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Debt Rattle August 5 2026

Aug 052026
 
 August 5, 2026  Posted by at 9:41 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , ,  27 Responses »


Vincenzo Camuccini La Morte Di Cesare 1804


• Bessent Promises Hormuz Breakthrough: ‘May Have Deal Tomorrow’ (ZH)
• Rubio: “Denuclearization of Iran” is the “Ultimate Deal” (ZH)
• Ukraine Ambassador to the United States Removed from Duty (CTH)
• Another Trump Assassination Attempt May Have Just Been Thwarted (Margolis)
• The EU and the Iron Law of Oligarchy (Stephen Soukup)
• New Signals Point To Another Possible Migrant Invasion Against Ceuta (ZH)
• Mamdani’s War on New York Business Is a Double-Header (Stephen Green)
• New York’s Property Tax Crackdown (Victor Davis Hanson)
• Anthony Fauci Hurt America’s Children … and Her Future (Joseph Ford Cotto)
• Rand Paul Makes His Move Against Fauci (Matt Margolis)
• Sen. John Kennedy Blasts John Thune Over a ‘Huge Mistake’ (Matt Margolis)
• Leading Biden COVID-19 Figure Embraces the Lab Leak Theory (Turley)
• The Last White Generation (Paul Craig Roberts)

 


 

https://twitter.com/GuntherEagleman/status/2084425516958781562?s=20

 


 


There’s movement with Iran. They were saying there’s no talking, but now there is.

“We are in talks with the Iranians, and I think there is a chance we may have a deal today or tomorrow to open the Strait and move towards a more normalized position in this conflict,” Bessent said in an interview with CNBC.

• Bessent Promises Hormuz Breakthrough: ‘May Have Deal Tomorrow’ (ZH)

[..] Washington brought out its heavy hitter to re-anchor the administration’s narrative, seeking to assure markets that a diplomatic deal with Tehran is not only real, but imminent – potentially coming together even as soon as Tuesday through Wednesday. “We may have an Iran deal tomorrow to open Hormuz,” Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent declared, signaling that a major diplomatic resolution is within reach. He pointed out that physical maritime traffic is already quietly resuming, regardless of headline volatility.


Bessent claimed the administration is seeing “quite a few ships coming out of Hormuz, even now,” suggesting the chokehold is loosening ahead of an actual deal and formal signature. With physical crude flows expected to resume, Bessent predicted that elevated energy prices will soon settle down, paving the way for a massive “relief trade” across broader markets: “We are in talks with the Iranians, and I think there is a chance we may have a deal today or tomorrow to open the Strait and move towards a more normalized position in this conflict,” Bessent said in an interview with CNBC.

Asked if Tehran would be allowed to charge a toll, Bessent said the deal would allow freedom of movement in the strait.”It would be freedom of movement,” he said. “Even though things are still a little dicey there over the past few days, we saw quite a few ships coming out even now.” Of course, we’ve heard all of this before, and notably Bessent’s commentary came just after Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian insisted that while Tehran would defend its borders, it does not seek to expand the war, according to state media. An advisor to the Supreme Leader also reiterated that if the blockade continues, US vessels and forces will face serious risks and casualties. And there’s this not so small hiccup in the strait emerging Tuesday:

A vessel has been struck in the Strait of Hormuz near Oman, the UK maritime security firm Vanguard says. One crew member is missing.

Looming large over all of this is the fact that the Iranians have still denied that they are in formal talks with Washington, which Trump the day prior described as a ruse, venting his frustration while insisting that the Iranians have been engaging. The Hormuz blueprint as it basically stands: Reuters: Iran would gain full control over vessels entering the Strait of Hormuz under a temporary plan being discussed with Oman, an Iranian official says.

Outbound vessels would use the route between Iran and Oman, with Oman approving their exit only after notifying Tehran. The plan would give Iran full visibility over outbound traffic and the ability to intervene if needed and Iran is unlikely to accept any other proposal to open the strait The Bessent clip:

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“Rubio insisted again that Strait of Hormuz remains open and that vessels are continuing to pass through it..”’

• Rubio: “Denuclearization of Iran” is the “Ultimate Deal” (ZH)

Secretary of State Marco Rubio spoke at the White House Tuesday, just after headlines out of Qatar touting that a new draft deal initiative is gaining momentum. Rubio insisted again that Strait of Hormuz remains open and that vessels are continuing to pass through it, but said the US is working to open it up to bigger vessel transit flows.”I think there is a conversation and a negotiation that we are involved in between Iran and Oman on how more ships can be able to go through there safely in the short term, as we move towards… longer-term talks about denuclearization,” said Rubio. He then emphasized that that the “denuclearization of Iran” is the “ultimate deal”.


But from Tehran’s point of view, this will constitute Washington shifting the goalposts back to square one once again. Iran has insisted it will not negotiate the end of its nuclear program, especially while the conflict is still in an active phrase. It has consistently said that nuclear talks can happen later, only once an agreement to end the war has been accomplished. The two sides continue to be far apart, despite the Tuesday morning onslaught of ‘Hormuz deal imminent’ headlines.

PressTV, however, has said that Iran-Oman talks on opening Hormuz are in a “new phase” – and despite what it calls “US obstruction” – but so far it appears this management scheme will be favorable to Iran’s demands. And yet there’s still some signs of compromise on the horizon:

IRAN WEIGHS ALLOWING EUROPE TO CLEAR MINES IN STRAIT OF HORMUZ

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Sundance: “I give it four months, and it’s over..”

“Every Russian move exists silently, almost in isolation from Western media. Every Ukraine move exists loudly, coordinated and promoted for maximum media value.” Did she piss off the nazis?

• Ukraine Ambassador to the United States Removed from Duty (CTH)

Olha Stefanishyna says she resigned. Volodymyr Zelenskyy says she was removed. Regardless of which storyline is accurate, the Ukraine Ambassador to the United States is no longer in position. There is no replacement. Stefanishyna is also under investigation for her connection with financial irregularities involving the Asset Recovery and Management Agency, although she has not been formally charged, yet. The Western narrative, which has continuously looked like an intelligence community shaping, says that U.S. relations with the government of Ukraine have never been stronger. The reality seems to be something else entirely.


Olha Stefanishyna


Aug 3 (Reuters) – President Volodymyr Zelenskiy dismissed Ukraine’s ambassador to the United States, Olha Stefanishyna, in a decree published on Monday. Stefanishyna had been in her job for nearly a year. Her departure had been expected for several weeks.Her departure coincides with a shake-up in recent weeks of top officials, including the replacement of the prime minister and defence minister. A reshuffle of Ukraine’s diplomatic and ambassadorial appointments is also expected. Stefanishyna, writing on Facebook, said the decision to leave her post was “my own decision, driven by personal circumstances … ” and said she had accomplished much during her time in the post. (read more)

I am not going to belabor the points, because I’m told by most my review of the data is incorrect. However, once again, I would simply point out the distinct difference between the preferred Western narrative and the reality of events as they unfold. From the June 11th London visit that preceded the G7 assembly in Paris, things have not made sense when you compare Western narrative to the reality of events. The removal of Stefanishyna is simply just another datapoint. Western media say Ukraine has turned the tide on the war against Russia. Reality – Russia has methodically gained ground in Eastern Ukraine.

Western media say Ukraine has exceptional drone building and technological capabilities to share with allies. To highlight this expertise Ukraine held a drone exposition in Kiev; Russia blew it up killing hundreds of contractors. Media went silent. Ukraine drones attack Wildberries warehouses. Russia blows up drone manufacturing factories. Western media say Ukraine drone capabilities are the most remarkable testimonial to their military effectiveness. Zelenskyy fires the Minister of Defense responsible for the drone capabilities.

Western media say Ukraine is effective in stopping the Russian advancements in the Donbas region. Zelenskyy fires the military general in command of the Ukraine military in the Donbas. Western media say Ukraine long-range drones are striking deep into Russian oil refining capacity. Zelenskyy says he needs to build drone and missile factories in Great Britain. If you want to evaluate the war, go back to the timing of events right after Zelenskyy last went to London and met with King Charles. It was a few days before the G7 summit in Paris. Go back to that exact date and then read the headlines on Ukraine/Russia from that date to today.

If you can be emotionally disconnected from the spin, and just focus on what the headlines would mean in every other timeframe, what you will notice is that Ukraine is panicking. Every move is a panic move from that London visit to today. Every Russian move exists silently, almost in isolation from Western media. Every Ukraine move exists loudly, coordinated and promoted for maximum media value. It looks like an intelligence influence operation. Go look.

The recently organized U.S. Senate sanctions against Russia are mostly directed toward China and India, while framing censorship in the form of punishment against any action that might “undermine” the government of Ukraine. It’s the ‘be careful what you say’ sanctions. Russia is methodically destroying Ukraine defenses, and the only response Zelenskyy has put together is flashy political promotion and media headlines to hide a reality that Russia is methodically destroying Ukraine defenses.

Western media says one narrative; the datapoints show something entirely different. I give it four months, and it’s over. Perhaps, that’s why President Trump: (A) pulled back from Patriot and Tomahawk missile sharing; and (B) has told his team to reengage both sides in peace negotiations now.

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Assassination attempts. Quite something to lose count of.. But there you go…

• Another Trump Assassination Attempt May Have Just Been Thwarted (Margolis)

An armed man spent part of Sunday casing Trump National Golf Club in Rancho Palos Verdes, snapping photos and videos of the grounds while federal agents watched from a distance. By the time deputies moved in, investigators say he had already zeroed in on something specific: security planning.The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department confirmed the arrest in a statement Tuesday. President Donald Trump was in the air aboard Air Force One, en route to California, when word of the arrest broke. He is set to attend a Republican National Committee dinner at that very golf course Tuesday evening.


The Secret Service is now investigating whether the man posed a threat to the president, according to a federal law enforcement source who spoke to CNN. A separate source told the network the investigation remains ongoing.Deputies identified the suspect as 38-year-old Jeanine John Taele of Downey. The El Segundo Police Department is separately investigating him in a robbery case. According to the sheriff’s department, Taele photographed and filmed the property while appearing to monitor what officials called “security-planning activities.” Deputies arrested him on charges of carrying a concealed firearm and possession of prohibited ammunition.

The case escalated fast. Detectives assigned to the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force executed a search warrant on Taele’s home Monday, citing the “potential security implications surrounding the incident.” What they found inside should worry anyone still inclined to shrug this off: an AR-style rifle that had been illegally modified, a .45 caliber pistol, body armor, high-capacity magazines, ammunition, and equipment for monitoring radio signals, along with notebooks filled with what the sheriff’s department called “concerning statements.” The FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force and the Secret Service are both assisting in the investigation, and officials say additional charges could follow.

It’s hard to see how this was anything other than an attempted assassination, which would make it now the fourth time in two years that a man carrying a rifle has turned up uncomfortably close to Donald Trump. In July 2024, Thomas Matthew Crooks shot at Trump in Butler, Pa., grazing his ear before Secret Service snipers took him out. Two months later, Secret Service agents caught Ryan Routh lurking with a rifle near Trump’s golf course in West Palm Beach, Fla. In April, Cole Tomas Allen attempted to gain entry to the White House Correspondents Association Dinner with a shotgun and other weapons.

Make no mistake about it, a pattern like this does not happen by coincidence. The sheriff’s department is trying to strike a careful balance between reassurance and warning. “Currently, investigators have identified no credible threat to our communities,” the statement said. “However, this case underscores the importance of vigilance, strong partnerships with local, state, and federal law enforcement agencies, and the proactive steps taken to identify and investigate suspicious activity before it can escalate.”

Whatever Taele’s intentions turn out to be, the arsenal found in his home and his apparent interest in “security-planning activities” at a property Trump was hours from visiting are facts hard to ignore.

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“The EU won’t reform because it can’t reform. And so, it will collapse instead.”

• The EU and the Iron Law of Oligarchy (Stephen Soukup)

For most of the last forty years, Spain has been a hub of primarily North African and Middle Eastern immigration to Europe. Since the 1980s, Spain has had six major extraordinary regularizations for its migrant populations. Although different in name and details, these “extraordinary regularizations” are essentially broad general amnesties, grants of legal immigration status to those who entered the country illegally. In 2005, under the former Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero (a socialist), Spain granted amnesty to more than half a million illegal immigrants.


Earlier this year, under current Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez (also a socialist . . . or worse), the country began the process of yet another regularization, the total size of which is unknown at present but is estimated to be between 500,000 and over 800,000. Additionally, earlier this summer, the Spanish Supreme Court issued a ruling limiting the ability of the government to return immigrants who arrived in Ceuta and its sister city, Melilla, by sea rather than by land (over a technical “border”).

All things considered, Spain has done everything in its power to encourage as much immigration as possible, and its government has openly conceded this fact, arguing that demographic and workforce realities make mass immigration an absolute necessity. Unsurprisingly, given all of this, the country’s foreign-born population jumped significantly in less than two years, from approximately 18.2% of the total population in 2024 to 20.3% today.

In light of Spain’s immigration policies and in the wake of the Ceuta disaster, over the weekend, several EU nations called for a suspension of Spain’s privileges under the Schengen Agreement, which allows borderless travel within the Schengen region: no passport control, a unified set of regulations, etc. Predictably, Meloni’s Italy was the first to speak up. Deputy PMs Antonio Tajani and Matteo Salvini announced a formal one-month suspension of Italy’s Schengen relations with Spain, closing Italy’s maritime and air entry points to Spain and introducing “targeted and selective” checks on non-EU travelers arriving from that country.

France followed suit, reintroducing checks at its land border crossings with Spain. Finland began preparing to reimpose border controls along its own Schengen borders, and its interior minister, Mari Rantanen, offered the sharpest public statement by a government official to date: “Spain’s outer border is also our outer border, and. . . they have failed in their efforts to prevent this incursion, this invasion.” Denmark and Czechia both demanded Spain’s suspension from Schengen, but neither has taken unilateral action on its own.

In response, Pedro Sánchez complained that everyone, everywhere, was overreacting, stating that the rest of Europe was being “selfish, polarising, and unlawful.” Taken as a whole, this entire episode—starting with Spain’s admitted desire to import as many immigrants as possible and continuing through this weekend’s demands for Spain’s suspension from Schengen—helps clarify some of the broader issues facing the EU.

First, in the age of mass immigration, Schengen shows clearly that the EU itself was a half-baked idea. Interestingly, Schengen did not start as an EU enterprise. It started as a side agreement between a handful of member states: Belgium, France, Germany, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands. It was only in 1999, via the Amsterdam Treaty’s Schengen Protocol, that the “Schengen acquis” (the whole body of Schengen rules and agreements) was formally absorbed into EU law. In 2004, the EU—as opposed to its member states, a key distinction—tried to push a European constitution on its members, including provisions formally mandating Schengen compliance, making the EU “an area without internal frontiers, in which the free movement of persons is ensured. . . .”

The following year, French and Dutch voters explicitly rejected the constitution via referenda, which should, by all rights, have been the end of it. The EU being the EU, it decided that it wouldn’t take no for an answer and scaled the constitution back marginally and re-presented it as the Lisbon Treaty, which, among many foolish things, formalized and mandated participation in the Schengen migration policies.

Second, the Euro, the immigration mess, and the EU’s unwillingness to accept the will of the people as definitive confirm Robert Michels’ Iron Law of Oligarchy and show that the EU’s pretensions to “democracy” are rather laughable. Michels was a student of Max Weber, the founder of modern sociology, who sought to deepen his appreciation of socialism by studying the German Social Democratic Party (SPD), the most avowedly democratic, mass-participatory political organization in Europe at the time. He presumed that he would find a functional, egalitarian organization that confirmed all his fantastical priors.

Instead, what he discovered was the opposite. He concluded, based on his study, that even organizations explicitly founded on democratic principles—universal participation, elected leadership, accountability to the membership—invariably develop into oligarchies, ruled by a small, self-perpetuating leadership class. It is simply the nature of large organizations. This, then, is Michels’ Iron Law of Oligarchy: “It is organisation that gives birth to the domination of the elected over the electors, of the mandataries over the mandators, of the delegates over the delegators. Who says organisation, says oligarchy.”

The EU is an oligarchy in Michelsian terms. It is governed by a small self-perpetuating ruling class that sees “the people” as impediments to its technocratic program and will do whatever is necessary to advance its agenda, regardless of the will of those people.

Finally, the EU will crumble. All Utopian enterprises eventually do. They must. They can’t help but do so. And while it may not be the monetary union that brings it down, something will. Maybe it will be Schengen and immigration. Maybe it will be something else. Who knows? Whatever the case, it will, eventually, collapse. The real, painful part of Michels’ Iron Law is the inability of oligarchies to reform themselves. They are incapable. What this suggests is that the EU’s response to the Ceuta incident and to Spain’s immigration unilateralism more generally will be to add more layers of centralizing regulation to the already oligarchical system, thereby making a bad problem even worse.

The EU won’t reform because it can’t reform. And so, it will collapse instead.

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The EU yesterday complimented Spain on its reaction so far… No kidding.

• New Signals Point To Another Possible Migrant Invasion Against Ceuta (ZH)

The scenes from the Ceuta invasion were deeply alarming, as 60,000 predominantly military-aged men, many carrying no supplies, crossed from Morocco into the Spanish enclave. The invasion set off alarm bells across the West, reinforcing concerns that uncontrolled mass migration poses a major national security risk. According to The Sun, there are new concerns that a second invasion of Ceuta could be “just days” away, as the outlet cites online posts warning it may be their [migrants] “last chance” to enter Europe.


The outlet continued: “Fears are also mounting convicted terrorists were among the tens of thousands of people who stormed the Spanish enclave last week, reports say.” [. . .]But reports say the peninsula could see scenes of mayhem play out on the streets yet again, as plans are being made for another mass border crossing on August 15.On social media, posts appear to be plotting another storming of the shores of Ceuta, with one message reading: “Everything will be seen that day.” Another appears to call for the creation of a WhatsApp group, saying: “Our appointment is on 15/08/2026.”

The invasion prompted Italy to suspend Schengen arrangements with Spain and to secure its borders, while 22 EU leaders demanded “immediate action” to address the national security threat. Denmark’s Mette Frederiksen, Italy’s Giorgia Meloni, Germany’s Friedrich Merz, and other European leaders warned: “We cannot allow uncontrolled mass crossings, the instrumentalization of migration or other hybrid threats to create the perception that illegal entry into the European Union is possible.” Reports that emerged in recent days show that Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez’s (unhinged socialist) claim that the migrants had been expelled from Ceuta may not have reflected the situation on the ground. Read the full report.

Years of open-border policies under Spain’s socialist government may now be approaching a political breaking point. The invasion of military-aged men was so visible to the world in real time on X, making it increasingly difficult for lefty corporate media to reconstruct the narrative and gaslight the public into believing this was merely a humanitarian migration event. The images instead reinforced views of a coordinated border invasion and undercut the left-wing narrative framing such arrivals solely as poor migrants searching for milk and bread.

We noted last week: “Spain’s Border Invasion Is An Optics Disaster For Open-Border Democrats” Hopefully, common sense can return to the West: secure borders. And, really, hold those accountable for nation-killing open border policies.

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“This is gonna go great, and I have a fresh supply of I Told You Sos all ready to go.”

• Mamdani’s War on New York Business Is a Double-Header (Stephen Green)

BananaMamdani
New York City’s socialist bad boy mayor Zohran Mamdani just made his latest move against the city’s business leaders — and this time, he hit the leadership of Gracie Mansion’s own Mayor’s Fund Board of Advisors. Plus, I have the latest news on Mamdani’s incredibly wrong-headed plan for city-owned grocery stores in today’s double-header of socialist stupidity. The New York Post reported early Tuesday that Mamdani “axed the advisors of a major nonprofit that channels private sector donations to fund city initiatives in his latest hostile act toward New York business leaders.”


Also, according to the Post, the board has “raised hundreds of millions since its 1995 inception – including a staggering $107 million to support family members of rescue workers killed or injured in the Sept. 11, 2001 terror attacks.”The mass firing marks “the first time in at least three mayoral administrations that all members were let go.” At least? If I’ve done my counting correctly, you only have to go back four mayors before Mamdani to reach the Board’s founding under Rudy Giuliani.

“The creation of a new advisory board is an important next step in reimagining how philanthropy can augment, but not replace, public dollars and public goods, and we are eager to share more about our new board of advisors later this year,” Mamdani senior advisor Dora Pekec told Bloomberg. Well, that’s exactly what the board did prior to the mayor sacking its entire membership. The mayor’s office told Bloomberg that Mamdani would select new members “later this year,” and it’s a safe bet that his picks will be more in line with his socialist vision for the city.

Which brings us to the latest report on Mamdani’s city-owned, taxpayer-subsidized grocery stores — and no matter how bad you or I thought they would be, now they’re worse. If it seems like at least once each week I write something about some new idiocy coming out of Mamdani’s New York City or Gavin Newsom’s California, well, it’s because there’s always some new idiocy.Finance and winemaking guy Nick Kokonas actually downloaded and read Mamdani’s just-released Request for Proposal (RFP) asking large private grocers for their plans for running city-owned stores. “Forget for a moment whether or not the government should own a grocery store,” Kokonas wrote, and “Let’s review the doc instead.”

It’s… well, let’s just say it’s even more dumberer than you could have imagined. Then there’s the little matter that the city will give preference to companies willing to bid on operating all five stores, but will award operations one store at a time. The city wants “scale pricing while refusing to award scale.” According to Kokonas, Mamdani wants stores to run on a “limited SKU model” that reduces costs by limiting selection. But Mamdani also insists that the stores stock “full grocery departments, household goods, culturally specific products, plus kosher, halal, vegan, gluten-free, dairy-free and diabetic options.”

There’s much more, but two stick out as particularly thick-headed.First, the stores’ subsidized goods aren’t means-tested, so “anyone can shop there.” What that means is that as bodegas are forced out of business, or at least to stop carrying non-subsidized staples, “taxpayers will subsidize groceries for affluent shoppers who happen to live nearby, while needy families elsewhere get zero.”

