort to target individuals and companies around the world allegedly helping it. The US Treasury Department openly stated that its objective was to raise “the risk of secondary sanctions for foreign financial institutions” that deal with Russia, threatening to deprive them of access to Western finance.

China has responded by condemning “illegal unilateral sanctions” and vowing to protect its citizens and companies from American “abuse.” Beijing also denounced Washington for fueling the Ukraine conflict by sending weapons and ammunition to Kiev. The US “has totally undermined trust in the dollar as a global reserve currency by imposing illegal sanctions” against Russian banks, said the chairman of the Russian State Duma, Vyacheslav Volodin. “The dollar has become toxic,” he added, predicting that the sanctions will result in more and more countries moving away from US securities. Cameron was prime minister from 2010-2016 but resigned after UK voters surprisingly voted to leave the EU. He returned to the government in November 2023 as Sunak’s foreign secretary. The UK is headed for a general election in July, which the ruling Conservatives are widely expected to lose.

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“..Moscow also has the option of not returning funds that Western countries have kept in Russia..”

G7 Countries Could Lose $83 Billion If Russia’s Assets Confiscated (Sp.)

The confiscation of Russian assets by G7 countries could cost them almost $83 billion in the amount of their investments in the Russian economy, Sputnik has calculated based on data from national statistical services. According to the calculations, the volume of direct investments of G7 members in the Russian economy by the end of 2022 (there is currently no more recent data available) amounted to $82.8 billion. The largest investor in the Russian economy was the United Kingdom, according to the latest available data, with assets estimated at $18.9 billion. Next was Germany ($17.3 billion), France ($16.6 billion), and Italy ($12.9 billion). Investments of American companies in the Russian economy amounted to $9.6 billion; Japan and Canada invested $4.6 billion and $2.9 billion, respectively.

In a statement following the first day of their summit in Italy on Friday, the G7 countries formally confirmed their intention to provide Ukraine with about $50 billion in loans by the end of the year, to be repaid from the proceeds of frozen Russian assets. The EU and G7 countries have frozen almost half of Russia’s foreign currency reserves, about 300 billion euros, since the start of Russia’s special military operation. Russian President Vladimir Putin said that the seizure of Russian state assets by Western countries would not go unpunished. The Russian Foreign Ministry called the freezing of assets in Europe theft. Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov warned that Russia would respond if its reserves were confiscated. According to him, Moscow also has the option of not returning funds that Western countries have kept in Russia.

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“..the G7 will launch ‘Extraordinary Revenue Acceleration (ERA) Loans’ for Kiev..”

G7 Demands $486 Billion From Russia (RT)

The leaders of the Group of Seven (G7) nations have demanded that Russia pay $486 billion to Ukraine in damage allegedly inflicted by the ongoing conflict, according to a joint statement issued on Friday. The US and its G7 allies – the UK, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, and Japan – indicated that Russian assets will remain frozen until Moscow ends the conflict and pays compensation. The West has frozen roughly $300 billion in Russian sovereign funds since the start of the Ukraine conflict. “Russia must end its illegal war of aggression and pay for the damage it has caused to Ukraine. These damages now exceed $486 billion, according to the World Bank,” the G7 statement, published by the White House, reads. The group declared that “with a view to supporting Ukraine’s current and future needs in the face of a prolonged defense against Russia,” the G7 will launch ‘Extraordinary Revenue Acceleration (ERA) Loans’ for Kiev. This will make available “approximately $50 billion in additional funding to Ukraine by the end of the year,” it said.

The G7 said it intends to provide financing that will be serviced and repaid by future flows of “extraordinary revenues stemming from the immobilization of Russian Sovereign Assets” held in the European Union and other relevant jurisdictions. “To enable this, we will work to obtain approval in these jurisdictions to use future flows of these extraordinary revenues to service and repay the loans,” the statement reads. The G7 intends to disburse the financing through multiple channels that direct the funds to Ukraine’s military, budget, and to its reconstruction needs, it added. The US has been pushing its allies to embrace a loan backed by income from the frozen Russian assets that could provide Ukraine with billions of dollars in near-term funding. Most of the frozen assets are being held in the EU. US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said recently that the flow of windfall profits earned on the immobilized Russian assets amounts to around $3-$5 billion per year.

Russia has repeatedly stated that any actions taken against its assets would amount to “theft” and would violate international law. Moscow has warned it would respond in kind if the West went through with threats to confiscate Russian assets. Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday outlined conditions for Ukraine peace talks, insisting that Ukraine should first of all remove its troops from Russia’s new regions. Putin also condemned Kiev’s Western backers for allegedly preventing it from holding peace talks with Moscow while also accusing Russia of rejecting negotiations. Accepting the terms would allow everyone involved to turn the page and gradually rebuild damaged relations, the Russian president said. Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky has rejected Russia’s terms for ending the conflict, describing the peace conditions as an “ultimatum.”

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“..despite Russia winning decisively in that two-and-half-year conflict and the Kiev regime facing oblivion from corruption and alienation from a war-sickened population.”

Two Summits… Elitist Warmongering G7 And Peacemaking Multipolar BRICS (SCF)

This week provided an instructive juxtaposition of summits. In Italy, the United States and its Western allies convened the Group of Seven (G7) talking shop, while in Russia the BRICS nations held a workmanlike summit for their foreign ministers. The G7 has become a shorthand term for elitist Western dominance over the world economy. On the other hand, the relatively new group known as BRICS can be seen as a progressive forum and voice for the global majority. While the former is shrivelling with irrelevance, the latter is steadily growing in importance for authentic international development. There was a time when the U.S. and a clique of Western capitalist nations (including Japan) were viewed with respectability and an aura of global leadership. The heyday of Western economic and political power has waned in line with the systemic failing of U.S.-led capitalism as a model for the rest of the world to emulate.

The presumed moral authority of these nations has also diminished as their reputation for hypocrisy and insufferable arrogance has burgeoned. Indeed, the G7 has become a caricature of power. The United States, Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Canada and Japan are seen as being ruled by self-serving extortionists, contributing little to global development. Their presumed superiority is untenable and looks ridiculous. The group represents a neocolonialist clique whose exploitation of finance and natural resources of other nations is an obscenity and shackle on the abundant potential for world development. By contrast, the BRICS coalition of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa plus a growing number of other nations, collectively known as the Global South, is a living harbinger of a more just and equitable international order. The multipolar world that the BRICS represent and advocate has become the practical roadmap for proper international development.

It is based on cooperation, partnership, and mutual respect grounded in a genuine commitment to the principles of the United Nations Charter. The BRICS summit this week held in the beautiful city of Nizhny Novgorod on the Volga River was a convening of foreign ministers. In October, the national leaders of the BRICS will gather in the Russian city of Kazan. The list of nations seeking to join the group has reached 50, representing every continent. In terms of combined economic power and population, the BRICS Plus has far surpassed the G7. At the G7 confab, the leaders of that motley crew look like yesterday’s men. U.S. President Joe Biden is languishing in record-low poll numbers among his citizens while Britain’s Sunak, France’s Macron, and Germany’s Scholz are clinging onto power by their fingernails. European Union elections this week showed a cratering in voter support for Macron and Scholz.

No doubt their slavish pandering to Uncle Sam’s warmongering in Ukraine while their citizens endure hardship and poverty rightly took a toll. The G7 has dispensed with any pretense of standing for international economic development. The entire summit in Italy can be summed up as a gathering for warmongering and theft. The disreputable clique could henceforth be labeled the “economic wing of NATO”. Guest of honor was the corrupt dictator of Ukraine, Vladimir Zelensky, wearing his pantomime military fatigues and being ladled with tens of billions more dollars. His G7 patrons pledged $50 billion a year for the NeoNazi Kiev regime to buy more weapons “until it prevails” in the proxy war against Russia. This is despite Russia winning decisively in that two-and-half-year conflict and the Kiev regime facing oblivion from corruption and alienation from a war-sickened population.

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“..real wages grew by a record 13.3% in May 2023..”

Russian Wine Boom Follows The War (Helmer)

Wine, and the money to spend on drinking it, are growing at an unprecedented pace in Russia. For a country at war in Europe this has not happened in modern times, and probably not since the ancient Roman emperors and medieval English kings arranged for their city fountains to flow with wine in celebration of military victories and coronations. The surge in wine consumption signals the growing confidence of Russian consumers in their future. A parallel surge in wine imports since April is also a signal that the Russian Finance Ministry aims to raise taxes on this good cheer. In 2023, 320 million litres of still and fortified wine were imported to Russia, which was 4.4% more than in 2022, according to a study by the large Moscow importer, distributor, and retailer, the Luding group.

According to other market reports, by the end of last year the largest supermarket groups had increased their imports of wine by 7% compared to the year before. The X5 group, for example, which operates the Pyaterochka and Perekrestok stores, reported an 18% annual increase; the Magnit chain was up 83%. This year the rate of increase in wine imports has been accelerating. Through April, the Russian Customs figures show a 20% rate of increase in the volume of wine imports compared to the first four months of 2023. The most noticeable surge was observed in April, when twice as much wine was imported as a year ago. Part of the reason is that the Russian war economy is now generating significantly faster growth in consumer income than the rate of inflation. Adjusted for that, real wages grew 0.3% between March 2022 and March 2023. This is after a prolonged decline in real wages between 2013 and 2021.

In the first quarter of this year, January through March, real disposable income – a slightly different metric measured by the state statistics agency Rosstat — jumped 5.8% compared to the year before. This was a relative slowdown compared to the last quarter of 2023, when real disposable income was up 7% year on year. Rosstat is reporting also that real wages grew by a record 13.3% in May 2023. The agency’s measurement reflected the jump in war-related civilian sector wages and in payments to military personnel. Pensions, by contrast, were shrinking slightly in real terms. The government is now estimating the full-year 2023 rate of real income growth at 5.4%; in 2024 at 2.8%, and next year at 2.8%. Consumer demand is predicted to rise in step. Despite Russian casualties at the front already running ahead of the ten-year Soviet Afghanistan War, the Russian war economy, and the impact of the NATO sanctions war, are paying a large domestic dividend – and not only at the wine shop.

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“In the West, the thesis that Russia started the war within the framework of a special military operation, that it is the aggressor, is constantly being repeated..”

Putin On Seized Assets: “Despite All The Trickery, Theft Is Still Theft” (ZH)

After on Thursday Group of Seven leaders agreed at a summit in Italy to give Ukraine $50 billion utilizing interest from frozen Russian Central Bank assets, President Putin has addressed the move during a speech before his Ministry of Foreign Affairs. He once again denounced this as brazen ‘threft’ and described that Western leaders are trying to come up with “some kind of legal basis” for the asset freezes, “but despite all the trickery, theft is still theft and will not go unpunished.” European Council President Charles Michel had announced the day prior, “Russia has to pay.” And President Biden had said, “I’m very pleased to share that this week the G7 signed a plan to finalize and unlock $50 billion from the proceeds of those frozen [Russian] assets, to put that money to work for Ukraine, [in] another reminder to Putin that we’re not backing down.’ Putin also warned that if the West steals Russia’s sovereign assets, then it is proof that “anyone” could be next.

Additionally, following up on Putin’s words Alexander Bespalov, co-chair of the Investment Russia public organization, addressed the G7 plan: “The idea of issuing any loans to Ukraine is inherently hopeless because only a person who is extremely detached from life and reality can suppose that it may win a conflict with Russia. Ukraine is already in a losing position. This is clear to everyone, and from an economic point of view there will be no growth or the capability to return loans in the next decades. So what we see is yet another attempt to establish some formal economic foundation to provide money for Ukraine’s military needs,” he told Izvestia. In Putin’s remarks before diplomats, he at one point asserted that Moscow did not start the war. Instead, “In the West, the thesis that Russia started the war within the framework of a special military operation, that it is the aggressor, is constantly being repeated,” he explained.

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“The left-wing gender insanity being pushed at our children is an act of child abuse. Very simple..”

Trump Vows To End ‘Gender Insanity’ In Schools (RT)

Former US President Donald Trump has promised that if reelected this November, he will defund schools that promote “inappropriate” content to children such as gender identity and critical race theory. He also pledged to strip federal funding from schools mandating vaccines and masks, as well as banning men from participating in women’s sports. “On day one, I will sign a new executive order to cut federal funding for any school pushing critical race theory, transgender insanity, and other inappropriate racial, sexual, or political content onto the lives of our children,” the presumptive Republican nominee for the White House told a cheering crowd at Turning Point Action’s ‘The People’s Convention’ in the state of Michigan on Saturday.

“And I will not give one penny to any school that has a vaccine mandate or a mask mandate,” he continued, adding that he will also “keep men out of women’s sports” and fully uphold the Second Amendment, which protects the right of Americans to keep and bear arms. “We will protect innocent lives and we will restore a thing called free speech, as it is being taken away from us by these radical thugs,” Trump vowed after announcing that he had received a full endorsement from the National Rifle Association gun rights advocacy group. Trump has said education is one of the main priorities of his presidential campaign, arguing that the system needs to be overhauled. He previously outlined plans to “break up” the Department of Education, change the school curriculum, and allow school principals to be elected.

Accusing the Democrats of forcing the “liberal indoctrination of America’s youth,” he vowed to reverse a new expansion by President Joe Biden’s administration of Title IX – which restricts federally funded schools from preventing transgender students from using bathrooms, locker rooms, and pronouns aligned with their identities. He also pledged to block doctors who provide gender-affirming care, as well as forbidding federal agencies from promoting “the concept of sex and gender transition at any age.” “The left-wing gender insanity being pushed at our children is an act of child abuse. Very simple. Here’s my plan to stop the chemical, physical, and emotional mutilation of our youth,” Trump said in a video address in January, in which he detailed a range of policies designed to curb the promotion of the LGBTQ agenda.

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Sopranos

 

 

Elon Optimus

 

 

AI

 

 

Poach

 

 

Lizard
https://twitter.com/i/status/1801532529260040438

 

 

Whale
https://twitter.com/i/status/1801659875790819444

 

 

 

 

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

 

 

 

 

 

Jun 152024
 


Édouard Vuillard In bed 1891

 

Russia and NATO Are Drifting Towards A Major War (Timofeev)
Putin Names Two Conditions For Ending The War ‘This Very Minute’ (ZH)
Putin Names Conditions For Ukraine Peace Talks (RT)
Ukraine’s ‘Room For Compromise Is Diminishing’ – Medvedev (RT)
Zelensky Responds To Putin’s Peace Offer (RT)
America Prepares for Global War, Restarts Draft for 18-26 Year Olds (Kucinich)
Scott Ritter: West Has to Decide If It Wants Peace After Putin’s Proposal (Sp.)
Biden’s 10-year Security Pact With Ukraine is Nothing But a PR Stunt (Sp.)
Moscow Reveals Further Steps After Putin’s Ukraine Offer (RT)
Russia Was Ready To Withdraw From Southern Ukraine – Putin (RT)
Russian Troops Never Intended To Capture Kiev – Putin (RT)
US Government Uses NGOs To Corrupt ‘Civil Society’ Around The World (Diesen)
Fossil Fuels: The Best-Kept Secret in Our World Today (RCW)
The Confiscation of Reality (Sinead Murphy)
The Afterlives of Lies (Patrick Lawrence)
Sick Of and Done With (Kunstler)
The Faux Outrage Over the Alito Flags and Tapes (Turley)
Searching for the Truth About the Raid at Mar-a-Lago (Julie Kelly)

 

 

 

 

Tucker Alex

 

 

Black vote
https://twitter.com/i/status/1801357121130287270

 

 

77

 

 

Logan Paul

 

 

 

 

“..it’s clear that foreigners are fighting on Ukraine’s side, that their participation is systematic rather than accidental, and that at least some of them are citizens of Western countries.”

Russia and NATO Are Drifting Towards A Major War (Timofeev)

Is it possible that NATO forces could become directly involved in the military conflict between Russia and Ukraine? Until recently, such a question seemed very hypothetical given the high risks of escalation of the military confrontation between the US-led bloc and Russia into a large-scale armed conflict. But this scenario should be taken seriously now. The direct participation of individual NATO countries or the entire bloc in hostilities could gradually spiral out of control. Crossing red lines can lead to the belief that there will be no consequences for engaging in war. The result of such movements can manifest itself at an unexpected moment and lead to a much more dangerous situation than the current one. Strictly speaking, NATO countries have long been involved in the conflict. This takes several forms.

First, Western countries provide Kiev with substantial financial and military assistance, including increasingly advanced and destructive weapons systems. As the stockpiles of Soviet-style kit in the arsenals of the USSR’s former allies in the Warsaw Treaty Organisation have been depleted, the Ukrainian army is receiving more Western systems and ammunition. So far, mass deliveries have been limited by the production capacity of the Western defence industry and size of existing stockpiles. But if hostilities are prolonged, industrial capacity has the potential to grow. Increasing supplies are also inevitable in the event of a peaceful pause, which would allow Ukraine to prepare for a new phase of hostilities. Russia can hardly hope that the West lacks the political will and resources to increase support for Kiev. Moscow appears to be preparing for the worst-case scenario, namely a steady increase in substantial and long-term military assistance to Ukraine. In addition to the supply of arms and ammunition, this aid includes the training of personnel, help with the development of military industry and infrastructure, and the reimbursement of expenses in other areas that allow Ukraine to focus its resources on the defence sector.

Second, Ukraine receives extensive Western support in the form of intelligence, including technical data from satellites, radars, reconnaissance aircraft, etc. The information received enables a wide range of operations, from scoping the theatre of operations to the identification of specific targets. Data providers can be selective in granting the Ukrainian side access. But its use in military operations against Russia is not in doubt. Third, military specialists who are citizens of NATO countries are involved in combat operations. Their role does not always appear to be official. They may be ‘volunteers’ or simply mercenaries, whose participation the authorities of their countries turn a blind eye to. Russian estimates put their number at around 2,000 in October 2023. Whether that is accurate or not, it’s clear that foreigners are fighting on Ukraine’s side, that their participation is systematic rather than accidental, and that at least some of them are citizens of Western countries.

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“As soon as Kyiv says it is ready to do this and begins really withdrawing troops and officially renounces plans to join NATO, we will immediately — literally that very minute — cease-fire and begin talks..”

Putin Names Two Conditions For Ending The War ‘This Very Minute’ (ZH)

Russian President Vladimir Putin in a Friday speech addressed the West’s efforts to host a major Ukraine peace summit in Switzerland this weekend. Though scores of world leaders will be there, Russia has not been invited, and China has snubbed the event citing that it’s pointless without Moscow’s representation given it is a party to one side of the war. Putin outlined his “conditions” for peace. He said for the military operation to be halted Ukrainian forces would have to withdraw from the four regions annexed by the Russian Federation. “Ukrainian troops must be completely withdrawn from the Donetsk People’s Republic, the Luhansk People’s Republic, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions,” Putin said in a televised address. Russia held referendums in late September 2022 for these war-torn oblasts, and the overwhelming majority of voters were in favor of being absorbed into Russia, which Kiev and the West called a “sham” election.

Putin also stipulated a second main condition for ending the war: Ukraine must reject ambitions to join the NATO alliance. “As soon as Kyiv says it is ready to do this and begins really withdrawing troops and officially renounces plans to join NATO, we will immediately — literally that very minute — cease-fire and begin talks,” Putin said in the talk given to a gathering of diplomats. Interestingly, Putin showed signs he could be willing to compromise when it comes to territory, which is a bit of the first and hopeful sign that he’s serious about finding ways to wind down the war. According to AFP: The Russian leader said he did not “rule out maintaining Ukrainian sovereignty” over the southern Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions “on the condition that Russia has a strong land link with Crimea.”

But despite what appears to be very serious possible overtures, the Zelensky government has long maintained that it will not countenance negotiations or peace settlement until there is a full withdrawal of Russian armed forces from Ukrainian territory as existed pre-February 2022. The weekend Swiss peace summit is expected to focus on gaining full international backing for Zelensky’s 10-point peace formula, however international press has acknowledged this as still “a largely symbolic effort”. The sixth point of Kiev’s plan reads as follows: it calls on Russia “To cease the hostilities, Russia must withdraw all its troops and armed formations from the territory of Ukraine, plain and simple. Ukraine’s full control over its state border, recognized internationally, needs to be restored.”

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“Our side will order a ceasefire and start negotiations the minute Kiev declares that it is prepared to take this decision and starts actual withdrawal of troops from those regions..”

Putin Names Conditions For Ukraine Peace Talks (RT)

Ukraine must remove its troops from Russia’s new regions before any meaningful peace talks can begin, President Vladimir Putin has said. Moscow rejects Kiev’s claims of sovereignty over five formerly Ukrainian regions, four of which have joined Russia amid the ongoing hostilities. People in the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics and Kherson and Zaporozhye Regions voted for the transition in late 2022, though hostilities continue in all of them. Ukrainian troops must be removed from these territories, Putin said on Friday at a meeting with Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and other senior Russian diplomats. “I stress: the entire territory of those regions as defined by their administrative borders at the time they joined Ukraine [in August 1991],” Putin stated.

“Our side will order a ceasefire and start negotiations the minute Kiev declares that it is prepared to take this decision and starts actual withdrawal of troops from those regions, and also formally informs us that it no longer plans to join NATO,” the Russian leader pledged. Putin outlined the conditions after condemning Kiev’s Western backers for allegedly preventing it from holding peace talks with Moscow while accusing Russia of rejecting negotiations.“We are counting on Kiev to take such a decision on withdrawal, neutral status, and dialogue with Russia, on which the future existence of Ukraine depends, independently based on the current realities and guided by the true interests of the Ukrainian people and not at Western orders,” Putin stated. At this point, Moscow will not accept a frozen conflict, which would allow the US and its allies to rearm and rebuild the Ukrainian military, Putin claimed. The full resolution of the issue will involve Kiev recognizing the four new regions as well as Crimea as part of Russia, he insisted.

“In the future, all those basic principled positions have to be enshrined in fundamental international agreements. Naturally, that includes the lifting of all Western sanctions against Russia,” Putin stated. Accepting these terms will allow everyone involved to turn the page and gradually rebuild damaged relations, the president said. Eventually, a pan-European security system that works for all nations on the continent could be created, Putin added, noting that Moscow has sought this outcome for years.The Russian president’s keynote remarks came ahead of a Swiss-hosted summit supposedly meant to further peace in Ukraine. Kiev has insisted that Moscow could not be invited to the event because it would try to “hijack” it by promoting alternatives to the “peace formula” pushed by the Ukrainian government. Putin claimed that the event was meant to distract public opinion from the “true roots” of the conflict, and that Vladimir Zelensky has usurped power in Ukraine after his presidential term expired last month. Nothing but demagoguery and accusations against Russia can come out of the Swiss gathering, he predicted.