Think of Bane Grocers (as I refer to Mamdani’s government stores) as subsidized Whole Foods for his wealthy white supporters.But here’s where the stupid leaves third-degree burns. “The ‘best’ bid promises 30% discounts, best-in-class wages/benefits, local sourcing, sustainability, community programs and full-time jobs,” Kokonas noted, incentivizing bidders to promise the world. But when choosing the winning bid, “20% of the score goes to whoever claims they need the least subsidy.”

So the incentive is to lowball the city, guaranteeing cost overruns that will be paid for by city taxpayers.Or maybe the new crony members of the Mayor’s Fund Board of Advisors will stop raising money for the families of first responders, and start raising money to pay for the mayor’s stupid city-run grocery stores. I’m just spit-balling here, but it hardly seems impossible.

This is gonna go great, and I have a fresh supply of I Told You Sos all ready to go.

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“…they inherited it from their parents or they bought it 50 years ago for $50,000, and in crowded New York it’s worth $1 million. They’re hardly wealthy.”

• New York’s Property Tax Crackdown (Victor Davis Hanson)

Zohran Mamdani, the mayor of New York, has just stirred up a lot of controversy. He said that he wanted to go after property owners who had homes worth more than $5 million, and they were likely to be second homes. In other words, they had a primary residence elsewhere, either in the state of New York, outside the state, or in a foreign country. m And he wanted to tax them with a new surcharge in addition to property tax. But then, when the letters went out, they didn’t just go to the upper-middle class or the wealthy who owned $5 million properties. Mamdani went back on his word and sent almost 950,000 letters out to property owners who, on their register, had a home worth more than $1 million.


Now, this is where it gets interesting. He’s under a lot of criticism for this because he was bragging and he kind of, as he always does in his cute socialist smile … Remember, he got in front of Ken Griffin’s second home and looked into the camera and said, “Ha ha, we’re coming for you,” type of thing. This email was supposed to be cute. Something’s coming in the mail. But here’s the problem. A person can have a relatively modest house, and maybe they inherited it from their parents or they bought it 50 years ago for $50,000, and in crowded New York it’s worth $1 million. They’re hardly wealthy.

But more importantly, in the United States, Mamdani isn’t familiar, apparently, with an age-old foundational principle that you’re innocent until proven guilty. In other words, you don’t word a letter to people that says, “I assume you are guilty of having a house which is not your principal residence. You have three weeks to prove to me that you’re not guilty, and then maybe I will adjudicate you’re innocent and not slap a surtax.” Can you imagine hundreds of thousands of people getting a letter in the mail that they owe $5,000, $10,000, $20,000, $50,000, or $80,000 on top of their property taxes and going into panic and then going to the New York City website with hundreds of thousands of other people trying to get in and say, “Look, I’ve been in this house. I’m not a second-property owner”?

It was designed to cause confusion and anger and chaos and make Mamdani an object of fear. Don’t cross the mayor. He has a long memory. But here’s the other thing. Besides inverting the idea to “you are guilty until you prove yourself innocent,” what’s wrong with having a second house? It’s a free country. You have a right to have a house. So what was he doing by sending this letter and threatening you? Well, one of the things is he’s broke. He’s had all of these lavish welfare ideas that are not fundable because he’s driving out the upper-middle class and the wealthy, and they’re leaving in droves.

Some estimates say maybe $11 billion already in real value and revenue. So, he needs money. And more importantly, by sending this surtax out in addition to property taxes, if you have a property that’s worth $1 million or $2 million and you’re paying $20,000, $30,000, or $40,000 in property tax, and this surtax comes in at another $10,000, $20,000, or $30,000, a lot of people are saying, “You know, I’m not getting that much rent,” if it is a second home.

If it’s their primary home, they’re saying, “I already pay this huge property tax and I have maintenance costs.” If you’re renting, you have rental costs. You’re subject to oversight. There are rental subsidies for your renter. There’s rent control. And so what he’s trying to do is force people to sell. Either sell their second home, or he considers them affluent enough that they had their turn, and it’s time to sell because they will not be able to afford, especially retired people, a surcharge property tax on top of a property tax, on top of insurance.

And if you have a lot of sales, the house price drops. If the house price drops, Mamdani can come in and either buy them for the city or subsidize the, quote, “repressed poor” to buy. It’s a huge redistribution plan. There’s a third, more sinister agenda behind Mamdani’s enemies list. If you send out the names of over 900,000 New Yorkers in various boroughs, and you say, “These people, I accuse these people, until they can prove me wrong, of having a second property or a vacant property that is worth over a million dollars.”

And you give the name, as he did, and the address, as he did, then you’re going to have a lot of envious people saying, “Oh, Mr. Smith down the road, he’s on that list. Oh, Mr. Jones, I didn’t know that he wasn’t living in that house. Hmm.” And that’s the best interpretation. There’s two, I think, more accurate and maybe even more disturbing. We have an epidemic in this country of squatting. So if you are a potential squatter where the law protects you, once you get possession of an empty home it’s almost impossible to evict you unless you spend thousands of dollars.

So all these would-be squatters are going to be looking at this list, and they’re going to say, “Well, the mayor of New York accuses this person at this address of having a vacant home. Let’s check it out. Maybe he’s wrong. Maybe we’ll go down the list, five, six, seven, 10 of them, but we will find a vacant house, and we’ll know he’s not going to come, and we’ll just crash and move in. And then the whole legal apparatus of the city protects us, and we can get two, three, four years of free rent.”

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“The damage the once-vaunted Fauci did to society’s most vulnerable was incalculable.”

• Anthony Fauci Hurt America’s Children … and Her Future (Joseph Ford Cotto)

Anthony Fauci spent nearly four decades running the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. In that time, he became the face of public health in America.Yet the record now shows he inflicted lasting harm on the very people he claimed to serve, especially the young. His private writings and public actions reveal a pattern of deception that paved the way for lockdowns, school closures, and social isolation whose scars will stretch across generations.


In late July, Senator Rand Paul, a Republican from Kentucky, released more than 1,000 pages of Fauci’s personal diary. These ranged from December 2019 through December 2022. Those entries strip away an image which had been polished for the public year after year. On Jan. 26, 2020, Fauci noted that the first COVID-19 infection appeared early in December and had no link to the Wuhan market. He called the market an amplifier, not the source.

Days later, on Feb. 1, he recorded a conference call with a dozen scientists. Most of them saw laboratory engineering of COVID as a real possibility. Only two favored a purely natural origin.Fauci never shared that private judgment with the public. Instead, he steered grant money toward the Wuhan Institute of Virology and helped shape a paper that dismissed the lab-leak idea. He then promoted that publication at press conferences without revealing his own involvement. Or the later multimillion-dollar grant he approved for one of its authors.

The gap between what he knew and what he said cleared the path for economy-wrecking shutdowns, hysterical public shaming, and months of shuttered classrooms. All that ripped apart families and mauled the economy.Worse still, the diary shows Fauci actively pushed the very lockdowns he later denied association with. On March 15, 2020 — which he labeled “BIG DAY!” in red ink — he wrote that he convinced Democrat New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio to close municipal schools. He noted that de Blasio had already leaned that way from Fauci’s television appearances.

The same entry records him urging de Blasio to shutter bars and restaurants. He influenced California Gov. Gavin Newsom, a Democrat surely running for president in 2028, to embrace locking down. Five days later, Fauci pressed for a full shelter-in-place order in New York. This came despite resistance from Gov. Andrew Cuomo, another Democrat.Fauci later claimed credit for extending the original “15 days to slow the spread” into 30 days, warning that stopping early would be a disaster. In November, he backed a three-week shutdown in Los Angeles County.

The damage is already measurable and will compound for decades. A 2023 peer-reviewed study of German secondary students found that those tested after six months of pandemic disruption scored substantially lower on intelligence tests, relative to comparable groups from 2002 and 2012. When the same students were retested a year later, amid continued irregular schooling, they showed no recovery.The researchers tied this shortfall to lost classroom time, not stress alone, and warned of lasting effects on cognitive growth.

In the United States, a 2021 survey of nearly a thousand parents linked COVID-driven school closures, remote learning, and canceled activities to clear drops in children’s social skills. Kids spent most of their days isolated at home watching screens instead of playing outdoors or joining group sports. Reductions in time with friends and extracurricular activities tracked directly with worse social outcomes.

Researchers at the Urban Institute projected long-term consequences from actual COVID-era learning loss and socio-emotional disruptions. Eighth-graders in the 2021-22 school year could earn three percent less at age 30 than they would have without academic centers shutting down. High-school graduation rates and college degrees are expected to fall as well, with steeper hits for students from low-income and minority households.

A National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine report detailed the pandemic’s physical and mental tolls. These include rising diabetes rates in children, higher maternal deaths (especially among black and Hispanic women), spikes in adolescent overdose deaths (driven by fentanyl), as well as delayed vaccinations and check-ups that hit minority children hardest. Loss of a parent or other caregiver were several times higher for Native American, black, and Hispanic children than for white children.

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“..he has repeatedly pressed the question of whether American taxpayer dollars funded research at a Chinese lab suspected of playing a role in unleashing the virus that killed millions.”

• Rand Paul Makes His Move Against Fauci (Matt Margolis)

Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) told Dr. Anthony Fauci last week exactly what would happen if he stonewalled Congress. Fauci ignored him. Now Paul is delivering on that promise, and conservatives who have waited years for this moment have every reason to celebrate. Paul introduced a resolution Tuesday to hold Fauci in contempt of Congress. The move comes after the former National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases director sat before a Senate committee and refused, again and again, to answer a single question.


The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, which Paul chairs, subpoenaed Fauci on July 22 to testify as part of its investigation into risky life sciences research and the true origins of the virus that upended the world in 2020. Fauci showed up Wednesday and gave Republicans nothing. He invoked his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination 111 times. It didn’t matter if it was about the origins of COVID-19 or what day of the week it was; Fauci’s answer was the same: “On the advice of counsel, I respectfully decline to answer based upon my rights under the Fifth Amendment of the Constitution.”

Sen. Paul was not amused. “I ordered him to answer and warned him about contempt, yet he still refused,” Paul said, calling Fauci’s defiance obstruction of a congressional investigation the committee plans to act on.

The committee will vote on the contempt resolution Thursday, and Paul has already dismantled Fauci’s legal excuse for hiding behind the Fifth. Before leaving office in January 2025, then-President Joe Biden gave Fauci a preemptive pardon, an unusual move clearly aimed at protecting one of Donald Trump’s most prominent critics from prosecution. Paul, in a statement on Tuesday, explained that the pardon wiped out any basis Fauci had for pleading the Fifth in the first place. Fauci also gave up whatever privilege remained the moment he delivered opening testimony at the hearing.

This fight has been years in the making. Paul has accused Fauci of destroying government records, and he has repeatedly pressed the question of whether American taxpayer dollars funded research at a Chinese lab suspected of playing a role in unleashing the virus that killed millions. Fauci has denied it every time.

Contempt of Congress is a serious charge that could land Fauci in jail. “Contempt of Congress is the legal offense of disobeying or disrespecting the authority of the U.S. legislative branch through actions like refusing to comply with congressional subpoenas, disrupting proceedings, or obstructing investigations,” explains FindLaw. “This federal offense typically arises when individuals fail to respond to legally binding orders from congressional committees during their oversight and lawmaking functions. Penalties include criminal prosecution with up to one year in jail and $100,000 in fines.”

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“Democrats (for a change) have no appetite for dragging the country through another government shutdown this fall ..”:

• Sen. John Kennedy Blasts John Thune Over a ‘Huge Mistake’ (Matt Margolis)

Democrats (for a change) have no appetite for dragging the country through another government shutdown this fall, right before the midterm elections. The Senate moved forward Monday with a plan to keep the government funded past the midterms, and the continuing resolution cleared a procedural hurdle Monday evening in an 89-4 vote. Senators hope to pass the measure before leaving town for the August recess later this week. Naturally, Democrats are treating it like a win.


Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.), the top Democrat appropriator in the Senate, praised the measure as a “much-improved CR to keep the government funded and avert a shutdown that no one wants,” and pointed to provisions her party secured in the Senate version. “This bill includes important extensions and language that House Republicans’ CR did not, and it rejects Trump’s frivolous war spending wish list,” Murray said in a statement. “Importantly, we closed the loophole in House Republicans’ CR that would have allowed the Trump administration to transfer funding provided for other programs to Border Patrol, which desperately needs reform, not more money.”

Sure, Patty. If declaring victory over a bill that 89 senators voted to advance helps you sleep at night, knock yourself out. Still, it looks like we won’t have a distracting shutdown before the midterm elections. Even House and Senate Republicans appear to be on the same page this time around. But that doesn’t mean everyone in the GOP is thrilled with how things are going in the upper chamber.

Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.) took aim at Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) on Monday over his decision to focus on confirming President Donald Trump’s nominees instead of working on a budget. Kennedy called it a “huge mistake” in an interview with Punchbowl News’ Andrew Desiderio.

“You know one of the things I never say? I never look those people in the eyes and say, ‘We set a record for the number of nominees confirmed.’ I’ve never said that. And I don’t think any other senator has ever said that,” Kennedy said, describing what he tells voters and fellow Republican candidates on the campaign trail. “Because I don’t think the American people care.”

Kennedy has a point. Voters back home want to know what the Senate is doing about spending, the border, and the economy. Your average voter isn’t thinking about confirmation statistics. For months, Senate Republicans have essentially scoffed at Trump’s policy demands, particularly his push to pass the SAVE America Act, the most important election integrity legislation in history, as far as I’m concerned. At least one senator is unhappy that the funding deal does nothing to advance it, which means the fight over that bill is coming sooner or later, shutdown or no shutdown.

On the plus side, no shutdown means no weeks of breathless media coverage blaming the GOP for shuttered parks and delayed paychecks. Would it be nice for the SAVE America Act to get its moment? Sure, but heading into the fall, Democrats would certainly have taken us into a shutdown if it had been included.

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“The New York Times Science and Health reporter Apoorva Mandavilli called any mention of the lab theory “racist.”

• Leading Biden COVID-19 Figure Embraces the Lab Leak Theory (Turley)

Former Biden White House COVID-19 Response Coordinator Dr. Ashish Jha this weekend became the latest denier of the lab theory to do a 180-degree turn. During the interview with CNN’s Dana Bash, Jha admitted that he now believes that the most likely explanation is a lab leak at the Wuhan Institute of Virology. As pundits and politicians quietly admit that the natural mutation theory is not as credible, the courageous scientists who were blacklisted for years remain persona non grata in higher education.


Jha stated: “This is going to surprise some people. You know, when I went into the White House, my view was, ‘This was almost surely a natural outbreak, maybe a lab leak.’ Based on information I learned and based on information I‘ve seen, I have come to conclude that it is more likely to have been a lab leak.” I commend Jha for publicly addressing his change. Indeed, everyone in academia, myself included, has had their views evolve. What should not evolve is the willingness of the scientists and academics to accept dissenting viewpoints. One of my long-standing complaints against figures like Anthony Fauci is that they held prominent positions during the pandemic, but said nothing about the cancel campaigns directed against those experts who disagreed with their views on issues like the origins of COVID-19.

As I discuss in my new book, “The Indispensable Right,” the result is that we never really had a national debate on many of these issues and the massive social and economic costs that resulted. I spoke at the University of Chicago with Bhattacharya and other dissenting scientists in the front row a couple of years ago. After the event, I asked them how many had been welcomed back to their faculties or associations since the recognition of some of their positions. They all said that they were still treated as pariahs for challenging the groupthink culture.

For years, figures like Bhattacharya (who was recently awarded the prestigious Intellectual Freedom Award by the American Academy of Sciences and Letters) were hounded and marginalized. Others opposed Bhattacharya’s right to offer his scientific views, even under oath. For example, in one hearing, Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-Ill.) expressed disgust that Bhattacharya was even allowed to testify as “a purveyor of COVID-19 misinformation.”

Los Angeles Times columnist Michael Hiltzik decried an event associated with Bhattacharya, writing that “we’re living in an upside-down world” because Stanford University allowed dissenting scientists to speak at a scientific forum. Hiltzik also wrote a column titled “The COVID lab leak claim isn’t just an attack on science, but a threat to public health.” As recently as last year, Hiltzik continued to attack the lab theory. Bhattacharya’s experience is not unique. When scientists argued that the virus’s origin was likely the Chinese research lab in Wuhan, they were mobbed by the media. That position was denounced by the Washington Post as a “debunked” coronavirus “conspiracy theory.”

The Washington Post denounced Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark) when he raised the theory for “repeat[ing] a fringe theory suggesting that the ongoing spread of a coronavirus is connected to research in the disease-ravaged epicenter of Wuhan, China.” After Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) mentioned the lab theory, Post Fact Checker Glenn Kessler mocked him: “I fear @tedcruz missed the scientific animation in the video that shows how it is virtually impossible for this virus to jump from the lab. Or the many interviews with actual scientists. We deal in facts, and viewers can judge for themselves.”

The New York Times Science and Health reporter Apoorva Mandavilli called any mention of the lab theory “racist.” At NPR, an endless stream of segments ran dismissing the lab leak notion, painting it as a debunked conspiracy theory of the far right, including one story titled “Scientists Debunk Lab Accident Theory of Pandemic Emergence.”

I consider it valuable to have voices like Hultzik’s that still challenge the lab theory — just as I thought it was valuable to have lab theorists voice their views. The difference is that critics of the lab theory are not being canceled, but continue to be celebrated for their prior work. To the contrary, figures like Scott Atlas have shown how those educators who helped lead the mob against dissenters still hold positions of power. These figures should not be canceled for holding opposing views, but their conduct in silencing others should be reviewed.

Despite the vindication of scientists on their opposition to policies on the use of surgical masks, the closure of schools, and other issues, there have not been any repercussions for those who enforced the orthodoxy and intolerance during the pandemic in higher education. The fact is that most are now willing to admit that the lab theory is probably correct, but they are unwilling to forgive those who forced them into that admission.

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“All Western nations are essentially on the same path to dispossession.”

• The Last White Generation (Paul Craig Roberts)

Immigrant-invader elected to US Congress introduces bill to abolish US border protection White ethnicities in Europe, the UK, and the white former British colonies in the “New World” continue to actively participate in their own demise by encouraging massive inflows of hostile and unassimilable immigrant-invaders who are provided not only with material support by the white populations that are being overrun but also with legal privileges that the white citizens do not have. As Lenin once asked, “What is to be done?”


Unfortunately, white ethnicities do not have a leader of Lenin’s capability. Those few whites aware of the problem have come up with “Remigration” and recently held a summit. The conclusion was that time is against white ethnicities because the last white generation that can respond to the threat is the current one. All that “come after us will already be born into this multicultural atmosphere and so it will be normal to them” for white ethnicities to be second-class citizens discriminated against by their governments and facing dispossession of their rights, possessions, and lives.

In the recent overrunning of a Spanish city we see the inability of Western civilization to respond to attack by privileged persons of color. Enoch Powell warned the British in the 1960s, Jean Raspail warned he French and all of Europe, including Russia, in the 1970s, and Wilmot Robertson warned the Americans in the 1970s. But the insouciant, ignorant, and utterly stupid white ethnicities paid no heed, and now they, leaderless, face elimination. There is no more endangered species on earth than white ethnicities.

White ethnicities everywhere have proven themselves to be so throughly brainwashed and indoctrinated against themselves as to be incapable of defending themselves. Their remaining time on earth is limited. Remigration was President Lincoln’s solution for America’s Africans. His plan, terminated by his assassination, was to return Africans to Africa or perhaps send them to Central America. The “Great Emancipator ” freed the slaves so he could return them to Africa.

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Debt Rattle July 30 2026

Jul 302026
 
 July 30, 2026  Posted by at 8:32 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , ,  33 Responses »


Pablo Picasso Girl Before A Mirror 1932


• New US Attack Wave On Iran Begins In Overnight Hours(ZH)
• Rand Paul Delivers a Cinematic Indictment of Fauci’s COVID Legacy (Queen)
• Paul Confirms Plans For Fauci Contempt Vote (JTN)
• Hawley Exposed Fauci’s 5th Amendment Charade, Then the Takedown (Margolis)
• ’Who the F**k Do You Think You Were?’ Moreno Destroys Fauci (Margolis)
• Senate Fan Girls for Zelenskyy then Advances Russian Sanction Bill 86-12 (CTH)
• Britain Backs Ukraine With New Electronic Warfare Cooperation (RFE/RL)
• Trump Admin Asks SCOTUS To Revive Mail-In Voting Order Ahead Of Midterms (AmG)
• DOJ and Trump Ask Supreme Court to Review $83.3 Million Carroll Verdict (ET)
• Trump Urges SCOTUS To Overturn E. Jean Carroll’s $83M Defamation Verdict (CNN)
• CNN Trump Midrerms Poll (CNN)
• Welcome to Socialism’: A Clinton Hand’s Stark Warning About Mamdani (Green)
• The Mamdani Grocery Grift (Turley)
• Laura Loomer Says There’s No Nazi Problem In Ukraine. What She Didn’t See (RT)
• The End Of Freedom – The Last Breath Of A Dying Continent (Adams)

 


 

 


 

https://twitter.com/VigilantFox/status/2082500161914257556?s=20 https://twitter.com/EricLDaugh/status/2082524598277378179?s=20

 


 


Losing Zerohedge support?!

• New US Attack Wave On Iran Begins In Overnight Hours

The United States has begun a new round of airstrikes in Iran in the night time and early morning hours (local), according to a senior US official to Axios. The extent of the bombings, or whether they will be sustained, remains unclear: Trump “is in an escalatory mood” but is still contemplating “the depth of that response.”, A senior administration official says – WSJ. Trump is apparently making good on his earlier Wednesday threat: President Trump has told Fox News that he is “going to beat the fucking shit” out of Iran in response to their attack on US forces in Jordan overnight. Speaking to Trey Yingst, he added “we’ll be hitting them hard, they’re going to get a beating.”


There was heavy US refueler activity in regional skies just ahead of the strikes’ commencement – as well as unconfirmed reports of explosions at Riyadh’s international airport, but the cause has remained subject to speculation. But with each attack on Iran, its forces tend to respond in kind against Gulf countries hosting US assets and bases. It is going to be a long night for the region, especially while bracing for the IRGC’s inevitable response.

US is quite clearly stuck, in search of a strategy…

Details of Trump-Netanyahu Meeting at Oval Finally Emerging
After on Tuesday President Trump hosted both Zelensky and Netanyahu in the Oval Office there were no big press conferences or readouts given. But on Wednesday some key statements have begun to emerge concerning what was discussed, but at this point only offered via the Israeli side…

To be expected, Iran and the nuclear question dominated the discussions, according to i24’s Ariel Oseran, with Israeli officials describing a White House focused on three possible paths forward. “Trump is weighing three options: a nuclear deal, maintaining and intensifying the economic blockade, or renewed military strikes,” one official said, adding, “We didn’t tell Trump Israel’s preference is a strike. Our preference is the outcome. The decision is ultimately his.”

…talk about stating the obvious. But Israeli still maintains that the situation is at tipping point inside Iran, which according to more independent ‘realist’ analysts seems highly dubious. Israeli officials argued that Tehran is under mounting internal strain. “Iran is under severe economic pressure” due to fuel and diesel shortages, roughly 90% inflation, and “the beginning of public protests.” They added, “We discussed increasing pressure on Iran, both economically and kinetically.”

On Iran’s leadership, officials said, “We know for certain Mujtaba is alive, but since Operation Rising Lion no one has seen him.” Regarding Iran’s military capabilities, they claimed, “Iran now has only 1,500–1,600 missiles left after we destroyed much of its production capability.” Expletives fly and Trump talks ‘tough’ – but this whole gambit has been a bombing campaign in search of a strategy…

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Today, Fauci is an 85-year old grandpa. You should have gotten to him when it mattered.

• Rand Paul Delivers a Cinematic Indictment of Fauci’s COVID Legacy (Queen)

We’ve seen it countless times: the dramatic courtroom scene. It could be an attorney, or it might be the person testifying. But someone in a courtroom delivers a stirring speech that makes the difference in a case or makes a statement altogether. The courtroom scene is a hallmark of scriptwriting. From To Kill a Mockingbird to A Few Good Men to countless episodes of Law & Order, writers love a good grandstanding courtroom speech. And on Wednesday, Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) delivered a takedown of Dr. Anthony Fauci that screenwriters could easily drool over.


Paul reminded Fauci and everybody watching and listening of the costs of Fauci’s COVID-19 policies: The COVID lockdown could never have been inflicted without you aiding and abetting the crime. Children lost years of education, small businesses built over a lifetime disappeared, patients delayed cancer screenings and other medical care, families were separated from dying relatives, workers were ordered to accept a medical procedure or lose their jobs, worship assembly, employment, education, and travel were restricted in the name of science. While you did not impose every restriction, you used your public authority to justify them.

My own experiences during that period bear witness. My dad was in a hospital with cancer ravaging his body, with family unable to visit him (and a cellphone that went dead because a nurse misplaced his charging cable). By the grace of God, he came home with hospice, and we got to spend his last two days with him as a family. I was on staff at my church at the time, and even in the first state to open back up, we felt compelled to continue weird protocols for months “out of an abundance of caution” — a phrase I never hope to have to utter again.

We can’t ignore the damage that Fauci’s COVID policies did to businesses, churches, and even some families. Some politicians dutifully followed them for months and even years after the danger of the first waves of the pandemic was long gone.

Side note: Keisha Lance Bottoms, who famously declared that “Atlanta Isn’t Ready to Reopen—And Neither Is Georgia,” now wants to run the Peach State. The Atlanta mayor demanded that people wear masks outside long after Gov. Brian Kemp (R-Ga.) opened the state back up. We have to hold her accountable by making sure she never holds public office again.

Paul savaged Fauci for his word games on gain-of-function research: On May 11, 2021, you told the Senate the NIH has never, ever, and does not now fund gain-of-function research in Wuhan at the Wuhan Institute of Virology. When I gave you the opportunity to correct the record to reconsider the statement, you responded that you had never before lied to Congress. We were then told that only the government’s narrowest regulation of definition counted here. That you could define gain-of-function in one way in which this was not gain-of-function, in which all of the common sense of the world be thrown out…

The American people were not asking for a semantics debate over what is gain-of-function. They were asking, does common sense say this research was dangerous in Wuhan? They wanted to know whether their money funded experiments in Wuhan that made bad coronaviruses better able to infect humans. The answer is, yes.

https://twitter.com/townhallcom/status/2082449192895566181?s=20

Finally, and possibly most devastatingly, Paul pointed out that the biggest thing that Fauci and his league of arrogant scientists did was destroy trust in institutions — possibly rightly so, but it happened under Fauci’s watch nonetheless. “There will be another pandemic. There will be another crisis. And there will again be officials that insist uncertainty must be hidden for the public’s own good. They will demand obedience. They will invoke science. “I am the science!” as though it were a commandment. They will argue that government officials cannot be questioned, because questioning them would undermine public trust. They have it backwards.

It is secrecy that destroys trust. It is arrogance that destroys trust. It is censorship that destroys trust. And it is the refusal to admit error that destroys trust. That loss of trust may be YOUR MOST DAMAGING LEGACY. Trust can’t be ordered. It has to be earned. No scientist is above scrutiny. No government official is beyond accountability. And no public servant has the right to treat suffering of millions of Americans as a footnote to his preferred version of history.”

https://twitter.com/townhallcom/status/2082450685337960467?s=20

Of course, we watched as Fauci pleaded the Fifth repeatedly. We gleefully enjoyed Paul ejecting Fauci’s attorney from the chambers. But it’s hard to imagine a more cinematic moment than those opening remarks from Paul. Good stuff.

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“The question on contempt will be voted on and then there’s the question of whether or not the Department of Justice will take that up,” he said.

• Paul Confirms Plans For Fauci Contempt Vote (JTN)

Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., on Wednesday confirmed that his Senate committee would hold a contempt of Congress vote against Dr. Anthony Fauci after he invoked the 5th Amendment to avoid answering questions. “We believe… he didn’t need to hide behind the 5th Amendment and that maybe the 5th Amendment doesn’t attach when you have a pardon in place,” he told reporters. “The question on contempt will be voted on and then there’s the question of whether or not the Department of Justice will take that up.”


Fauci appeared before the Senate Homeland Security Committee on Wednesday and declined to answer questions, citing the 5th Amendment. Multiple senators, including Paul and Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., have questioned whether Fauci could legitimately invoke the 5th Amendment due to his pardon from President Joe Biden. Hawley opined that Fauci was improperly invoking the 5th Amendment to avoid answering uncomfortable questions about his increase in wealth during the COVID-19 pandemic. Fauci declined to respond.

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“Fauci, while Americans were dying by the hundreds of thousands during the COVID-19 pandemic, directed his own staff to solicit cash prizes on his behalf..”

• Hawley Exposed Fauci’s 5th Amendment Charade, Then the Takedown (Margolis)

Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) didn’t just question Anthony Fauci on Wednesday. He dismantled him methodically in front of the entire country, using nothing but public records, a Supreme Court precedent, and a series of questions so basic that a child could have answered them. Fauci had exactly one response prepared for every question senators asked him during the hearing: a canned invocation of his Fifth Amendment rights.The only problem is that Fauci doesn’t have Fifth Amendment protection anymore. President Biden pardoned him in the final hours of his term, which means that Fauci cannot legally “stand upon his privilege,” as the Supreme Court ruled all the way back in 1896.


Hawley knew that. He built his entire line of questioning around forcing Fauci to demonstrate it to the world, starting with the simplest possible setup. “Well, nothing says honesty like taking the fifth, huh, doc?” Hawley asked. “Let’s try something. What day of the week is it today?” “On the advice of counsel, I respectfully decline to answer based upon my rights under the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution,” Fauci said.Hawley asked what color tie Fauci was wearing.Same answer. He asked what color the carpet was in front of him.Same answer again.

Three questions. Zero risk of self-incrimination. Three invocations of a constitutional right that, thanks to his own pardon, Fauci doesn’t legally possess anymore. That’s when Hawley reminded him.”Let’s just get one thing straight, you don’t have any rights under the Fifth Amendment because you’ve been pardoned,” Hawley said. “As you very well know, as the Supreme Court has been clear for a century and more, Brown v. Walker, 1896. When he has been pardoned, he may not stand upon his privilege.” From there, Hawley moved from exposing the absurdity of Fauci’s stonewalling to laying out exactly why Fauci was hiding behind it. The answer, according to Hawley, is money.

Hawley walked through how Fauci, while Americans were dying by the hundreds of thousands during the COVID-19 pandemic, directed his own staff to solicit cash prizes on his behalf, using federal time, federal resources, and federal email accounts. Hawley named the staffers: Greg Folkers and Patricia Conrad, Fauci’s chief of staff and personal assistant. Both, Hawley said, spent government time chasing awards for their boss. One of those awards was the Dan David Award, worth $900,000. Hawley read from an email Folkers sent seeking help padding Fauci’s nomination. “I’m working on this nomination for the Dan David Award for Fauci,” the email read, according to Hawley.

“We need to beef up the COVID part. Do you have language in the can that you can share that delineates how we responded in new ways to COVID?” That wasn’t the only prize on the list. Hawley cited the Partnership for Public Service Award, the Adelson Prize, the Smithsonian Award, the National Academy of Medicine Award, and an award from the CDC Foundation, all pursued using federal employees on the taxpayers’ dime. “You turned your staff into a full-time application machine,” Hawley said. He noted Fauci’s staff didn’t stop at applying. They pressured federal ethics officials to approve the payouts. “We want to get to yes because Fauci wants the money,” one email read, according to Hawley.

Federal law bars government employees from soliciting cash awards or personal benefits, and it bars using subordinates to do it for them. Hawley cited the regulation by number, 5 C.F.R. Section 2635.205(b), and dared Fauci to explain how none of it applied to him. Fauci said nothing. He couldn’t.Hawley closed by putting Fauci’s fortune on the table. Fauci’s net worth now tops $12 million. His pension paid out more than $400,000 in its first year alone. Fauci built all of it, Hawley argued, while a million Americans died and he was busy chasing awards and sitting for glossy magazine profiles.

“You could sit for InStyle magazine, but you can’t answer questions for the American people,” Hawley said. Then came the closing blow. Hawley told Fauci that his silence spoke louder than any answer could have.”Silence is admission,” Hawley said. He accused Fauci of turning the pandemic into a vehicle for personal glory, calling him “a narcissist and a megalomaniac and a liar” who “disgraced” his own profession. “You’ve done more to harm science than anybody in my lifetime,” Hawley told him. “I hope you’ll go home and write that in your diary.”

I bet he will.

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“..I decided I’m going to give up my businesses, sell them all, run for office, run through the United States Senate. Here I am sitting in front of you, six years later, saying, who the f**k do you think you were for doing that? It is a total disgrace what you did to this country..”

• ’Who the F**k Do You Think You Were?’ Moreno Destroys Fauci (Margolis)

Sen. Bernie Moreno (R-Ohio) walked into Wednesday’s hearing wanting one thing from Dr. Anthony Fauci: an apology. He didn’t get one. Fauci came to Capitol Hill, read an opening statement, then refused to answer a single question that followed it. He wouldn’t even answer Sen. Rand Paul’s (R-Ky.) question about whether a folder was sitting right in front of him. Moreno used his time to remind Fauci exactly what the last six years cost him personally, and what they cost the country.


“It was about six years ago, today that I decided I’m going to give up my businesses, sell them all, run for office, run through the United States Senate. Here I am sitting in front of you, six years later, saying, who the f**k do you think you were for doing that? It is a total disgrace what you did to this country,” Moreno said. He turned next to the colleagues who spent years defending Fauci in public. “I hope the voters of the United States of America watch the clips of every one of you doting on a guy who was more interested in being a celebrity than saving American people,” Moreno said. “You may have had a 50-plus-year legacy of public service, but it ends in total and complete disgrace.”

Then Moreno asked the only question that mattered. “Will you apologize, just apologize to the people who you harmed through your actions? Do you have the dignity to just say you’re sorry?” Moreno asked.”On the advice of counsel, I respectfully decline to answer based upon my rights under the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution,” Fauci said.

Fauci repeated that one sentence over and over again through the rest of the hearing. Moreno asked about service members discharged for refusing the vaccine. Fifth Amendment. He asked about business owners who lost everything during the lockdowns. Fifth Amendment. He asked about parents who strapped masks onto toddlers too young to understand why. Fifth Amendment. He asked about families who buried relatives who trusted Fauci’s word on booster after booster. Fifth Amendment.

Moreno brought up the Ohio mother arrested for watching a football game with her family during the pandemic. Fauci answered the same way. By the end, Moreno stopped asking questions and started making a point. He noted that James Madison, the man who wrote the Fifth Amendment, once lived a few blocks from the hearing room, and wondered aloud what Madison would think of a public health official invoking it to dodge accountability for his own decisions. “It’s no secret why you have to hire the biggest dirtbag attorney on the planet,” Moreno said. “I hope you’re paying him well, and I hope that one way or the other, somewhere, sometime, you answer for your crimes.”

Fauci’s reputation was already shot by the time he showed up on Capitol Hill, but boy did he absolutely destroy his legacy today.

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“Senators, grown adults awaiting Zelenskyy’s arrival, clinging to every word, clamoring to be first in line for his reception, competing against each other for time standing next to him..”

• Senate Fan Girls for Zelenskyy then Advances Russian Sanction Bill 86-12 (CTH)

The behavior of the U.S. senators clamoring to be with Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy reflects a certain level of disconnect that needs to be witnessed to be realized. Senators, grown adults awaiting Zelenskyy’s arrival, clinging to every word, clamoring to be first in line for his reception, competing against each other for time standing next to him, the entire event was grotesque and creepy.



Shortly after the guided tour of the upper chamber, the Golden Child was carried on a gilded chariot into the viewing chamber while trumpets blared, senators took turns bringing forth their taxpayer funded indulgences, and Senator Jeanne Shaheen knelt down at his feet and peeled Zelenskyy’s grapes. Yeah, that’s the vibe. The “Lindsey O. Graham Sanctioning Russia and Iran Act of 2026” was then advanced by the Senate in an 86 to 12 procedural vote teeing up the bill for final passage in the Senate later this week. However, I would challenge people to READ THE BILL, it’s only 61-pages.

Within the bill you will note almost everything within the law is left to the enforcement discretion of the President; which normally would not be of great concern, however, given the punishment for violations – things may get sketchy depending on who is in office.A foreign person who “undermines the peace, security, political stability, or territorial integrity of Ukraine;” and/or “undermines the democratic processes of Ukraine,” will be in violation of the U.S. law and subject to fines, travel or visa restrictions. [Page 13, page 28] As a consequence, any person who may be critical of Ukraine -undermining the democratic process via criticism- can be punished by the U.S. President.

Page 36 applies a 100% U.S. tariff against the import of any country’s goods into the USA if that country purchase energy products from Russia (with qualifiers). The intent of that section is to stop China and/or India from purchasing Russian oil and gas. As noted by Politico, ‘the revamped bill expands the number of Russian entities that would be subject to mandatory sanctions — including Russia’s shadow fleet of ships ferrying oil — but it also grants Trump broad waiver authority.’ The House is in summer recess, so things may stall even if the Senate (very pro-Ukraine) passes the bill.

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Their thought: Once there is war with Russia, nobody will notice the mess they made domestically.

• Britain Backs Ukraine With New Electronic Warfare Cooperation (RFE/RL)

President Volodymyr Zelensky met British Prime Minister Andy Burnham on July 27 as he kicked off a key week of talks with officials around the world to bolster Ukraine’s defenses amid a rising civilian death toll from Russian air strikes back home. Zelensky became the first foreign leader hosted by Burnham since he took office one week ago following the resignation of fellow Labour Party member Keir Starmer. The two leaders met at the Portsmouth Naval Base on England’s southern coast as Burnham pledged his country’s “unwavering” support for Kyiv as the war with Russia runs well into its fifth year.


Zelensky said being the first foreign leader to meet Burnham was “an important signal of support.””We discussed our defense for Ukraine, it is important to have sufficient capabilities to protect lives both in the sky and at sea,” Zelensky wrote on social media after the meeting, adding the development of joint defense production was also touched upon.Burnham and Zelensky were later scheduled to meet some of the 200 Ukrainian military personnel who have been in Britain the past three weeks participating in a maritime security and counter-mine exercise in preparation for potential future Black Sea missions.

‘Stone Cloak’ System
Burnham announced the sharing of the intellectual property behind Britain s new Stone Cloak electronic warfare system, enabling Ukraine to produce the technology itself. The jammers, the size of a tablet computer, can be used to prevent Russian air defenses from tracking and targeting drones when attached to the projectiles, officials said.Downing Street pointed out that the United Kingdom’s support for Ukraine has reached 25 billion pounds ($33 billion) since Russia’s full-scale invasion of February 2022, including 16 billion pounds ($21 billion) in direct military assistance.

Following the London visit, Zelensky is scheduled to travel to Washington on July 28 for talks with US President Donald Trump. Zelensky is also expected to attend the funeral of US Senator Lindsey Graham, who died earlier this month. The Republican lawmaker was a vocal Ukraine supporter and had traveled to Kyiv for meetings with Zelensky days before his death.

Russia, Ukraine Exchange Deadly Strikes
Five people, including a child, were killed and eight injured in a Ukrainian drone attack on Russia’s Rostov region, local officials reported on July 27. Rostov Region Governor Yuri Slyusar said rescuers recovered bodies, two adults and one child, from the rubble of an apartment building hit by a drone, while emergency crews continue recovery operations and provide assistance to victims. Zelensky, in a post on X, said that Ukraine’s long-range strikes hit an export terminal in the Rostov region and oil facilities in the Yaroslavl and Udmurtia regions to reduce Russia’s ability to finance the war.

“Last night, our long-range sanctions were effective in the Rostov region. An export terminal approximately 250 kilometers from the front line was hit. Deep strikes also targeted oil facilities in the Yaroslavl region and the Udmurt Republic, which is 1,300 kilometers from Ukraine’s state border,” Zelenskyy wrote. Meanwhile, the death toll continued to rise in Ukraine, with the capital, Kyiv, coming under a Russian ballistic missile attack on July 26, authorities said, while other regions suffered air strikes during the day that led to at least six deaths.

In the northern Ukrainian city of Chernihiv, a Russian drone struck a supermarket, killing two people and wounding 25, Ukraine’s emergency services said. “This is deliberate Russian terror that has no military justification,” Zelensky wrote on Telegram. Regional Governor Ivan Fedorov said a glide bomb attack killed one person and wounded six in the southern Ukrainian city of Zaporizhzhya, which has been a frequent target of Russian bombardment.

In the frontline city of Slovyansk in Ukraine’s Donetsk region, the Naftogaz oil and gas company said two of its employees were killed in a Russian attack while trying to help residents affected by an earlier air strike. One person was killed, and eight others were injured in a Russian strike on the town of Balakliya in Ukraine’s Kharkiv region on July 27, regional authorities reported.Russia denies targeting civilian areas despite widespread evidence of such attacks that have killed thousands of people since the start of Russia s full-scale invasion.

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`What else can they do?

• Trump Admin Asks SCOTUS To Revive Mail-In Voting Order Ahead Of Midterms (AmG)

The Trump administration asked the Supreme Court on Monday to let the president’s mail-in voting executive order take effect ahead of the midterms, after a federal appeals court sided with Democrat-led states seeking to keep it blocked just months before Election Day.


Trump signed the order in March, directing the Postal Service to restrict delivery of mail-in ballots in states that refuse to hand over lists of eligible voters. It also orders the Department of Homeland Security and Social Security Administration to compile lists of verified absentee voters for the Postal Service to reference, and threatens to withhold federal funds from states that do not comply, part of a larger effort by the president to tighten a mail voting system he has long argued is vulnerable to abuse.

A federal judge in Massachusetts blocked the order in June, ruling that its timing made it impossible for the Postal Service to propose the rule through proper channels and would deny Congress its required chance to weigh in. The 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld that ruling Saturday, rejecting the administration’s appeal and leaving the order blocked in the 23 states and Washington, D.C., that sued to stop it.

In Monday’s filing, Solicitor General D. John Sauer argued the injunction improperly impedes the president’s authority over the executive branch, noting the Postal Service falls within it despite its independent structure. Sauer warned that further delay could make the order impossible to implement in time for November even if the administration ultimately wins on appeal. “Every day that the agencies are unable to take steps to carry out the Executive Order as to the November 2026 election makes it less likely that they will, as a practical matter, be able to implement any lists or rules that they ultimately finalize, even if they obtain appellate relief,” the filing states.

The order is one piece of a larger push by Trump to overhaul election security, an effort that has repeatedly run into resistance from federal judges. Trump has also urged Congress to pass his SAVE America Act, which would restrict mail voting and require identification to cast a ballot, though the legislation has stalled on Capitol Hill despite mounting pressure from the president.

Trump devoted a primetime address earlier this month to laying out his concerns about election interference, releasing declassified documents alongside the speech. Trump used the address to direct federal agencies to investigate a Michigan get-out-the-vote operation and to examine whether intelligence officials withheld information about Chinese efforts to influence the 2020 election.

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“In the new petition, the Justice Department argues Trump’s 2019 White House statements denying the allegations were official acts protected by federal law.”: ”Trump may have to pay almost $100 million in damages and interest “for issuing a press release and answering reporters’ questions, from the White House ..”

• DOJ and Trump Ask Supreme Court to Review $83.3 Million Carroll Verdict (ET)

The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) asked the U.S. Supreme Court on July 28 to intervene in the defamation dispute between President Donald Trump and writer E. Jean Carroll. The DOJ is arguing in the petition in United States v. Carroll that the federal government—not Trump personally—should be the defendant in the case that led to an $83.3 million verdict against Trump. At the same time, Trump’s private attorneys filed a petition with the high court in the case of Trump v. Carroll, asking the justices to review the same verdict, largely on grounds of presidential immunity.