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“The room for compromise is diminishing like shagreen leather, together with the shrinking territory of the dying country.”

Ukraine’s ‘Room For Compromise Is Diminishing’ – Medvedev (RT)

Russia has repeatedly sought to resolve the Ukraine crisis through diplomatic means since 2014, but Kiev and its Western backers have always responded with either “manipulation” or “deception,” former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said on Friday. Now that the latest peace proposal has been offered by Russia, the time for compromise is running out, he warned. Kiev is about to face a “catastrophic scenario,” Medvedev, who currently serves as deputy chairman of the Russian Security Council, said in a statement published on his social media account. The former Ukrainian territories Kiev still lays claim to have officially become part of Russia as a result of referendums held there in 2022, Medvedev pointed out. “And this is forever.” Now, Moscow will only agree to peace talks if this fact is taken into account, he added.

“The room for compromise is diminishing like shagreen leather, together with the shrinking territory of the dying country.” The official was referring to the latest peace proposal put forward by President Vladimir Putin during his meeting with senior Russian diplomats on Friday. Moscow is demanding that Kiev withdraw its troops from all the regions that voted to join Russia in 2022 and forgo its plans to join NATO. In exchange, Russia is ready to order a ceasefire and start talks the moment Ukrainian officials agree to these terms. Medvedev described this weekend’s Ukraine peace conference in Switzerland as a “summit of the doomed” that will end in “total failure.”

Kiev has been actively promoting the conference, to which Russia has not been invited, to push its own peace plan. It includes the withdrawal of Russian troops from territories it claims as its own, a war crimes tribunal, and reparations. Medvedev dismissed Kiev’s peace proposal as a “stillborn formula,” commenting that its only purpose is to provide legitimacy to Vladimir Zelensky. Zelensky, whose presidential term officially expired in May, is nothing but an “usurper,” a “nobody” with “no real authority,” according to Medvedev. He has now seized power and “took the entire population hostage” while still “sending soldiers forth to die,” the Russian official concluded.

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“..Ukraine received very generous peace terms in March 2022, but rejected them “on orders from the British.”

Zelensky Responds To Putin’s Peace Offer (RT)

The terms Russian President Vladimir Putin outlined for ending the conflict are an “ultimatum” to Ukraine and as such unacceptable, Vladimir Zelensky has said. Speaking at a meeting with senior Russian Foreign Ministry officials on Friday, Putin said that Kiev would have to cede all the territory of four regions that chose to join Russia and guarantee it would never join NATO before peace talks could begin. “What can I say? These messages are ultimatum messages, they are nothing different than other ultimatums that he has made before,” Zelensky told the TV network Sky TG24 while attending the G7 meeting in the south of Italy. “He wants us to give up part of our occupied territories, but he also wants the unoccupied ones. He talks about regions of our country, and he won’t stop,” Zelensky claimed.

Zelensky’s characterization of Putin’s offer as an ultimatum was dismissed as “a wrong understanding, definitely,” according to Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov on Friday. “This is a comprehensive, very deep and constructive proposal,” Putin’s press secretary told Izvestia. If the terms seem harsher than those Moscow proposed in the spring of 2022, he explained, that’s because “a different situation has arisen,” with four regions choosing to become part of Russia. Residents of Kherson and Zaporozhye Regions as well as the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics voted overwhelmingly in September 2022 to leave Ukraine and join the Russian Federation. Kiev and its Western backers have denounced the vote as “rigged” and a “sham,” just as they refused to recognize Crimea’s return in 2014.

Peskov reminded Izvestia that Ukraine received very generous peace terms in March 2022, but rejected them “on orders from the British.” Ukrainian media and officials have confirmed that Boris Johnson, UK prime minister at the time, told them they should not accept any deal with Russia. Announcing the military operation against the government in Kiev, in February 2022, Putin said that Moscow intended to achieve the “demilitarization and denazification” of Ukraine and secure guarantees that Kiev would never join NATO or any other anti-Russian military bloc.

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“There is no other conceivable reason to require more than 16 million American males to be automatically registered for the draft, other than to prepare for a large-scale war.”

America Prepares for Global War, Restarts Draft for 18-26 Year Olds (Kucinich)

Our government is planning a big draft, conscripting millions of young Americans for an even bigger war! I call to your attention a Democratic amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), which was slipped into the almost trillion-dollar Pentagon war spending bill, by voice vote, in the House Armed Services committee. The Democratic Amendment to H.R. 8070, the National Defense Authorization (NDAA) reads: “Section 531. Selective Service System: Automatic Registration. SEC. 3. (a)(1) “Except as otherwise provided in this title, every male citizen of the United States, and every other male person residing in the United States, between the ages of eighteen and twenty-six, shall be automatically registered under this Act by the Director of the Selective Service System.”

This amendment is in the NDAA legislation and there is no pending amendment to strip it from the bill. So, when the NDAA passes, as early as this week, Congress will have taken steps to make automatic conscription the law of the land. Why an automatic draft? Members of Congress and the President have an obligation to explain to the American people to which foreign land will their sons, and perhaps their daughters, be sent to die? The U.S. has been in a continuous “State of Emergency” since September 11, 2001, which provides a president with over 100 powers he would not ordinarily have. Notwithstanding that the automatic draft provision will go into effect in a year, a presidential order invoking emergency powers and/or an Act of Congress, could readily move millions from their civilian lives to the front lines of a war. WHAT WE KNOW: We know that America is fomenting wars around the world We know that the military industrial complex controls our government We know that we are on the precipice of a global war, provoking aggression rather than resolution with Russia, China and in the Middle East.

The only winners in these wars are the war profiteers. They’re now going to take our children to fight in unnecessary, destabilizing, dangerous, debt-creating wars. Just today President Biden committed the U.S. to an additional decade of support for Ukraine’s war with Russia. There is no other conceivable reason to require more than 16 million American males to be automatically registered for the draft, other than to prepare for a large-scale war.

The Selective Service System is the vehicle by which individuals are inducted into the armed forces. This NDAA Automatic Registration amendment facilitates an efficient, large-scale draft. The new law will automatically register all males between the ages of 18 and 26. Selective Service will notify in writing every young American male that they have been registered and will prescribe regulations which can require the registrant to provide “date of birth, address, social security account number, phone number and email address….” There are members of Congress who advocate that young women also be included in any draft, which could bring to 32 million the number of Americans of draft-eligible age. The U.S. currently has over 1,300,000 men and women, career soldiers, as well as volunteers, serving in the all-volunteer armed forces.

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“No longer will they be talking about Zelensky’s unrealistic expectation of having Russia leave the new territories. The West will now be saying, what about this offer? Can we do this offer?”

Scott Ritter: West Has to Decide If It Wants Peace After Putin’s Proposal (Sp.)

President Vladimir Putin has outlined another proposal to solve the Ukraine crisis once and for all at a meeting with top diplomats at the Russian Foreign Ministry in Moscow, making clear that Moscow is not interested in freezing or postponing the conflict. According to the president, Russia is ready to cease fire and start negotiations once Ukraine begins to withdraw from the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics and the Zaporozhye and Kherson regions within their administrative borders and officially renounces plans to join NATO. Additionally, Russia requires Ukraine to adopt a neutral, non-aligned, and non-nuclear status. “We are ready to sit at the negotiation table tomorrow,” said Putin. “Today, we made another specific, real peace proposal. If Kiev and the Western capitals refuse it, as they have previously, then ultimately, it is their matter, their political and moral responsibility for the continuation of bloodshed,” the president stressed.

Putin’s new peace proposal is a brilliant move, according to former US Marine Corps intelligence officer Scott Ritter. “A [Western] peace conference in Switzerland [from June 15 to 16] that was never going to succeed now has a completely different angle to it,” Ritter told Sputnik. “It will now be discussing the Russian peace initiative. No longer will they be talking about Zelensky’s unrealistic expectation of having Russia leave the new territories. The West will now be saying, what about this offer? Can we do this offer? The NATO summit won’t be about ‘How do we expand, how do we enlarge?’ It will be about ‘What do we do about the Russian peace proposal?’ This puts the West in the horns of a dilemma. That’s exactly where Russia wants them.” Ritter underscored that Russia isn’t looking for a ceasefire or freezing the conflict to make it fester any longer: “Russia’s looking for conflict resolution. They want a genuine peace plan.” The plan is based on the 2022 Istanbul communiqué while taking into account the reality on the ground, the former US Marine Corps intelligence officer noted.

The roadmap proposed by Vladimir Putin also meets the initial goals of the special military operation launched on February 24, 2022, i.e. de-militarization and de-Nazification, the military expert continued. “Demilitarization will occur through the negotiation process. When Ukraine commits to not being a member of NATO, this resolves a number of issues, such as what to do with all of this NATO equipment that has been accumulated by Ukraine. There’s no longer a need for it. It will go away. So too will the NATO advisors. Demilitarization has been accomplished.” “De-Nazification… Vladimir Putin made it clear that Volodymyr Zelensky is not the political future of Ukraine. Neither are the right-wing political parties that have produced Nazi-type organizations like the Right Sector, Svoboda*, Azov**, and other neo-Nazi-affiliated paramilitary and military organizations.

These will, of course, have to be done away with. But who’s going to do away with that? Russia’s not occupying Ukraine. This will be part of the post-conflict political rebuilding, restructuring of Ukraine. And again, once Ukraine has walked away from NATO and has assumed a position of genuine neutrality, this changes the domestic political dynamic inside Ukraine, empowering political entities that otherwise have been suppressed, the opposition that Volodymyr Zelensky has sought to silence over these many years,” Ritter explained. The military veteran pointed out that the Russian president has also made it clear that if the proposals are snubbed, the military confrontation will continue and the future requirements for peace could be very different.

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“The deal is not a “treaty”, but an “executive agreement” since Biden didn’t seek a congressional approval to make it..”

Biden’s 10-year Security Pact With Ukraine is Nothing But a PR Stunt (Sp.)

US President Joe Biden struck a 10-year security deal with the Kiev regime at the recent G7 Summit. Volodymyr Zelensky, whose presidential tenure expired on May 20, inked the agreement on behalf of Ukraine. Despite the White House calling the deal “historic” the US media says its future is in doubt. The deal is not a “treaty”, but an “executive agreement” since Biden didn’t seek a congressional approval to make it. Treaties, which require the consent of two-thirds of US senators, are legally binding agreements between nations; they become part of international law. Executive agreements are concluded on the authority of the incumbent president and don’t necessarily bind his successors. President Donald Trump tore apart his predecessor Barack Obama’s nuclear deal with Iran (which was not confirmed by Senate) in 2018. This illustrated the fragility of the executive agreement – which was also called “historic” in July 2015.

Recent YouGov, Yahoo News, Emerson polls show Trump leads Biden in the 2024 presidential race. Trump is also leading Biden in key battleground states which provided for Biden’s victory in the 2020 elections, as per RealClearPolitics.
Even if Biden wins in 2024, his second tenure will end in 2029, meaning the fate of the 10-year accord will depend on his successor. Treaties aren’t immune to the US president’s unilateral action: In 1978, President Jimmy Carter withdrew from 1954 Mutual Defense Treaty with the island of Taiwan. President George W. Bush tore apart the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty with Moscow in 2002. Last but not least, in the absence of clarification of the Constitutional Court of Ukraine, Zelensky’s legitimacy as a signatory is null and void: under the nation’s Constitution, the presidential tenure is limited to five years and is not subject to extension under martial law.

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“..the lack of will and responsibility on part of the Western elites is the main obstacle on the road towards a durable peace..

Moscow Reveals Further Steps After Putin’s Ukraine Offer (RT)

Russia’s diplomats will communicate President Vladimir Putin’s latest Ukraine peace proposal to Western leaders in “in meticulous detail,” Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov told journalists on Friday. Earlier the same day, the head of state set conditions for peace negotiations with Kiev. The Russian president’s initiative includes a demand that Kiev withdraw its troops from all former Ukrainian territories that joined Russia following referendums in the fall of 2022 and abandon its plans to join NATO. Moscow is ready to order a ceasefire and start negotiations “the minute” Ukraine agrees to those terms and starts the withdrawal, he told Lavrov and other senior Russian diplomats at a meeting.

Following the event, Lavrov told journalists that he believes the world is already well-aware of the president’s proposal. Moscow has no plans to issue the offer in a formal document, the minister said. Russia’s ambassadors will nevertheless hand the text of Putin’s speech to the relevant foreign officials and clarify the Kremlin’s stance, he said. “We won’t chase after anyone,” Russia’s top diplomat said, adding that Moscow would simply make its position clear and “look at the reaction” of the foreign nations. He stated that his ministry plans to raise the issue at the meetings of BRICS and the Shanghai Cooperation Organization as well as in talks with China and the Latin American and African nations.

The minister also expressed his hope that the initiative would be discussed at the ongoing G7 summit in Italy and at the conference on Ukraine which Switzerland is set to host this weekend. When further asked by journalist Pavel Zarubin if he believes the latest peace initiative could lead to some meaningful dialogue with the West, Lavrov responded by saying that “hope is the last to die.” “Those that have ears to hear, let them hear. Those that have brains, let them understand,” the minister said, adding that, although he was “not sure that everything is alright with those organs” when it comes to the Western politicians, he still hopes that some good can come of it.

Putin’s proposal was also lauded by Valentina Matvienko, the head of the Russian Federation Council – the upper house of the national parliament. She described the initiative as a “real peace offer” opening the “only possible path towards the end of the Ukraine conflict.” The Russian president’s words also made it clear that “the lack of will and responsibility on part of the Western elites is the main obstacle on the road towards a durable peace,” she said. The initiative came just a day before the start of the Swiss-hosted summit supposedly meant to further peace in Ukraine. Kiev insisted that Moscow could not have been invited to the event because it would try to “hijack” the agenda by presenting alternatives to the plan being proposed by the Ukrainian government. Putin stated that the meeting was only meant to distract the public opinion from the real roots of the conflict.

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“..when Bennett traveled to Kiev to present Moscow’s proposal to the Ukrainian government, it was rejected, and the Israeli leader was branded a Russian sympathizer..”

Russia Was Ready To Withdraw From Southern Ukraine – Putin (RT)

Russia was open to withdrawing its troops from Kherson and Zaporozhye Regions early in the Ukraine conflict on the condition that Kiev agreed to an uninterrupted land connection between Crimea and the mainland, President Vladimir Putin stated on Friday. Speaking at a meeting with the country’s senior diplomats, Putin revealed that in early March 2022, as Russian troops were advancing into southern Ukraine, a senior foreign politician representing the West proposed mediating the conflict between Moscow and Kiev. While Putin did not name the leader, former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev identified him as then-Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett. According to the Russian president, Bennett asked officials in Moscow at the time why Russian troops were operating in Kherson and Zaporozhye Regions, given that their stated goal was to help Donbass.

Bennett was told the decision to send Russian troops to those regions was made based on the plans drawn by the General Staff, which sought to bypass heavily fortified Ukrainian positions in Donbass, Putin explained. According to the Russian leader, when Bennett asked whether Russian troops would remain in Kherson and Zaporozhye Regions after the end of the conflict, Putin said he was open to the idea of pulling them back to their bases. “I replied that, in general, I do not rule out that Ukraine will retain its sovereignty over these territories, provided that Russia will have a solid land connection to Crimea.” Putin noted that to secure the guarantee, Moscow and Kiev would have to sign a legally binding “servitude” agreement, a property law that ties rights and obligations to the ownership or possession of land. The deal would then have to be finalized with the involvement of the UN Security Council, as well as local citizens and the Russian public.

However, when Bennett traveled to Kiev to present Moscow’s proposal to the Ukrainian government, it was rejected, and the Israeli leader was branded a Russian sympathizer, Putin noted. Now, this proposal is off the table, given that Kherson and Zaporozhye Regions, along with the two Donbass republics, voted to join Russia in public referendums in the fall of 2022, Putin stated. “There can be no talk of violating our national unity… This question is closed forever and beyond any debate.” At the same time, Putin signaled that Moscow was ready for talks with Ukraine on the condition that Kiev fully withdraws its troops from Donbass, Kherson, and Zaporozhye regions and abandons plans to join NATO. But the proposal has been rejected by Kiev, which insists upon returning the country to its 1991 borders.

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“On March 29, 2022, we withdrew our troops from Kiev because we were assured that it was essential to create conditions for the conclusion of the political negotiating process..”

Russian Troops Never Intended To Capture Kiev – Putin (RT)

Russian forces did not plan to storm Kiev when they advanced towards the Ukrainian capital in the first weeks of the conflict between the two countries, President Vladimir Putin has said. During a meeting with his Russia’s top diplomats on Friday, Putin noted continued “speculation” in Ukraine and the West about the intentions of Russian units when they reached the outskirts of Kiev in late February 2022. “But there was no political decision to storm the city of 3 million, no matter what anyone says due to their lack of thought,” Putin insisted. According to the president, the Russian advance towards Kiev was “nothing more than an operation to persuade the Ukrainian regime to [make] peace.” “The troops were there to motivate the Ukrainian side to engage in negotiations, to try to find an acceptable solution and this way end the war unleashed by Kiev against Donbass back in 2014,” he said.

The conflict between the Ukrainian government and the People’s Republics of Donetsk and Lugansk, which erupted after the Western-backed coup in Kiev in February 2014, “posed a threat to the security of our country, to the security of Russia,” Putin stressed. The move by Russia did result in talks that led to agreements that “in principle, suited both Moscow and Kiev,” he said, referring to the negotiations that took place between the two sides in the Turkish city of Istanbul in late March 2022. “On March 29, 2022, we withdrew our troops from Kiev because we were assured that it was essential to create conditions for the conclusion of the political negotiating process,” the president recalled. “Our Western colleagues” insisted back then that the Ukrainian authorities “cannot sign such agreements… with a gun to their head,” he added.

However, Kiev and its Western backers have been claiming that the Russian withdrawal from the area of the Ukrainian capital was not a goodwill gesture by Moscow, but the result of military successes achieved by Kiev’s troops. Already in April 2022, US President Joe Biden said “the ‘Battle of Kiev’ was a historic victory… won by the Ukrainian people with unprecedented assistance by the US and our allies.” The next day after the Russian troops left, the Ukrainian leadership seized their participation in the negotiating process, staging “a provocation” in Bucha, Putin said.On April 1, 2022, the Zelensky government blamed the Russian military for massacring civilians in the town of Bucha near Kiev. Moscow denied those accusations, saying that the purported evidence of the crimes was fabricated. “I think it’s clear now that this dirty provocation was needed to somehow explain the rejection of the results that had been achieved during the negotiations. The path to peace was again turned down,” the Russian leader stressed.

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“..they rest on the source credibility of being “non-governmental” and merely devoted to human rights, which increases the effectiveness of their messaging..”

US Government Uses NGOs To Corrupt ‘Civil Society’ Around The World (Diesen)

In the West, and beyond, pressure groups operating under the banner of “human rights non-governmental organizations” (NGOs) have become key actors in disseminating war propaganda, intimidating academics, and corrupting civil society. These outfits act as gatekeepers determining which voices should be elevated and which should be censored and canceled. Civil society is imperative to balance the power of the state, but governments are increasingly seeking to hijack it through NGOs they fund. They can enable a loud minority to override a silent majority. In the 1980s, the Reagan doctrine exacerbated the problem as these “human rights NGOs” were financed by the government and staffed by people with ties to intelligence agencies, to ensure civil society won’t deviate significantly from government policies.

The ability of academics to speak openly and honestly is restricted by these gatekeepers. In a case in point today, NGOs limit dissent in academic debates about the great power rivalry in Ukraine. Well-documented and proven facts that are imperative to understanding the conflict are simply not reported in the media, and any efforts to address these facts are confronted with vague accusations of being “controversial” or “pro-Russian,” a transgression that must be punished with intimidation, censorship, and cancellation. I will outline here first my personal experiences with one of these NGOs, and how they are hijacking civil society. The Norwegian Helsinki Committee is financed by the US government and CIA-cutout the National Endowment for Democracy (NED). They regularly publish hit pieces about me and rarely miss their weekly tweets that label me a propagandist for Russia. It is always name-calling and smearing, rather than anything that can be considered coherent argument.

The standard formula for cancellation is to shame my university in every article and tweet for allowing academic freedom, with the implicit offer of redemption by terminating my employment as a professor. Peak absurdity occurred with a seven-page article in a newspaper in which it was argued I’d violated international law by spreading war propaganda. They grudgingly had to admit that I have opposed the war from day one, although for a professor in Russian politics to engage with Russian media allegedly made me complicit in spreading war propaganda. Every single time I am invited to give a speech at any event, this NGO will appear to publicly shame and pressure the organizers to cancel my invitation. The organization also openly attempts to incite academics to rally against me to strengthen their case for censorship in a trial of public opinion. Besides whipping up hatred in the media by labeling me a propagandist for Russia, they incite anonymous online troll armies such as “NAFO” to cancel me online and in the real world.

After subsequent intimidations through social media, emails, SMS and phone calls, the police advised me to remove my home address and phone number from public access. One of the Norwegian Helsinki Committee recently posted a sale ad for my house, which included photos of my home with my address for their social media followers. The Norwegian Helsinki Committee also infiltrates and corrupts other institutions. One of the more eager Helsinki Committee employees is also a board member at the Norwegian organization for non-fictional authors and translators (NFFO) and used his position there to cancel the organization’s co-hosting of an event, as I had been invited to speak. The Norwegian Helsinki Committee is also overrepresented on the Nobel Committee, to ensure the right candidates are picked.

Why would a humanitarian NGO act like modern Brownshirts by limiting academic freedom? One could similarly ask why a human rights NGO spends more effort on demonizing Julian Assange rather than exploring the human-rights abuses he exposed. This “human rights NGO” is devoted primarily to addressing abuses in the East. Subsequently, all great power politics is framed as a competition between good values versus bad ones. Constructing stereotypes for the in-group versus the out-groups as a conflict between good and evil is a key component of political propaganda. The complexity of security competition between the great powers is dumbed down and propagandized as a mere struggle between liberal democracy versus authoritarianism. Furthermore, they rest on the source credibility of being “non-governmental” and merely devoted to human rights, which increases the effectiveness of their messaging.