The DOJ’s petition, a copy of which was obtained by The Epoch Times, focuses on the federal Westfall Act, which shields federal employees from personal liability for common law tort lawsuits arising from their government employment. Common law refers to the body of law developed over centuries by court rulings, as opposed to statutes passed by legislatures. A tort is a wrongful act or infringement of a right that gives rise to civil liability. When the U.S. attorney general certifies that a federal employee—including a president—was acting in an official capacity, the United States is usually substituted as the defendant, and the individual ends up being dismissed from the lawsuit.

The $83.3 million verdict arose from statements Trump made in mid-2019 while he was president, in which he denied Carroll’s allegation that he sexually assaulted her in the mid-1990s. Trump denied the claim in an official White House statement and again when speaking to reporters—statements the jury found defamatory. In 2020, then-Attorney General William Barr, who served in Trump’s Cabinet, certified under the Westfall Act that Trump’s statements were within the scope of his official duties. As a result, the case, which had been pending in New York state court, was transferred to federal court. Then in 2023, then-Attorney General Merrick Garland, who served in President Joe Biden’s Cabinet, took the unusual step of withdrawing the certification, the petition said.

This allowed the lawsuit to move forward against Trump personally, after which the jury found for Carroll, rendering the $83.3 million verdict. While an appeal was pending, Trump was reelected, and in April 2025, his attorney general appointee, Pam Bondi, recertified Trump’s conduct and made a motion to substitute the United States as the defendant in the case. The Second Circuit blocked Bondi’s recertification, an action the DOJ argues the court was not entitled to take. The DOJ also argues the Second Circuit misinterpreted the Westfall Act.

“This petition presents the question whether the Westfall Act contains an implicit timing restriction barring the Attorney General’s posttrial recertification. Such a restriction does not exist,” the petition said of Bondi’s action. If the United States replaces Trump as the defendant, Carroll’s defamation claim would almost certainly fail. The Federal Tort Claims Act, which covers lawsuits against the government, specifically excludes defamation claims. The DOJ urged the Supreme Court to take the case, arguing it raises potentially significant institutional stakes.

Trump may have to pay almost $100 million in damages and interest “for issuing a press release and answering reporters’ questions, from the White House, defending against attacks on his fitness for office,” the petition said. Trump’s petition in Trump v. Carroll argues that the Second Circuit was wrong to treat presidential immunity like an ordinary legal defense that can be lost if not raised in time, and that the appeals court didn’t actually decide whether immunity protected Trump’s 2019 statements.

If the Second Circuit’s “mistreatment of Presidential immunity and the Westfall Act” are not corrected, there will be reverberations far beyond this case, as the threat of a single judgment for damages based on official acts will prevent presidents from “fearlessly” executing their duties, the petition said. The $83.3 million verdict is separate from a prior $5 million civil verdict Carroll secured in 2023. In that case, a jury found Trump liable for sexually abusing Carroll in the 1990s and for defaming her again in 2022 when he was out of office.

The Supreme Court recently declined to take up Trump’s challenge to the $5 million verdict, but Trump has asked the court to reconsider its ruling. It is unclear whether the Supreme Court will take up the two new petitions.

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“This is the first case in our nation’s history in which a court has imposed damages liability on a president for his conduct in office,”

• Trump Urges SCOTUS To Overturn E. Jean Carroll’s $83M Defamation Verdict (CNN)

President Donald Trump on Tuesday urged the Supreme Court to once again step into his messy legal brawl with magazine columnist E. Jean Carroll, appealing an $83.3 million jury verdict for defamation on the grounds that, as president, he is immune from the litigation.The appeal, which has not yet been docketed at the high court, relies heavily on the court’s 2024 decision granting the president wide immunity for actions taken in office.


“This is the first case in our nation’s history in which a court has imposed damages liability on a president for his conduct in office,” Trump’s attorneys told the high court, according to a copy of the appeal reviewed by CNN. “Yet, in upholding the exorbitant $83.3 million defamation judgment here, the Second Circuit never even decided whether presidential immunity applies.” Trump told the justices that an appeals court decision in Carroll’s favor would “cause significant damage, not only to this president and future presidents” but also the nation.

In addition to raising the prospect that Trump should be immune from the litigation, Trump is also asking the court to review whether the United States government should be the defendant rather than the president. “Here, the president of the United States has been ordered to pay nearly $100 million in damages … for issuing a press release and answering reporters’ questions, from the White House, defending against attacks on his fitness for office,” his attorneys told the court. The latest appeal comes weeks after the Supreme Court declined to take up a separate case from Trump in which the president is seeking to unwind a $5 million civil verdict that found he sexually abused and defamed Carroll at a Bergdorf Goodman department store in the 1990s.

Trump has denied wrongdoing in both cases. The new appeal involves statements Trump made against Carroll in 2019, when he was president, that a jury found were defamatory and ordered him to pay $83 million in damages. A federal appeals court panel affirmed the damages award, finding it “reasonable in light of the extraordinary and egregious facts” and rejected several of Trump’s legal challenges. Among them, the appeals court found that Trump had previously waived any claim of presidential immunity and said the Supreme Court’s decision in 2024 involving presidential immunity did not alter their view.

The full 2nd US Circuit Court of Appeals declined to revisit that decision in late April. At that time, one of the appeals court judges who sided with Carroll wrote that Trump had first brought up his immunity claims far too late in the litigation.

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CNN hates Trump. So they make this of his polls.

Note: The CNN poll was conducted by SSRS from July 23-27 among a random national sample of 1,225 US adults drawn from a probability-based panel. Surveys were either conducted online or by telephone with a live interviewer. Results have a margin of sampling error of ±3.2 percentage points.

• CNN Trump Midrerms Poll (CNN)

President Donald Trump, pictured in the Oval Office on July 21, during a meeting with the President of Lebanon
A record-high 73% of US adults say that President Donald Trump hasn’t paid enough attention to the country’s most important problems, a new CNN poll conducted by SSRS finds, with just 27% saying he’s had the right priorities. That comes amid increasingly bleak views of the Iran war, stagnating economic unhappiness, and broad discontent about Trump’s approach to these challenges.Roughly two-thirds of Americans think that Trump’s policies have worsened economic conditions and that his military decisions in Iran have hurt the US. Around three-quarters say the president is not in touch with the problems ordinary Americans face in their daily lives.


Trump’s overall approval rating, 34%, matches the career low he last saw at the close of his first term, following the January 6, 2021, insurrection. Half of Americans now strongly disapprove of him, a high across his terms, with a record-low 15% strongly approving. Within his own party, his approval rating has hit a new low at 78% among Republicans, and just 19% of Republicans say they’re enthusiastic about the rest of his second term, down from 38% last spring. While his ratings are underwater across a range of issues tested, Trump sees his lowest numbers on a trio of interconnected issues:

Just 28% approve of his handling of the situation in Iran, 25% on inflation and 21% on gas prices, with significant pockets of disapproval even among his supporters. With an increasing majority of Americans anticipating a long-term military conflict, only about one-quarter think Trump has a clear plan for handling the situation, down from 40% at the start of the war. And 62% now say Trump is not an effective world leader, up from 54% who felt that way early in his second term. Just one-quarter now say the war has been worth the toll in American lives and dollars, with younger Americans particularly skeptical.

On the most tangible economic fallout of the conflict in Iran, 74% of Americans say rising gas prices have caused them at least some hardship, up from 63% in March, with just under one-quarter believing the president has a plan to address the issue. And 71% say Trump hasn’t gone far enough in trying to reduce the price of everyday goods, up from 58% a year ago. There are few domestic bright spots for the president, whose issue approval ratings top out at 41% for handling voting rights and election integrity – one topic where his supporters have rallied most closely around him.

Just 39% of Americans approve of Trump’s handling of immigration, a relative positive at the start of his second term, with 35% approving of his management of the federal government. Following two recent deadly ICE shootings, Americans say by a 20-point margin that the agency is making cities less, not more, safe. And amid the cyclospora outbreak and a surge in measles cases, they say by a 34-point margin that changes to health agencies like the FDA and CDC are leaving the public less, not more, safe.

Trump has never gotten high marks in polling as someone who’s in touch with the problems of ordinary Americans. In the latest poll, just 27% say that description applies to him, while about two-thirds say that he’s someone who does not put the good of the country ahead of his personal gain.

Those numbers reflect broad skepticism about the high-profile projects that would leave Trump’s mark on the nation’s capital. A 58% majority of Americans say they feel dissatisfied or angry about the construction projects Trump has undertaken in Washington, DC, including the effort to build a new White House ballroom and renovate the Reflecting Pool. Just 17% express positive feelings, with another 25% saying it doesn’t matter to them.

At the time of Trump’s second inauguration, nearly half of Americans thought it was at least somewhat likely that Trump would avoid conflicts between his family’s company and his work as president, but a scant 23% think he’s done so at least somewhat well. And 57% say it’s a bad thing that Trump earned more than $2 billion last year while serving as an elected official, including income from cryptocurrency holdings, royalty payments and property investments. Just 7% see that as a good thing, with 36% calling his earnings while president something that doesn’t matter much.

More than 6 in 10 say that Trump has gone too far in pursuing his personal business interests while serving as president and undertaking projects to remodel the White House and other Washington landmarks, with nearly as many saying he’s gone too far in making changes to cultural institutions like the Kennedy Center and the Smithsonian.

Construction on President Donald Trump’s White House ballroom is seen on July 14. Daniel Heuer/Bloomberg/Getty Images
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Mamdani = taxes.

• Welcome to Socialism’: A Clinton Hand’s Stark Warning About Mamdani (Green)

Dem strategist Mark Penn took to X during the wee hours Wednesday morning to warn the public about “the lie of socialism” represented by New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, but it’s really a cry for help over what’s happening to his party. Before we get to that, however, you need to understand just what a colossal screw-up Mamdani’s pied-à-terre tax really is. Because if what Penn says is correct — and apparently it is — it’s a colossal screw-up by design. And an oh-so-bitter taste of what New Yorkers are stuck with for the next three-and-a-half years.


In a piece headlined “Welcome to Socialism,” Penn wrote that Mamdani’s administration “with fanfare” released its list of “960,000 owners of real estate in New York City that have been determined they could owe the pied-a-terre tax because NYC computers have determined they own what was billed as a market value of $5 million or more.” So far, so socialist, right?But, Penn added, “there are only about one million residential tax lots in New York City so the first question is how did virtually every owner get put on the list?” Welcome to socialism, indeed.

“The answer is that you are subject to the tax in the first two years if your property has a “DOF valuation” of over $1 million. And so the $5 million figure was a fake,” Penn concluded. But here’s where we got to what Penn called “the interesting part” with understatement he must have choked on: “Once you are on the list you have to prove you should not be taxed by showing you are a resident. Or by challenging the valuation.””Good luck fighting the city bureaucrats on both of these counts. The individual litigation will be massive.” Socialism always starts with “soak the rich” but always ends with “stick it to everybody.” Mamdani is notable only for his speed.

But here’s what Penn missed in his piece.The New York Post reminded readers on Monday that “Mamdani threatened to raise city property taxes by a staggering 9.5% in February unless he was allowed to ‘tax the rich’ to cover a $12 billion budget gap that was later revised down to $5.4 billion.”The good news is that the hole in NYC’s budget got revised downward by more than $6 billion. The bad news is that “City Hall estimates the pied-à-terre tax would yield $500 million per year.” The worse news is that “Democratic city Comptroller Mark Levine’s office said the real figure would be closer to $340 to $380 million.” And the worst news is that critics of the tax say that it “could cause property values to plummet.”

“Add a tax of 4 to 6 per cent (yes condos are taxed that high now) a year of its DOF value to a condo or coop and that condo won’t be worth that much,” Penn explained. “And you can forget about out of town buyers. So this will destroy much of the home values that people have built up.” Mamdani’s brand of socialism is taxing everybody for unrealized gains on properties whose value Mamdani will destroy. Nifty, eh? He’s also the fresh new face of a Democratic Party that has grown so corrupt and stands for so little that Democratic Socialists in cities like New York have taken to wearing it like a skinsuit.

They even boast about it, and the most that even an old Clinton hand like Penn can do is whine about it on X. So the initial burst of pied-à-terre schadenfreude was over Mamdani supporters like Anna Wintour, Woody Allen, and Cynthia Nixon finding themselves on his Enemies of the People list. But today I’m standing in a puddle of my own schadenfreude as top-level Democrats like Penn come to realize just how badly the DSA takeover of their party is going to hurt them.

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“The plan is a multimillion-dollar version of the $5 gold watch grift. The chumps are New York taxpayers who believe that Mamdani can sell them produce at a discount of 30 percent below the market rate and not lose money. Indeed, this could end up the most expensive produce in the Big Apple.”

“The Mamdani con will cost New Yorkers millions, and most will thank him for it.”

• The Mamdani Grocery Grift (Turley)

Last week, Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s short stint as a faux president ended with an embarrassing acknowledgment that he could not, as promised during his campaign, arrest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. So, this week, Mamdani the Grocer made a reappearance, with details on the five city-run grocery stores that he will open. But rather than deliver discount groceries, Mamdani is selling New Yorkers a bill of goods that will cost them millions.


What Mamdani described was a discount food bank dressed up as a grocery. Standing in front of blackboards saying “REDUCED 30%,” Mamdani sounded like a bodega hawker: “Once a month, our five city-run grocery stores will set prices for this core set of goods at 30% below typical retail prices. No exceptions, no gimmicks” Here’s the most delicious part: the presser was a gimmick from beginning to end. The mayor promised that “The savings will last for the entire month. That means no weekly fluctuations or sticker shock at the checkout line — not for our seniors living on fixed incomes, nor for the parents who rely on a regular supply of apple slices to keep toddler tantrums at bay.”

The Mamdani markets are new variations of an old New York grift: selling gold watches for $5. The dupes want to believe that somehow this street vendor, surreptitiously displaying watches inside his overcoat, actually found a way to sell “solid gold watches” for just a few bucks. The math simply does not add up for Mamdani. Most groceries have an average profit margin between 1% and 3%, one of the smallest margins of any industry. To promise a 30% discount below market rate that cannot be adjusted due to monthly market fluctuations is economically absurd.

It is not a description of a competitive grocery but a public charity. It is a quasi-food bank where taxpayers subsidize the cost. As usual, Mamdani turns this into a class war, demonizing business owners. He suggests that real grocery stores are simply price gougers hoarding windfall profits from consumers. He ignores that they must pay rent, upkeep and fees — all things the city-run stores may simply write off. He proclaimed, “May the most affordable grocery store win.”

Of course, the test is not which grocery is the most affordable, but which is the most sustainable. If you are willing to take a bath on sales, you can always offer the most affordable prices for as long as your excess cash holds out. In Mamdani’s case, he has the credit of New York City to draw on to compete against Mom-and-Pop bodegas.The subsidy, however, is only part of the costs. The average bodega owner must cover the fixed costs of renting a space, building the store, and complying with inspectors. Those are the fixed costs that must be internalized into the cost of produce to break even.

Real stores are competing in one of the tightest markets in the world and are grappling with a 33% nationwide increase in costs since 2019. Mamdani wants to use the stores to prove that socialism works as part of his effort to introduce New York to the “warmth of socialism.” We may never know the real costs of the Mamdani markets. According to the New York Post, the city plans to open an East Harlem location as its first store, at a reported cost of $30 million.

However, that is not the full cost. The Post also reported that the city had already appropriated $25 million to improve the first site. The city will lose millions that could have been acquired through a sale of the land or through rents to private companies. Those costs are left on other ledgers and not likely counted in the true costs of the Mamdani markets. The first store will not even open until 2027 despite the props behind Mamdani. The second Manhattan store will not open until 2029. That is three years and tens of millions of dollars for just the first two stores.

That is how Mamdani is promising New Yorkers savings of “$90 a month, or roughly $1,000 a year.” He is using the city to subsidize food under the guise of selling at low, but still profitable prices. Ironically, those who can take advantage of the subsidy at the first two stores in Manhattan will be anyone, including the privileged, wealthy New Yorkers whom Mamdani denounces for not paying their fair share. After all, everyone wants below-market-priced slices in the Big Apple.

The first city-run grocery, in East Harlem, will cost $30 million to build — and perhaps more. It will never need to pay this money back nor factor it into its prices. The “warmth of socialism” will cover it; that is, you. In reality, Mamdani will be selling apples at a far greater cost than any competitor, but those true costs will be buried in the city budget and paid for by the taxpayers. Indeed, the Mamdani markets are likely to prove the most expensive groceries in the city.

Mamdani, however, has never sweated the math or the means. He knows that the focus will be on the cash register price and not the true cost. Of course, there is a big difference between the gold watch grift and the Mamdani grift: buying a knockoff watch only costs chumps a few bucks. The Mamdani con will cost New Yorkers millions, and most will thank him for it.

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“Does Zelensky’s Jewish identity settle Ukraine’s neo-Nazi question?”

• Laura Loomer Says There’s No Nazi Problem In Ukraine. What She Didn’t See (RT)

US conservative activist Laura Loomer arrived in Kiev after years of denouncing Ukraine’s “Nazi apologists.” She met Vladimir Zelensky, apologized for articles she had written for RT and said Russian media had “bamboozled” her. During their interview, Zelensky rejected the accusation Ukraine’s politics is riddled with neo-Nazi influence: the conutry had elected a Jewish president and even adopted a law against anti-Semitism, he argued. Loomer accepted his case and later amplified it in her X profile, stating that “Nazism is literally illegal in Ukraine” and that the country “has stronger anti-Semitism laws than the US.”


Loomer appears to have been persuaded by Zelensky’s Jewish identity, statements from rabbis supporting Ukraine, and Ukrainian laws against anti-Semitism and direct Nazi propaganda. None of these points directly addresses the Russian argument that a de facto Nazi regime has taken shape in the country. But when Russians speak of Nazism in Ukraine, they don’t really mean only anti-Jewish hatred. Ukrainian nationalism, aside from its direct connections to Hitler’s Reich in the Second World War, was born and existed as an idea of ethnic exclusivity directed against a whole range of other peoples.

Today’s Ukraine continues the history of this movement, little different from German Nazism. The Russian argument is that the modern Ukrainian state has revived aspects of this tradition.nThis is not only being noticed by Russians: in recent years, Ukraine’s fascination with Nazi-style politics and the glorification of Nazi collaborators themselves has led to conflicts with other neighboring countries, including the recent scandal with Poland.

Ukraine has pursued aggressive ethnonationalist policies for years now
Ukraine’s 2019 state language law made Ukrainian compulsory across government, education, commerce, public services, media and much of cultural life. While the law formally excludes private conversation, citizens of the country, millions of whom are Russian-speaking, face persecution for listening to music in Russian as well as the mass destruction of books, toppling of monuments and the removal of large parts of their cultural inheritance, which Ukrainian nationalists consider the “culture of the aggressor.”.

Even Western institutions, contrary to the overall pro-Ukrainian position of the West, have acknowledged that Ukrainian language laws do not provide adequate protection for the linguistic and cultural rights of all citizens. Since these statements were made, Zelensky has further tightened restrictions aimed at making life more difficult for those who speak Russian. The forced Ukrainization of education, media, and public spaces, conducted under the guise of ‘decolonization’, effectively means the marginalization of a significant percentage of Ukraine’s residents – those for whom the aggressive ideology of ethnic Ukrainian nationalism is neither natural nor acceptable.


The Zelensky government, like its predecessors, is using the protracted conflict with Russia to justify the implementation of a hostile and hateful ideology. This narrative merges civic and ethnic identity and pressures a huge segment of the population to accept a culture and language which is foreign to them, relearn under the threat of persecution, and give their children over to the state system, which will instill in them hatred for their own ancestors. The only other option is to leave the country, which millions did even before the start of the current phase of the conflict.

[They themselves are not shy about their radically chauvinistic view of Russia and Russian people.] Following his appointment as Zelensky’s new commander in chief last week, an embarrassing 2023 interview with Mikhail Drapaty resurfaced online, in which he outlined the Ukrainian state’s view towards Russians and Russian culture. “We see that you cannot call them neighbors. It is a nation, together with its leadership, that has no right to exist. Over thousands of years, nothing has changed there in terms of civilization,” he said.

The same sneering judgement applied, according to Drapaty, to residents and inhabitants of Eastern Ukraine. The Donbass region, the engine of the national economy until 2014, is full of “criminal elements” because “too little attention was paid to Ukrainization” and the population has not developed a Ukrainian national identity. Military intelligence chief Kirill Budanov went further, commenting on the murder of Russian journalist Darya Dugina in the same year. “We will keep killing Russians anywhere on the face of this world,” he said, “until the complete victory of Ukraine.”

Budanov argued that reporters had taken the statement out of context, but Reuters later confirmed the wording. Ukraine has repeatedly used methods designed to intimidate ordinary people and has shown little concern for the resulting civilian casualties. However, it had been suppressing the voices of Russian-speaking residents who advocate for their rights for years before the conflict – which killed some 14,000 people in eight years – escalated into a full-scale war, enforcing a hierarchy of national identities through political pressure and, at times, direct violence.

Ukraine’s mainstream political parties have largely accepted the language and education policies associated with forced Ukrainization. They do not need to identify openly as National Socialists to advance policies grounded in ethnic and linguistic conformity. Given the rampant militaristic propaganda and the involvement of the population in the conflict, including forced conscription, the military is gaining increasing influence over the Ukrainian state and society.

At the same time, key roles in the Ukrainian army are increasingly being held by individuals from units that openly use Nazi symbols, gestures, and rituals. Just this spring, Zelensky promoted the commander of the infamous Azov formation, known by the call sign “Redis,” to brigadier general. Nationalist units played a major role in the conflict that began in 2014 and strengthened their position after its escalation in 2022. Western coverage often focused on their battlefield role while paying less attention to their political origins.

Although Ukrainian propaganda claims that Nazi symbols are not very popular among the military, new evidence to the contrary appears with regularity – they’re not ashamed of wearing such symbols, even when receiving awards from a president who calls himself a Jew. .

Read more …

Not the present, but it is the future.

• The End Of Freedom – The Last Breath Of A Dying Continent (Adams)

They are killing us slowly. Not with bullets or blades, but with spreadsheets and algorithms, with policies drafted in climate-controlled rooms by people whose children will never shiver through a winter night without heat, whose pantries will never echo empty, whose futures remain secured behind gates we cannot approach.


In 2026, 333 million Europeans—more than the entire population of the United States—have fallen into energy poverty, a euphemism that cannot conceal the raw human suffering it describes, a bureaucratic term that sanitizes the screams of families watching their lives dismantled piece by piece.


Since 2021, utility costs have surged 47%, while wages stagnate in a cruel arithmetic that reduces families to penury. The numbers do not lie, even when governments do. Behind every percentage point stands a human being with a name, with memories, with children who ask why the heat does not work. Behind every data point lies a tragedy that statistics cannot capture—the sound of teeth chattering beneath thin blankets, the smell of cheap candles burning down to nothing, the silence of a home where conversation has stopped because speaking requires energy that hungry bodies cannot spare.

Look at these figures and understand that they represent flesh and blood. In Greece, 40% of households now face the impossible choice between heating and eating—a statistic that translates to grandmothers wrapping themselves in newspapers, to children doing homework by candlelight, to parents skipping meals so their sons might have warmth for one more night. The Greek winter of 2026 brought temperatures that dropped to -8°C in regions where insulation remains a luxury, where families huddle in single rooms wearing every garment they own, where the decision to turn on a heater for one hour means skipping dinner for three days.

Germany, once the industrial titan of Europe, now bleeds 15,000 manufacturing jobs each quarter, its factories darkening like dying stars. The Rhine Valley, which hummed with production for generations, now echoes with the footsteps of workers carrying boxes of personal effects, of security guards locking gates that may never reopen, of communities watching their purpose drain away like water into cracked earth. Energy bills now exceed rent payments by 23% across twelve member states, a reversal of economic reality that breaks families before they even begin, that ensures the poor remain poor and the middle class joins them in descent.

In Portugal, elderly citizens have begun collecting firewood in public parks, risking fines and arrest to secure warmth their pensions cannot purchase. In Poland, organized crime networks now control the black market for coal, selling inferior product at extortionate prices to desperate families who know that burning treated wood releases toxins but choose poison over freezing. The European Commission reports these trends as “energy market adjustments,” as if describing the migration of birds rather than the collapse of human dignity.

But the economic strangulation serves merely as prelude to a more comprehensive destruction. Step into any supermarket in Milan after 7 PM and witness the new normal: empty shelves where fresh produce once stood in abundance, security guards monitoring cooking oil purchases as if guarding gold reserves, elderly women weeping quietly beside discount bins where bruised vegetables wait for hands brave enough to claim them. The Italy that exported culinary culture to the world now imports 60% of its grain from nations that view food as geopolitical leverage, as a weapon more effective than any missile.

Read more …

 

 

 

 

https://twitter.com/VigilantFox/status/2081929230837760228?s=20

 

 

 

 

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Debt Rattle July 29 2026

Jul 292026
 
 July 29, 2026  Posted by at 10:08 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , ,  56 Responses »


Johannes Vermeer Woman in Blue Reading a Letter 1662-3


• War Pause Holds, Trump Vows To Destroy Pickaxe Mountain If No Deal (ZH)
• Mediators Say US-Iran ‘Close’ To ‘Resurrecting’ Failed MoU Deal (ZH)
• US Forces Block Attempted Iranian Surprise Attack (Catherine Salgado)
• New British Defense Secretary: Europe “Shaken Out Of Complacency” By Trump (ET)
• Zelenskyy Says Ukraine Intends to Build Drone and Missile Factory in UK (CTH)
• Cuba Falling: A Lot Happened Last Week. Let’s Talk About It (Sarah Anderson)
• NYC: Begun, the Class War Has (Stephen Green)
• The Future of Artificial Intelligence Is a Choice, Not an Inevitability (Dornik)
• This Fauci Diary Entry Will Cause Your Blood to Boil (Matt Vespa)
• Rand Paul Releases Files of Serious Manipulation of COVID-19 Info (CTH)
• RFK Jr. Reveals the COVID Vaccine Secret Fauci Hid From Americans (Margolis)

 


 

https://twitter.com/TVNewsNow/status/2081870166606954953?s=20 https://twitter.com/VigilantFox/status/2081934073006522766?s=20 https://twitter.com/EricLDaugh/status/2081882207208063423?s=20

 


 


“Trump has on Tuesday reiterated to Fox News that Iran understands it will never have a nuclear, and reaffirmed that the two sides are talking.”

• War Pause Holds, Trump Vows To Destroy Pickaxe Mountain If No Deal (ZH)

US-Iran attacks have remained paused, and oil prices have extended their declines, as President Trump has claimed Tehran and Washington are now having “very friendly talks” while at the same time suggesting negotiations might not be prolonged. “We are in very deep talks with Iran. If they don’t work out, we will go back to very strong military action,” Trump told Axios, as we highlighted previously.


But possibly the most promising development in terms of an off-ramp is that Oman has presented Iran with a plan backed by Gulf states to manage the Strait of Hormuz.This would reportedly include including collecting voluntary fees for using it, according to sources who spoke to Reuters Tuesday. The report notes that “The plan could serve as a basis to end the disruption to trade through the strait caused by the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran.”

However, this also to some degree represents the stalemated situation going back to square one, given the United States has consistently and vehemently opposed any fees being collected that would go to Iran. An immediate response from Tehran on the proposal has not been forthcoming, and talks could drag on for days related to the Oman plan. Already Tehran is adding some strict conditions regarding frozen or seized Iranian assets abroad, per Bloomberg citing state media:

“Any company or country that receives funds from Iranian assets will not be allowed to pass through the strait,” semi-official Tasnim news agency cites a spokesman for Iran s central military command as saying in response to recent US proposal.

Reuters provides more detail in the following: “The system would be analogous to one in place on Asia’s Strait of Malacca, where Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore ask ships to pay voluntary contributions to fund navigation, environmental protection and search-and-rescue operations.” “The Western diplomat compared it to a voluntary carbon tax for flights, where anyone buying a plane ticket can choose to tick a box if they want to pay to offset their emissions,” the report adds.

The Wall Street Journal has said this represents a “glimmer of hope” as fighting has halted since last Friday: A U.S. official and mediators said Iran and Oman were still far apart on some issues, including whether to charge fees for transit. But both sides said there was progress, marking the first glimmer of hope for diplomacy since President Trump ordered a new round of military strikes on Iran more than two weeks ago in response to Tehran firing on commercial vessels in the strait.

…The goal of the Iran-Oman talks is to agree on which route vessels can take through the 22-mile-wide strait. Conflict erupted earlier this month after the U.S. began guiding ships through the strait by hugging the Omani coast, while Iran wants vessels to cross through its territory.

In the meantime President Trump had laid out Monday while speaking to reporters aboard Air Force One his view that there’s “plenty of time” to deal with Iran and that “we are talking right now..” He laid out that while “there’s a good chance that something could happen,” it remains that If not, “we go back to doing what we were doing two days ago.” Trump has on Tuesday reiterated to Fox News that Iran understands it will never have a nuclear, and reaffirmed that the two sides are talking.

Read more …

Feels like dancing. But not together. Not the same dance.

• Mediators Say US-Iran ‘Close’ To ‘Resurrecting’ Failed MoU Deal (ZH)

Update(11:35ET): Here we go again… despite no evident change in war posturing on either side, and despite shipping traffic still largely at a complete standstill in the Strait of Hormuz, Fox News is out with claims that the failed Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) could be ‘resurrected’… bringing us back to the ‘deal is close’ constant headlines of earlier this summer (though of course the sides were never in reality close – and simply returned to a wider bombing campaign)…


“Mediators of the ongoing conflict in the Middle East believe the U.S. and Iran are close to a deal that would resurrect the failed memorandum of understanding, according to The Times of Israel,” Fox writes, based on the earlier Israeli media article. Negotiators from Pakistan, Egypt and Qatar have been haggling over an Oman-proposed Strait of Hormuz management plan. It will involve fee-collection and is backed by the Gulf states, supposedly. The timing of all of this interesting given Trump is currently hosting Netanyahu at the White House. More from Fox:

Iran and Oman — both of which are situated on the Strait of Hormuz — have reportedly signed off on the proposal advanced by the mediators.The two sources said the White House was waiting to make a decision until after President Donald Trump meets with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Tuesday. Meanwhile…

JMIC: DATA INDICATES ZERO TANKERS IN EITHER DIRECTION OF HORMUZ

Still, the return to deal ‘optimism’ has pushed oil prices down further – which is perhaps the entire point of US officials anonymously hyping that a deal is ‘close’ once again.

Read more …

“Khamenei’s regime..”? We don’t even know if the guy is alive. Stop saying that.

• US Forces Block Attempted Iranian Surprise Attack (Catherine Salgado)

U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) troops thwarted an attempted surprise attack from the terrorist Iranian regime as Tehran doubles down on “death to America.” CENTCOM posted an update on X Tuesday afternoon. “At 5:45 p.m. ET today, Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps forces launched multiple ballistic missiles from Iran in an attempted surprise attack on U.S. forces based in the Middle East. All Iranian missiles were successfully intercepted. U.S. forces remain vigilant and at a high state of readiness,” it apprised the public. Both American and Saudi forces are now conducting strikes on Iranian targets.


In fact, CENTCOM issued a press release on Tuesday about the U.S. and Saudi efforts to eliminate Tehran-tied terrorists in Iraq, where different factions and ethnic groups either enthusiastically support or bitterly resent the Iranian regime. The Iran-backed Iraqi jihadis were gunning for American troops and Saudi infrastructure. U.S. and Saudi fighter aircraft struck multiple terrorist logistics and weapons sites across eastern Iraq in a strong response to over 30 IRGC-directed aerial drone attacks in the last 72 hours. The unwarranted attacks against U.S. forces were not successful.

From February through April 2026, there were more than 600 attempted attacks on U.S. citizens and facilities by Iran-aligned terrorist militias in Iraq. This is why the U.S. will eventually have to take out the Iranian regime altogether, or we’ll never have peace. The Iranian regime is the biggest state sponsor of terrorism in the world, with more reach and proxies even than the Qatari dictatorship.

President Donald Trump periodically threatens total destruction of the Iranian regime. If he really has that firepower, why not do it? It will save lives and a great many years of such ineffective back-and-forth as we’re still experiencing. Four Americans died as a result of Iranian strikes this month. We don’t want any more casualties.Iranian leadership continues to bribe potential assassins for Trump while threatening dire deeds. For example, on Sunday, we had the following message from the supreme leader of Iran (or whoever is running his account):

And a few days before:

Khamenei’s regime just executed several more freedom protesters.

The Tehran terrorists are demonically vicious.

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Yeah yeah, flatter Trump.

• New British Defense Secretary: Europe “Shaken Out Of Complacency” By Trump (ET)

New British Defence Secretary Wes Streeting
Newly appointed British Defence Secretary Wes Streeting said on July 26 that Europe will one day thank U.S. President Donald Trump for “shaking us out of our complacency” on defense spending Speaking to British broadcaster Sky News, Streeting said that he genuinely believes when this period of history is written, Europe will thank President Trump for shaking us out of our complacency and forcing us to stand on our own two feet and end the period of overreliance on the United States for defense.


Former Health Secretary Streeting was appointed to the defense role on July 20 by the new British Prime Minister Andy Burnham after he reshuffled the Cabinet following the resignation of his predecessor Keir Starmer. What he’s said about Europe isn t unique to President Trump, the MAGA movement or the Republican Party. This has been a long-standing grain of U.S. frustration with Europe under Democratic and Republican presidents, Streeting said, adding that in the world we live in, it is right that we can act to secure ourselves.

Trump has repeatedly called on the UK and other European countries to spend more on defense and become less reliant on the United States for the continent s security. The push for NATO allies to do more to secure their own defenses came as the United States reoriented its defense and security priorities. Asked if he trusts Trump, Streeting said, “I don’t know him, but I do trust the United States,” adding that in his first week in the role he has had “a unique insight into just how close and integral that relationship [between the UK and the United States] is when it comes to defense and security.”

Discussing his conversation with U.S. Secretary of War Pete Hegseth, Streeting said he was “clear that we’ve not supported offensive action in Iran and we won’t support offensive action [in] Iran,” but added that there are “plenty of things that we can and should do together when it comes to securing the Strait of Hormuz.” Streeting’s predecessor but one, John Healey, who now has the role of chancellor of the exchequer, the UK’s equivalent to treasury secretary, resigned his post last month in protest over the previous government’s reluctance to adequately fund defense spending, in a move that contributed to Starmer’s eventual downfall.

Healey announced his resignation in a highly critical public letter posted on X, in which he accused Starmer and the Treasury of being “unable” and “unwilling” to “commit the resources that the nation needs to defend the country at this time of rising threats.” Burnham, in one of his first interviews since becoming prime minister, told the BBC he was “absolutely committed” to what was promised to NATO partners. The UK has pledged to spend 3.5 percent of GDP on defense by 2035, in line with a new NATO target.

Burnham said that when he appointed Healey to be chancellor he was “very aware of what he had said about the critical importance of defense spending and the position that he had taken about that.” “The first challenge facing us both is to ensure that the defense investment plan is fully funded and that’s the thing that’s right in front of us and we need to work that through as we go towards the budget later this year.” Burnham also stated that he would be prepared to publicly disagree with Trump if British and American interests didn’t align but added that he had had a good first exchange with the president, finding him to be “really warm.”

Trump, discussing his phone call with Burnham in a July 20 post on Truth Social, said he had a “very good conversation” with the new British prime minister. “We discussed many subjects, including the outstanding relationship we have had with the UK. We will be meeting in the not too distant future for topics of mutual interest,” Trump said, adding that Burnham “has got a big job ahead of him, but he will be able to do it and, of course, the U.S.A. will be there to help!” He added that they discussed “North Sea Oil, Trade, the Military Alliance, Demining of the Hormuz Strait, and many other topics,” and said the call “went very well.”

Read more …

In all they do, there is one purpose: bring Trump/US in to the war. They would love for Russia to bomb Portsmouth. How could Trump say no?

• Zelenskyy Says Ukraine Intends to Build Drone and Missile Factory in UK (CTH)

Watching carefully what Volodymyr Zelenskyy says, with an overlay of his contacts and travel itinerary, it appears the next phase in Ukraine weapon production will be to build missile and long-range drones outside Ukraine. That is to say outside the reach of proactive Russian attack. Zelenskyy travelled to Portsmouth, U.K., today for a meeting with newly installed Prime Minister Andy Burnham. Instead of meeting in London, the two met at a military base in Portsmouth, where 200 Ukrainian soldiers are currently completing maritime exercises.


In an interview with Sky News just before departing for the meeting, Zelenskyy noted the intention to use U.K. factories. In mentioning a joint U.K-Ukraine “drone deal,” Zelenskyy noted [15:32video] “I want to build a big factory in Britain, while offering new technologies and sharing with our partners.“I don’t think Zelenskyy was supposed to say that out loud.Zelenskyy noted the challenges for the U.K effort to support him essentially boils down to “money, intelligence and technology.”

With the EU providing Zelenskyy with funds from the seized Russian sovereign fund; essentially loans with no payback provisions as forfeiture of the fund is intended to be wrapped into any peace negotiation with Russia; Zelenskyy is positioning Ukraine to spend the EU (Russian) funds in the U.K to manufacture authorized Patriot Missiles, U.K Storm Shadow missiles and drones to expand the conflict with Russia. One thing is abundantly clear from the action over the past few weeks, Ukraine and EU/NATO are fully intending to expand the conflict with Russia and, if possible, pull the Iran conflict into the European dynamic. That’s why Ukraine attacked the Iranian vessels recently.

(You may need to use a VPN to watch this interview as the content was suddenly limited after it was on YouTube for a few hours. I suspect the note I made above is directly related to this content control.)

“LONDON — Andy Burnham pledged a “close partnership” between the U.K. and Ukraine Monday after Volodymyr Zelenskyy became the first world leader to meet Britain’s new prime minister. In a show of support, the pair toured a military base in Portsmouth, where 200 Ukrainian soldiers are currently completing maritime exercises. Burnham said his meeting with the Ukrainian leader was “warm” and that he intends to visit the country soon. “We will build this and we will work through the different issues that President Zelenskyy has, many of which we’ve gone into today,” Burnham said.

The meeting came as Britain announced it would share intellectual property to help Kyiv’s war effort. The new prime minister announced that the U.K. will share its “Stone Cloak” electronic warfare system — devices attached to drones to help them evade detection — helping Ukraine to produce the technology on a mass scale. (read more)

Read more …

Trump and Rubio won’t invade Cuba.

” You’re talking about a system that’s been in place since 1959. You talk about a country that’s suffered tremendously because of poor leadership and a bad economic model. You’re talking about a regime that’s survived all these years because they had a foreign sponsor, be it the Soviet Union or Hugo Chávez. They don’t have that anymore..”

• Cuba Falling: A Lot Happened Last Week. Let’s Talk About It (Sarah Anderson)

There’s been a lot going on with Cuba over the last week, and I promise you that every single day last week, I sat down to write about it, but my mind wandered onto the next shiny object — to Venezuela or El Salvador or Costa Rica or Nicaragua or the Georgia governor’s race. I’ve admitted in the past that I’m a little bored with all of it, and I feel like the way Iran has played out has distracted the Donald Trump administration from working toward liberating the Caribbean nation from the Castro regime and 67 years of communism.


The truth is it’s a complicated process. This isn’t Venezuela. We likely won’t have a clean and tidy(-ish) ending to the regime. You can’t just take out one guy, neutralize his cronies, cut off their revenue stream, and start over with Marco Rubio in charge. The Cuban regime is older, more decentralized, and designed to withstand such moves. The power lies within the Communist Party, the military’s economic empire (GAESA), and a deep security apparatus.

There’s also the media problem. The number of MSM fake news stories from anonymous sources about Cuba is exhausting, and it drives me insane how many prominent people report on them or share them as if they are fact. For example, for a while, there was this idea that the Trump administration’s goal for liberating Cuba was the end of this year. It was fun to buy into, and I didn’t find it all that outlandish pre-Iran, but Rubio put a stop to that kind of talk last week when speaking to the press.

“No, look, guys, global affairs are not like – we’re not a miniseries, like, you get in three episodes and it’s over,” he said. “I mean, global affairs are difficult. You’re talking about a system that’s been in place since 1959. You talk about a country that’s suffered tremendously because of poor leadership and a bad economic model. You’re talking about a regime that’s survived all these years because they had a foreign sponsor, be it the Soviet Union or Hugo Chávez. They don’t have that anymore. So it’s – these are complex things that take time, and obviously we’re prepared to do what we can do to effectuate a positive change in Cuba because it directly impacts our national security.”

He added: “It’s a failed state. But I’ve never laid out any timeline as to what change would look like or when it would happen. I wish it was tomorrow because they deserve it; the people of Cuba deserve a better future.” One thing Rubio did confirm — and Trump has hinted at this in the past — is that this is his project. “I work on this issue more than anybody else,” he said, and I think that’s fairly obvious. That said, let’s get to the news. The actual, factual, verifiable news.

The Big State Department Report
The biggest Cuba-related news from last week was the 100-page report from the State Department called “Cuba: The Capital of 21st Century Communism.” I haven’t reported on it yet for two reasons. One, I wanted to read it myself. Two, I’d already reported on some of it over the last year, so I felt like it wasn’t quite the bombshell the State Department wanted it to be. However, I’ve come around to realizing that it’s a good report because it centralizes the information in one location, it helps build a case against the regime for whatever comes next from Trump and Rubio, and it supports the administration’s current anti-far-left terrorism stance and actions it plans to take against it.

So I’m going to hit some highlights here. You can skim them or check out the entire report yourself. The report paints Cuba as what it is. Rather than calling it a failed dictatorship, it’s an ideological threat to the United States, as well as a threat to our national security. Rather than relying on military action against the U.S., it has used irregular warfare to infiltrate, including espionage, infiltration of U.S. institutions, recruitment of American activists, providing a safe haven for terrorists, and creating or supporting ideological networks designed to turn segments of American society against the U.S. government and system.

And not just in the United States, but in other Latin American countries as well — it’s trained groups that helped lead to the Sandinista victory in Nicaragua in 1979; supported Puerto Rican terror groups like FALN and Macheteros; and created alliances with Hugo Chávez. I’ve written about this in the past, but before he got into politics, Nicolás Maduro barely had a high school education. His only formal schooling was a year in Havana at Fidel Castro’s commie training camp.

Cuba essentially had spies within the U.S. government, like Ana Belén Montes, a senior Pentagon analyst, or Victor Manuel Rocha, a U.S. diplomat who was arrested in 2023 after working as an agent for Cuba for over 40 years. The regime especially liked to push black extremists, supported groups like the Black Panthers, and granted asylum to many black criminals, like Assata Shakur. It highlights the Venceremos Brigade, which has brought at least 10,000 U.S. citizens to Cuba since 1969 to identify potential activists, build relationships, and strengthen radical organizations.

It also highlights the Cuban Institute of Friendship with Peoples (ICAP), which has a presence in 150 countries and direct ties to Cuban intelligence, as well as the National Network on Cuba, which is connected to groups like the Democratic Socialists of America, Communist Party USA, Code Pink, and the National Lawyers Guild. It also says that Cuba is a meeting point for countries and groups hostile to the U.S., like Russia, China, Iran, Venezuela, Palestinian Marxist organizations, Hamas and Hezbollah-linked networks, and members of Iran’s Axis of Resistance.

Read more …

“Taxpayers will subsidize Big Grocery to help put mom & pop bodegas out of business, and make the city’s poorest residents more dependent on Big Government than ever.”

• NYC: Begun, the Class War Has (Stephen Green)

Socialist New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s plan for city-owned grocery stores came into sharper focus on Monday after he announced the stores would have prices 30% “below typical retail prices” on a “core basket of goods.”“No exceptions, no gimmicks,” Mamdani promised Monday at a Campaign Against Hunger event in East New York. Spoiler: There’s no hunger to speak of in NYC. Poverty remains a leading indicator of obesity. Guess where Mamdani plans to build his first 30%-under-retail city-run grocery store.