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“For a group claiming to seek “Our Children’s Trust,” this activist group seems to be deliberately abusing children’s trust.”

Fossil Fuels: The Best-Kept Secret in Our World Today (RCW)

Apparently, you can litigate anything these days, and it’s gotten far more insidious than suing McDonald’s over hot coffee being, you know, hot. A new climate activist group called Our Children’s Trust is suing state and federal government agencies on behalf of individual children, claiming that fossil fuel regulators are negligently ruining their future. That children should feel entitled to come of age under a specific set of favorable environmental and political circumstances — and to demand punishment for individuals they disagree with — isn’t just a testament to the egocentrism dominating the 21st Century. It also exposes our culture’s deeply warped understanding of climate science, which, surprisingly to many of us, actually shows global warming has no meaningful negative effects on our lives or our environment.

In fact, we have fossil fuels to thank for the twenty-first century for being the best time in human history to be alive. Unfortunately, it’s the best-kept secret in our world today. If we really want to earn “our children’s trust,” we should teach them the truth instead of foisting crippling and needless anxiety on an entire generation. Contrary to the attention-grabbing clips of forests burning and shock-inducing statistics about record-high temperatures, modern climate science suggests that warming is likely to remain mild and manageable while our resilience continues to improve. In fact, despite average global temperatures increasing about 1° Fahrenheit and our population quadrupling in the last century, climate-related disasters claim 99% fewer lives.

Our resistance to severe weather events (which actually have remained consistent or even declined in recent decades) is actually growing at a faster rate than non-weather-related natural disasters like volcanoes and earthquakes. The alarmists want you to believe a changing climate is jeopardizing human lives; however, the opposite is true. Our environment is also better than ever. The U.S. has cut air pollution by nearly 80% in the last 50 years and ranks number one in the world for access to clean drinking water. In fact, those infamous greenhouse gases may actually help the planet. Mild increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide create a “global greening” effect that stimulates plant growth, which both helps natural ecosystems and makes agricultural production more efficient.

Meanwhile, this is the best time in human history to be alive, thanks largely to widespread access to affordable, reliable energy. Children today have a far greater chance of living a long, healthy, fruitful life than ever before. Around the world, in both developing and developed nations, poverty has plummeted and people are enjoying the tangible, life-improving benefits of lower infant and child mortality, better nutrition, improved education, lower infectious disease rates, more economic opportunity, gender equality, and longer lives. It’s no coincidence that global quality of life spiked and has continued to improve consistently since the Industrial Revolution — or that communities without access to electricity are still plagued by poverty, danger, and disease. For a group claiming to seek “Our Children’s Trust,” this activist group seems to be deliberately abusing children’s trust.

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“It appears, however, that we do not want it back, that the lockdown mode continues to tantalize..”

The Confiscation of Reality (Sinead Murphy)

The UK Meteorological Office has just reported that we have enjoyed the hottest May on record. Meanwhile, those of us who have lived in the UK during May have endured unseasonal cold and rain, and have complained to one another constantly about it. Welcome to the age of abstraction, when lived experience is irrelevant and theoretical constructions carry the day – when what is deemed right and true is unmoored from what is actually happening here and now. Over four years ago, Covid lockdowns staged a dramatic confiscation of present reality. The question is, did we ever get it back? When the UK government ordered its first lockdown at the end of March 2020, the present reality was put on hold – businesses were shut, schools closed, social activities banned, and human interactions restricted. Chaos and suffering inevitably ensued. But in the midst of the misery, there arose a new possibility.

With present reality in abeyance, we were freed of its reality check. And we began to indulge in a new and joyous expectancy, of a wonderful future to revive a glorious past. ‘We’ll meet again,’ Queen Elizabeth assured us, reprising in her words and presence a fondly recalled togetherness of the last world war and promising its restoration as if it had only just been paused – as if the decades-long decimation of community and family and individual had never happened, as if only a temporary order to Stay Home stood between us and a lost world. This new possibility was tantalizing and quickly took hold of Middle England, the BBC-believing bastion of British Values, bent ever more implausibly on keeping calm and carrying on. By 2020, this beleaguered demographic had been all but spent from spotting certainties and consolations on the horizon of Left and Right, to forestall a looming vertigo at elite interests dashing its hopes from above and state-reliant deplorables whose fate beckoned from below.

Middle England, front and centre of policy and institution, had long been demoralized by its present reality: Consigned to jobs made ever more bullshit by the erosion of ambition and discipline; flip-flopping between debt and the dregs of old desires; addled by precarity and the virtuosity that survives it; overseeing the retreat of human sympathy everywhere and applying for relief to anxiously awaited festivals that never failed to disappoint. Lockdowns’ suspension of this reality was in itself a great boon. But greater still was what followed: unimpeded anticipation, of a happy tomorrow to follow a happy yesterday, in which all we would do because all we had done was Hug Granny and Play Whist and Toast Marshmallows and Sing Carols. This was not nostalgia. It was infinitely more potent. mIn nostalgia, the past is glorified as what is dead, as what is ‘vintage’ or ‘retro,’ as what can therefore only be remembered, however wistfully. In lockdown, the past was reanimated, suddenly reframed as what would be again once universal cocooning came to an end.

Lockdowns relieved us of the one thing that had stood between us and fantastic recollections of Digging For Victory and Winning At Cribbage: present reality. We were free now to regret the past, not hopelessly as what was lost and gone, but hopefully as what had just been put on hold and would soon resume once things got back to normal. Yes, we still went through the present realities of 2020 and 2021. We ate food and washed clothes and logged on, and drank too much and fought too hard and lost our sense of purpose. But suddenly, all of that was in parentheses – not real at all, just for now. Lockdowns achieved a transfer of the reality-effect from an inglorious present, sodden with disappointment, to a host of abstract ideas plundered from an invented past and projected to an inflated future. Over four years on, we are no longer supported in our exemption from present reality by government orders to Shelter In Place. Present reality is returned to us, after a fashion. It appears, however, that we do not want it back, that the lockdown mode continues to tantalize.

The reluctance with which many have relinquished their facemask has surely warned of this. As has the ongoing normalization of work-from-home. But there is another and more insidious aspect to our cleaving to lockdowns’ suspension of present reality: our growing enthusiasm for theoretical constructions for which present reality is irrelevant. During lockdowns, we plundered the almost-dead stock of yesteryear for content for the new mode of fond expectancy – abstract ideas of Dunkirk Spirit and Oh! What A Lovely War were hastily put abroad, adorned with Union Jack bunting, mugs of builders’ tea, allotment lemonade, and royal memorabilia. But already before lockdowns ended, the stock of abstract ideas began updating. The widely disseminated death of George Floyd launched a Black Lives Matter theme complete with its cartoon fist, and the rainbow of Gender was a seamless segway from the I Heart NHS refrain that had played ad nauseam for Covid. As lockdowns receded, we were encouraged to extend our exemption from present reality by a growing fund of available abstractions: Climate, Health, Equity, Security, Safety, Identity…

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“.. those who continue to peddle the junk conjured by the Israeli propaganda machine will merely expose themselves as unserious buffoons..”

The Afterlives of Lies (Patrick Lawrence)

Last Friday, while President Joe Biden, French President Emmanuel Macron and other Western leaders, along with the reporters who clerk for them, were in Normandy busily airbrushing out the Red Army’s heroism in defeating the Reich 80 years ago, something truer to history occurred in the pages of The Times of London. Under the headline, “Israel says Hamas weaponized rape. Does the evidence add up?” two investigative reporters, Catherine Philp and Gabrielle Weiniger, decisively shredded the dense fabric of lies on this topic, woven these past eight months by the Israelis, Western media, freakishly obsessed Zionist sympathizers and various feminist poseurs.Philp and Weiniger have produced an exceptional piece of journalism, the virtues of which I will shortly consider. For now, just this: You will never read a piece of this integrity on this side of the Atlantic — and certainly never in The New York Times, whose infamous dishonesty in the matter of alleged sexual violence in the Gaza crisis has few matches in the history of the once-but-no-longer newspaper of record.

But the significance of The Times piece extends well beyond its quality as first-rate work. Mainstream media have at last reported on the monstrous propaganda operation that has fabricated lurid allegations of sexual abuse on the part of Hamas militias. The surface of silence has finally been disturbed. The historians will have a record with which to work. And the record will include, as reflections in a mirror, the base derelictions of other major media — The New York Times, the BBC, the wire services, and so on down a long list — as they collaborated with the Zionist state to advance this edifice of lies to justify the barbarities of the Israel Occupation Forces. (And let us rename these savages in uniform.) [Three Israeli experts claim their comments were misrepresented in The Times of London piece.]

I liked Aaron Maté’s remark when he posted a link to The Times piece on X soon after it came out: “Establishment media starting to catch up with independent journalists and a squirrel Twitter account” – the latter a reference to the man, woman, or entity that flagged the piece when it was published last Friday. Just the point, or one of many. Various independent publications, notably but not only The Grayzone, Mondoweiss, Electronic Intifada and The Intercept, were swift to expose the Israelis’ aggressive propaganda op when, with Jeffrey Gettleman’s breathtakingly counterfeit pieces in The New York Times last December, the lying got entirely out of hand. These publications kept the light shining on a story that otherwise would have disappeared in darkness. We see in their reports the increasing power of independent media to force accurate accountings of events into the record. In this case if not in many others, those airbrushing the picture failed.

Answering the question posed in the headline atop their piece, Philps and Weiniger reply with an unambiguous “No”: there is no sound evidence whatsoever that Hamas militias, and others that crossed into southern Israel with them last Oct. 7, engaged in systematic, officially planned sexual violence against Israelis, women and men, during their attacks on various kibbutzim just across the Gaza–Israel border. These fabrications began to appear within days of the Oct. 7 events and have ever since polluted public discourse across the West. We must now bear another bureaucratic acronym, CRSV, “conflict-related sexual violence,” to secure the gravity of the charges in our minds. Prominent faux-feminists — Hillary Clinton and Sheryl Sandberg chief among them — continue to indulge in “the politicization of rape,” as one of Philps and Weiniger’s sources calls it. But the air begins to clear. From here on out, those who continue to peddle the junk conjured by the Israeli propaganda machine will merely expose themselves as unserious buffoons in the service of an apartheid state. Let them.

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“Biden is not well. Everyone knows this even those who support him…the difference is they don’t care and that’s the most frightening aspect of this situation.” — Edward Dowd

Sick Of and Done With (Kunstler)

I’m a little sorry to go all quasi-supernatural with you about this, but we are truly faced with the fact that the devastation in sexual relations and failures of family formation in recent decades has produced a very particular form of anomie in Western Civ’s female population — and the dynamic has badly deranged increasingly feminized men, too. Covid-19 was basically a Munchausen-by-proxy event, which ChatGPT describes accordingly:”. . . a psychological disorder wherein a caregiver, typically a parent, exaggerates, fabricates, or induces illness or injury in a person under their care, usually a child. The primary motive is to gain attention, sympathy, or praise from medical professionals and others, rather than any tangible benefit like financial gain.”

Actually, ChatGPT was wrong about the financial gain part. There were billions made off Covid by Big Pharma, including hundreds of millions in royalties doled out to public health employees. The government played the role of “mother” in the Covid caper, keeping you (her “children”) safe. You’ve noticed, I’m sure, that claims about safety and safe places have been major themes in Wokery both before and during Covid. Anyway, as usual with Munchausen-by-proxy syndrome, the “children” (i.e., the US population) were injured badly by the “treatment,” the mRNA vaccines. And also as usual with mothers displaying Cluster-B personality disorder, the “bad” children who refuted the narrative and refused the specified “treatment” were punished severely. (Cluster-B is sadistic.)

One thing this suggests is that the cabal running things behind the empty suit “Joe Biden” is dominated by women, and my guess would be the women directly associated with Barack Obama: Susan Rice, Lisa Monaco, Kathryn Ruemmler, Sally Yates, Valarie Jarrett, Samantha Power, Avril Haines, Torie Nuland, give-or-take some combo of them, et al. I have alleged for years that the motif driving batshit-crazy, Cluster-B Democratic Party women is that Donald Trump represents Daddy’s-in-the-house. In their boundaryless state-of-mind nothing threatens the Cluster-B ladies as much as the imposition of boundaries by a fearsome daddy figure. Daddy = the monster of monsters to them.

Thus, the “Biden” regime’s remorseless persecution of Mr. Trump — like the village rabble hunting down Frankenstein with torches and pitchforks — and the fantasies, were he allowed to live, about being sent to concentration camps by the likes of Rachel Maddow. There’s nothing like barbed-wire and sentry towers to vividly suggest the imposition of “boundaries” on your behavior.

I have strayed a bit from my initial theme concerning the grotesque game of “pretend” being played around “Joe Biden’s” re-election candidacy. Let’s say this: it is the terminal op being run by an out-of-control Deep State blob now losing its mojo in big gobs each day as its epic dishonesty gets exposed. This blob had some very potent tools at its command to jerk around the people of this land, especially the legacy news media. Most of that consisted of deception which is to say the tactical application of untruth. The op was tragically effective for some years, but its victims — US citizens — are onto the game now and they are angrily flipping over the game board. Mark this essential fact of life: truth is sturdy and lies are fragile. So, now you know what must, in the end, prevail.

“Joe Biden” is not long for this world as a token in that game. Mere days, I’d say. There is no way that the Democratic Party can afford to put him in a debate arena June 27th with Mr. Trump. Two minutes in, “JB” would be leaking sawdust and stuttering incoherently. The Party would be revealed as a fraud for the ages. And then, by the time you’re scarfing down blueberry pie on the Fourth of July, Hillary Clinton (better known here as Rodan the Flying Reptile, or She-Whose-Turn-It-Is) will be flapping her leathery wings on-high in triumph as “JB’s” emergency replacement. I am here to save our democracy, caw caw—! Wait for it! Trouble is, batshit crazy women are exactly what our country is sick of and done with.

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“I don’t think it’s something we can do. We have a very defined role and we need to do what we’re supposed to do. But this is a bigger problem. This is way above us.”

The Faux Outrage Over the Alito Flags and Tapes (Turley)

In a world of moral relativism, Lauren Windsor may reign supreme. The Democratic activist recently lied to justices in order to record answers at a dinner. In an interview with CNN, the filmmaker (who has been lionized by many in the media for her dishonesty) cheerfully explained that she lies to “elicit truths that serve the greater public good.” The “greater good” is to contribute to a campaign of harassment and attacks on Supreme Court justices by academics, the media and Democratic members. The chief target of these efforts lately has been the author of the decision that overturned Roe v. Wade, Justice Samuel Alito.

For years, the left has maintained a well-funded, unrelenting campaign against the court and its conservative majority. This has included an effort by such figures as Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D., Mass.) to pack the court immediately with a liberal majority. Warren declared that the court must be packed because it is daring to oppose “widely held public opinion.” The statement, of course, ignores that the court was designed to resist public pressure (and even members of Congress) in order to protect the constitutional rights and liberties of minority groups.

Unsurprisingly, the usual suspects have assembled again to call for resignations and impeachments after Windsor’s surreptitious taping of both Alito and Chief Justice John Roberts. That includes Warren, who declared that “Alito is an extremist who is out of touch with mainstream America. His rising power on the Supreme Court is a threat to our democracy.” It did not matter that what Windsor captured on her secret recording was neither surprising nor unethical. Pretending to be a religious conservative at a dinner of the Supreme Court Historical Society, Windsor successfully induced the deeply religious Alito to say . . . wait for it . . . that he believes the country should return to a place of “godliness.”

It was an otherworldly moment as this notoriously anti-conservative activist asked an unsuspecting Alito why the nation was so filled with rage. In the recording, Alito laments the divisions in the country, stating, “I wish I knew. I don’t know. It’s easy to blame the media, but I do blame them because they do nothing but criticize us. And so they have really eroded trust in the court…American citizens in general need to work on this to heal this polarization because it’s very dangerous.” When pushed on what the court can do, Alito again answered honestly: “I don’t think it’s something we can do. We have a very defined role and we need to do what we’re supposed to do. But this is a bigger problem. This is way above us.”

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“What the hell was the Secret Service management thinking, letting the FBI in there with guns? It was a protected facility.”

Searching for the Truth About the Raid at Mar-a-Lago (Julie Kelly)

Top officials at the Department of Justice are downplaying recently disclosed documents showing FBI agents were authorized to use deadly force during their 2022 raid of Donald Trump’s Florida estate, Mar-a-Lago. Responding to Trump’s claim that “Joe Biden was locked & loaded ready to take me out & put my family in danger,” FBI Director Christopher Wray said the bureau was following “standard operating procedure” as it executed a search warrant on Aug. 8, 2022, regarding classified material that the former president was holding at Mar-a-Lago. While noting that Trump was not present during the raid, Attorney General Merrick Garland dismissed Trump’s claim as “false” and “dangerous.” Garland said the same language was used in a later search warrant seeking classified documents President Biden was storing in various locations.

But critics argue that there was nothing ordinary about the Mar-a-Lago raid, in which more than 30 FBI agents descended on Trump’s Palm Beach estate, potentially creating a dangerous situation with the armed Secret Service agents on site. “There was zero reason to create an unnecessary, even one in a thousand chance, of a blue-on-blue situation with firearms,” former Secret Service agent and political commentator Dan Bongino said on his podcast. “The FBI, DOJ, and management of the Secret Service effed this up royally.” Even as the DOJ presents its actions as business as usual, the newly released documents and other public records suggest the department’s actions entered uncharted territory. While the department claims that all citizens must be treated equally, critics note that no former president was ever the subject of an FBI search warrant before Trump.

A recently discovered Department of Defense memo suggests that the federal government may well have had copies of the documents in Trump’s possession, also raising questions about the need for the raid. The content of those documents has not been disclosed but, critics ask, if Trump was not retaining copies of information that threatened national security, what was the need for an armed raid? Many on the right see the Mar-a-Lago raid as part of a broader effort by the Department of Justice to intimidate its political enemies. They say it is part of a larger pattern that includes the armed morning raid on the home of Trump associate Roger Stone in 2019, the arrest of anti-abortion activist Mark Houck by dozens of armed agents in 2022 a year after he was accused of pushing someone outside a Philadelphia clinic, and the DOJ’s aggressive efforts to find and charge to date more than 1,400 people connected to the Jan. 6 protest at the Capitol.

The recent court disclosures also underscore the very different treatments the department has accorded to Trump and the Biden family. Trump, who has asserted that his presidential authority empowered him to retain and declassify documents, got a surprise nine-hour raid a few months before announcing his plans to run for reelection. President Biden, who never had the authority to declassify or take home classified records as a senator or vice president, received the courtesy of at least two consensual FBI searches, presumably unarmed. IRS whistleblower Joseph Ziegler, who has worked on tax cases involving Biden’s son Hunter, has testified that Hunter Biden’s lawyers were tipped off that investigators had probable cause to search his Northern Virginia storage unit. Trump’s attorneys are now asking Judge Aileen Cannon, who is presiding over Special Counsel Jack Smith’s espionage and obstruction case against Trump in Florida, to prohibit Smith from using any of the materials seized during the Mar-a-Lago raid at trial. The FBI sought the warrant as part of its attempt to recover classified records, including national defense materials, which Trump supposedly took with him at the end of his presidency.

[..] Another section of the order addressed a possible response if the Secret Service attempted to impede the search or if Trump showed up that day. (Trump, at the time, was residing at his Bedminster, New Jersey, home for the summer.) “Should FPOTUS [Former President of the United States] arrive at MAL [Mar-a-Lago], FBI [agents] will be prepared to engage with FPOTUS and USSS [U.S. Secret Service] Security Team,” the order read. In a partially redacted portion of the plan, agents were advised to “engage” with an unidentified Secret Service contact “should USSS provide resistance or interfere with FBI timeline or accesses.” Dan Bongino faulted the Secret Service for permitting armed police into Mar-a-Lago. “What the hell was the Secret Service management thinking, letting the FBI in there with guns? It was a protected facility.”

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Ryan Cole
https://twitter.com/i/status/1801334739766231492

 

 

Elon semi
https://twitter.com/i/status/1801436442264277160

 

 

Grouper

 

 

 

 

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

 

 

 

 

 

Jun 082024
 
 June 8, 2024  Posted by at 8:12 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , ,  51 Responses »


René Magritte Le Mal du Pays (Homesickness) 1940

 

Trump Judge Flags Facebook Post Suggesting Possible Mistrial (RT)
Putin’s 4D Chess: West ‘Losing’ War on Four Fronts (Sp.)
West Will Remove Zelensky – Kremlin (RT)
Kremlin Responds After Biden Claims He’s Known Putin For 40 Years (RT)
Some Dads Don’t Pardon (Manley)
Media Shrugs as Biden Laptop is Authenticated in Federal Court (Turley)
Retired US Army Officer: West Pushing World to Brink of Nuclear War (Sp.)
US Won’t Tolerate Dissent On Russia Narrative – Scott Ritter (RT)
Tara Reade: If Biden is Reelected, ‘We’re Looking at World War III’ (Sp.)
US Faces ‘Economic Degradation And Misery’ Due To Foreign Policy – Hinkle (RT)
Most Germans Disagree With Berlin On Russia Policy – Bismarck Descendant (RT)
The Myth That Biden Had Nothing To Do with the Prosecutions of Trump (VDH)
Time to Jettison the Animals (Kunstler)
FBI Agents Fear Being Jailed By Trump – McCabe (RT)
Power Play: Von der Leyen Faces Showdown in EU Leadership Race (Sp.)
EU Is In ‘War Psychosis’ – Orban (RT)
Bob Iger, DEI, and Wokism Broke Disney’s Trust with America (AmG)

 

 

 

 

https://twitter.com/i/status/1798909398288392653

 

 

Trump Dr Phil

 

 

Yale Law professor

 

 

Bomb jobs – The Arsenal of democracy
https://twitter.com/i/status/1798965632022819096

 

 

Holder

 

 

Trump Arpaio

 

 

Roseanne

 

 

 

 

 

 

Making sure that Trump cannot use it on appeal?!