Or I could just tell you. The first Bane Grocers (I made up the name) will open next year in The Peninsula in Hunts Point, in the South Bronx. The plan is to open four more, one in each borough’s poorest neighborhood.The really fun part is that bodegas are particularly dense in the city’s poorer neighborhoods, serving areas that big grocery stores would rather not. These are mom and pop operations getting by on razor-thin profit margins of about 2%. The solution to the city’s problem with its abundant and efficient grocery supply system (yes, you read that correctly) is to introduce city-run stores to undercut the abundant and efficient bodegas in the city’s poorest neighborhoods.

Despite their small size, bodegas operate just like any other grocery or convenience store. They sell staples at maybe a breakeven price, hoping shoppers will splurge on higher-markup items like Chocolate Frosted Sugar Bombs cereal for the kids and a liter of Coke. They don’t make enough money to stay in business selling quarter gallons of milk. What happens to bodegas when customers start going to Bane’s because they can get that same quart of milk for $1.20 or so instead of $1.75? For starters, the bodegas can devote less precious fridge space to milk, or stop selling it altogether. Then maybe they watch those boxes of Chocolate Frosted Sugar Bombs gather dust.

“The only reason to shop at a city-run store — which, if they’re like anything else the city runs, will be poorly managed and with customer service moving at Glacier Speed — is if they undercut the competition with subsidized prices,” I predicted just three weeks ago. That’s when the New York Post talked to bodega owners who claimed that Julie Su, Mamdani’s deputy mayor for “economic justice,” was demanding to know what their best-selling items were, and what their markup was.

If selling staples at 30% under market price puts bodegas out of business, Mamdani may very well engineer an actual problem — a scarcity of small local grocers. Less selection, too, as South Bronx shoppers find themselves having to make the longer trip to city-run Bane’s.If you’ve ever been to a state-run liquor store, you don’t need me to tell you about state-run selections. You’ll be allowed to choose from what they think you should choose from. The New York Post interviewed locals who had “questions about how the discount would work, what few items they’d have to choose from, and how much it would cost taxpayers to subsidize the lefty mayor’s scheme.”

But this is maybe my favorite part of Monday’s sharp focus. While the city will own Bane Grocers, the city won’t run it. Instead, as the Post reported, Mamdani “put out a request for proposals to private grocery chains to run the stores, asking potential bidders to estimate the figure themselves through an annual ‘Affordability Payment’ to cover the losses from selling below retail prices.” Translation: Taxpayers will subsidize Big Grocery to help put mom & pop bodegas out of business, and make the city’s poorest residents more dependent on Big Government than ever. “In the end, it all costs more, and you get less,” Juan Carlos Santiago — a refugee from Communist Cuba — told the paper about the life he escaped. “Thank God, here you can go to another store. Thank God!” But for how much longer?

Read more …

So far I’m not terribly impressed with articles about the future of artificial intelligence.

• The Future of Artificial Intelligence Is a Choice, Not an Inevitability (Dornik)

I have developed something of a reputation as the “anti-AI guy,” primarily because I refuse to join the technological priesthood in singing hymns to artificial intelligence while a handful of billionaires quietly purchase the printing press, the library, the factory, the surveillance camera, the public square, and eventually the human brain. In this new AI-dominated era, even simply asking who controls the machinery is considered an impolite interruption during the worship service.


I am not opposed to artificial intelligence as a technological tool. AI can help doctors identify disease, assist disabled people, accelerate scientific research, automate administrative work, strengthen cybersecurity, improve education, and dramatically expand the capabilities of entrepreneurs and creators. I use technology, I build technology, and I understand its extraordinary potential. My objection concerns the weaponization of AI, the centralization of its ownership, and the political and economic system that many of its most influential advocates openly describe as its destination.

The inevitability argument has become Silicon Valley’s favorite method of avoiding accountability. We are told that AI will eliminate most jobs, replace human decision-making, connect our brains to computers, monitor our behavior, restructure capitalism, and require some form of universal government income. Then, after announcing this revolutionary demolition of human society, its architects shrug and tell us that none of it can be stopped. One must admire the efficiency of building the bulldozer, choosing the building, starting the engine, and then explaining that demolition is simply a force of nature.

Elon Musk told the VivaTech conference in 2024 that, in a “benign scenario,” probably none of us would have a job. He predicted a “universal high income,” an abundance of goods and services, and a world in which the central human question becomes whether life retains meaning when computers and robots can perform everything better than we can. This is an extraordinarily revealing admission because Musk recognizes the problem of meaning while continuing to promote the economic conditions that would produce it. His imagined future bears a remarkable resemblance to WALL-E, except the floating chairs with screens would be replaced by brain-chip implants.

Musk has described Neuralink’s long-term purpose as creating a high-bandwidth brain interface through which human beings could become “symbiotic with AI.” Neuralink’s immediate medical work, including helping people with paralysis control computers, is genuinely promising and deserves recognition. The broader transhumanist ambition raises an entirely different category of questions. Once human thought becomes technologically accessible, the issues of privacy, consent, ownership, manipulation, security, and government access are no longer theoretical. They become constitutional emergencies taking place inside the human skull.

Sam Altman has been equally explicit about the economic transformation he expects. In his essay “Moore’s Law for Everything,” Altman wrote that the technological revolution would be “unstoppable,” that power would shift further from labor toward capital, and that society would require drastic policies to distribute the wealth created by AI. His proposed American Equity Fund would tax companies and privately held land, then distribute annual payments to citizens. The language is dressed in entrepreneurial optimism, but the governing premise is unmistakable: the productive economy will belong to an increasingly concentrated class of capital owners while the public receives a politically administered dividend.

Bill Gates has expressed the inevitability argument with unusual clarity. Writing about the development of powerful technology, Gates said that if he possessed a magic button that could slow development for several decades, he might press it, but “that button doesn’t exist.” He concluded that these technologies will be created regardless of what any individual or company does, driven by competition among nations, corporations, and individuals seeking profit, power, glory, and leadership. Gates has also suggested that AI could reduce the workweek as machines produce more goods and services with less human labor.

Larry Ellison has offered perhaps the most honest preview of how AI centralization could affect civil liberty. During Oracle’s 2024 Financial Analyst Meeting, Ellison described AI systems processing information from police body cameras, vehicle cameras, doorbell cameras, drones, and other recording devices. He predicted that “citizens will be on their best behavior” because everything would be constantly recorded and reported. That sentence should be engraved above the entrance to every congressional hearing on artificial intelligence because it perfectly captures the managerial worldview behind the coming surveillance state. Freedom is apparently much safer once every citizen behaves as though an invisible parole officer is watching from the cloud.

Work carries moral meaning beyond the production of goods. Even before sin entered the world, God placed Adam in the garden “to work it and keep it” (Genesis 2:15). Work was part of human purpose before it became burdened by the Fall. The Bible never treats productive responsibility as an embarrassing defect that humanity must engineer out of existence. A society that strips millions of people of responsibility, discipline, contribution, and the dignity of providing for others will not automatically produce a nation of poets, philosophers, and volunteer gardeners. Human beings deprived of purpose frequently become anxious, addicted, isolated, and easily controlled.

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“Fauci writes that the CIA had information from sources that the Chinese military had conducted unknown experiments in Wuhan, and that the CIA had information about a “super spreader” event in China in July 2020 in relation to “passage of a virus in a laboratory.”

• This Fauci Diary Entry Will Cause Your Blood to Boil (Matt Vespa)

Dr. Anthony Fauci was ‘America’s Doctor’ during the COVID pandemic. He’s now being exposed as an egotistical clown, which makes sense as the establishment press showered him with praise daily. When his science fiction was exposed, he said that people who attacked him were attacking science. That was the clue that something ugly was underneath, and now we have these diaries that paint this man as a psychopath. All bow before Lord God Fauci—nope.


The medical expert community should be ashamed for, among other things, engaging in this political effort to influence the 2020 election. And what a waste: Trump was elected again in 2024. With Fauci pardoned by brain-dead Joe Biden, his testimony tomorrow morning should be interesting since he can’t plead the Fifth so easily. Still, this journal entry, where he was briefed by the CIA about intercepted communications that might support the lab leak theory and then criticizes a CIA analyst for not understanding the science at his level, is truly disgusting. He’s a pretentious lefty in a lab coat, a Democrat with an MD, who spread nonsense while countless families suffered and many died alone. Bill Melugin has more:

Dr. Fauci writes in his diary that in June 2021, he received a (classified?) briefing from the CIA on the origins of COVID-19 while in a SCIF (Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility) at NIH, and reveals that the CIA told him they had intercepted Chinese communications in Wuhan, including indications that the Chinese had transferred pangolin viruses from Beijing to Wuhan.

Additionally, Fauci writes that the CIA had information from sources that the Chinese military had conducted unknown experiments in Wuhan, and that the CIA had information about a “super spreader” event in China in July 2020 in relation to “passage of a virus in a laboratory.” Fauci writes that the CIA briefer, who he names, was “almost pathetic in her naivety and obvious lack of appreciation of any of the science of what she was talking about.”

The fireworks begin at 8:30 AM on Wednesday morning. Also, remember this nonsense, where Fauci bashed Republicans over the vaccine, then spoke to some black families, and they told him to get his COVID juices out of their faces.

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“..,painting himself in somewhat of a god-like position and arbiter of all covid truth.”

• Rand Paul Releases Files of Serious Manipulation of COVID-19 Info (CTH)

Dr Anthony Fauci the White House Chief Medical Advisor during the SARS-CoV-2 outbreak under Biden, and head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases from 1984 to 2022, has been subpoenaed to testify before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee this Wednesday, July 29, about his role and activity during the outbreak. Senator Rand Paul has long argued that Dr Fauci misled the nation, and indeed the entire world, on the origin of the COVID-19 outbreak, and attempted to coverup the man-made components to the SARS-CoV-2 that created massive medical, social and economic turmoil.


Anticipating the testimony, Senator Rand Paul has released a massive dataset of records from Anthony Fauci that includes a personal diary written by Fauci during the timeframe in question. [FAUCI FILES HERE] The personal notes and records of Fauci indicate a serious intention to control all elements of what took place during the COVID-19 outbreak; painting himself in somewhat of a god-like position and arbiter of all covid truth.

The records released by Senator Paul are exhaustive and paint a disturbing picture of a medical bureaucracy who believed they were more important than any elected official. Dr Fauci led that bureaucracy with visions of grandeur and an ego fed by a compliant media apparatus who consistently portrayed Fauci as the guardian of all medical truth.

The exact opposite of that altruistic narrative comes through in the details within the FAUCI FILES. “Fauci’s personal diary reveals that as early as January 31, 2020, he was told by top virologists that the virus’s furin cleavage site raised real doubts about a natural origin, with about half the scientists on that initial call believing it looked “constructed.” Despite this early private uncertainty, Fauci spent the following years publicly and confidently dismissing the lab leak theory while insisting the science was settled. The diary also documents his private frustration and defensiveness over gain-of-function funding questions tied to EcoHealth Alliance and the Wuhan Institute of Virology — even as he told Congress under oath that no such research had occurred.” ~ Rand Paul

It appears that Rand Paul gained much of the information for his release from ODNI documents previously, discovered, researched and released to congress by DNI Tulsi Gabbard. It also seems like Acting DNI Bill Pulte continued to declassify and release the files. President Trump realized on April 23, 2020, that he had been misled by the small group within the medical bureaucracy. Dr Fauci noted in his diary….

“[we] will be loved by the people we care about“… Who exactly was that?

The scale of the fraud orchestrated by Anthony Fauci is jaw-dropping. All those so-called scientists, perched up high in their ivory towers, flapping their mouths to lecture and mock anyone who dared have an opinion on that massive gain-of-function experiment they unleashed. They were not doing science at all; they were stroking their own egos the entire time. The hearing on Wednesday is likely to be very explosive; however, in accordance with the strategy of Democrats and Communists in both the House and Senate, there is a distinct possibility they may not attend the hearing in an effort to diminish the sunlight.

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“Fauci “had a pulmonary infarction, which is one of the adverse events that NIH, CDC and FDA said are expected from the vaccine. He never told anybody,” Kennedy said.”

• RFK Jr. Reveals the COVID Vaccine Secret Fauci Hid From Americans (Margolis)

For years, Dr. Anthony Fauci assured Americans that the COVID-19 vaccines were safe and effective. What he never mentioned, according to Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., is that he may have suffered one of those “rare” adverse events himself, and he hid it from the country while publicly insisting such injuries weren’t happening. Kennedy appeared on Fox News’s The Ingraham Angle to discuss the newly released diary entries that Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) made public, entries that document Fauci’s day-to-day life during the pandemic, on top of his disturbing obsession with himself and the power he wielded during the pandemic.


When Laura Ingraham asked whether there would be any accountability for the trillions of dollars lost, the ruined education of America’s children, and the shattered reputation of the public health establishment, Kennedy didn’t hesitate. “Yeah, and millions of people injured,” Kennedy said. “So he lied about masks, he lied about social distancing, he lied about the transmission, he lied about natural immunity, he lied about the capacity, as you just said, of the vaccine to prevent infection.”

Then came the bombshell. “He got vaccinated at a very, very public press conference in January of 2021,” Kennedy said, noting that five months later, the diary reveals, Fauci “had a pulmonary infarction, which is one of the adverse events that NIH, CDC and FDA said are expected from the vaccine.” “He never told anybody,” Kennedy said. “He got treated for it privately by the best doctors in America at the same time, he was telling everybody that was not an adverse event.”

Think about that for a second. The man who badgered every American into taking the shot, insisting it was perfectly safe, appears to have experienced one of the exact injuries his own agencies flagged, then quietly got elite private care while assuring the public that such reactions weren’t real. Ordinary Americans who reported similar problems got dismissed and mocked. Fauci got the best doctors in America.

The diary entries also reveal a man drunk on his own celebrity. Fauci mused that he could call himself the most famous and talked-about person in America without exaggerating. Kennedy said Fauci’s “focus was on promoting himself, on getting on TV and not doing public health.” While hospitals overflowed and small businesses died, “America’s doctor” was cataloging his own fame.

Kennedy knows firsthand what happened to anyone who challenged the Fauci narrative. Instagram suspended his account, a million followers and all, for supposed misinformation, including saying that COVID came from the Wuhan Institute of Virology. That claim has since gone from forbidden conspiracy theory to the leading explanation. The same fate awaited everyone else who questioned Fauci’s edicts. They got smeared as cranks while his assertions, which have since collapsed, went unchallenged by a compliant press.

We know firsthand here at PJ Media the risks that were involved in questioning the official narrative. We risked being censored and demonetized by Big Tech, which was coordinating with the Biden administration to control what the public knew.And what did we get from Fauci’s narcissism and drunken power? Kennedy pointed out that the United States recorded the highest COVID-19 mortality rate of any country in the world, about 3,000 deaths per million people. Under Fauci’s leadership, the wealthiest nation on Earth did worse than every other country.

He destroyed public trust in health agencies, and Kennedy argues the damage may never be undone. Of course, the legacy media deserves its share of the blame here. Kennedy described the press’s protection of Fauci as corrupt collaboration, and he’s right. We may have asked the hard questions, but the legacy media ran interference instead, torching their own credibility to shield “America’s Doctor.”

Fauci testifies before Congress on Wednesday about his diary and his handling of the pandemic. As PJ Media previously reported, if Fauci repeats his falsehoods under oath, he could face perjury prosecution.

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Debt Rattle June 4 2024

Jun 042024
 
 June 4, 2024  Posted by at 8:43 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , ,  53 Responses »


Eugène Delacroix The Good Samaritan 1849

 

• Which Movie Will It Be? (Jim Kunstler)
• The Trump Conviction Presents a Target-Rich Environment for Appeal (Turley)
• Of Course They’ll Put Trump in Jail (Victoria Taft)
• Rand Paul Warns Of “War In The Streets” Coming From Trump Verdict (MN)
• Top Judge Blocks Complaints Against Trump Judge Aileen Cannon (ET)
• Biden Denies ‘Pulling the Strings’ in Trump’s Criminal Conviction (ET)
• Dear American (Paul Craig Roberts)
• Jury Selection Begins In Hunter Biden Gun Trial (ZH)
• Germany Begins To Militarize: When Have We Seen This Before? (Amar)
• US Close To ‘Fatal’ Miscalculation – Moscow (RT)
• China Explains Snub Of Zelensky ‘Peace Summit’ (RT)
• Ready Reckoner For Killing – The Raisi Assassination (Helmer)
• US Force Scott Ritter Off Plane to Russia, Seize His Passport (Sp.)
• Deaf and Blind: The Maladies of American Diplomats (Patrick Lawrence)

 

 


“..a gesture that is sure to live in infamy..”

 

 

Eastman

 

 

https://twitter.com/i/status/1797274885925765432

 

 

 

 

Shellenberger

 

 

Eric T

 

 

Obama 1992

 

 

Greenwald

 

 

 

 

“..the next day in the White House when “Joe Biden” was asked to comment on it as he shuffled away from the podium, halted, turned, and smirked silently at the cameras, a gesture that is sure to live in infamy.”

• Which Movie Will It Be? (Jim Kunstler)

The ninnies of Bidenworld seem to not understand that by subjecting Mr. Trump to a kangaroo court they’ve made him the kind of outlaw that Americans revere above every other archetypal hero. He’s the new American Robin Hood, the people’s outlaw — with “Joe Biden” relegated as the wicked Sir Guy of Gisbourne, master of foul play and servant of the evil regent Prince John (Barack Obama). The galvanizing moment in this melodrama was not the verdict in Judge Juan Merchan’s kangaroo corral of a court, but the next day in the White House when “Joe Biden” was asked to comment on it as he shuffled away from the podium, halted, turned, and smirked silently at the cameras, a gesture that is sure to live in infamy. The fun should really kick off when the judge gets to sentence Trump-the-Outlaw July 11, a few days before the Republican convention. Life in some New York state pen? A year on Rikers Island? House arrest? Who knows. But you can bet that just like Robin-of-Locksley, Donald-of-Mar-a-Lago will manage to slip out of his captors’ clutches and cleverly vanquish them.

In a sane world, of course, the US Supreme Court would be entreated to adjudicate this gross insult to due process as spelled out in Section 1 of the 14th Amendment. “No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.” But you might have noticed that this is not a sane world, at least not these days, and not a few supposedly sober analysts, such as Jonathan Turley of George Washington University, claim that a SCOTUS review is a long-shot — which only confirms the reigning insanity since it’s hard to imagine a more compelling moment for the SCOTUS to carry out its fundamental duty: to elucidate the meaning of our Constitution and resolve disputes arising therefrom.

Now, it looks like what we’re seeing after a few days for the shock to wear off, is a mighty righteous rage arising among the faction designated as “Red” — that is, the anti-Woke, anti-Globalist, anti-neoMarxist, anti-Deep State blob, anti-Lawfare, anti-Democratic Party chunk of the adult US population. It amounts to a recognition that we are already in some kind of civil war, and that the tactics of “Joe Biden’s” party must and will be opposed by all means. The SCOTUS is the last resort of legal means for redress in this matter, and they would punt this duty at great peril to the country. To clarify just what this matter is: “Joe Biden’s” White House and Department of Justice conspired with New York County (Manhattan) authorities to maliciously construct and execute a court case made of patently false charges against their principal political adversary, and with a cavalier disrespect to both state and federal law.

As such, the “Stormy Daniels Payoff Case,” as it’s known, is just the latest ploy in a long train of lawless gambits starting with RussiaGate in 2016 (the “Steele Dossier” and all) that have left hundreds of high appointed officials in the federal bureaucracy (plus many retired from it) liable to severe criminal charges ranging as far as sedition and treason. RussiaGate may have started its life as a typical campaign prank by doofuses in the Hillary Clinton organization, but it turned seriously sinister when it was adopted by the FBI and the CIA to execute a plan to harass and defenestrate the elected president, Mr. Trump.With each subsequent prank, to distract from and cover-up their crimes, the same group of officials has committed more crimes, to the point that the federal government now behaves like a gigantic mafia, dedicated to nothing but crime of one kind or another. The Democratic Party has become this mob’s protective order; the old mainstream media its mouthpiece; and the people of this country increasingly its victims.

Naturally, these criminals are now desperate to avoid having to account for their crimes, which is exactly and explicitly what Mr. Trump promises to make them do.So, there it is: a criminal regime versus the people defended by their outlaw hero. Does the SCOTUS want to aid and abet this gang of criminals — led by the way, and just so you know, by Barack Obama and his Kalorama coterie, John Brennan, Mary McCord and her Lawfare coterie, Hillary and Bill Clinton and their henchmen, and scores of additional DC lawyers, fixers, and judges — or, will the SCOTUS avert an epic crisis of legitimacy by stepping in to quash the ridiculously fake New York case just concluded? If they demur in some cowardly blur of excuses, then it’s onto the next truly nation-ending stage of this game.

The “Joe Biden” regime would like nothing more than an outbreak of civil violence they can blame on “right-wing extremists.” In fact, they could and probably will gin that up themselves, just as they transformed the Jan-6-21 mass protest against widespread ballot fraud into a “MAGA insurrection.” You are also certainly aware of the sinister millions, mainly young men from faraway lands, who “Joe Biden” imported across the border the past three years. And you might imagine how they could be put to use against American citizens, along with the Democratic Party shock troops known as BLM and Antifa. Summer’s here and the time is right for fighting in the streets. And, of course, even if the SCOTUS puts an end to this latest bit of Lawfare fuckery, the “Joe Biden” crew can always opt to just up and kill its opponent. Nothing is beneath them now. But when that happens, we’ll be in a very different kind of movie.

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“..if Biden wins the election before this conviction is overturned, history’s judgment will be deafening.”

• The Trump Conviction Presents a Target-Rich Environment for Appeal (Turley)

The conviction of former President Donald Trump in Manhattan of 34 felonies produced citywide celebrations. This thrill-kill environment extended to the media, where former U.S. Attorney Harry Litman told MSNBC’s Nicolle Wallace that it was “majestic day” and “a day to celebrate.” When I left the courthouse after watching the verdict come in, I was floored by the celebrations outside by both the public and some of the media. The celebrants would be wise to think twice before mounting this trophy kill on the political wall. The Trump trial is a target-rich environment for an appeal, with multiple layers of reversible error, in my view. I am less convinced by suggestions that the case could be challenged on the inability of Trump receiving a fair trial in a district that voted roughly 90 percent against him. The problem was not the jury, but the prosecutors and the judge. Some of the most compelling problems can be divided into four groups.

The Judge – Acting Supreme Court justice Juan Merchan was handpicked for this case rather than randomly selected. This is only the latest in a litany of Trump cases where Merchan has meted out tough rulings against Trump and his organization. With any other defendant, there would likely be outrage over his selection. Merchan donated to President Biden. Even though the state bar cleared that violation based on the small size of the contribution, it later stressed that no such contributions were appropriate for a judge. We learned later that Merchan has contributed to a group to stop the GOP and Trump. Merchan’s daughter is also a Democratic organizer who has helped raise millions against Trump and the GOP and for the Democrats.

To his credit, CNN legal analyst Elie Honig has previously said that this case was legally dubious, uniquely targeted Trump and could not succeed outside of an anti-Trump district. On the judge, he recently challenged critics on the fairness of assigning a Biden donor who has earmarked donations for “resisting the Republican Party and Donald Trump’s radical right-wing legacy.” He asked “Would folks have been just fine with the judge staying on the case if he had donated a couple bucks to “Re-elect Donald Trump, MAGA forever!”? “Absolutely not.” What is equally disturbing is the failure of Merchan to protect the rights of the defendant and what even critics admit were distinctly pro-prosecution rulings in the trial. It is not just the appearance of a conflict with Judge Merchan but a record of highly biased decisions. In watching Merchan in the courtroom, I was shocked by his rulings as at times incomprehensible and conflicted.

The Charges – A leading threshold issue will be the decision to allow Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg to effectively try Trump for violations of federal law. The Justice Department declined any criminal charges against Trump under federal election law over the alleged “hush money” payments. The Federal Election Commission likewise found no basis for a civil fine. With no federal prosecution, Bragg decided to use an unprecedented criminal theory not only to zap a dead misdemeanor into life (after the expiration of the statute of limitation) but to allow him to try violations of not only federal election law but also federal taxation violations. In other words, the Justice Department would not prosecute federal violations, so Bragg effectively did it in state court.

Even when closing arguments were given, analysts on various networks admitted that they were unclear about what Bragg was alleging. The indictment claimed a violation under New York’s election law 17-152 that the falsification of business records were committed to further another crime as an unlawful means to influence the election. However, in a maddeningly circular theory, that other crime could be the falsification of business records. It could also be violations of federal election and taxation laws, which Trump was never charged with, let alone convicted of.

[..] The Supreme Court has repeatedly emphasized that the requirement of unanimity in criminal convictions is sacrosanct in our system. While there was unanimity that the business records were falsified to hide or further a second crime, there was no express finding of what that crime may have been. In some ways, Trump may have been fortunate by Merchan’s cavalier approach. Given that the jury convicted Trump across the board, they might have found all of three secondary crimes. The verdict form never asked for such specificity. These are just a few of the appellate issues. There are other challenges, including but not limited to due process violations on the lack of specificity in the indictment, vagueness of the underlying state law and the lack of evidentiary foundation for key defenses like “the legitimate press function.” They are the reason why many of us view this case is likely to be reversed in either the state or federal systems. None of that is likely to dampen the thrill in this kill in Manhattan. But if Biden wins the election before this conviction is overturned, history’s judgment will be deafening.

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“Leftists currently going after Trump have pierced attorney-client privilege and destroyed lawyers for representing the wrong client. They will think nothing of putting Trump in jail. I hope I’m wrong, but I’m not.”

• Of Course They’ll Put Trump in Jail (Victoria Taft)

Why wouldn’t Judge Juan Merchan finish the job and add to the left’s glee in calling Donald Trump a “convicted felon” by sentencing him to jail? That fact that Trump’s sentencing is on July 11, mere days before the Republican National Convention, would not impede a judge who, according to Trump attorney Alina Habba, covered his mouth to laugh during his sentencing. It would be no impediment to the hand-picked jurist who allowed prosecutors to hide the underlying “crime” for the entire trial, hide witnesses, and overrule the majority of the defense objections in this goat rodeo. What would stop him from jailing Trump? The case has horrified believers in the rule of law, without which you cannot have a civil society. It has horrified people who barely paid attention to the trial but gave this judge the benefit of the doubt. Tens of millions of Americans know that this trumped-up case means prosecutors wouldn’t hesitate to do the same to them. Nobody is above the law, but Donald Trump is under it, as has been stated a lot recently with good reason.

Obama’s former Svengali, David Axelrod, told HBO’s Bill Maher that he didn’t think it was a wise idea to put Trump in jail because “it would be worrisome for our country” and “MAGA nation would go nuts.” “I think there is something about jailing a former president, especially on something like this [and] worrisome for our country,” he gamely said. “And I would really be shocked if this judge gave him a prison sentence for this.” We’ll wait for Axelrod’s look of surprise when Trump is sentenced to jail. But don’t be misled. Axelrod knows that Democrat cranks like Bennie Thompson, he of the January 6 Commission, and other dumb representatives introduced a bill to strip “convicted felon” presidential candidates sentenced to jail from getting Secret Service protection. So they want to kill him, too. In the same way the feds got Michael Cohen to plead guilty to elections violations to get a shorter sentence, on unrelated charges, they’ve teed up this case. They’ll send him to jail. I’d be glad to be wrong.

Would Hillary Clinton stand up for the rule of law for Donald Trump? Of course not. She made up stories about him being a Russian spy and then wrote them off as legal expenses. Clinton used campaign funds to pay for the Steele dossier, and used a Russian spy to make up a document calling Trump a spy! She used her campaign coffers to pay for this, calling them legal expenses, but was fined $8,000 for violating campaign finance laws. Trump used his own money to pay off Stormy Daniels through his attorney in 2017 to “influence” the 2016 election, then grossed up and plussed up the money to pay Michael Cohen for legal fees for his work, and he is probably going to jail. They had to make up stuff to smear Trump. There were hundreds of violent riots at which police officers and Secret Service were injured and hospitalized. Kamala Harris gave them bail money in the unlikely event it was needed. Antifa and BLM tried to attack the White House. And nobody who encouraged unrest – like Harris, Maxine Waters, and Chuck Schumer – was held to account. Trump called for a peaceful rally and made an alleged “bad” phone call and they impeached him.

Would people who tried to frame Donald Trump, a man running for president, as a Russian spy hesitate to throw him in jail? [..] Professors, court watchers, former federal prosecutors, former attorneys general, and people who deal in the legal space all the time blithely assure us with bromides. Sending him to jail is highly unlikely. Sending Trump to jail would be hard for a judge to justify. It would be very hard to send a former president to jail on a records offense. It would create a constitutional crisis. They haven’t noticed that the left has destroyed all norms. Leftists currently going after Trump have pierced attorney-client privilege and destroyed lawyers for representing the wrong client. They will think nothing of putting Trump in jail. I hope I’m wrong, but I’m not.

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“I worry about strife. I worry about war in the streets. I worry about 50 percent of the public believing that the court system will be used against them..”

• Rand Paul Warns Of “War In The Streets” Coming From Trump Verdict (MN)

GOP Senator Rand Paul has warned that the fallout of the weaponisation of the justice system against Donald Trump could lead to “war in the streets.” Appearing on Fox Business, Paul was asked “What is your reaction to the conviction?” The Senator responded that it is “a sad day in America,” adding “what I worry about is something even bigger than Donald Trump.” “I worry about strife. I worry about war in the streets. I worry about 50 percent of the public believing that the court system will be used against them,” Paul further urged. “I worry when half the country thinks they won’t be treated fairly, what happens and how people react,” the Senator continued. Paul also pointed out how Hillary Clinton was treated completely differently when she was charged over her email server. “If you look at records violations and you look at Hillary Clinton, $8 million expense, and they slapped her on the wrist cause she got an $8 thousand fine,” Paul asserted. “I think Donald Trump is the only person ever prosecuted for this particular crime,” Paul further suggested, stating that there are probably thousands of cases of records violations in New York that never go to court.

As we highlighted yesterday, Bill Maher has predicted that if Trump is sentenced to any prison time, there will be a civil war that will quickly evolve into a race war because of MAGA supporters. As we highlighted earlier this week, former US Attorney for the District of Utah Brett L. Tolman is adament that Judge Merchan will give Trump jail time. “This judge has considerable power now, on July 11th he has the power to take Trump forthwith, he can take him, put him in custody right then and he can do it for whatever period of time,” said Tolman, warning that despite there being a range of sentencing, “the rules are out the window, who knows what this judge will do.” “I predict he will give him some jail time, I think he will fine him, he’ll give him a stern lecture and then he’ll promptly plan his retirement and a book deal,” concluded Tolman.

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Oasis in the desert.

• Top Judge Blocks Complaints Against Trump Judge Aileen Cannon (ET)

The chief judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit has blocked complaints against the judge overseeing one of former President Donald Trump’s criminal cases. Chief Judge William Pryor Jr., in a newly released order dated May 22, instructed the circuit court’s clerk to stop accepting new complaints against U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon after the clerk was flooded with complaints. “Since May 16, 2024, the clerk of the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit has received over 1,000 judicial complaints against Judge Cannon that raise allegations that are substantially similar to the allegations raised in previous complaints,” Judge Pryor, an appointee of former President George W. Bush, wrote in the order. “These complaints appear to be part of an orchestrated campaign.” Judiciary rules enable each judicial council to act when a series of “many essentially identical complaints” from different people flood into the circuit in which the council is based.

The council can instruct the circuit clerk “to accept only a certain number of such complaints for filing and to refuse to accept additional complaints. Judge Pryor recommended to the council that it instruct the clerk to stop taking additional complaints against Judge Cannon, and the council adopted the recommendation. Judge Pryor entered the new order on behalf of the council. Federal law lets people file complaints against federal judges over judicial misconduct, which includes treating litigants “in a demonstrably egregious and hostile manner” and “making inappropriately partisan statements.” Some activists and others have complained about Judge Cannon’s ruling against special counsel Jack Smith, who is prosecuting President Trump. The rulings have resulted in the trial against the former president being pushed back multiple times.

After Mr. Smith’s team on May 31 asked for an immediate gag order on President Trump, for example, Judge Cannon on June 2 directed President Trump to respond and said the government could issue a reply to that response on or before June 21. Misconduct can not include the correctness of a judge’s ruling or allegations about delays, “unless the allegation concerns an improper motive in delaying a particular decision or habitual delay in a significant number of unrelated cases,” according to judicial rules. The order does not apply to four of the complaints lodged against Judge Cannon, according to Judge Pryor. The judge said he reviewed those complaints and dismissed them because they “lack[ed] sufficient evidence to raise an inference that misconduct has occurred.”

Many of the complaints that flooded in are aimed at the rulings or other actions of Judge Cannon in the case against President Trump, which centers on his handling of documents containing sensitive information. President Trump was charged with Espionage Act violations and obstruction in the federal case. He has pleaded not guilty. “Although many of the complaints allege an improper motive in delaying the case, the allegations are speculative and unsupported by any evidence,” Judge Pryor said. “The complaints also do not establish that Judge Cannon was required to recuse herself from the case because she was appointed by then-President Trump.”

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True, it’s not him pulling the strings. He wouldn’t be able to find them.

• Biden Denies ‘Pulling the Strings’ in Trump’s Criminal Conviction (ET)

President Joe Biden has dismissed the notion that he was “pulling the strings” in the criminal cases against former President Donald Trump, who had been found guilty of 34 felony counts. During an exchange with a Fox News reporter outside the White House on Friday, President Biden was asked if the criminal conviction helped his political rival in the election, to which he replied: “I have no idea.” Fox News reporter Peter Doocy followed up by asking President Biden if he is concerned about facing criminal charges once his presidential term ends. “Not at all,” the president answered. “I didn’t do anything wrong. The system still works.” When asked about President Trump’s assertion that he was “pulling the strings behind the scenes” to hurt him politically, President Biden laughed off the claim, saying: “I didn’t know I was that powerful.” President Trump was found guilty on May 30 in a case in which he was charged with 34 counts of falsifying business records to conceal non-disclosure payments to adult film actress Stormy Daniels as part of a bid to influence the 2016 presidential election.

This marks the first criminal conviction of a U.S. president. The former president denounced the verdict outside the courthouse, calling it a “rigged trial” and an attempt by the Biden administration to hurt a political opponent. “The real verdict is going to be Nov. 5, by the people,” President Trump said. “We’ll keep fighting, we’ll fight to the end, and we’ll win.” Minutes after the jury returned the verdict, an avalanche of donations to the Trump presidential campaign caused the donation page to temporarily become unavailable. The following day, the Trump campaign announced a record one-day fundraising haul of nearly $35 million. President Biden said Friday that it was “reckless” for the presumptive GOP presidential nominee to call the trial rigged, arguing that the case was heard by a jury of 12 Americans selected through a process in which President Trump’s attorney was part of.

“Donald Trump was given every opportunity to defend himself. It was a state case, not a federal case,” the president said in a May 31 address at the White House. “The jury heard five weeks of evidence. And after careful deliberation, the jury reached a unanimous verdict. They found Donald Trump guilty on all 34 felony counts,” he added. President Biden said that, like everyone else, the former president was afforded the opportunity to appeal the court’s decision. “That’s how the American system of justice works. And it’s reckless, it’s dangerous, and it’s irresponsible for anyone to say this was rigged just because they don’t like the verdict,” President Biden said.

“The justice system should be respected, and we should never allow anyone to tear it down. It’s as simple as that,” he added. President Trump’s sentencing—which is set for July 11—will come just four days before the Republican National Convention where he will be formally designated as the Republican presidential nominee. His legal team has vowed to appeal the verdict, while House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) said the U.S. Supreme Court should get involved and overturn the conviction, arguing that the circumstances of the case have led to an erosion of public faith in America’s justice system. While there are no laws barring President Trump from running for the White House as a convicted felon, an overturned verdict before Election Day would likely boost his chances of victory.

Read more …

“..future historians will ask why the people did not protest their pending annihilation..”

• Dear American (Paul Craig Roberts)

Dear American, Do you realize that the Republican Speaker of the House, the House Democrat minority Leader, the Senate Majority Leader and the Senate Republican minority leader, along with an almost unanimous Congress have committed you to the support of the Israeli Genocide of Palestine, both the people and the country? “Our” representatives told Netanyahu that “we (meaning the US) join the State of Israel in your struggle against terror.” For eight months Israel has been terror bombing and destroying everything in Gaza, and “our” leaders see the slaughter of women, children, hospitals, all infrastructure as a “struggle against terror” rather than as an exercise of terror.The Congress of the United States, supposedly our representatives, but in reality the representative of Zionist Israel, has invited Chief Genocide Leader of the World Netanyahu for whom arrest warrants are outstanding to address the United States Congress.

The US Congress is doing this because the US Congress, especially its “leaders,” are paid by Israel Lobby campaign donations to defend the indefensible–the Genocide of the Palestinians and the suppression of all criticism of Israel. This will be the fourth time that Netanyahu has addressed the US Congress. Only Senator Bernie Sanders objected: “Netanyahu is a war criminal. I certainly will not attend.” The rest of Congress is comfortable celebrating a war criminal for whom an arrest warrant is issued by the Hague-based International Criminal Court.

Dear American, Does it bother you that “our” government has put our approval on genocide and has endorsed in our name the Genocide of the remnant of a peaceful people who Israel has demonized in order to steal their country? Dear American, Are you aware that you are about to be taken into nuclear war over the borders of Ukraine while your own undefended, wide open borders are welcoming in 3.6 million immigrant-invaders each year? Dear American, Are you aware that President Trump has been convicted in a Democrat Joseph Stalin type show trial of a non-existent crime? Dear American, Are you aware that the New York justice (sic) system is the most corrupt of any on planet Earth? The New York justice (sic) system could not find justice if there was a quadrillion dollar reward. Dear American, Do you comprehend that you live in a country that is collapsing at light speed, morally, politically, economically, socially, militarily?

Dear American, Has it occurred to you to wonder why, while the streets of Budapest, Hungary, are filled with hundreds of thousands of people protesting the coming war with Russia that Biden is bringing us, there is no protest activity in America and elsewhere in Europe, and not a word in the media, and no opposition in Congress to the destruction of the Western world that war with Russia will bring? Dear American, My questions are for aware people, a status for which few Americans qualify. If Human history continues, which at this point of time seems doubtful, future historians will ask why the people did not protest their pending annihilation. How was it possible that entire populations could be so brainwashed that they were removed from the reality of their own destruction?

Read more …

“The prosecution does not plan to bring out the entire infamous laptop..”

• Jury Selection Begins In Hunter Biden Gun Trial (ZH)

Of all the things Hunter Biden has been accused of, and recorded himself doing, he’ll be in a Delaware courthouse this week on three federal felony gun charges. Jury selection begins in the case brought against him by special counsel David Weiss, who has charged the First Son with making a false statement during the purchase of a firearm, making a false statement related to information required to be kept by a licensed firearm dealer, and one count of possession of a firearm by a person who is an unlawful user of or addicted to a controlled substance. According to the indictment, Hunter bought a Colt Cobra revolver Oct. 12, 2018 – during which he “knowingly made a false and fictitious written statement, intended and likely to deceive that dealer with respect to a fact material to the lawfulness of the sale of the firearm … certifying he was not an unlawful user of, and addicted to, any stimulant, narcotic drug, and any other controlled substance, when in fact, as he knew, that statement was false and fictitious.”

Specifically, Hunter answered ‘no’ when asked if he was “an unlawful user of, or addicted to, marijuana or any depressant, stimulant, narcotic drug, or any other controlled substance.” Eleven days after Hunter bought the gun, his brother’s widow, Hallie Biden, threw it in a dumpster behind a market near a school. An elderly man discovered the items and police later obtained them from him. Authorities placed the items into “an evidence vault” and no charges were brought. Searches of Mr. Biden’s account, undertaken as federal agents investigated him for tax crimes, uncovered evidence that led to the firearm charges. That included pictures showing drugs and texts relating to how Mr. Biden was using drugs. He later wrote in his memoir that he was addicted to drugs during the period he bought and owned the revolver. Maximum prison time on all charges could be up to 25 years (we’ll wait for you to catch your breath), and each count carries a maximum fine of $250,000 and three years of unsupervised release.

The trial begins almost a year after Judge Maryellen Noreika blew up a sweetheart plea deal, which would have conveyed broad immunity to Hunter on a wide swath of unrelated potential criminal charges. The deal sought to cap a five-year investigation into Hunter’s tax affairs and business dealings. After the plea deal unraveled, David Weiss requested and was granted “special counsel” status by Attorney General Merrick Garland.

During the trial, prosecutors will not be allowed to let the jury know about Hunter’s 2014 discharge from the Navy after testing positive for cocaine, nor his salacious child support case for his out-of-wedlock daughter in Arkansas. Judge Noreika also said that Weiss only has to show that Hunter was addicted to drugs, not that he was on them the day he purchased the gun. The prosecution does not plan to bring out the entire infamous laptop containing details of Hunter Biden’s life but will introduce certain portions. Noreika ruled that Hunter Biden’s team will be able to question aspects of the laptop in front of the jury. The laptop, which leaked in 2020 just before the presidential election, was decried as Russian disinformation by 51 former intelligence officials. Noreika also ruled that the special counsel cannot mention Hunter Biden’s pending federal tax trial in California during the trial in Delaware, which is also part of Weiss’s investigation and scheduled for a September trial. -Fox News

Read more …

“..We are in the long term now, and the contours of the new Germany are emerging.”

• Germany Begins To Militarize: When Have We Seen This Before? (Amar)

Recent German history is marked by two dates – 1918 and 1945 – that stand for extraordinary, catastrophic failures of, among other things, militarism. Most countries have militaries, many have substantial ones. But militarism is, of course, something else: In essence, the term stands for a syndrome: a type of politics and culture – an integrated Zeitgeistpackage, if you wish – that harmfully exaggerate the public importance, social prestige, and political power of a country’s military. Both pre-World War I and pre-World War II Germany were clear cases of this political pathology, and both paid dearly for it, with massive defeats in wars started – first with significant input from others, then entirely on its own – by Berlin. History can be a harsh teacher, and in this case, the lessons that Germany brought on itself were not only painful, but they also got successively worse: 1918 was a severe setback that led to regime change, deep economic crisis, and lasting instability; 1945 was a total defeat that came with national partition and a robust geopolitical downgrading that was to last forever. Or so it seemed.

When the two Germanies that emerged after 1945 united in 1990, everyone with any sense of history knew that things would change again. It is true that in purely constitutional terms, the new Germany is merely a bigger version of the former West Germany; the former East Germany was simply absorbed. Yet in every other respect – including political culture, geopolitics, and, quite fundamentally, what it means to be German – that bigger version of old West Germany was on a timer: In the short term, post-unification Germany phase one (just a bigger West Germany) was bound to be transitory, just like, for instance, post-Soviet Russia phase one (the 1990s). And as with post-Soviet Russia, the really intriguing question has always been what phase two would look like, while those who thought they knew in advance risked being humbled by history. (Remember that once fashionable idea that Russia was “in transition” to becoming a geopolitically docile copy of an imaginary Western standard model? No? Don’t worry. No one else does either.)

Now, however, it’s 2024. Over a third of a century has passed since German unification. Gerhard Schroeder and Angela Merkel, the quintessential leaders of that deceptively abiding phase-one version of post-unification Germany are history. We are in the long term now, and the contours of the new Germany are emerging.

Read more …

“..Russia could react asymmetrically to a Ukrainian attack on its nuclear deterrence, as Moscow would hold the US responsible..”