Trump Judge Flags Facebook Post Suggesting Possible Mistrial (RT)

The judge presiding over the New York criminal case in which former US President Donald Trump was found guilty of 34 felony charges has notified defense lawyers and prosecutors of a social media post indicating possible jury misconduct, raising questions over whether the verdict could be nullified. Judge Juan Merchan sent a letter to attorneys in the case on Friday, flagging a comment that was apparently posted on the New York State Unified Court System’s Facebook page on May 29, the day before Trump’s guilty verdict was announced. The author, identified as Michael Anderson, said, “My cousin is a juror and says Trump is getting convicted. Thank you folks for all your hard work!!!” Merchan gave no indication of whether he considered the post to be legitimate, and he didn’t ask the prosecution or defense teams to do anything in response.

https://twitter.com/i/status/1799193726557868517

The judge said the court “became aware” of the pre-verdict comment and was therefore bringing it to the attention of parties in the case. Jurors were given strict instructions not to discuss the case or their deliberations with anyone besides each other. If those rules were proven to have been violated, Trump could seek a mistrial to have his conviction thrown out based on jury misconduct. The jury deliberated from May 28 to May 30 before finding Trump guilty on all 34 counts of falsifying business records to boost his chances of winning the 2016 presidential election. Lawyers for the ex-president had unsuccessfully sought a change of venue in the case, arguing that they couldn’t get a fair trial with a jury in one of the most staunchly Democrat cities in the nation.

It’s not clear whether Anderson was actually related to one of the 12 jurors; nor has it been verified that he posted his message before the verdict was declared. Nevertheless, Trump supporters quickly seized on Merchan’s letter as further evidence that the trial wasn’t fair. “If true, this is likely headed to a mistrial because a juror isn’t allowed to discuss the case with family or friends like this,” conservative podcast host Robby Starbuck said. “Big deal.” Former federal prosecutor Joyce Alene said that it was smart for Merchan to notify the parties of the potentially incriminating post and hold a hearing to resolve the issue. “Why does a clear record matter?” she asked. “Because Trump will raise this on appeal to argue for reversal. Now, both sides have notice of this issue, and there’s an opportunity to get all of the details and facts out so that if there is nothing to this, it won’t affect the appeal.”

Juror
https://twitter.com/i/status/1799191685735305423

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“The West is losing four wars in one – economically (in trade and debt), financially (de-dollarization and international payment systems), militarily (in Ukraine in battle and in a comparison of weapons systems) and geopolitically with a massive loss of influence around the world..”

Putin’s 4D Chess: West ‘Losing’ War on Four Fronts (Sp.)

Tens of thousands of sanctions leveled against Russia by Western countries have paradoxically failed to crush the Russian economy, and on the contrary the country is seeing economic growth at rates almost unprecedented in its post-Soviet history. “We have set a goal to enter the top four largest economies in the world,” President Putin said during his speech at SPIEF on Friday. “Just last week the World Bank made additional calculations and put Russia in fourth place. We found ourselves ahead of Japan. Russia ranks fourth in terms of purchasing power parity GDP.” But Russia won’t rest on its laurels, Putin said, noting that the difference in GDP remains “small,” that other countries are not standing in one place, and that “leadership positions need to be constantly confirmed and strengthened.”

To that end, Putin outlined an economic growth and investment strategy over the next six year period, including, among other things, a drive toward increased self-sufficiency, a substantial jump in capital investment, changes to the tax code, and a renewed push to attract private investment. Highlighting Russia’s reorientation in trade and payments away from the West toward the developing world, the Russian president said the West had “been dealt a significant blow,” largely “by Western countries themselves,” with countries boosting trade in currencies other than the dollar and the euro. At the same time, Putin said, the hegemon of the Western economic order, the United States, faces serious financial straits which would be even more serious were it not for its continued plunder of developing nations. “They have a current account deficit of a trillion dollars. What is this? I think, everyone will understand what I’m talking about. This is neocolonialism in its modern iteration. Using the monopoly position of the dollar, the United States consumes a trillion dollars a year more than it produces. They seem to be pumping out these resources from other countries,” Putin said. He added that America’s gargantuan debt, which runs in the tens of trillions of dollars, is not backed by any tangible assets.

“The growth in the Russian economy (outpacing Western economies) is spectacular and it shows that the 15,000 sanctions applied by the West have blown back on them,” British academic and author Rodney Atkinson told Sputnik, offering his key takeaways from Putin’s speech. “The West is losing four wars in one – economically (in trade and debt), financially (de-dollarization and international payment systems), militarily (in Ukraine in battle and in a comparison of weapons systems) and geopolitically with a massive loss of influence around the world,” Atkinson explained. To make matters worse, the political and economic commentator stressed that the hostility with which the West has responded to the metamorphosis of a unipolar world order into a multipolar one has only made matters worse for itself thanks to its selfish and short-sighted policy elites.

“Even before the 20-year expansion towards Russia and the 2014 Maidan-instigated war, European imperial ambitions and US neocon aggression were unpopular. Now that the Global South has witnessed recent events and the BRICS offer an alternative and the US has descended into record debt and industrial weakness, it is very difficult for the West to recover its influence. Plagued by geopolitical ignorance, financially irresponsible policies and weak leadership, the US and its allies may not even survive as one of the poles of the multi-polar world,” Atkinson said.

Atkinson emphasized the madness of the West’s logic of slapping sanctions against a country the size of Russia with its abundance of food, mineral and energy resources. What’s worse (for the West) is that Moscow has been trailblazing a path to independence which can be emulated by other nations. “Import substitution by Russia and the unwillingness of Western companies to leave Russia (1,600 international companies have left Russia since 2022 but there are more than 2,100 left) and the substitution of national currencies for dollar-based trade (i.e. rupee, yuan, ruble) all show the Global South that there are alternatives to a Western-based system based on sanctions,” Atkinson said.

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“..Putin explained. It is now June 2024, and in order to do this, I feel, it will take a year. He will be tolerated until the spring, until the beginning of next year..”

West Will Remove Zelensky – Kremlin (RT)

The US and its allies will tolerate Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky until he has served his purpose, at which point he will be replaced, Kremlin Press Secretary Dmitry Peskov said on Thursday. President Vladimir Putin’s spokesman gave an interview to Izvestia on the sidelines of the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum (SPIEF), where he addressed recent remarks by the president about the likely fate of Zelensky. “Obviously, he will be removed,” Peskov said. “Obviously, reducing the mobilization age will cause an increasing wave of negativity in Ukrainian society.”

Peskov’s comments came as clarification to statements made by Putin on Wednesday, in a meeting with the heads of international news agencies that lasted more than three hours. At one point, the Russian president noted that the US has been pressuring Ukraine to mobilize increasingly younger men. According to Putin, Washington has already compelled Kiev to lower the draft age from 27 to 25, with a view of moving it down to 23 next, and then to 20 or straight to 18. “The law has to be passed and certain steps have to be taken,” Putin explained. “It is now June 2024, and in order to do this, I feel, it will take a year. He will be tolerated until the spring, until the beginning of next year at the very least. When it is done, they will say goodbye.”

Ukraine is currently losing around 50,000 troops per month and is able to mobilize only 30,000 replacements, leaving Kiev with an unsolvable problem, Putin added. The West already has “a few candidates” lined up to serve as president of Ukraine, according to the Russian president. Earlier in the conversation, Putin said that Zelensky had effectively carried out a coup by extending his presidential term past May 20, when it legally expired. Zelensky has argued that Ukrainian law forbids elections during a state of emergency, so he has to stay in office until the end of the conflict with Russia. The Ukrainian constitution, however, contains no such provisions – and in fact stipulates that the head of the parliament should assume power.

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“..The two officially met for the first time in 2011..”

Kremlin Responds After Biden Claims He’s Known Putin For 40 Years (RT)


Vladimir Putin wearing KGB uniform in 1980. © Wikipedia

It is often difficult to fathom what US President Joe Biden means with his statements, including when he claims to have known his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, for 40 years, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has said. Biden lashed out at Putin during an interview with ABC News on Thursday, saying: “I have known him for over 40 years. He has concerned me for 40 years. He is not a decent man. He is a dictator.” Speaking on the sidelines of the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum (SPIEF) on Friday, Peskov stated that Putin “does not react and will not react” to insults such as Biden’s. The spokesman added that he could only express regret that “in international politics at this level such rhetoric and such expressions are employed regarding a head of state.”

Referring to Biden’s claim that he has known the Russian leader for four decades, Peskov added that “sometimes one can only wonder what the US president means, including when he speaks about [knowing Putin for] 40 years.” Some commentators have already “rolled back time to understand what Putin was doing 40 years ago. One can make very deep analytical conclusions about how Biden could have become acquainted with him [at that time],” Peskov said, prompting laughter from journalists. The presidential spokesman was apparently referring to the fact that 40 years ago, the then 32-year-old Putin was working for the Soviet security agency, the KGB. Biden was 41 at the time, serving as senator for the US state of Delaware. The two officially met for the first time in 2011, when Putin held the post of prime minister under President Dmitry Medvedev, and Biden was US vice president in the administration of Barack Obama.

Posting on X (formerly Twitter) on Thursday, conservative commentator and former US Senate staffer Steve Guest wrote that by claiming he had known Putin for four decades, the 81-year-old Biden was “either… lying or he is admitting he was in contact with a KGB agent since 1984 or Biden’s brain is so cooked that he doesn’t know what on earth he is talking about.” The Wall Street Journal reported earlier this week, citing dozens of people who have been in contact with Biden recently, that beyond his frequent mental gaffes in public, the president is also showing “signs of slipping” in closed-door meetings with US lawmakers. Biden has directed insults at Putin throughout his presidency, among other things calling the Russian leader a “killer” in 2021 and a “crazy SOB” in February. The Kremlin has denounced the comments as “shameful,” but has declined to respond with equally harsh rhetoric.

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He says he won’t pardon Hunter because he knows he doesn’t have to..

Some Dads Don’t Pardon (Manley)

The maximum sentence for the first son’s most serious charge is 10 years in prison, but if he is convicted he would most likely face a lighter sentence. US President Joe Biden said he would not pardon his son, Hunter Biden, if he is convicted in his criminal trial in Delaware. The president sat down for an interview with ABC News in Normandy, France during a trip in commemoration of the 80th anniversary of the WWII D-Day landings. During the interview, the president was asked if he would accept the outcome of his son’s trial in Wilmington, Delaware, to which he said, “Yes.” During the interview, Biden said that former President Donald Trump got a “fair trial” and said the “jury spoke”. The president also said he would not pardon his son if he is convicted, which he has reportedly been saying for months. Biden issued a personal statement on Monday offering support for his son and said he was a father as well as the president.

“I’ve been very clear — the president is not going to pardon his son,” Karine Jean-Pierre, the White House press secretary, told reporters in December. Former Republican presidential candidate, Vivek Ramaswamy, said on social media that Hunter Biden’s trial is a “smoke screen”, and is “designed to make the prosecution of Trump appear nonpartisan, yet the outcome of the Hunter trial doesn’t matter” because the president “can and will pardon him.” The trial is on felony charges related to the first son’s efforts to obtain a .38 revolver from a gun shop in 2018 while allegedly battling drug addiction. Prosecutors allege that in October 2018, the president’s son visited StarQuest Shooters & Survival Supply in Wilmington to purchase the gun but say he lied about his drug addiction.

The younger Biden is now facing charges of false statement in purchasing of a firearm, false statement related to information required to be kept by a federal firearms licensed dealer, and possession of a firearm by a person who is an unlawful user of or addicted to a controlled substance. This is the first time that the son of a sitting president has faced a criminal trial. On Thursday, the widow of Hunter Biden’s late brother, Hallie Biden, testified. Following Beau Biden’s death in 2015, Hunter began an affair with Hallie Biden who said she “panicked” when she found a Colt Cobra revolver in Hunter’s vehicle on October 23, 2018. She said she threw it away in a trash can as a result. Hallie claims that Hunter smoked crack on a “daily” basis or “frequently” during her testimony. However, she told the jury that she did not see Hunter Biden abusing drugs or alcohol for most of the month of October.

Prosecutors said that they will rest their case on Friday and that they have two more witnesses – a DEA drug specialist and an FBI chemist. Meanwhile, the defense counsel said they would call two or three witnesses and would likely rest their case by the end of the day on Monday. The trial comes on the heels of Trump’s own criminal trial, the conclusion of which found the former president guilty of 34 felonies, making him the first president in US history to be criminally convicted. Hours before leaving office, Trump himself pardoned 70 people and commuted the sentences of 73 others. Of the 143 people he excused, his former chief strategist Steve Bannon and his former top fundraiser Elliott Broidy, were on the list. Others he pardoned included those committed of fraud schemes, the illegal use of a disadvantage business enterprise to receive government-funded construction contracts, a Google engineer sentenced for stealing a trade secret, bank fraud over the 2009 collapse of a mortgage company, and the ex-husband of a Fox News host.

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51 former spooks (+ Blinken) to prosecute… for election interference..

Media Shrugs as Biden Laptop is Authenticated in Federal Court (Turley)

Watching the coverage this week out of Delaware was like finding oneself in a parallel universe. There were ABC, NBC, CBS, the Washington Post and other news outlets reporting matter-of-factly that the Hunter Biden laptop showed no evidence of tampering and was both real and authentic. These are the same outlets, and some of the same reporters, who eagerly spread the false claims that the laptop was “Russian disinformation.” Yet, what followed the testimony of FBI agent Erika Jensen was absolute crickets. There was no effort to track down the signatories of the now-debunked letter from former intelligence officials just before the election. In the letter, figures such as Leon Panetta, former CIA director in the Obama administration, claimed that the laptop had all the markings of a Russian disinformation effort by intelligence services. (Panetta continued to make the assertion even in late 2023 in pushing what the federal government is now calling a “conspiracy theory.”)

There was no attempt by the media to confront associates of the Biden campaign (including now Secretary of State Antony Blinken) who pushed a long effort to get former intelligence officials to sign a letter. There was no attempt to question President Joe Biden, who made this false claim in the presidential election to deflect any questions about the evidence of corrupt influence peddling on the laptop. Years ago, I wrote that the Biden campaign had pulled off the single greatest political trick in history. As I wrote back then, the key to this Houdini-esque trick was to get the media to invest in the deception like audience members called to the stage.Houdini used to make his elephant Jennifer disappear on stage every night because he knew that the audience wanted her to disappear. They were part of the act. The Bidens made the media part of the act, and these reporters have to back the illusion or admit that they were part of the deception.

They are all laptop deniers, but they know that there are few who will call them to account for their conspiracy theory. Rather, it is social media where readers can see videos of leading media claiming that the laptop is the work of Russian intelligence. In 2020, CBS News’ Lesley Stahl literally laughed mockingly at then-President Donald Trump when he raised the Hunter Biden laptop and what it revealed about the Bidens. Figures like former Chief of Staff at the CIA and Department of Defense Jeremy Bash, who told MSNBC that the laptop “looked like Russian intelligence” and “walked like Russian intelligence.” He dismissed the relevance of the laptop before the election by declaring that “this effort by Rudy Giuliani and the New York Post and Steve Bannon to cook up supposed dirt on Joe Biden looks like a classic, Russian playbook disinformation campaign.”

Bash added that it made Trump an effective agent of Russian intelligence since he kept referencing the laptop: “[when] Rudy Giuliani suddenly comes forward with these mysteriously created emails, probably hacked through a Russian intelligence operation, we have to acknowledge the fact that the President of the United States is supporting, is condoning, is welcoming a Russian intelligence operation in 2020. … This is collusion in plain sight.” Bash, like others behind the conspiracy theory, was later given an intelligence position by Biden.

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“.. there are facilities that the entire US Congress and their families will be safe with, if we get to a nuclear stage. But they don’t care about the actual people. They don’t care about their own people..”

Retired US Army Officer: West Pushing World to Brink of Nuclear War (Sp.)

Russian President Vladimir Putin held a meeting with foreign journalists on June 5 within the framework of the 27th annual St. Petersburg International Economic Forum (SPIEF). Addressing the Ukraine conflict the Russian president noted that Western weapon deliveries to the Kiev regime, coupled with the approval to hit targets deep inside Russia, is fraught with severe escalation risks. “How do you respond to this use of weapons and allowing them to attack and basically violate the sovereignty of Russia itself?” Earl Rasmussen, a retired US Army lieutenant colonel and international consultant told Sputnik. “If we look at these attacks, they’re not targeting military targets, or they’re targeting strategic targets. They’re targeting civilians, many of them, or strategic targets as well. It’s essentially, basically authorizing and supporting terrorism.”

Russia is aware of the fact that while Ukrainian military personnel can participate in the selection of targets for long-range NATO-grade missiles, decisions to strike are made by those who supply the weapons, the president emphasized. Putin made it clear that Russia will respond and consider various options to do this. To illustrate his point, the president suggested delivering weapons to third countries confronting NATO member states involved in the Ukraine conflict. “Why do we not have the right to supply our weapons of the same class to those regions of the world where attacks on sensitive facilities will be carried out… The answer may be asymmetric. We will think about it,” Putin remarked. For his part, Rasmussen said that, “He could be looking at something that’s not the typical type of response, but much broader, perhaps looking at other areas of the world, perhaps looking at where weapons are originating from, or where advisers or intelligence information is gathered to provide for firing. Perhaps we’re looking at Western efforts in the Middle East or in Asia.”

While Russia pursues a policy of no first use (NFU) of nukes, Putin did not rule out using all means available to Russia if the country’s sovereignty and territorial integrity are threatened in accordance with its nuclear doctrine. “Russia, and to another extent China as well, has been very patient,” Rasmussen highlighted. “They have been measured in their responses to different situations. (…) We need to have a grasp, and President Putin has shown a much more understanding and grasp of where we are in this situation. He went on to say that, unfortunately, Western leaders continue to move up the escalation ladder being completely detached from reality. “[Western leaders] really would not accept failure. It’s scary. They’re moving the world to the precipice, to the cliff. And they would rather destroy the world, I think. It’s astonishing that we’ve somehow come to the point with leaders that have very little vision,” Rasmussen said.

“Sometimes I think that they have their nuclear-hardened bunkers for senior decision makers. I mean, there are facilities that the entire US Congress and their families will be safe with, if we get to a nuclear stage. But they don’t care about the actual people. They don’t care about their own people,” Rasmussen said. The expert lamented the fact that the Western establishment is trying to silence voices in the US and Europe which are warning against raising stakes in Ukraine and bringing the ongoing proxy war with Russia to a direct confrontation. Rasmussen particularly referred to the US authorities’ decision to seize the passport of former Marine Corps intelligence officer Scott Ritter to prevent him from traveling to Russia. Given all of the above, it’s hardly surprising that Western elites are eager to fight for the last Ukrainian in its proxy war against Russia, the expert remarked. During the meeting with foreign journalists, Putin drew attention to the US behind-the-scenes efforts to force the Kiev regime to lower the draft age to 18 in order to replenish its huge losses on the battleground.

According to Putin, the Ukrainian Army loses about 50,000 soldiers a month, with sanitary losses accounting for only 50% of them. “I said 50,000, but this is the most modest estimate. These are 50,000, this is what we see on the battlefield,” the president said, adding that Russia’s losses are several times less with an approximate one-to-five ratio. “The unacceptance of the Western leaders to recognize this clearly shows they do not care or have any ambitions or any desire to support Ukraine itself,” the military expert said. “Their entire desire is to try to weaken Russia. And it has been a complete failure. Yet politically they don’t want to accept that.” “It’s almost as if Western leaders are living in a parallel universe and they couldn’t care less. They do not care about the Ukrainian people whatsoever. They don’t care about Ukraine as a country. They do not care. They’re purely using it as a tool and it has not been working. The Ukraine project is a failure and the current leadership will not accept it,” Rasmussen concluded.

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“Anyone who goes against US national security goals, including the escalation of tensions with Russia, is “deemed an enemy of the state – literally..”

US Won’t Tolerate Dissent On Russia Narrative – Scott Ritter (RT)

Western governments need the people to perceive Russia as a threat, so they target anyone who tries to show the reality of the country, American political commentator Scott Ritter said at a St. Petersburg International Economic Forum (SPIEF) panel on Friday. Ritter was invited to take part in an RT-hosted panel discussion on Western efforts to vilify Russia. He was not able to do so in person because his passport was seized by the US authorities just as he was boarding a plane, so he joined the event remotely via video link. The former US Marine and UN weapons inspector in Saddam Hussein’s Iraq became a vocal critic of Washington’s foreign policy in the run-up to the 2003 invasion of the Middle Eastern country.

Anyone who goes against US national security goals, including the escalation of tensions with Russia, is “deemed an enemy of the state – literally,” he told the audience. ”It comes down to perception vs. reality, and perception is going to win if you are not able to put an alternative point of view out there. It’s a constant struggle.” The US and its allies need Russia as an enemy, since they are consolidating resources on the pretext of countering a threat, Ritter, who is an RT contributor, explained. Apart from Ritter, the event gathered several high-profile speakers, including Tara Reade – a former aide to Joe Biden – former Austrian Foreign Minister Karin Kneissl, and the great nephew of Otto von Bismarck, Alexander von Bismarck.

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The Dems are all about #MeToo, but they force Tara Reade to flee the country.

“I don’t think the US wants their citizens to know how good it is because the Russian state provides education, medical care, and housing in a way that America does not..”

Tara Reade: If Biden is Reelected, ‘We’re Looking at World War III’ (Sp.)

If Biden is reelected for another four years, “we’re looking at World War III,” Tara Reade, a writer, and former assistant in Joe Biden’s Senate office, told Sputnik. “There’s no question, that’s where we’re at right now,” she said on the sidelines of the 27th St. Petersburg International Economic Forum (SPIEF). “So the administration is very hawkish, the people around him and behind him. His leadership is feeble at best. I don’t even know if he’ll last that long, much less through the campaign. So no, I don’t think America economically and existentially can survive Joe Biden and his administration,” Reade said. Tara Reade, a former staffer in Biden’s US Senate office, spoke out about allegedly being sexually assaulted by the current president in 1993 after several women reported Biden’s unwelcomed “touching.” She was also spurred on by the #MeToo movement.

However, after telling her story in 2019 about then-candidate Joe Biden, she found herself branded “a Russian asset.” The Biden administration has vehemently denied her claims.Reade currently lives in Russia, where she has continued writing, and hosts a podcast. She claims she was forced to move to Russia because the FBI was harassing her, noting that they issued sealed subpoenas against her social media accounts. Weighing in on her impressions of life in Russia under sanctions, she extolled the thriving economy of the country, and how safe she felt living here. “Russia is so safe. It’s safer than the United States actually. You have a much lower crime rate. And I have been here a year and I can’t tell you how much I love it,” said Reade.

The former Senate staffer lauded everything from the culture to the food and the efficiency of the transportation. She added that her travels had taken her outside Moscow, and everywhere across the country she witnessed, “a lot of development and building because …Russians have a thriving middle class and working class.” “I don’t think the US wants their citizens to know how good it is because the Russian state provides education, medical care, and housing in a way that America does not. So we have 700,000 homeless right in comparison to Russia where there is virtually no homeless.” People in Russia enjoy “a better standard of living because the economy is really thriving,” said Reade, pointing to the 5.7% growth rate of one of the world’s largest economies. “That’s a thriving economy. That’s a sign that things are going the right direction,” underscored Tara Reade.

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“You cannot have 1% of the world that stands on the neck of the 99% of the world and expect that to continue..”

US Faces ‘Economic Degradation And Misery’ Due To Foreign Policy – Hinkle (RT)

Washington is wasting money on foreign policy blunders like Ukraine, instead of improving the lives of American people, US journalist Jackson Hinkle has said.The political commentator was one of the guests for a discussion panel on US information warfare against Russia, which RT hosted on Friday as part of the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum (SPIEF). He lampooned the administration of US President Joe Biden for trying to justify continued military assistance to Ukraine by highlighting its intention to spend the money at home to ramp up military production. Biden and other senior officials have repeatedly used this narrative when a White House appropriation request stalls in Congress due to Republican opposition.

It was a “pragmatic” decision to tell the Americans that “the money is actually going to Raytheon and Lockheed Martin, which are, of course, historic friends of the American people, right?” Hinkle joked. People in the US would rather see the funds spent “to fix our roads, our infrastructure, the trains that are blowing up, the planes that are cruising,” he added. But there are also indirect consequences, since the US is antagonizing the rest of the world with its foreign policy, Hinkle warned. As Washington loses its clout, Americans face “economic degradation and misery,” he said, adding that America’s claim to global hegemony is leading it towards disaster. “Unipolarity cannot exist. You cannot have 1% of the world that stands on the neck of the 99% of the world and expect that to continue,” he said.

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“[Otto] used to say: if Russia and Germany go together and be friends together, then Europe will be well,” he stated.”

Most Germans Disagree With Berlin On Russia Policy – Bismarck Descendant (RT)

The Western mainstream media is distorting reality regarding Russia and doesn’t reflect what people really think of the country and its actions, German politician Alexander von Bismarck, great nephew of his nation’s first chancellor, Otto von Bismarck, has claimed. Speaking during an RT panel discussion titled ‘The Empire of Evil: Has the West Successfully Demonized Russia?’ at the 2024 St. Petersburg International Economic Forum (SPIEF) on Friday, the politician argued that the media toeing the line drawn by Western governments regarding Russia and the Ukraine conflict. Berlin and its Western partners sided with Kiev when the conflict began in 2022, and has been instrumental in supporting Ukraine’s military effort with financial aid and sanctions against Moscow. Bismarck, however, said ordinary Germans are not fooled by the anti-Russian narrative.

“[The view of] the German political elite on Russia is very different to the rest of Germany. 80% don’t believe what our government does and says… The mainstream media want to push the people, they want to give another picture, but most young people look not at the mainstream – they look at the social media and […] the thinking of the young people is other than the political elite,” he stressed. Bismarck also stated that the policy of painting Russia in an unfavorable light dates back to the days of the Cold War, when the US wanted to promote the idea of “the crazy Russian people” in West Germany. The general opinion of those living in East Germany always focused on separating people from politics when forming opinions on Russia and Russians, he added. The politician signaled that his renowned ancestor, who at one point served as an envoy to Russia, would not have approved of the current state of relations between Moscow and Berlin.

“[Otto] used to say: if Russia and Germany go together and be friends together, then Europe will be well,” he stated. He added that he has faith in the younger generation, which has an opportunity to communicate globally through social media and form opinions without the influence of political agendas, to change Berlin’s policies. Otherwise, Bismarck warned, Germany may find itself “the biggest loser” in the Ukraine conflict by continuing to act on orders from Washington. “The younger generation… they look to many countries and say: yes, America does bad things, they only think about themselves for money, and Europe pays for this conflict, and Germany is the biggest loser in the whole of Europe,” he stated.

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Victor Davis Hanson sees just the little parts, but not the connection.

The Myth That Biden Had Nothing To Do with the Prosecutions of Trump (VDH)

Given Politico was publicly reporting six months ago about Biden’s anger at the pace of his DOJ’s prosecution of Trump, does anyone believe his special counsel, Jack Smith, was not aware of such presidential displeasure and pressure? Note Smith had petitioned and was denied an unusual request to the court to speed up the course of his Trump indictment. And why would Biden’s own Attorney General, Garland, select such an obvious partisan as Smith? Remember, in his last tenure as special counsel, Smith had previously gone after popular Republican and conservative Virginia governor Bob MacDonald. Yet Smith’s politicized persecution of the innocent [MacDonald] was reversed by a unanimous verdict of the U.S. Supreme Court. That rare court unanimity normally should have raised a red flag to the Biden DOJ about both Smith’s partiality and his incompetence. But then again, Smith’s wife had donated to the 2020 Biden campaign fund. And she was previously known for producing a hagiographic 2020 documentary (“Becoming”) about Michelle Obama.

Selecting a special counsel with a successful record of prior nonpartisan convictions was clearly not why the DOJ appointed Smith. The White House’s involvement is not limited to the Smith federal indictments. Fulton County district attorney Fani Willis’s paramour and erstwhile lead prosecutor in her indictment of Trump, Nathan Wade, met twice with the White House counsel’s office. On one occasion, Wade met inside the Biden White House. Subpoenaed records reveal that the brazen Wade actually billed the federal government for his time spent with the White House counsel’s staff — although so far no one has disclosed under oath the nature of such meetings. Of the tens of thousands of local prosecutions each year, in how many instances does a county prosecutor consult with the White House counsel’s office — and then bill it for his knowledge? Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s just-completed felony convictions of Trump were spearheaded by former prominent federal prosecutor Matthew Colangelo.

He is not just a well-known Democratic partisan who served as a political consultant to the Democratic National Committee. Colangelo had also just left his prior position in the Biden Justice Department — reputedly as Garland’s third-ranking prosecutor — to join the local Bragg team. Again, among all the multitudes of annual municipal indictments nationwide, how many local prosecutors manage to enlist one of the nation’s three top federal attorneys to head their case? So, apparently, it was not enough for the shameless Bragg to campaign flagrantly on promises to go after Trump. In addition, Bragg brashly drafted a top Democratic operative and political appointee from inside Joe Biden’s DOJ to head his prosecution. Not surprisingly, it took only a few hours after the Colangelo-Bragg conviction of Trump for Biden on spec to start blasting his rival as a “convicted felon.” Biden is delighted that his own former prosecutor, a left-wing judge, and a Manhattan jury may well keep Trump off the campaign trail.

So, it is past time for the media and Democrats to drop this ridiculous ruse of Biden’s White House “neutrality.” Instead, they should admit that they are terrified of the will of the people in November and so are conniving to silence them.

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“More than twenty states have “motor-voter laws” that automatically register anybody with a driver’s license. And these enrollees don’t even have to cast their ballot..”

Time to Jettison the Animals (Kunstler)

The most astounding part of America’s “Joe Biden” three-plus-years thrill ride is that the Party of Chaos and Hoaxes was able to pretend until just a few days ago that this political phantasm could run for re-election. Now, regime insiders are forced to confess that they can’t hide it anymore. They spilled the beans as “unnamed sources” this week in a huge Wall Street Journal article. The president is going necrotic in full view of the whole world. His mind is gone. He looks ridiculous when he shuffles in front of the cameras. He utters obvious absurdities and lies. His wife has to lead him around like a dog on a leash. Everyone can see it. He’s got to go. ASAP.

The embarrassing ineptitude has been on view since the 2020 campaign, yet his handlers managed to flimflam half the country ever since, thanks to a news media captured by intel blob gaslighters and to half the country’s susceptibility to mass formation psychosis — fear driven thought disorder — that gave cover to treasonous actors seeking to save their asses even if they had to wreck the USA doing it. Who were these actors? The Clintons and the coterie around them, steeped in financial crime and sex trafficking; the Obama coterie of anti-white racists and bungling Marxists; the batshit-crazy Woke race-and-gender hustlers working to derange the merit-based social order (and get paid for doing it); the congressional grifters living off Pharma and Pentagon loot; the agency top bureaucrats who became a corrupt praetorian guard for all the above players, now desperate to evade accountability.

Everything they’ve done since 2020 has been in the service of covering up their crimes, and each hoax has just compounded the damage done to our country. The Covid-19 prank was pulled to enable mail-in ballot fraud so as to assure a permanent government-by-blob, of which the Democratic Party is now a mere tentacle. We don’t know yet whether the mRNA vaccine module of the prank was a deliberate effort to kill a lot of people or a grievous blunder by greedy drug-makers, or some wicked combo — with assistance from the WEF or China.

They can’t afford to lose their grip on the levers of power in the 2024 election — lose control of the Justice Department, the FBI, and the so-called “national security” apparatus, especially. The open border is just an effort to illegally import and enlist a vast wad of potential new voters to ensure an election victory. More than twenty states have “motor-voter laws” that automatically register anybody with a driver’s license. And these enrollees don’t even have to cast their ballot. Their names can just be “harvested” systematically, attached to voting documents, and bundled to be submitted for them. Millions have entered the country illegally since 2021 at “Joe Biden’s” direct invitation. There’s nothing hidden about this — but all you see is the learned helplessness of actual US citizens unable to stop it.

And yet, even that prank may not work to keep the Party of Chaos and Hoaxes in power. Designated candidate “Joe Biden” is obviously so far gone that even actual citizen voters under the mass formation spell can’t be counted on anymore. His poll numbers look abysmal. He’s scheduled to debate his opponent, the outlaw Donald Trump, on June 27. If his handlers allow that to actually happen, it will be like the unmasking scene in The Phantom of the Opera: brain-ringing horror, from sea to shining sea! Of course, an insult to the zeitgeist that severe will force the party leaders into some ‘splainin’, and I personally doubt they will be able to ‘splain their way out of it. Did all of you Democrats not notice?

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“On a very personal level, these are torturous discussions with their family members about whether or not they have to leave the country to avoid being unconstitutionally and illegally detained..”

FBI Agents Fear Being Jailed By Trump – McCabe (RT)

Former US intelligence and law enforcement officials are fretting that they may face retribution, including incarceration, if Donald Trump wins back the presidency in November, an ex-deputy director of the FBI has claimed. Andrew McCabe, who was fired by the Trump administration in 2018 for lying to investigators about a media leak, revealed his fears in a CNN segment on Thursday. Now working as an analyst for the media outlet, he called the prospect of a potential Trump victory in the presidential election “terrifying” and “frightening.” “If he feels like he’s been wronged in some way, then he focuses on revenge and vengeance,” McCabe said. “And so, he’s made it perfectly clear that that’s what he’s going to do.” McCabe did not spell out what he and other Washington officials had done to make themselves enemies of the former president, but some of their clashes with Trump are well known.

Trump has accused the US Department of Justice (DOJ) of trying to help block his return to the White House by filing bogus criminal charges against him. Just last month, Trump said FBI agents were “locked and loaded” to potentially shoot him when they raided his home for classified documents in 2022. The FBI improperly spied on a Trump campaign staffer in 2016 and lied to the US FISA court to obtain warrants in a probe of alleged Russian interference in that year’s election. The agency also covered up its knowledge that the ‘Russiagate’ conspiracy narrative was false. A high-level FBI agent and his mistress, an FBI lawyer, discussed the use of the Russia investigation as an “insurance policy” to ensure that Trump did not win the election. Trump suggested in 2019 that McCabe and other FBI leaders had committed treason. More than 50 former intelligence agency officials put their thumbs on the scale in the 2020 election when Trump was running against Joe Biden.

They falsely claimed that a Biden influence-peddling scandal – reported by the New York Post just weeks before the election – appeared to stem from “Russian disinformation.” McCabe said he has spoken to many former intelligence and law enforcement colleagues who are trying to assess the risks they would face in a second Trump presidential term. “On a very personal level, these are torturous discussions with their family members about whether or not they have to leave the country to avoid being unconstitutionally and illegally detained. I mean, people are actually worried about being thrown in jail or grabbed in some sort of extrajudicial detention.” Trump runs the risk of “dismantling and gravely incapacitating” the DOJ and the FBI, McCabe argued. “That is something that Americans on both sides of the political aisle should be worried about. We depend on those institutions to protect us, and he is proposing to tear them down.”

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“She must be turned out of office. But for this salutary change to happen, the rightist parties must achieve big results on June 9th.”

Hmm. I’d say if she plays her cards, she’ll become the elected head.

Power Play: Von der Leyen Faces Showdown in EU Leadership Race (Sp.)

With the European Parliament (MEPs) elections taking place on June 6-9, the chances of the European Commission’s head Ursula von der Leyen keeping her job are slimming. Rising non-systemic right-wing mobilization may boost Eurosceptic MEPs, challenging von der Leyen’s pro-American stance. Loss of support in the European Council adds to her woes. On the eve of the Euroelections, Politico has published a story headlined “Charles Michel Plots A Revenge Against Ursula Von Der Leyen.” The story attracted a lot of attention, since the position of the European Commission’s president is crucial. The president heads the whole executive branch of power inside the EU. But that is not all: only the commission and its head can present draft laws for the vote in the European Parliament, which gave von der Leyen (VDL) some legislative leverage, too.

During her mandate, VDL made several controversial steps, which make her, too, a divisive candidate. These steps included:
• Invitation of embattled and impoverished Ukraine to the EU and a promise of speedy membership amid the protests in Poland and Rumania against cheap Ukrainian exports;
• Non-collegial way of running EU policy, with even the EU’s foreign policy chief Josep Borrell telling El País* that “she should not take personal credit for all the successes of the European Commission”;
• active lobbying of greater involvement of the EU in anti-Russian sanctions and of EU member countries in military aid to Ukraine, which led to protests from Hungary and the non-systemic right wing in France and Germany.

No wonder that news about von der Leyen having a powerful enemy in the person of Michel, the head of the European Council, attracted attention. Gilbert Doctorow an international relations and Russian affairs analyst accused VDL of “usurping” power. “The biggest usurper is, of course, the Commission’s president Ursula von der Leyen who has taken into her hands all manner of decision-making which under her predecessors was left to the [European] Council, meaning the heads of state acting together, or to individual EU member states,” he told Sputnik. “She must be turned out of office. But for this salutary change to happen, the rightist parties must achieve big results on June 9th.”

Several European media outlets have recalled that VDL became the president of the European Commission in 2019 in an undemocratic way, with Michel’s European Council involved. As Germany’s Der Spiegel reported, von der Leyen did not win an honest vote in the newly elected European Parliament with many candidates running. Instead, her candidacy was “handpicked at a confidential meeting” of the European Council. An unelected institution, the European Council is a body that unites presidents and prime ministers of the EU’s member countries. This time, von der Leyen, most likely, will have to go through a real election through the European Parliament, without the European Council throwing its weight behind her candidacy. So, relying on its own calculations, Politico concludes in another headline, “Von der Leyen needs 361 votes to keep her job.” But this is a tricky challenge.

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“..if Budapest’s troops were to do so, they would be commanded by officers appointed by the US-led military bloc. “If this happens, then we have lost a very important part of our sovereignty..”

EU Is In ‘War Psychosis’ – Orban (RT)

The EU has plunged into “war psychosis” in the Ukraine conflict, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has said, arguing that this mindset will almost certainly lead to the deployment of Western troops in the country. In an interview with Radio Kossuth on Friday, Orban said the West was “approaching the end of its possibilities” for the conflict between Moscow and Kiev to be ended, adding that “whoever claims that there is no immediate danger of war is deceiving people.” “Only a blind person does not see that there is a war psychosis in Europe, the logical conclusion of which will be the arrival of the military units of the Western European countries on the territory of Ukraine, at best not on the front line,” the prime minister said.

Orban said that, despite tensions reaching boiling point, “hope dies last” and the ongoing European Parliament election could defuse the crisis to a certain extent. According to the Hungarian leader, if the conflict does not spill beyond the Russian-Ukrainian front in the coming weeks, “as early as November if [US presidential candidate] Donald Trump returns, and with a good European election behind us, we can make a pan-Western, transatlantic peace coalition” to cease hostilities. Orban insisted that Hungary must refrain from taking part in any possible NATO mission in Ukraine, noting that if Budapest’s troops were to do so, they would be commanded by officers appointed by the US-led military bloc.

“If this happens, then we have lost a very important part of our sovereignty,” he said, adding that Hungary was already paying an economic price for the conflict. Budapest has consistently slammed the Western approach to the Ukraine conflict, warning that it could result in an escalation and direct NATO-Russia clash. The EU country has also opposed arms shipments to Kiev and called for immediate ceasefire talks. It has also pushed back against remarks by French President Emmanuel Macron, who had suggested that the West should not rule out the option of sending troops to Ukraine, warning that such a move could trigger World War III.

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It’s like it is all on purpose. How many blunders is credible?

Bob Iger, DEI, and Wokism Broke Disney’s Trust with America (AmG)

On May 7, 2024, in the wake of its successful battle to keep activist investor Nelson Peltz off its Board of Directors back in April (after which Peltz liquidated his Disney holdings, walking away with more than $1 billion), Disney CEO Bob Iger held Disney’s quarterly earnings call, during which its stock tanked almost 10%, losing $20 billion in its market cap. While it has recovered a bit, to $105 a share, it’s well below its 52-week high, $123.72, and off its all-time highest closing price of $201.91 on March 8, 2021. Those investors who abandoned Peltz in his proxy battle for two seats on the Disney Board of Directors can now lick their financial wounds. There is speculation in the financial community that if Disney stock again falls below $90 a share, Peltz could mount a third bid for two or more seats on the Disney board or possibly oust Iger.

It’s hilarious to watch the New York Times put its spin on the battle, saying Peltz lost his battle with Iger. Actually, Peltz and his Trian Partners investment group walked away with $1 billion. Yes, Peltz lost the battle, but he won the war. Despite the current dip, many stock analysts are predicting that Disney stock will rebound. That seems unlikely. Here are the reasons why things are likely to get worse, not better, for The Walt Disney Company for the remainder of 2024 and into 2025. Disney is one of America’s wokest companies. It sees itself as being out in front on cultural and social issues, especially where Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion are concerned. This has been a huge issue in America’s—especially American parents’—loss of trust in the House of Mouse. You can’t watch this clip from Disney programming Vice President Latoya Raveneau bragging about how she pushed LGBTQ messages anywhere she could into Disney’s programming without parents seeing that agenda.

Because of this agenda, Disney parks, Disney feature films, Disney animation, and especially the Disney Channel have lost trust with many parents. Disney has lost its decades-long leadership in animation to NBCUniversal’s Dreamworks Animation studio. Its slate of feature films—with their bloated $250,000,000 production budgets requiring a $500,000,000 theatrical run to just break even—has been an unmitigated disaster. Along the way, it has destroyed two of the successful film franchises it acquired during Iger’s first term as CEO: Star Wars and Indiana Jones. And its long-delayed live-action remake of its own 1937 Snow White classic animated film is mired in its own disaster, mostly due to woke comments from its star, Rachel Ziegler. It was moved back a year from a March 2024 release to 2025. But could its theatrical release be scrapped entirely and go directly to the Disney+ streaming service?

Related to its film franchises, which also include Marvel and Pixar (which just laid off 175 employees), was the company’s $250,000,000 misadventure, Star Wars: Galactic Starcruiser, a $6,000 two-night Star Wars-themed hotel experience that opened on March 1, 2022, and closed on September 30, 2023. It was forced to take a charge against earnings for this catastrophe. This disaster was documented in a four-hour viral video by YouTuber Jenny Nicholson that has received an incredible seven million views in a little more than two weeks. (That was 10 times the number of views CNN’s coverage of the debacle received.)

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Marathon

 

 

Dogbed

 

 

Argue
https://twitter.com/i/status/1798616700549759035

 

 

Maravilloso

 

 

Productive
https://twitter.com/i/status/1798683288539697184

 

 

Car washer

 

 

 

 

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

 

 

 

 

 

Jun 062024
 


Paul Gauguin We hail thee Mary 1891

 

RNC Backup Plans for Presidential Nomination If Trump Is In Prison (ET)
X Urges Supreme Court for Review After Jack Smith Obtained Trump Files (ET)
J6 Committee Delayed Secret Service Driver From Refuting Limo Story (Turley)
Poll: Plurality of Americans Believe Trump Trial was Politically Motivated (AmG)
“Biden Allies Freak After WSJ Blasts “Slipping” Brain (ZH)
Is Hunter Biden Pursuing a Jury Nullification Strategy? (Turley)
Scott Ritter on Reason Behind Move to Stop Him From Traveling to Russia (Sp.)
NATO Would Stand No Chance’ Against Russia-China Military Alliance (Sp.)
The West Is Already At War With Russia But Its Leaders Can’t Wake Up (Jay)
Ukraine To Recruit Deserters – Media (RT)
Ukraine No Longer Allowing Dual Citizens To Leave (RT)
Nobody in US Has Ukraine’s Interests At Heart – Putin (RT)
Austria’s Ex-FM Kneissl Says Europe ‘Lost Its Soul,’ Entered War Path (Sp.)
Americans Are an Abused People (Paul Craig Roberts)

 

 

 

 

Huckabee
https://twitter.com/i/status/1798530465214693854

 

 

Trump ad


https://twitter.com/i/status/1798402097773428890

 

 

Ron Paul
https://twitter.com/i/status/1798183178823197100

 

 

John Roberts
https://twitter.com/i/status/1798137403019768042

 

 

The greatest temptation is to settle for too little. – Thomas Merton

 

 

Trump Black Panthers

 

 

Putin on Trump case

 

 

Laptop

 

 

Laptop
https://twitter.com/i/status/1798383585683968496

 

 

 

 

 

 

The last paragraph is golden.

RNC Backup Plans for Presidential Nomination If Trump Is In Prison (ET)

With former President Donald Trump facing the possibility of being sentenced to prison just days before the Republican National Convention, GOP officials are formulating backup plans in case the former president isn’t able to receive the Republican Party’s presidential nomination in person. “We’ll be thinking about it, and we’re working on that right now,” Republican National Committee Chair Michael Whatley told Newsmax in an interview on June 4, when asked whether the Republican Party is preparing for the possibility that the former president can’t attend the convention because he’s behind bars. The convention, which will take place in Milwaukee from July 15 to July 18, is expected to draw thousands, but President Trump might not be one of them, given his recent felony conviction and the possibility that, on July 11, Justice Juan Merchan will sentence him to prison.

President Trump was recently found guilty of 34 counts of falsifying business records to hide nondisclosure payments, supposedly to prevent bad press and sway the 2016 election in his favor. He maintains his innocence and says he’s the victim of a vindictive political prosecution meant to derail his 2024 comeback bid. Justice Merchan could sentence President Trump to up to four years on each business records falsification count, with a maximum of 20 years. The former president said in a June 2 interview on Fox News that he could handle being jailed or imprisoned, while calling the people involved in his conviction “sick” and “evil.” The former president and his attorneys have vowed to appeal the conviction, with President Trump even calling on the U.S. Supreme Court to step in before the sentencing date and overturn the guilty verdict.

Although a former Manhattan district attorney predicted that President Trump would receive no prison time regardless of any appeals process, GOP officials say they’ll be ready to handle whatever scenario presents itself at the convention. “We expect that Donald Trump is going to be in Milwaukee and he’s going to be able to accept that nomination,” Mr. Whatley said. “And if not, we will make whatever contingency planning we need to make for it.” Although Mr. Whatley didn’t provide specifics about the contingency plans, he said the RNC will “certainly” have a plan in place to make sure President Trump receives the nomination no matter what. “We want to have a show that is going to roll out Donald Trump and his vision for America, which is going to set up this election cycle,” Mr. Whatley said while expressing confidence that President Trump will become the 47th president when the Election Day dust settles in November.

In response to Mr. Whatley’s preparing for the possibility of President Trump virtually addressing the Republican National Convention, Democratic National Committee Rapid Response Director Alex Floyd released the following statement: “Even before Donald Trump became a convicted felon, his inner circle was already staffed by a roster of convicts and fraudsters brought on board for their loyalty to Trump and his MAGA agenda over the rule of law. Now Trump’s hand-picked RNC chair is openly floating Trump calling into the convention from a jail cell because the Republican Party has become completely beholden to a criminal who is willing to undermine our justice system and our democracy to pursue his agenda of revenge and retribution.”

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“..disclosing the warrant would result in “destruction of or tampering with evidence, intimidation of potential witnesses, and serious jeopardy to the investigation,” and let President Trump “flee from prosecution.”

X Urges Supreme Court for Review After Jack Smith Obtained Trump Files (ET)

Elon Musk’s X Corp. has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to consider stepping in against a process that lets officials obtain information from social media companies and bars the companies from informing people whose information is handed over. The process wrongly enables officials to “access and review potentially privileged materials without any opportunity for the user to assert privileges—including constitutional privileges,” lawyers for X said in a filing to the nation’s top court. Unsealed documents in 2023 showed that X provided data and records from former President Donald Trump’s Twitter account to special counsel Jack Smith after Mr. Smith obtained a search warrant. X was blocked from informing President Trump by a nondisclosure order that Mr. Smith also obtained. The order said disclosing the warrant would result in “destruction of or tampering with evidence, intimidation of potential witnesses, and serious jeopardy to the investigation,” and let President Trump “flee from prosecution.”

X challenged the order, arguing it violated its First Amendment rights and noting that President Trump might have reason to claim executive privilege, or presidential privilege. The company wanted to alert the former president so he could assert the privilege, but U.S. District Judge Beryl Howell ruled against it, claiming during a hearing that the only reason X was issuing the challenge was “because the CEO wants to cozy up with the former president.” A panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia upheld the ruling from Judge Howell, an appointee of former President Barack Obama. “The government proffered two compelling interests that supported nondisclosure of the search warrant: preserving the integrity and maintaining the secrecy of its ongoing criminal investigation of the events surrounding January 6, 2021,” U.S. Circuit Judge Florence Pan wrote. She was joined by Circuit Judges Cornelia Pillard and Michelle Childs. Judge Pillard was appointed by President Obama; Judges Pan and Childs were appointed by President Joe Biden.

The full court denied a rehearing en banc, although four judges said “we should not have endorsed this gambit,” referring to the combination of a warrant and nondisclosure order. “Rather than follow established precedent, for the first time in American history, a court allowed access to presidential communications before any scrutiny of executive privilege,” Circuit Judge Neomi Rao wrote in a dissent. The appointee of President Trump was joined by Circuit Judges Gregory Katsas and Justin Walker, other President Trump appointees; and Judge Karen Henderson, an appointee of former President George H.W. Bush. The Supreme Court should take up the case because the majority’s opinion conflicts with Supreme Court precedent and rulings from other circuits, lawyers for X said in the new petition. “This court has long held that holders of executive privilege must have notice and an opportunity to assert privilege before confidentiality of the potentially privileged documents is breached. The decision below departs from that precedent.

Because former President Trump was not informed of the warrant before his records were produced, he could not timely assert executive privilege,” they wrote. Several circuit courts have issued contrasting decisions, which creates a split that needs resolved, X lawyers said. That included a ruling from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit that cleared a protocol for a warrant that involved giving people with attorney-client privilege “the first opportunity to identify potentially privileged materials” and did not let investigators access the materials until the parties or the court approved. Another circuit split exists in regard to the nondisclosure order, the lawyers said. In Freedman v. Maryland, the Supreme Court ruled that “any restraint prior to judicial review can be imposed only briefly in order to preserve the status quo.” While two circuit courts have found the ruling does not apply to nondisclosure orders, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit has found that some nondisclosure orders must adhere to the ruling. The conflict “warrants this court’s review,” X lawyers said.

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What a disgrace that committee is/was.

J6 Committee Delayed Secret Service Driver From Refuting Limo Story (Turley)

Just the News is reporting that the January 6th Committee rebuffed repeated efforts from a Secret Service agent to refute the false story related by Cassidy Hutchinson alleging a violent episode with Trump in the presidential limousine during the Capitol riots. The J6 Committee staff repeatedly delayed the testimony of the agent to disprove the widely reported allegation. Rep. Barry Loudermilk, the chairman of the House subcommittee that is investigating the Jan. 6 riot, has obtained a transcript of the driver’s interview that was conducted months after he first offered to testify. However, it turns out that committee staff were asked repeatedly by counsel for the agent to let him present evidence debunking the claim. Despite being reported by virtually every news outlet, the Committee slow walked his appearance as the story went viral.

The transcript of the driver’s testimony contains express objections by the lawyer that his client had offered to testify in July, August and September of 2022, but was “rebuffed” by the committee. The account reaffirms a major criticism of the committee. After Democrats refused to allow the GOP to pick its members (as a long-accepted practice in the House), the Democrats selected two anti-Trump Republicans who did little to push for a full and fair display of witnesses and facts. The Committee was chaired by Rep. Benny Thompson, a Democrat, with Rep. Liz Cheney, as Vice Chairwoman. Cheney and the committee members clearly knew that Hutchinson’s account was debunked by the very driver who allegedly struggled with Trump. Yet, they allowed the media to report the incident for months while rebuffing the requests of the driver. Loudermilk is quoted as saying “We’re talking about the driver of the limousine, and the head of the entire protective detail. They were brought in by the select committee to testify, but they weren’t brought in until November.

The false account was given by Hutchinson in June of that year. The Secret Service driver testified Trump never tried to reach for or grab the wheel of the SUV. Notably, the transcript shows Cheney trying to explain the delay as due to the need for the Secret Service to produce all documents in the January 6 investigation. Yet, she had no problem with making the false story public through Hutchinson before such supporting material was supplied. She also did not suggest any countervailing testimony or witnesses on the issue as the media ran with the account. Instead, Cheney publicly teased the claim that they had much more evidence of crimes against Trump, which never materialized. Cheney ended one hearing by calling for more officials to come forward and noting that Trump family members and former officials have now come forward with their own public “confessions.” Many of us support the effort to bring greater transparency to what occurred on Jan. 6th and these hearings have offered a great deal of important new information.

Indeed, it has proven gut-wrenching in the accounts of lawyers and staff trying to combat baseless theories and to protect the constitutional process. Yet, the heavy-handed approach to framing the evidence by the Committee was both unnecessary and at times counterproductive. The strength of some of this evidence would not have been diminished by a more balanced committee or investigation. We previously discussed the highly scripted and entirely one-sided presentation of evidence in the Committee. Indeed, witnesses were primarily used to present what Speaker Nancy Pelosi referred to as “the narrative” where their prior videotaped testimony was shown and they were given narrow follow-up questions. They at times seemed more like props than witnesses — called effectively to recite prior statements between well-crafted, impactful video clips. It had the feel of a news package, which may be the result of the decision to bring in a former ABC executive to produce the hearings.

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A mixed set of numbers.

Poll: Plurality of Americans Believe Trump Trial was Politically Motivated (AmG)

A new poll shows that a sizable plurality of the American people believe that the New York trial of former President Donald Trump was a politically-motivated show trial. As the Daily Caller reports, the ABC News/Ipsos poll shows that 47% of Americans believe the trial was indeed a political hit job, while 38% say that the trial was legitimate and fair. On the question of the “guilty” verdict, 50% of respondents believe the verdict was correct; by contrast, just 27% believe the verdict was wrong, while the remaining 23% said they “don’t know” what to believe with regards to the verdict. Among those who claimed to have followed the case closely, 55% say the verdict was correct while 35% say it was incorrect; another 8% said they “don’t know.”

After the verdict was announced, 49% of respondents said that Trump should end his campaign for re-election. Among partisan lines, just 16% of Republicans said Trump should drop out while 75% want him to continue his candidacy. Among Democrats, 79% want Trump to drop out now, while 52% of independents say the same thing. The same poll also showed that the trial and its outcome have had virtually no effect on Trump’s approval ratings, and may have even led to a slight increase. While the former president had a 29% favorability in March, his favorability currently sits at 31%. Biden’s favorability is at 32%, a slight decrease from 33% in March. The poll featured a sample size of 781 American adults, and was conducted from May 31st to June 1st. The margin of error is 3.7%.

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“I used to meet with him when he was vice president. I’d go to his house,” McCarthy said in an interview. “He’s not the same person.”

“Biden Allies Freak After WSJ Blasts “Slipping” Brain (ZH)

The Biden administration is scrambling for damage control over the president’s mental condition. Over the past month, the White House claimed executive privilege over an audio tape of Biden’s classified documents interview with Special Counsel Robert Hur, the transcripts of which were altered to make Biden seem more competent Next, TIME Magazine’s Massimo Calabresi couldn’t give a straight answer over Biden’s serious cognitive decline exhibited during an interview. Now, the White House and Biden allies are slamming a Tuesday report from the Wall Street Journal in which 45 people from both sides of the aisle told the outlet that Biden is, to put it mildly, two sandwiches short of a picnic. The Journal cites a January meeting behind closed doors during a critical discussion about Ukraine funding, Biden’s soft-spoken nursing home demeanor led some participants to question his engagement, as he occasionally read from notes and paused.

“You couldn’t be there and not feel uncomfortable,” one attendee noted about the meeting’s dynamics, adding “I’ll just say that.” In another example, Biden completely forgot the details of ‘his’ own policy on big energy projects during a one-on-one meeting with House Speaker Mike Johnson. Others who attended said Biden’s demeanor and level of engagement fluctuated and he seemed lively and engaged at some points. When the topic moved to an immigration overhaul, Johnson, the House speaker, offered Biden a list of dozens of executive actions he could undo to improve border security. Biden, rather than responding to Johnson’s suggestions, chided him, according to people at the meeting, “I’ve forgotten more about immigration than you’ll ever know.” -WSJ

Then, during debt ceiling negotiations with House Republicans, former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy and others noted that Biden’s demeanor and command of the details varied significantly from day to day. On some days, Biden was described as relying heavily on notes and mumbling, which could suggest inconsistency in cognitive performance. “I used to meet with him when he was vice president. I’d go to his house,” McCarthy said in an interview. “He’s not the same person.” -WSJ. The article also lays out public speaking errors, such as mixing up names of his Hispanic cabinet secretaries, mistakenly speaking about conversations with long-deceased leaders, and other factual errors. These instances contribute to the narrative of cognitive decline. In another section, the Journal reports that “The president moved so slowly around the Cabinet Room to greet the nearly two dozen congressional leaders that it took about 10 minutes for the meeting to begin, some people who attended recalled.”

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What are the odds of him being convicted in Delaware?

Is Hunter Biden Pursuing a Jury Nullification Strategy? (Turley)

There was an interesting development this week in the Hunter Biden gun trial: the fact that there will indeed be a Hunter Biden gun trial. That development is surprising only because there do not appear to be any facts in dispute in this case. And the primary witness against Hunter Biden will be Hunter Biden himself. The sole issue in this case is whether Biden filed a false gun form (ATF Form 4473) in which, as a condition for his purchase of a .38-caliber Colt Cobra revolver from the StarQuest Shooters and Survival Supply in Wilmington, Del., he stated that he was not a user of drugs. Biden’s counsel, Abbe Lowell, previously suggested that his client may have had a window of sobriety when he signed the form, but then returned to his addiction afterward. But then Hunter himself blew that theory away with his public comments and books. Lowell then suggested in court that someone else may have checked the box on the form.

In the interim, Lowell has brought a litany of challenges. At one point, he claimed that the government must fulfill a prior dead plea agreement. At another, he adopted an argument of the National Rifle Association challenging the underlying statute. The defense also failed this week to call a last-minute witness who would testify that Hunter may not have known that he was an addict. The defense was accused of essentially hiding the ball with the expert’s expected testimony so Judge Maryellen Noreika barred the appearance of the Columbia professor. Yet, again, Hunter Biden himself would have destroyed the defense. The form asks if Hunter was a user of drugs, not just an addict: “Are you an unlawful user of, or addicted to, marijuana or any depressant, stimulant, narcotic drug, or any other controlled substance?” Hunter wrote how he was a user of a wide array of drugs for years. It is hard to imagine he thought himself as clean as a clergyman in Wilmington in 2018.

So why wouldn’t Hunter just plead guilty? Even without his earlier plea deal, a guilty plea could significantly reinforce a request to avoid jail time in the case. It would also avoid an embarrassing trial for himself and his father during a presidential election. While Hunter could always throw in the towel before the start of testimony, there is currently no discernible strategy beyond hoping that a pending case in the Supreme Court might undermine the indictment. There may also be another possible strategy in play: jury nullification. Unlike Donald Trump in Manhattan, Delaware is Biden country. The chance that he will get strong supporters of his father on the jury is an almost statistical certainty. In 2020, Joe Biden received roughly 60 percent of the vote over Donald Trump in the state. Having first lady Jill Biden, who is extremely popular, at the trial will only reinforce the connection. In addition to a favorable jury pool, Biden may be hoping that testimony on his travails with drugs will prompt one or more jurors to ignore the law and vote to acquit.

Notably, virtually all of the selected jurors have said that they know of someone who has struggled with drugs. Indeed, Judge Noreika already appears to suspect such a strategy. Noreika rejected the effort of the defense to introduce an altered version of the federal firearms form created by the gun store employees. They argue that the alternation showed a political bias on the part of the prosecutors. The court found the document “irrelevant” and chastised the defense team for pursuing “conspiratorial” theories and an effort to confuse or mislead the jury. She noted that the use of the altered form would be “unduly prejudicial and invites (jury) nullification.” Jury nullification arguments have long been banned or discouraged in many courtrooms. Nevertheless, jury nullification has its advocates. For example, Georgetown Law Professor Paul Butler has called for Black jurors to refuse to convict Black defendants of drug crimes. Butler has said that “my goal is the subversion of the present criminal justice system.”

Hunter Biden is obviously not the primary concern of Professor Butler in the impact of drug prosecutions on the Black community. However, he has also argued that “jury nullification is just part of an arsenal of tools to end the failed “war on drugs.” Biden’s case has all of the characteristics of a nullification defense. Even if he cannot secure acquittal, the combination of political and social elements at play in Delaware could produce a hung jury. Trying a Biden in Delaware is a challenge for any prosecutor, even without the potential sympathies for a reformed drug addict. With the first lady sitting behind him, the family ties will be on full display. There is an understandable parental desire to show emotional support for Hunter, but prosecutors cannot be thrilled by the potential effect on jurors in the pro-Biden state.

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“They provided no explanation of what they were doing. They just did it..”

Scott Ritter on Reason Behind Move to Stop Him From Traveling to Russia (Sp.)

On June 3, the former Marine Corps intelligence officer and Sputnik contributor was removed by US Customs and Border Protection officers from a plane bound for Russia, where he was to attend the 2024 St. Petersburg International Economic Forum (SPIEF). The US Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) does not have the authority to seize passports without probable cause, former Marine Corps intelligence officer Scott Ritter told Sputnik, commenting on Monday’s incident. Ritter recalled that as he prepared to board the plane, he was pulled out of line by three armed CBP officers who took control of his passport. He said that when he asked them “on what authority,” they cited orders from the US Department of State. “They provided no warrant, no documentation, nor did they provide a receipt for my passport. They provided no explanation of what they were doing. They just did it,” the Sputnik contributor pointed out.

Ritter stressed that his constitutional rights under the Fourth Amendment were violated because the document requires CBP officers to provide a warrant or some other form of authority upon which to conduct the seizure of his passport. “Under the Fifth Amendment of the Constitution and others, I’m free to travel. The US government cannot restrict my travel without specific justification, none of which was articulated to me and none of which I believe exists. So it’s a violation of my Fifth Amendment,” the former Marine Corps intelligence officer added.] He suggested that “the real reason” behind all this “appears to be to prevent” him from participating in the SPIEF 2024 and to prevent the work he planned to do as a journalist with his documentary film crew. According to him, he was planning to make a documentary about “the reality of Russia”. “This is my First Amendment right under freedom of speech and a free press. And this right was likewise violated by the US government, by the Biden administration,” Ritter noted.

The Sputnik contributor recounted that he had traveled to Russia “two times in the last year using this same passport,” and that on each time, the US government was notified in advance of his intent to travel and of his itinerary.
In an apparent reference to his planned trip to Russia to attend SPIEF 2024, Ritter said he was “not off on a secret mission” and that the US government “knew full well” what he was up to. “And this is why I believe they acted in the way they did. This has a chilling effect, not just on me and the work I was doing, but on all Americans who choose to speak out against the policies of the United States that they disagree with and to travel abroad at the same time that they are criticizing the US government. And what the US government is saying is that we can control your movement. We can control your life. We can punish you for what you’ve been saying that we disagree with,” the former Marine Corps intelligence officer emphasized.

Nap Scott Ritter : On My Way to Russia I Met Big Brother.

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“The strategic alliance between Russia and China ain’t going to be about taking over countries, ain’t going to be about missile-producing or whatever. It’s going to be about ensuring justice and fairness on the global stage…”

NATO Would Stand No Chance’ Against Russia-China Military Alliance (Sp.)

The United States has historically worked to prevent an alliance between Russia and China, but the two global powers have joined together in an effort to guard themselves against Western aggression.One year before his death Henry Kissinger, a consequential – and highly controversial – former US Secretary of State, saw the writing on the wall. “The time is approaching to build on the strategic changes which have already been accomplished and to integrate them into a new structure towards achieving peace through negotiation,” said the top diplomat, urging an end to Ukraine’s Western-backed war against Russia. Kissinger made the comments in an article entitled “How to Avoid Another World War” in the British magazine The Spectator, noting that Russia’s “thousands of nuclear weapons” make it “one of the world’s two largest nuclear powers.”

With characteristic braggadocio, the veteran strategist’s remarks were slammed by the Ukrainian government and criticized by a fair number of Western liberals, by then fully convinced of the United States’ duty to once again safeguard freedom and democracy. The West’s apparent indifference towards the prospect of nuclear war and strategic incompetence in allowing Russia and China to join forces was criticized by former security analyst Dr. David Oualaalou, who discussed the latest developments in the Russo-Ukrainian conflict on Sputnik’s The Critical Hour program Tuesday. “Putin will not bluff on this, because this is what’s going to be expected of the Russians, the Russian people, from their leader to defend the country by any means, as we are pushing more and more,” said Oualaalou, noting that Moscow views the conflict as a matter of existential importance.

“The idea to me, the way I look at it, is [Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor] Orban does not want to have his country caught in the middle of this, being a member of NATO or not at this point,” he added, characterizing the European leader as a voice of sanity on the issue. “He’s talking to his lawyers, the officers – they are looking for ways on how to opt out of this kind of involvement with NATO. Frankly, if I may use the term here, it’s about time for Hungary to make a decision whether to leave NATO altogether.” Oualaalou noted that the increasing unpopularity of Western involvement in the ongoing proxy war is leading to a surge in popularity for the right-wing across Europe, with French politician Marine Le Pen rising in popularity while suggesting the country should leave NATO.

Kissinger, credited with setting the United States on a path towards global dominance in the 1970s, worked to ensure China and Russia remained divided during his time as US Secretary of State, pursuing an opening of relations with China to pull them closer to the US. But Western bellicosity has now functioned to create a strong partnership between the two countries, Oualaalou argued – forming an alliance that Western powers would not be able to overcome through military means. “The strategic alliance between Russia and China ain’t going to be about taking over countries, ain’t going to be about missile-producing or whatever. It’s going to be about ensuring justice and fairness on the global stage… [With] these two countries – Russia and China – joined by others, NATO would stand no chance. The US would stand no chance,” he claimed.

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“..the West cannot entertain any of these requests and has taken so much control of the media that its leaders are starting to believe their own BS..”

The West Is Already At War With Russia But Its Leaders Can’t Wake Up (Jay)

Is NATO planning something big in Ukraine? Are we on the cusp now of WWIII really breaking out since the U.S. has now backed the idea that Ukraine can fire missiles beyond its borders into Russia? The news that President Joe Biden has given the go-ahead for long-range missiles to be fired into Russia should be worrying for a number of reasons. The dangerous game of escalation that the West is playing will have a breaking point in the not too distant future. The question is whether the West really understands how Putin thinks as it is presently betting on no retaliation from Russia, which is not only erroneous but very, very dangerous. Recent missile strikes into Russian territory destroyed two radar installations which western press refuse to report.

The significance of this strike is important as the more Ukraine loses on the battlefield, the more desperate its tactics, egged on by western leaders who still think that their stake in the war is minimal. Although just recently Germany’s leader Scholz did a U-turn at a conference in Berlin with French President Macron — in backing the missile strikes into Russia plan — the truth is that officially NATO does not support the plan, which is why the UK is doing it independently using Storm Shadows operated by SAS soldiers. This has been going on for months and so in many respects the news that the U.S. has authorised the practice could be taken lightly. What’s new? Or, more to the point, is Ukraine going to use longer-range U.S. missiles to keep up with such strikes like the radar stations? Does it have enough missiles in stock is also an important question.

With this strategy in play, we are looking in all scenarios at the slow demise of NATO as the more that such strikes occur, the more it is evident that NATO is a defunct organisation and only really a talk shop at best. NATO members are divided on an overall strategy with Ukraine and so member states do their own thing. If we see more of these strikes, the pressure on Putin to react will be overwhelming but when that time comes, he will practice and eye-for-an-eye strategy and strike the equivalent military installations within Europe or at least Ukraine’s drones operating in the Black Sea. This will be a shock for the West. It will take some days for such a strike to be seen for what it is: a warning. The message will be the escalation game has its limits and you’ve gone over a line.

But are the recent reports of a new offensive in the planning from NATO genuine? Probably not. Just like the reports of Putin wanting to negotiate a peace deal now. Both fake news are part of a strategy of panic from the Biden administration which really needs some sort of victory in Ukraine to present to the American people. Yet all of the aces are with Putin and he doesn’t seem to be showing any signs of falling into these traps. Putin has been pretty consistent in how he sees any kind of peace deal. Denazification, demilitarisation and no deal on NATO membership. The reasons why peace talks are a mere figment of the imagination of western journalists who sink to new lows is that the West cannot entertain any of these requests and has taken so much control of the media that its leaders are starting to believe their own BS. The fourth requirement also of Putin’s is that he can’t negotiate peace with a leader in the Ukraine who no longer has legitimacy as a president. One wonders how long the West can continue to kick up a fuss about that one.

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Anyone who can fog a mirror…

Ukraine To Recruit Deserters – Media (RT)

Ukraine’s State Bureau of Investigation (SBI) has allowed the country’s Armed Forces to recruit deserters as the military continues to experience personnel shortages after suffering heavy casualties, RIA Novosti reported on Wednesday. The agency cited a letter sent by SBI Director Alexey Sukhachov to Ukraine’s commander-in-chief Aleksandr Syrsky. According to the document, up until now, how to deal with cases where servicemen who abandoned their units without permission or outright deserted have decided to voluntarily return to service had not been clearly defined to Ukrainian commanders. In his letter, Sukhachov reportedly asked Syrsky to “orient commanders of military units on the need to ensure the acceptance of the above-mentioned military personnel, who voluntarily returned to military units and expressed a desire to undergo further military service, to appoint them to positions and continue military service.”

Furthermore, RIA writes, the SBI chief asked that the service members who decide to return also be provided the right to monetary compensation. Sukhachov’s request comes as Kiev suffers from a shortage of military personnel having incurred heavy casualties on the battlefield. According to Russia’s Defense Ministry, Ukraine’s Armed Forces are estimated to have lost more than 35,000 troops in May alone, amid Moscow’s offensive in Kharkov Region. Despite the Ukrainian military’s efforts to ramp up mobilization, many people don’t want to serve in the army, prompting Kiev to further tighten mobilization rules and even reduce the conscription age limit from 27 to 25. Last month, Ukraine’s General Staff also announced that it intends to “optimize” its operations by releasing as many as 60% of its personnel and using them “to replenish the command and control bodies at the operational and tactical levels, as well as combat units.”

Ukraine’s mobilization campaign, which was announced shortly after the start of the conflict with Russia, has also been marred by widespread draft dodging. Many have tried to escape the country to avoid service, sometimes losing their lives in the process. According to the Ukrainian State Border Service, at least 45 Ukrainian men have already died while trying to illegally cross into the EU. In May alone, ten people were confirmed to have drowned while trying to cross the Tisza River, which flows from Ukraine’s southwestern border through Romania, Hungary, Slovakia and Serbia.

Arestovich
https://twitter.com/i/status/1798148258360889790

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And that includes Americans…

Ukraine No Longer Allowing Dual Citizens To Leave (RT)

Ukrainian nationals with dual citizenship have been barred from leaving the country, a border guard official said on Tuesday. They are also no longer exempt from the military draft under a new mobilization law. The authorities are struggling to replenish the army ranks as a result of heavy casualties suffered on the battlefield. Russia’s Defense Ministry estimates that Ukraine’s armed forces lost more than 35,000 troops in May alone. Ukrainians with dual citizenship were previously allowed to leave the country, border service spokesman Andrey Demchenko told state TV on Tuesday. “We are not letting this category of citizens through now,” he added.He cited a recent government decree that obliged such people to register for the draft within 30 days. Previously, dual citizens and Ukrainians who were living abroad under a residence permit had been exempted from military service.

Earlier, Defense Ministry spokesman Dmitry Lazutkin also demanded the return of Ukrainians who were residing abroad, saying they should visit their territorial draft offices in person even if they have updated their data remotely. The US embassy in Kiev immediately warned Americans who hold Ukrainian citizenship against traveling to Ukraine. “Effective June 1, Ukraine has eliminated a ‘residence abroad’ exception that previously allowed certain Ukrainian males aged 18 to 60 to depart the country,” it said in a statement, adding that “US-Ukrainian dual citizens… may no longer be able to depart the country” in light of the changes. The diplomatic mission then advised those who are already in Ukraine to “shelter in place and obey all local orders,” while cautioning those “not currently in Ukraine” against traveling there. “There is an extremely high risk you will not be allowed to depart, even with a US passport,” the statement said.

Kiev has been ramping up its mobilization efforts in recent months. In April, Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky signed a controversial mobilization law that lowered the conscription age from 27 to 25, greatly expanded the powers of enlistment officers, and introduced additional penalties for draft dodgers. In May, he approved further legislation that provided a way for some prisoners to be paroled if they enlist. Later the same month, the country’s justice minister, Denis Maliuska, announced the first release of convicts to fill the military ranks.

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“..Americans are “not fighting for Ukraine or the Ukrainian people, they are fighting for their own grandeur and global leadership.”

Nobody in US Has Ukraine’s Interests At Heart – Putin (RT)

The US only cares about its own grandeur and is involved in the Ukraine crisis in order to fulfil its global ambitions, Russian President Vladimir Putin told the leaders of global media agencies ahead of the Saint Petersburg International Economic Forum (SPIEF) on Wednesday. Washington has provided tens of billions of dollars in military aid to Kiev since the beginning of Russia’s special military operation in Ukraine.When asked about a potential shift in US policy towards Russia, Putin said that it is largely dependent on Washington itself and its perception of reality. America is currently obsessed with globalist ambitions that are “destroying the US from within,” the president said. US involvement in the Ukraine conflict is just one manifestation of that globalist policy, he told journalists.“Nobody in the US cares about Ukraine’s interests,” Putin said. Americans are “not fighting for Ukraine or the Ukrainian people, they are fighting for their own grandeur and global leadership.”

According to Putin, the current administration is not so much interested in helping Kiev prevail in the ongoing standoff but is rather “determined to prevent any Russian success precisely because they believe it would damage US leadership [positions].” Those globalist ambitions are harmful to America itself, Putin maintained, naming “high inflation and a huge debt” among the biggest challenges the US is currently facing. A future administration could reverse this destructive trend by focusing on “strengthening the US from within, strengthening its economy and finances, and building up normal relations with the world,” he said, adding that such policies could then bring some “real change” in relations between Moscow and Washington as well. The president’s words came just a day after the Kremlin called the US an “enemy” for the first time. Presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov referred to Washington as such while speaking to journalists on Tuesday.

“We are now an enemy country for them – much like they are for us,” Peskov said at that time, describing the two nations’ attitudes toward each other. The Kremlin has previously referred to the US as an “unfriendly state” or “opponent.” Peskov was commenting on Washington’s decision not to allow former US marine, UN weapons inspector and RT contributor Scott Ritter to travel to St. Petersburg to take part in several SPIEF panel discussions. Earlier, the US also let Kiev use American-supplied weapons against targets inside Russia, beyond what the US considers Ukrainian territory. Moscow has repeatedly warned that such actions, alongside continued weapons shipments to Kiev, only lead to further escalation and increase the risk of an all-out war between Russia and NATO, which can easily spiral into World War III.

Putin US
https://twitter.com/i/status/1798107091661680863

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She fled her home country. A Foreign Minister.

Austria’s Ex-FM Kneissl Says Europe ‘Lost Its Soul,’ Entered War Path (Sp.)

Europe has “lost its soul” by stepping onto the path of war, ex-Austrian Foreign Minister and currently Director of the St. Petersburg State University G.O.R.K.I. (Geopolitical Observatory for Russia’s Key Issues) Center, Karin Kneissl, said on Wednesday. Speaking at a meeting of the Russian Historical Society in the presidential library, Kneissl recalled German philosopher Oswald Spengler’s book “The Decline of the West,” to argue that Europe has been degrading for 20 years.

“Unfortunately, Europe today is a Europe of war. This is the current European agenda… I cannot conceal my sadness… I have always dreamed about a Europe of pluralism, a Europe of freedom, constitution, art,” she told the meeting, adding that Europe has “lost its soul, it is dead.” Kneissl served as the Austrian Foreign Minister from December 2017 to June 2019. Her scapegoating at home was largely associated with the alleged “Russian ties”. The former diplomat moved to Lebanon in June 2022 after leaving Austria in September 2020 and residing in France because of persistent death threats and a de facto ban on working in her home country. In August 2023, it became known that Kneissl had moved to Russia.

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“But if they write to a representative or senator about the misallocation of resources they will get back a letter explaining that “we have to stop them over there before they get over here.”

Americans Are an Abused People (Paul Craig Roberts)

Americans are screwed over people and are too insouciant to notice. And not just on big things, such as being forced to be injected with an untested new kind of “vaccine” with unknown safety and effectiveness. Millions of Americans were faced with the choice of being injected or losing their job and ability to pay rent or mortgage, car payments, utilities, and buy food. The “vaccine” has caused many deaths and millions of injuries from new diseases and profusions of what previously were rare diseases among age groups not previously affected. American babies now die from strokes and heart attacks. And the grieving parents are denied any recourse. No one is being held responsible. And apparently Americans don’t care. How is this any different from the Zionist story of Jews being herded into gas chambers?

Americans can’t do anything about the hundreds of billions of dollars Washington sends to Ukraine to conduct Washington’s proxy war against Russia, or about the billions sent to Israel for the slaughter of Palestinians and physical destruction of Gaza, or the billions sent to Taiwan for Washington’s proxy war against China. Meanwhile homeless American veterans sleep on the streets while the Biden regime gives immigrant-invaders pre-paid debit cards and houses them in hotels. A few Americans might wonder if the billions of dollars could be better used getting the homeless out of their public parks and tent encampments off their sidewalks. But if they write to a representative or senator about the misallocation of resources they will get back a letter explaining that “we have to stop them over there before they get over here.”

The message is: “we are here to serve the military/security complex and Israel Lobby, the funders of our election campaigns, and to replace white Americans with the third world in the interest of diversity. It is not the big things that Americans notice. They are not personally at risk of being sent to war, and there is no specific tax taken from them to finance Israel’s and Ukraine’s wars. But you would think that Americans living on credit card debt would at least notice that which dramatically affects them. Do Americans living on credit card debt comprehend that under the guise of interest charged the credit card companies are taxing their balances at rates ranging from 19.49% to 29.99% based on the credit card company’s estimate of the debtor’s credit worthiness.

In addition to the federal and state income taxes on their income and the Social Security tax and the Medicare tax on income, the credit card companies are imposing a 20-30% tax on debt that is paying for housing, transportation, food, and utilities, as incomes alone in the age of jobs offshoring are insufficient to support living standards for about 40% of the population. I learned about modern day usury in May when my credit card bill did not show up. Perhaps it went into the spam or junk folders or fell victim to a glitch, all possibilities being joys of the digital revolution. Consequently the amount due on May 18 did not get paid until 4 days later on May 22 when an unpaid bill notice appeared in the email. The notice told me that I am charged a late payment fee of $29 plus an interest charge of $61.54. So a 4 day late payment cost me $90.54.

The late payment notice told me that my interest rate of 19.49% is charged from the “first day of the billing period until we receive your payment in full.” In other words, the interest was not charged for the 4 late days, but for the 4 days plus the month’s billing period. The notice also told me that if I missed a second payment, even for one day, during a 12 month period, my interest rate on my unpaid balance would jump from 19.49 to 29.99. There you have it. This is a system for the enserfment of the American consumer. If you are able to focus your attention, try to imagine the rapid rise of impossible indebtedness of Americans who can only make the minimum payment. The minimum payment is a tiny percentage of the balance due. For example, a balance of $4,173.66 has a minimum payment of $131.37. The minimum payment leaves a balance of $4,042.29 accumulating interest at double-digit rates.

Assuming he does not miss two payments in 12 months, his interest rate based on creditworthiness (he only makes minimal payments) is 27.49%. So, the interest on the unpaid balance adds $1,100 to his debt. And the growth in debt increases with the interest charged on the rising unpaid balance. I remember when credit card companies made their money by the 2.5% charge to the businesses that accepted payment via credit card. Those days have vanished. Now credit card companies live extravagantly on interest on consumer credit card debt, while businesses accepting credit card payment charge their customers a fee for paying with a credit card. As an economist I am really amazed that Keynesian economists, whose policy is based on the American consumer’s ability to spend, stood aside while such extraordinary restrictions on aggregate demand were allowed to be put in place. After paying debt service, people have nothing left to spend.

Read more …

 

 

 

 

Covid patents

 

 

Jack

 

 

Square?
https://twitter.com/i/status/1798347399896998384

 

 

Bird feeding
https://twitter.com/i/status/1798356457039319235

 

 

Beers for breeders

 

 

Tucker Bukele

 

 

 

 

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

 

 

 

May 202024
 


Wassily Kandinsky Moscow II 1916

 

Iranian President Confirmed Dead In Helicopter Crash (RT)
The Trump Trial Could Be Over Sooner Than You Think – Unless He Testifies (Taft)
House GOP Want to Replace Speaker Despite Trump’s Support (Sp.)
Putin and Xi Are World Statesmen, Western Elites Threat To Global Peace (SCF)
Putin and Xi in Beijing: Steps into the 21st Century (Patrick Lawrence)
Russian Economic Growth Hits 5.4% (RT)
Closer to Nuclear War (Jacob G. Hornberger)
Old Genocide Joe Has Got To Go! (Philip Giraldi)
Profit-Generating and Woke Brainwashing: What Happened to US Military? (Sp.)
UN: Gaza Facing ‘Apocalyptic’ Famine (Sp.)
Professor Denounces Romance as a Creation of White Supremacy (Turley)

 

 

Much is said about the Putin-Xi hug. Both sitting here without a tie seems just as important.

 

 

I accept
https://twitter.com/i/status/1791971045114511463

 

 

6’9’”
https://twitter.com/i/status/1791728529782034886

 

 

Loomer

 

 

Mike Rowe

 

 

Khodorkovsky

 

 

 

 

The president is not the Supreme Leader, but still.. Between Damascus and this, they lost many leaders…

Iranian President Confirmed Dead In Helicopter Crash (RT)

Iranian state media have confirmed that President Ebrahim Raisi was killed in a helicopter crash on Sunday in the northwestern province of East Azerbaijan. His entire entourage, including Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian and Governor of East Azerbaijan Malek Rahmati, also perished. The head of state had traveled to the border region after joining Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev on Saturday to inaugurate a dam. Raisi had pledged to visit each of Iran’s 30 provinces at least once a year, and regularly traveled around the country. Reports of a “crash landing” began circulating on Sunday afternoon, with Iranian state media citing Interior Minister Ahmad Vahidi. IRNA news agency reported dense fog in the mountainous area where the aircraft went down.

Raisi was traveling in a US-made Bell 212. Low visibility and the impassibility of the area made search operations difficult, IRNA wrote. Rescue teams finally managed to locate the crash site on Monday morning with the help of Turkish surveillance drones. The wreckage was discovered in a wooded area on a mountain slope. The aircraft was severely damaged and charred, and there were no signs of survivors, the Iranian Red Crescent Society said. With Raisi’s passing, First Vice President Mohammad Mokhber is expected to take office as interim leader. A representative of the republic’s conservative wing, Raisi, was elected in 2021. Before assuming the presidency, he had worked his way up from Prosecutor and Deputy Prosecutor in Tehran in the 1980s and 1990s all the way to attorney general, and later chief justice.

Raisi

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“The Democrats’ latest Get Trump campaign [..] is circling a crusty drain into a gutter of ignominy..”

The Trump Trial Could Be Over Sooner Than You Think – Unless He Testifies (Taft)

The Democrats’ latest Get Trump campaign to smear the former president and keep him off the campaign trail is circling a crusty drain into a gutter of ignominy. When the prosecution rests in this Manhattan bookkeeping trial, which may be late Monday or Tuesday, this Russia! Russia! Russia! redux could be mere hours—or days— away from jurors. The timing depends on at least three considerations: • Will the defense mount a defense? • If so, will the defense be able to get two key witnesses to testify? • Would Donald Trump testify? Whether it’s hours or days will depend upon how much rehabilitation the prosecution will need to do in its re-direct questioning of Michael Cohen. Cohen, who was annihilated by Trump attorney Todd Blanche on Thursday, will return to the stand on Monday for more questioning. Court was dark on Friday so that Trump could attend his son Barron’s high school graduation. The former president also shoe-horned in a fundraiser in Minnesota on Friday night. What, no family rager at Mar-a-Lago for Barron?

Regardless, don’t expect miracles in the final few days of the Trump trial. There’s only so much that judges are willing to do to stay in the good graces of a daughter fundraising off daddy’s job or to keep those squash game invitations coming. Granting a directed verdict isn’t likely on the “to-do” list. When star witness Cohen, a “serial perjurer,” is done punching the time clock for the prosecution, the defense will ask for a directed verdict of not guilty or make another motion for a mistrial for putting on a witness prosecutors knew would lie on the stand. Trump’s team members have spent hours cogitating over whether they should mount a defense. On one side there are those lawyers who say Trump needs to do his best to direct a JDAM into the heart of the prosecution for the benefit of the court of public opinion. The other side says Team Trump should do a mic drop, declare that the prosecution didn’t prove its still-unstated case, and ask for an acquittal.

As usual in criminal legal cases, fates favor the prosecution. Their case resembles a teetering Jenga game. The case’s uncharged crime resurrects zombie misdemeanor charges, the statute of limitations of which has run out, and transmogrifies them into 34 felonies based upon an action—paying an adult movie contortionist extortionist $130,000 to take her and her stories of having sex with Trump in 2006 and go away. The payments were paid by Trump attorney Michael Cohen. Regardless of the suspicious nature and derivation of the case, a New York jury could will likely find him guilty. The uncharged portion of the case is campaign finance violations. So far the people who have testified to the existence of campaign violations are Cohen and the adult mattress actress Stormy Daniels.

The judge has already shrink-wrapped the kind of testimony the actual campaign finance expert, former Federal Elections Commission chairman Brad Smith, can attest to when or if he testifies. Cohen has been the only person called to assess Trump’s state of mind on whether he believed payments to Cohen were written to skirt election law or simply as a retainer for legal services. The person who arranged the payments is sitting at Rikers Island prison. Former CFO Allen Weisselberg was jailed for perjury in Trump’s other New York case about the value of his real estate holdings. He was at a meeting with Cohen and Trump on the 34 payments to Cohen. Weisselberg hasn’t been called to testify because it won’t help DA Alvin Bragg’s case. In what former federal prosecutor Andy McCarthy called “one of the sleaziest moves I’ve seen in a long time,” instead of calling Weisselberg to testify, Bragg introduced the former CFO’s separation agreement with the Trump organization into evidence to signal to the jury that the agreement wouldn’t let him testify, which is untrue.

“Bragg, who won’t prosecute anyone, prosecutes [Weisselberg] twice in two years…” McCarthy said incredulously. So it’s Cohen or nothing. Unless… Another possible witness is Cohen’s former attorney, Robert Costello, whose devastating evidence to the feds and the FEC about his former client’s lying is what convinced them to decline to bring campaign violations against Trump. Costello’s testimony before the Congressional Subcommittee on the Weaponization of Government was the first look many had at Costello’s story and why he could provide evidence that Cohen lied throughout the trial. At the behest of the feds, Cohen waived his attorney-client privilege, freeing Costello to tell his story. Go back and read that last sentence.

Alina
https://x.com/i/status/1791933868263518594

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MTG: “Everyone that’s gonna be voting for President Trump hates Mike Johnson..”

House GOP Want to Replace Speaker Despite Trump’s Support (Sp.)

The US Congress’ Republican Party members intend to replace incumbent House of Representatives Speaker Mike Johnson after the November elections to the lower chamber, despite the fact he has support from former President Donald Trump, the Axios news outlet reported on Saturday, citing sources. “Everyone that’s gonna be voting for President Trump hates Mike Johnson,” Republican Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene was quoted as saying. Furthermore, Congressman Jim Jordan has been preparing the groundwork to promote his candidacy to replace the incumbent House speaker, the news outlet wrote, citing multiple sources.

At the same time, Trump and Johnson have talked over budget priorities, energy and tax policy among other things, the news outlet wrote, citing sources. The two have deepened their relationship since 2019 when Johnson defended Trump while on his impeachment defense team, the news outlet wrote. Overall, the former president sees the House speaker as a “good enough ally,” a top Trump ally told the news outlet, and Johnson “respects him [Trump] as the party leader,” the outlet added, citing a senior GOP source. “Loyalty is always going to be chief among the things that [Trump] cares about, and Johnson has never wavered on that,” a former White House official was quoted as saying.

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“There is no partnership or mutualism in such an “order” because the entire system is predicated on privilege and exploitation, underpinned by fascist notions of superiority and exceptionalism.”

Putin and Xi Are World Statesmen, Western Elites Threat To Global Peace (SCF)

This week, for those willing to perceive reality objectively, displayed two kinds of world order. The heartening news is that one will prevail over the other and thereby produce a better world for humanity, one of dignity and development for the common good. It was a momentous occasion this week when Russian President Vladimir Putin visited China where he was warmly greeted by Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping. Both leaders affirmed their friendship and their vision of a multipolar world based on partnership and mutual benefit. Putin and Xi signed numerous agreements on a wide range of trade and development projects covering energy, technology, engineering, construction, agriculture, infrastructure and military defense. The visit was Putin’s second to China since October last year. It was his first foreign trip since he was inaugurated earlier this month as president for a fifth term.

Both leaders have established a tradition of visiting each other’s countries as a first international stop upon their respective inaugurations. On beginning his third time as China’s president in 2023, Xi made Russia his first international destination. Over the past two decades, both men have met as leaders on at least 40 occasions. The personal warmth attests to genuine friendship and also a closely shared political vision of the world. Putin and Xi have ardently advocated for a multipolar world based on respect, equality and cooperation. During his reception in Beijing this week on a two-day visit, Putin and Xi hailed their nations’ growing alliance as a fundamental factor in maintaining world stability and peace. Putin stated: “We work in solidarity on forming a more just and democratic multipolar world order which should rely on the central role of the United Nations and its Security Council, international law and the cultural and civilizational diversity, a verified balance of interests of all participants of the world community.”

For his part, Xi remarked that Russia-China ties have “set a model of mutual respect, frankness, harmony and mutual benefit,” and he emphasized their commitment to “fairness and justice”. Both men underscored that their alliance and vision did not seek to threaten anyone. They appealed for diplomacy and reasonable dialogue in settling international conflicts, including in Ukraine and the Middle East. President Xi did not mention specific nations but it was patent that he was referring to the United States when he denounced “Cold War mentality…unilateralism, hegemonism, bloc confrontation and power politics” as threats to peace and international security. By contrast, from two world statesmen representing progressive humanism, we may turn to the other kind of world on display this week, the one that Xi alluded to with his denunciation of Cold War mentality.

The second vision is anachronistic, abject, and failing. It is the world order that dominated since the Second World War based on Western hegemony, or more euphemistically, called the “rules-based order”. The lead hegemon is the United States whose Western allies are vassals to service its order of privilege and exploitation of others in a neocolonial paradigm. Today, this Western-dictated order is a hyper-militarized disorder where illegal wars and clandestine conflicts are fomented to shore up hegemonic suzerainty and parasitism. As in antiquated times, the majority are treated like slaves who must pay tribute to their overlords or be put to the sword. Today, the tribute system is manifested by trade exploitation, unfair terms of exchange, and financial predation from the abuse of fiat currency, the U.S. dollar. There is no partnership or mutualism in such an “order” because the entire system is predicated on privilege and exploitation, underpinned by fascist notions of superiority and exceptionalism.

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“..consider the May 16 joint statement from a few steps back. Apart from what is in it, what is conspicuously absent? There is no mention of the West, is there? The tone is strikingly self-confident and entirely self-referential..”

Putin and Xi in Beijing: Steps into the 21st Century (Patrick Lawrence)

Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping added another to their count of 40–odd summit meetings when the Russian and Chinese presidents convened in Beijing, later proceeding to Harbin in Northeast China, for two days of talks that ended Friday. At 9:55 Thursday evening Beijing time, a day’s work done, the two sat behind a long table draped in green to address “members of the media,” as Xi put it. Western officials and the media that clerk for them have done their best, per usual, to dismiss this latest encounter of the Russian and Chinese leaders as of no account, just two authoritarians bound together by nothing more than their shared enmity toward the West. Pay no attention. We ought not miss the significance of what Putin and Xi had to say this week to one another and to the rest of humanity. The world just turned once again.

The Kremlin was first to publish a transcript of their “Media Statement Following Russia–China Talks.” The two presidents spoke in turn—Xi, the host, going first and Putin to follow. Here is a snippet drawn from Xi’s remarks: “We signed joint statements on enhancing the comprehensive partnership and strategic cooperation between the People’s Republic of China and the Russian Federation for a new era…. China and Russia have served as a role model by showing others ways of building state-to-state ties of a new kind and working together as two major neighboring powers … based on the principles of respect and equality.” Xi spoke in this vein for several minutes. Here is a little of what Putin then contributed: “Our talks have reaffirmed that Russia and China have similar or identical views on many international and regional issues. Both countries have an independent and sovereign foreign policy. We are working together to create a fairer and more democratic multipolar world order based on the central role of the U.N. and its Security Council, international law, cultural and civilizational diversity, as well as a calibrated balance of interests of all members of the international community.”

There are two things to note about these remarks straight off the top. One, Western media have reported for months that there is a rift between Beijing and Moscow just below the surface. The Chinese do not approve of Russia’s military intervention in Ukraine, we have read. The bilateral relationship is radically unbalanced in Russia’s favor and of little use to China. Etc. This is nonsense, we can now see. In their brief presentation to the media and in other statements since, Xi and Putin have made it plain that there is virtually no air between the non–West’s two leading powers. As to the Ukraine question, to be noted right away, China has been studiously neutral while cognisant of the West’s provocations. Russia has never asked for more than this.

If Xi and Putin have made it a point to display their two nations’ closeness over the years—and their own as friends as well as statesmen, indeed—the two days they spent together this week mark an important public reaffirmation of their shared commitment to that “fairer and more democratic multipolar world” Putin mentioned Thursday. We have told you we have begun to build a new world order, they may as well have said. We’re on for this project. Together with others we will get this done. Two, and related to the above, consider the May 16 joint statement from a few steps back. Apart from what is in it, what is conspicuously absent? There is no mention of the West, is there? The tone is strikingly self-confident and entirely self-referential. In my read, the two leaders could not have more clearly if subtly demonstrated that the new world order of which they speak is to be an initiative the non–West will advance whether or not the Atlantic world approves or wishes to participate in its construction.

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“..exceeding the expected growth rates for the US (2.7%), the UK (0.5%), Germany (0.2%) and France (0.7%..”

Russian Economic Growth Hits 5.4% (RT)

Russia’s gross domestic product (GDP) grew by 5.4% year-on-year in the first quarter of 2024, the state statistics agency Rosstat said in a preliminary report published on Friday. According to the estimates, Russia saw robust growth in retail turnover (up 10.5%), manufacturing (up 8.8%) and construction (3.5%) in January-March. The Rosstat data aligns with an earlier estimate from the Economics Ministry, but exceeds that of the Bank of Russia (4.6% growth) and analysts’ expectations (5.3%). The agency is due to publish more detailed data on GDP in mid-June. According to an earlier forecast from the Bank of Russia, GDP growth is expected to slow in the second quarter due to tightening fiscal conditions. The regulator, however, expects consumer and investment demand to remain high and continue to drive economic growth.

The positive data comes despite multiple rounds of Western sanctions introduced since the start of Russia’s military operation in Ukraine in February 2022. The measures have ranged from blacklisting most Russian banks and cutting them from the SWIFT interbank messaging system, to freezing some $300 billion in Russian foreign exchange reserves. As a result, GDP suffered a downturn in 2022, contracting 1.2%. However, data for 2023 showed that the economy has recovered, posting growth of 3.6%. Many analysts have attributed this performance to Russia’s trade pivot to the East, and economic policies implemented to offset the effect of restrictions.

In April, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) said it expects the Russian economy to grow faster than all advanced economies in 2024. GDP is forecast to expand by 3.2%, exceeding the expected growth rates for the US (2.7%), the UK (0.5%), Germany (0.2%) and France (0.7%). Russian Finance Minister Anton Siluanov earlier said he expects GDP growth in 2024 to equal that of last year, while the Bank of Russia has been more cautious in its predictions, expecting growth of 2.5-3.5%.

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“If the day ever comes when mushroom clouds are suddenly and unexpectedly enveloping cities in Russia and the United States, those who are still alive can mull over whether Ukraine’s membership in NATO was worth it..”

Closer to Nuclear War (Jacob G. Hornberger)

I can’t help but wonder what proponents of America’s participation in the old Cold War dinosaur known as NATO are thinking about NATO officials who are contemplating sending NATO military personnel into Ukraine to train Ukrainian troops in their war against Russia. Those who relish the idea of nuclear war between the United States and Russia undoubtedly must be ecstatic over the possibility of such a move. It has been clear for some time that Ukraine is losing its war with Russia. Ukraine has lost countless young soldiers and their front-line troops are now largely composed of middle-aged men. Its production has plummeted. Its supply of weapons is low, which is why it continues to desperately seek replacement weapons from the United States. Ukrainian forces continue to retreat. And there is the increasing possibility that Russian forces will achieve a breakthrough in Ukrainian defense lines.

Obviously feeling desperate over the battlefield situation, European officials within NATO are contemplating sending military personnel into Ukraine to help train Ukrainian soldiers. But wouldn’t that put NATO and Russia into direct military conflict? After all, what happens if a Russian missile kills a bunch of NATO soldiers inside Ukraine? According to the New York Times, “So far the United States has said no, but Gen. Charles Q. Brown Jr., the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said on Thursday that a NATO deployment of trainers appeared inevitable. ‘We’ll get there eventually, over time,’ he said.” Brown’s objection, for now, seems to be based more on military practicality rather than the possibility than the increased likelihood of nuclear war. “For now, he said, an effort inside Ukraine would put ‘a bunch of NATO trainers at risk’ and would most likely mean deciding whether to use precious air defenses to protect the trainers instead of critical Ukrainian infrastructure near the battlefield.”

The Times adds the important kicker in all this: “As a part of NATO, the United States would be obligated under the alliance’s treaty to aid in the defense of any attack on the trainers, potentially dragging America into the war.” It’s important that we keep in mind why the United States continues to move ever closer to the possibility of all-out nuclear war with Russia. The reason is so that Ukraine can be a member of NATO, something that Russia has long opposed. If the day ever comes when mushroom clouds are suddenly and unexpectedly enveloping cities in Russia and the United States, those who are still alive can mull over whether Ukraine’s membership in NATO was worth it. Indeed, they can also contemplate whether U.S. membership in that old Cold War dinosaur was worth it too.

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“..a group of top federal judges have signed a letter stating that they will strike back against the demonstrating students by refusing to hire any graduates of Columbia University Law School as law clerks.”

Old Genocide Joe Has Got To Go! (Philip Giraldi)

It is extremely difficult to discern what might be the thinking behind the clueless President Joe Biden and his Blinken-Austin-Mayorkas foreign-policy-plus national security team. Or rather, the problem is that there does not appear to be any thinking about it at all if one measures it by what benefits it brings to the American people. It all actually seems to derive from a desire to construct a narrative that will win the presidential election coming up in November, which will fortunately be run against a deeply flawed GOP candidate named Donald J. Trump. But look at what is on the Biden record: the country’s southern border with Mexico is a porous as a Swiss cheese, allowing literally millions of illegal immigrants into the USA since Biden took office; Washington is both de facto and de jure simultaneously fighting and losing two unnecessary wars involving nuclear powers which has cost a nearly bankrupt Treasury well into the hundreds of billions of dollars; and the White House is needlessly sanctioning non-hostile competitors like China while also making illegal popular social media sites like TikTok which have committed the sin of reporting and disseminating accurate narratives about good old “best friend and closest ally” Israel. Predictably, neither of the assertions about the value of the Jewish state is true, nor is it a democracy, but who cares when you’re having fun shooting people and spending someone else’s money?

Oh, and just try to exercise your first amendment free speech rights by demonstrating against Israel’s slaughter of upwards of 40,000 Palestinian civilians using US provided weapons and you will be hit on the head by a cop, possibly arrested, and even expelled from college! If you want to see where this is all going, check out reports of the recent FBI detention and interrogation of distinguished Israeli historian Ilan Pappe seeking to enter the US through the Detroit International Airport. Pappe is a critic of the Netanyahu government and of US policy so he was held, questioned in detailed about his contacts, and had his phone copied before being allowed to proceed. Meanwhile, a group of top federal judges have signed a letter stating that they will strike back against the demonstrating students by refusing to hire any graduates of Columbia University Law School as law clerks.

And there even is a bill currently before Congress that would empower the government to label the foreign protesters “antisemites and terrorism supporters” and deport them, with some going to Gaza with the expectation that they would be killed, possibly by the mighty Israel Defense Forces (IDF)! It would be a startling new development to punish those whose crime consists mostly of trespass even given the rather loose ethical boundaries established by the war on terror and the Antisemitism Awareness Act! Or indeed one might follow the Senatorial route led by a chirping Lindsey Graham who recommends dropping a nuclear bomb on Gaza to kill everyone who has survived the Israeli onslaught. The area then might be developed after the radiation dies down for those splendid seaside villas for Jews only suggested by the esteemed Trump son-in-law Jared Kushner.

Biden black vote
https://twitter.com/i/status/1792358959979901427

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No such thing as a woke army.

“Just goofy sh*t all across, up and down the chain of command.”

Profit-Generating and Woke Brainwashing: What Happened to US Military? (Sp.)

The third saturday of May is celebrated in the United States as Armed Forces Day, an observance honoring all members of the country’s military. But many experts are not joining the celebrations, raising concerns about the state of the US troops. This year’s Armed Forces Day in the United States takes place as Washington’s war machine appears to be but a shadow of its former self, its reputation tarnished by the de facto humiliating defeat in Afghanistan in 2021 and the inability to stop Houthi attacks on Red Sea shipping lanes. The decline of the once-powerful US Armed Forces could be traced to the 1990s, the time right after the end of the Cold War, argued former US State Department counterterrorism analyst Scott Bennett. What started with reforms to those who could serve eventually “cascaded into an avalanche of social justice, acquainted theorems and attitudes towards the military,” he said. “Suddenly you saw a weakening of the military and that was the beginning of the end of the US military,” Bennett said.

Following that, the 9/11 terrorist attacks triggered a wave of US military interventionism across the world, ostensibly aimed at fighting terrorism but in reality serving as an “enrichment exercise for the military-industrial complex.” “So you’ve seen the military transform from a nationally-owned organization to an organization that was really being used to feed corporate entities like Raytheon, McDonnell Douglas, Booz Allen Hamilton, SAIC, a myriad of defense contractors, missile manufacturers, arms dealers, and that was another death blow to the military because suddenly it became a profit-generating organization,” Bennett remarked. According to him, the US military during the Obama administration suddenly lost interest in winning wars and resolving conflicts – instead, it became interested in perpetuating conflicts and “in using the military as a social re-engineering organization”.

“They [US authorities] completely corroded and decayed the military from within, causing a lot of the best soldiers, airmen, marines and sailors to depart, to not re-enlist,” he continued. “And as a result of all of the social pathologies and perversions that have been used and put into the military (…) You’re witnessing the United States military completely coming apart at the seams from a moral point of view, from a esprit de corps point of view.” He also noted that most Americans are reluctant to enlist because they do not want to join “a military that is at odds with their moral, traditional religious values.” “For the first time in the history of the United States, the American people, I believe, are looking at the military with a sense of disgust and a sense of fear and loathing because it has been used to ignite wars around the world and destroy the American reputation in Syria and Afghanistan, in Iraq and Libya and in Ukraine,” Bennett added.

“And now Europeans are also waking up and seeing the US military is one of the biggest threats to world peace.” Comparing the US military to the Russian military today, Bennett argued that the latter is clearly superior. “The Russian military is superior in technology and its manpower. Its technology is superior because the Russian people and the Russian government use their military development of weapons solely for the purpose of defending the country and the people, not to enrich companies that manufacture these weapons,” he elaborated. “Russia’s military manufacturing of weapons is solely and completely dedicated to the preservation of the nation, and to do it at a cost-effective rate.” Bennett also pointed out that the Russian military does not allow “homosexuality and transgenderism and all of these perversions that the West has allowed.”

Meanwhile, US Navy veteran Mike James – who served in Iraq in 2008 – observed that the United States’ military is surprisingly amateurish. “We’re surprisingly caught up in such an enormous sense of false superiority and security that there’s just really bad decisions made all up and down the chain of command, even at the highest levels. Yeah, just generally quite unprofessional and immature and goofy,” he told Sputnik. “Just goofy sh*t all across, up and down the chain of command.”

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Note: we have seen it coming. That carries guilt.

UN: Gaza Facing ‘Apocalyptic’ Famine (Sp.)

The UN under-secretary general for humanitarian affairs and emergency relief coordinator, Martin Griffiths, told the AFP that “apocalyptic” famine is coming to Gaza “If fuel runs out, aid doesn’t get to the people where they need it. That famine, which we have talked about for so long, and which is looming, will not be looming anymore. It will be present,” Griffiths said. “And I think our worry, as citizens of the international community, is that the consequence is going to be really, really hard. Hard, difficult and apocalyptic.” Griffiths claimed that 50 aid trucks can reach the people of North Gaza through the recently reopened Erez crossing, but that fighting in the south and central parts of Gaza, combined with other border closings, means very little aid can reach the Palestinians in the southern city of Rafah where Israel has been bombarding with tanks and warplanes and seized the border crossing with Egypt earlier this month.

“So aid getting through land routes to the south and for Rafah and the people dislodged by Rafah, is almost nil. And we all said that very clearly, that a Rafah operation is a disaster in humanitarian terms, a disaster for the people already displaced to Rafah. This is now their fourth or fifth displacement,” Griffiths said.= The floating pier off the Gazan coast constructed by the US opened days ago and some aid can travel through there, but Griffiths said that it cannot make up for land routes. Israel has repeatedly claimed to be doing all it can to facilitate humanitarian aid to Gaza but aid organizations have repeatedly said they have been hampered by Israeli authorities. For months, Israeli settlers have blocked aid going into Gaza, oftentimes as Israeli police and military forces stand by. Those incidents reached a fevered pitch last week with several violent incidents.

On Friday, Israelis reportedly attacked a commercial truck drive in Kochav Hashahar, an Israeli West Bank settlement that is considered illegal under international law. The Israelis attacked the driver, injuring him, according to the reports. Three IDF officers who arrived to treat the driver were also attacked and reportedly suffered minor injuries. Last week, a truck was set on fire after Israeli settlers stopped an aid convoy and destroyed the loads of several trucks. Videos on social media depicted Israelis ripping up bags of flour and dancing on the now-empty truck beds. Meanwhile, on Friday, the US State Department released a report on whether Israel was breaking humanitarian law by blocking aid or using US weapons in a way that is against humanitarian law. While the report noted “deep concerns” about Israel’s “actions and inactions” preventing humanitarian aid, it said that there was insufficient evidence to justify cutting off aid to Israel.

As of April, more than 250 aid workers have been killed in Gaza, including seven World Central Kitchen workers who were killed in what appeared to be a coordinated attack by Israel, hitting three identified aid vehicles while the organization was coordinating with Israel, providing their locations to the government, according to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA). “This was not just a bad luck situation where ‘oops’ we dropped the bomb in the wrong place,” the organization’s founder, Chef José Andrés said after the attack. “Even if we were not in coordination with the [IDF], no democratic country and no military can be targeting civilians and humanitarians.”

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“..Strings “challeng[es]readers to accept the end of love as they know it and to embrace more queer and feminist ideas of love, equity and partnership.”

Professor Denounces Romance as a Creation of White Supremacy (Turley)

In higher education, there is a virtual cottage industry of academics declaring everything from math to meritocracy to be forms of white supremacy and racism. Now, it appears romance will be added to the list. University of California Santa Barbara Black Studies Professor Sabrina Strings has written how romance promotes white supremacy and “global pigmentocracy.” In The End of Love: Racism, Sexism, and the Death of Romance, Strings recounts having “endured” her own bad relationships and maintains that “Romance is an old white cultural institution that began in the Middle Ages.” In an interview with The Current, Strings explains that “I am only one of the millions of Gen X-to-Gen Z women who have endured a seemingly endless array of miserable relationships with men. ”In viewing romance through her own lens, Strings comes up with distinctly different views of literature and famous relationships.

For example, many people have read the story of Lancelot and Guinevere, a story of forbidden love that introduced disharmony and disaster to King Arthur’s Round Table. It is a story of love and eventual betrayal. It is both irresistible and irrational. Many accounts show Lancelot rescuing Guinevere and, torn by their mutual loyalty to King Arthur, the couple finally succumbs to the inexorable pull of love to each other. It is a tragedy of love and loyalty that leaves everyone in ruin. Arthur would die of wounds in the later battles, Guinevere would die in a convent, and Lancelot would, according to some accounts, die as a hermit. It is a powerful tale of how love can overwhelm all other considerations and shatter every other bond. That is not exactly how Professor Strings sees it. She says that the tale is really about how a man of lower status is trying to secure greater power and prestige by seducing a higher class European Christian woman: “Love is very much about generosity but romance is very much about what you can get from somebody, especially if you’re a man who is social climbing.”

Professor Strings zeros in on the beauty and whiteness of Guinevere. She notes that the queen was viewed as irresistibly attractive and pale in complexion: “We can easily recognize these features today as those representing the apex of whiteness, even though race did not exist at the time of Troyes’s writing. Nevertheless, to the extent that some of these representations occurred before the seventeenth century dawn of race science, they have what historians have called a ‘proto-racist’ bent. Indeed, scholars have shown that the preference for light skin, hair, and eyes existed prior to the advent of racism, and that these characteristics were co-opted by it and enlisted for the purpose of installing a global pigmentocracy.” The “whitenesss” could also simply reflect the racial makeup of the historical characters as opposed to any “global pigmentocracy.” Yet, according to Professor Strings, romance is about “women who are not peak white or are ‘insufficiently white’ are subject deservedly to deceit, manipulation, assault and rape.”

Professor Strings previously wrote a 2019 book about how “fatphobia” is rooted in racism. In today’s academic environment, there often seems a rush to racialize common practices, customs, or terminology. Publications clamor for such articles and discovering another hidden racist element in society can bring academic accolades. However, others have already staked out many areas such as mathematics, astrophysics, statistics, meritocracy, climate change, dieting, tipping, skiing, chess, and organized pantries. Most recently, the American Psychological Association declared that merit-based hiring may be racist. Even robots are now declared to be part of the supremacist menace because they are often made of white plastic.

Indeed, it now appears that both romance and marriage are vehicles for white supremacy. We previously discussed the writings of George Mason Professor Bethany Letiecq on how marriage advances “White, heteropatriarchal supremacy in America.”Nevertheless, the Strings book has met with acclaim and praise from many. Ms. Magazine praised the book as espousing the foundations of romance in “the white supremacist cishetallopatriarchy. Personal, historical, rigorous and readable, this is a fresh and essential feminist analysis on sexism, whiteness and toxic masculinity.” Other reviews note that Strings “challeng[es]readers to accept the end of love as they know it and to embrace more queer and feminist ideas of love, equity and partnership.”

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Cybertruck
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