• US Close To ‘Fatal’ Miscalculation – Moscow (RT)

The US is close to making a “fatal” miscalculation in its attempts to deal with Russia and the Ukraine conflict, Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov has warned. The senior diplomat commented on Monday on the reported US decision to let Kiev use American weapons outside what Washington considers Ukrainian territory. The move is supposedly limited to a small piece of Russia’s Belgorod Region relevant to hostilities across the border in Ukraine’s Kharkov Region. ”I’d like to warn American actors against miscalculations that can lead to fatal consequences. For some unclear reason they underestimate how serious a response they could face,” Ryabkov told journalists. Up to then the stated US policy had been to ban such attacks, to prevent triggering “World War III.” Kiev has said it is disappointed by the change, as it wants permission to fire long-range American weapons deep inside Russia.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has warned of “serious consequences” of potential long-range strikes “considering the [countries’] parity in strategic weapons.” Ryabkov urged American policymakers to “spend some of their time, which they probably waste on computer games, judging by their air-headed approach to serious issues” on considering Putin’s words.The official also warned that Russia could react asymmetrically to a Ukrainian attack on its nuclear deterrence, as Moscow would hold the US responsible. Officials in Washington “have given Kiev a permit for any crimes, any action, and do nothing to curb provocations by their clients… But the US does not get this for free and will feel consequences,” the deputy FM warned. Ukrainian sources have claimed to the media that Kiev targeted two early-warning radar stations in Russia last month, allegedly damaging one. The facilities in question are designed to detect intercontinental ballistic missile launches and provide a response window to the Russian leadership.

Read more …

Biden will be absent as well, sends Kamala.

• China Explains Snub Of Zelensky ‘Peace Summit’ (RT)

The Chinese government has said it will not be taking part in an upcoming Swiss-hosted conference on the Ukraine conflict, as the conditions necessary for such an event have not been met. Beijing has repeatedly stressed that any summit on settling the fighting between Russia and Ukraine must include “three important elements,” Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning said during a media briefing on Monday. Those terms are recognition of the event by both Moscow and Kiev, equal participation of all sides, and a fair discussion of all peace proposals. None of the three conditions are likely to be fulfilled at the gathering, Mao explained, and therefore it would be “problematic” for China to participate in the summit – due to take place at the Burgenstock Resort near Lucerne on June 15 and 16.

The spokeswoman stressed that Beijing’s absence from the Swiss event does not mean a lack of support for peace between Russia and Ukraine. Mao went on to suggest that some countries who are sending delegations to the conference are not actually interested in ending the fighting. China has never “fanned fire or fueled the flames” when it comes to the Ukraine hostilities, Mao stressed, while expressing hope that all sides can understand China’s stance regarding the conference. On Sunday Ukraine’s leader, Vladimir Zelensky, lashed out at Beijing over its reluctance to attend the gathering in Switzerland, claiming that China has become “an instrument in the hands of [Russian President Vladimir] Putin” as he tries to discredit the conference.

Russia has not been invited to the summit, which is expected to address Zelensky’s so-called ‘ten-point peace plan.’ The scheme, among other things, demands a complete withdrawal of Russian forces from all territories that Ukraine considers its own, for Moscow to pay reparations, and for Russian officials to present themselves to war crimes tribunals. Russia instantly rejected the proposal as “unacceptable” when it was first floated by Zelensky in late 2022. According to Moscow, the plan disregards the situation on the ground and is a sign of Kiev’s unwillingness to seek a diplomatic solution to the crisis. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told RT last week that it was “absurd” to hold a summit on settling the conflict without Moscow’s participation. “This conference is completely without prospects,” he stressed.

Read more …

Differents accounts.

• Ready Reckoner For Killing – The Raisi Assassination (Helmer)

It was a frustrated Sherlock Holmes who told Dr Watson: “You will not apply my precept,” he said, shaking his head. “How often have I said to you that when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth?” That was in 1890 in the Arthur Conan Doyle story, “The Sign of Four”. Application of this Holmes rule of detection and deduction to the circumstances of the crash of Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi’s helicopter on May 19 is now producing the inescapable conclusion that Raisi, Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, and the six others on board their aircraft were killed by the actions of one or both of the pilots, who intended their own suicide and the killing of their passengers. This appears not to have been the conclusion of the Iranian Air Force commanders who paid a condolence visit to the families of the pilots on May 21, two days after their deaths.

But with the release last week by the Iranian Army’s General Staff of its second report on the fatal crash, the elimination of weather, machine failure, external missile attack, on-board bomb, electronic sabotage, and pilot navigational error is now complete. Together with the first General Staff report, the detailed Teheran television interview of Raisi’s chief of staff, Gholam-Hossein Esmaeili, and the eyewitness testimony by telephone from the crash scene by the Tabriz ayatollah, Mohammad Ali Al-Hashem, the evidence remaining is that the highly experienced chief pilot, Colonel Seyed Taher Mostafavi made three mistakes — the first, to fly into the cloud bank after he ordered the others to climb above; the second, not to detect on his radar and other instruments the sharp mountain peaks in close proximity to his flight course at 2,200 metres; and the third, to crash in horizontal orientation, not vertically nose first. Hattricks are rare, but they are never mistakes, never accidental.

[..] This is how the eyewitness in the third helicopter, behind Raisi’s aircraft, described the altitude, cloud and weather conditions: “Esmaeili:..There was fog on the ground, but not in up the air where we were advancing with the helicopters. However, in one small compacted area, there was a small patch of clouds above a cliff. In terms of height, this cloud was at the same height as our flight’s height. It was there that the now-martyred helicopter pilot [Mostafavi], who was also the commander of the fleet, told the rest of the pilots to ascend above the clouds. We were third behind the president’s helicopter. We rose above the clouds and advanced for approximately 30 seconds. Our pilot suddenly realized that the main helicopter carrying the president was missing.” Esmaeili said the pilot of his aircraft estimated that 90 seconds had elapsed between the radio contact of Mostafavi giving the order to climb above the cloud bank and the “disappearance”. “…we also have no radio contact with it anymore. So I asked him when was the last time contact was made? The pilot answered, ‘A minute and 30 seconds ago when the pilot [Mostafavi] told us to ascend above the clouds.’”

Esmaeili is explicit. It had been Mostafavi who had been at the controls of Raisi’s aircraft and who gave the order to the others to climb above the cloud. Esmaeili also revealed the direct testimony of Al-Hashem, who was thrown clear of the helicopter fuselage at the crash and was not reached by the fire which consumed the other passengers in the cabin. “After some tries, calling the cellphone of the captain [Mostafavi] accompanying the president, someone picked up the phone. It was Ayatollah Hashem, the Friday Imam of Tabriz. He told us that he was not feeling well. He didn’t tell us anything special. I asked him what exactly had happened. He told us that he didn’t know what had happened, and when asked about his whereabouts, he said that he didn’t know. He only described what he could see, described to us what he saw, for example, how he was surrounded by trees. I asked him about the condition of the others, the Ayatollah replied that he’s alone and couldn’t see anyone else and he’s alone.”

Read more …

Next up: Doug Macgregor.

• US Force Scott Ritter Off Plane to Russia, Seize His Passport (Sp.)

Ritter was slated to participate in the annual St.Petersburg International Economic Forum as a guest speaker. “As I was boarding my flight out of New York I was pulled aside by three CBP officers, who seized my passport. When asked why, they said orders of the State Department. No further information was provided. My bags were removed from the flight, and I was escorted out of the airport,” the former US Marine intelligence officer told Sputnik. Scott Ritter added that his passport was not given back. He said he will appeal the decision. Ritter believes US authorities are afraid of his participation in the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum (SPIEF).

“Is this done under the First Amendment to the US Constitution or the Fourth?” Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova asked sarcastically, commenting on Scott Ritter’s removal from his flight to Russia and the confiscation of his passport The First Amendment to the US Constitution guarantees, among other things, non-interference with the freedoms of speech and assembly, while the Fourth Amendment prohibits unreasonable searches and detentions. SPIEF is the largest annual Russian business event in the economic sphere, and is attended by dozens of politicians and entrepreneurs from around the world. This year, the forum will take place on June 5-8.

Read more …

A real life story.

“Mr. Kennedy’s thoughts on U.S. foreign policy,” as The Times’s obit explains, “were partly shaped by discussions with his captors.”

• Deaf and Blind: The Maladies of American Diplomats (Patrick Lawrence)

Here is a modest proposal, nothing too radical, just good sense. Turn over Antony Blinken and Jake Sullivan to the Iranian authorities on the understanding the two statesmen, very loosely defined, would spend 444 days at the U.S. embassy compound in Tehran. Let’s think of it as a reenactment. Said premises, long a mess of barbed wire, weeds, brambles, mold and anti–American graffiti, is now a museum. The Den of Espionage, as it is called, is dedicated to the shameful history of U.S.–Iranian relations leading up to that fateful day, Jan. 16, 1979, when the shah was deposed by a nation that had had enough of him. Those unkind Iranians had to rub it in: The old graffiti is now covered over with mocking murals featuring Mickey Mouse and McDonald’s. All the better, I say. My theory is that the Biden regime’s secretary of state and national security adviser would return from their year and 79 days in the embassy—sitting on the floor, sleeping in the offices, washing their socks in bathroom sinks, the whole nine—transformed almost beatifically into… into statesmen of high purpose and deep insight, the two being devoid of both as we have them now.

I am inspired to these thoughts by a good obituary The New York Times ran in its May 18 editions on the death of a good man named Moorhead Kennedy. Moorhead Kennedy’s blood ran very blue: Upper East Side childhood, Groton, Princeton, Harvard Law, a career in the Foreign Service. Having learned Arabic, he was something of a Middle East man, his assignments over the years including Yemen and Lebanon. And then destiny placed its gentle hand on Kennedy’s shoulder: He was on a temporary assignment as economics attaché in Tehran when the fecal matter hit the fan. And so Kennedy was among those 52 Americans—diplomats, others in civil service jobs—who spent the famous 444 days captives of militant but nonviolent, I would say altogether righteous students who had broken down the embassy gates and climbed over its walls. They were of many stripes, secular and religious, but they were all repelled by the shah’s coercive insistence on Westernizing Iran in the worst kind of way—“Westoxicity,” as it came to be called.

Many of them spent their days poring through the embassy files and diplomatic cables to reconstruct just how, covertly and criminally, the U.S. had been attempting to overthrow the Iranian government for the second time in 26 years. I recall years later seeing black-and-white news footage of the hostages as they filed up the stairs to board an Air Algeria flight home on Jan. 20, 1981. One of the diplomats turned back a few steps short of the cabin door, shouted something the film did not record, and gave the Islamic Republic and all its citizens a great big middle finger. Ah, yes, I recall thinking, with what dignity are we represented to the world. nMoorhead Kennedy would have had as much reason to vent his anger as that vulgarian on the stairs. He was blindfolded and tied to a chair when students filed into his office. But something happened to Kennedy during the long months that followed. He began talking to those who had stormed the embassy. And most of all, he began listening to them.

I have long argued that the first signs that an imperium is in decline are when it goes blind and deaf; it can neither see others for who and what they are nor hear what they have to say. Kennedy proved to suffer from neither of these symptoms. As he later recounted his experience in an interview with a small public-affairs journal in Connecticut, Kennedy seemed to have brought a singularly open mind to what was supposed to be a brief assignment filling in for an absent colleague. “I was very interested in seeing a revolution in progress,” he told a reporter from CT Mirror in 2016. “It was a very fruitful time until, all of a sudden, I heard a shout from the Marines, ‘They’re coming over the wall!’ And then a whole new experience began.”

There is a wonderful photograph of Kennedy atop The Times’s obit, taken in the embassy during his captivity. It shows him sitting at his desk, calmly reading with his fingers to his chin. On the floor beside him are two colleagues whose beards make them look like they are among Kennedy’s captors. On his desk you see the paraphernalia of makeshift meals: a jar of mustard, a jar of Sanka repurposed as a sugar bowl, a box of Cocoa Krispies. I suspect Kennedy’s apparent composure had something to do with that unshakable aplomb you often find in American bluebloods. It is odd now to think you are looking at a man midway through a life-altering metamorphosis from which he had the integrity never to turn back. It was in the embassy that Kennedy began to reflect on what he was doing as an American foreign service officer and to conclude that what he was doing was emphatically not what he ought to have been doing because the nation he served had it all wrong. “Mr. Kennedy’s thoughts on U.S. foreign policy,” as The Times’s obit explains, “were partly shaped by discussions with his captors.”

Read more …

 

 

 

 

Musk Rogan
https://twitter.com/i/status/1797427645870657618

 

 

Flynn

 

 

Push

 

 

Beauty
https://twitter.com/i/status/1796969333786087812

 

 

Anaconda

 

 

Great Escape

 

 

Maldives
https://twitter.com/i/status/1797542542034313299

 

 

Baby elephant

 

 

Painter elephant

 

 

Dog+friends

 

 

 

 

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

 

 

 

 

 

Debt Rattle April 18 2024

Apr 182024
 
 April 18, 2024  Posted by at 8:40 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , , ,  83 Responses »


John French Sloan A Woman’s Work 1912

 

• Prosecutors, Judges, Media Interfering in the November Election (PCR)
• Iran’s ‘New Equation’ Reaches Way Beyond West Asia (Pepe Escobar)
• Iran’s Attack On Israel Signaled A Major Change In The Region (Ibragimov)
• Could the Russians Seize Congress? (Patrick Lawrence)
• White House Says It Opposes Standalone Israel Military Aid Bill (Antiwar)
• Rep. Massie Joins MTG In Calling For Speaker Johnson’s Ouster (ZH)
• Rand Paul Drops COVID Bombshell: “We Have 15,000 Samples In Wuhan” (ZH)
• Tesla Asks Shareholders To Approve Musk’s $56 Billion Comp… Again (ZH)
• NPR Editor Resigns After Suspension for Exposing Bias and Intolerance (Turley)
• EU Leadership Must Go – Orban (RT)
• FBI Wanted Telegram Backdoor to Spy on Users – Founder (Sp.)
• Apple and Google More Dangerous Than Governments – Telegram Founder (RT)
• NSA ’Just Days From Taking Over The Internet’ – Edward Snowden (Mitchelhill)
• The Great Dispossession Part 2 (Paul Craig Roberts)
• The Great Dispossession Part 3 (Paul Craig Roberts)
• Driving America into a Brick Wall – Bill Holter (USAW)
• IMF Lambasts US Over Ballooning Debt (RT)

 

 

Seems a bit extreme.

 

 

Macgregor

 

 

Barron
https://twitter.com/i/status/1780246703976632531

 

 

Watters jury
https://twitter.com/i/status/1780401543004426659

 

 

Tucker CIA

 

 

Talking about testosterone…

 

 

Boeing

 

 

Macgregor: “The United States has not commit to attacking Iran. This is unacceptable to Netanyahu, and he will work to alter Washington’s position.

Under the circumstances, Washington should expect Israel to employ whatever military power is at its disposal, including nuclear weapons, to destroy Iran’s strategic power.

Destroying Iran’s underground nuclear facilities has been a goal for a very long time. Both parties must realize Moscow will not tolerate a devastating attack on Iran.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

“They create felonies out of thin air by stretching the interpretation of law beyond its meaning..”

“.. that their country has been stolen from them and that the ruling elite are not going to permit Trump to give it back to them..”

• Prosecutors, Judges, Media Interfering in the November Election (PCR)

From the beginning it has been completely clear that the criminal and civil indictments of Trump have the purposes of using up his energy, money, and time so that he cannot campaign and of discrediting him with the insouciant part of the population that is stupid enough to have faith in the “justice system.” The trials themselves and the words of the prosecutors and judges prove it. The black Democrat New York District Attorney Alvin Bragg, put into office by anti-Trump billionaire George Soros, who Elon Musk says hates humanity (which means gentiles), has concocted a criminal case against President Trump for “falsifying business documents” that legal scholars dispute. Apparently, Bragg cares not a whit about his reputation, only about preventing Trump from campaigning. Bragg contends that Trump should have reported his $130,000 payment to porn star Stormy Daniels as a campaign contribution to himself and not as legal fees. But, of course, it would have been one of Trump’s lawyers or CPA who filled in the form.

A person of Trump’s wealth leaves such decisions to professionals and does not himself navigate complicated and risky forms. Regardless, there is nothing illegal whatsoever in making extortion or bribery payments to a porn star so that she doesn’t make harmful accusations. It is a much cheaper solution than suing for slander. You should understand that there is nothing illegal about Trump’s payment to the porn star. The payment is perfectly legal. Trump is not charged with making an illegal payment. He is charged with reporting it differently than a black quota hire, clearly incompetent, George Soros DA alleges Trump should have reported it. The whore media has not made this clear to the public. Instead the presstitutes have planted the idea that it is the payment that is the criminal action.

In law the charges against Trump are misdemeanors, not crimes. Trump’s black enemy has in an unspecified way elevated the charges to a felony. Increasingly prosecutors do this. They create felonies out of thin air by stretching the interpretation of law beyond its meaning. Prosecutors know that by the time a wrongly convicted defendant reaches the point that he can appeal the wrongful conviction to a higher court he will have run out of money and energy and will make a plea to a lessor charge. In Trump’s case, the black DA knows that given the slowness of the system Trump will be in court for years appealing wrongful decisions. As corrupt prosecutors suffer no punishment for their crimes against defendants, there is no barrier to their legal abuse of law–particularly when they are in court with a biased judge and have a biased jury. This first of 4 criminal trials began yesterday. Estimates are that the show trial will keep Trump in court for four days a week for the next six or more weeks. Clearly this is election interference and nothing else.

The other criminal trials are in various stages of disrepair. Fani Willis, the black Democrat Atlanta DA who has brought RICO charges against Trump and his attorneys is in trouble herself for paying her lover $700,000 of taxpayers’ money and using the money for vacations. She apparently is another George Soros plant and is shielded by the Democrat machine. She has had to remove her lover from Trump’s case, but is unlikely to suffer any consequences other than embarrassment. A New York civil case orchestrated by a black Democrat attorney general and a Trump-hating Democrat judge confiscated Trump’s NY real estate empire. In order to delay the confiscation until his higher court appeal is decided, the two required Trump to post a $500 million payment that would have depleted his cash for his political campaign. The payment was seen as a form of extortion, and the corrupt AG and judge had to reduce it to $175 million.

Clearly, these are not normal trials or normal charges. The law schools, bar associations, Congress and the whore media don’t even raise questions about the show trials that clearly constitute election interference. As I have said many times, the system will not permit Trump’s return to office. Americans need to understand that their country has been stolen from them and that the ruling elite are not going to permit Trump to give it back to them.

Read more …

“Netanyahu is influenced by his [fundamentalist] political partners to go into an escalation so he can hold onto power and accelerate the coming of the Messiah.”

• Iran’s ‘New Equation’ Reaches Way Beyond West Asia (Pepe Escobar)

A Holy of the Holies was shattered in the Holy Land as Iran staged a quite measured, heavily choreographed response to the Israeli terror attack against its consulate/ambassador residence in Damascus, a de facto evisceration of the Vienna Convention on diplomatic immunity.This game-changer will directly interfere on how the Anglo-American system manages its simultaneous conflagration with Russia, China and Iran – three top BRICS members. The key problem is escalations are already built in – and will be hard to remove. The Total Cancel War against Russia; the genocide in Gaza – with its explicit policy masterfully decoded by Prof. Michael Hudson; and the decoupling/shaping the terrain against China won’t simply vanish – as all communication bridges with the Global Majority keep being torched.Yet the Iranian message indeed establishes a “New Equation” – as Tehran christened it, and prefigures many other surprises to come from West Asia.

Iran wanted to – and did send – a clear message. New equation: if the biblical psychopathic entity keeps attacking Iranian interests, from henceforth it will be counter-attacked inside Israel. All that in a matter of “seconds” – as the Security Council in Tehran has already cleared all the procedures. Escalation though seems inevitable. Former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak: “Netanyahu is influenced by his [fundamentalist] political partners to go into an escalation so he can hold onto power and accelerate the coming of the Messiah.” Compare it to Iranian President Raisi: “The smallest act against Tehran’s interests will be met with a massive, extensive, and painful response against all its operations.” For Tehran, regulating the intensity of the clash in West Asia between Israel and the Axis of Resistance while simultaneously establishing strategic deterrence to replace “strategic patience” was a matter of launching a triple wave: a drone swarm opening the path for cruise missiles and ballistic missiles.

The performance of the much-vaunted Iron Dome, Arrow-3 and David’s Sling – aided by F-35 fighter jets and the US and the UK naval force – was not exactly stellar. There’s no video of the “outer-layer” Arrow-3 system shooting down anything in space. At least 9 ballistic missiles penetrated the dense Israeli defense network and hit the Nevatim and Ramon bases. Israel is absolutely mum on the fate of its Golan Heights intel installation – hit by cruise missiles. Amidst classic fog of war, it’s irrelevant whether Tehran launched hundreds or dozens of drones and missiles. Regardless of NATOstan media hype, what’s proven beyond the shadow of a doubt is that the supposedly “invincible” Israeli defense maze – ranging from US-made AD/ABM systems to Israeli knockoffs – is helpless in real war against a technologically advanced adversary.

What was accomplished by a single operation did raise quite a few professional eyebrows. Iran forced Israel to furiously deplete its stock of interceptors and spend at least $1.35 billion – while having its escalatory dominance and deterrence strategy completely shattered. The psychological blow was even fiercer. What if Iran had unleashed a series of strikes without a generous previous warning lasting several days? What if US, UK, France and – traitorous – Jordan were not ready for coordinated defense? (The – startling – fact they were all directly dispensing firepower on Tel Aviv’s behalf was not analyzed at all). What if Iran had hit serious industrial and infrastructural targets?

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“..if Iran joins Russia and China and, as part of this troika, becomes an actor in the great world politics, the Middle East will face some big changes..”

• Iran’s Attack On Israel Signaled A Major Change In The Region (Ibragimov)

[..] the most intriguing question now is how the countries of the region, namely the Arab world, will react to Iran’s actions – after all, the attitude towards modern Tehran is quite mixed. Iran has been able to bolster its hand by using proxy organizations, which are now moving against Israel to defend the interests of Palestine. Judging by their neutral reactions – and quite unsurprisingly, in fact – none of the Arab leaders is interested in a strong Iran. They are interested in Iran existing as a moderate state allied with the West, with which they themselves cooperate. However, if Iran joins Russia and China and, as part of this troika, becomes an actor in the great world politics, the Middle East will face some big changes.

Despite the IRGC’s counterattacks, Iran continues to maintain its position that nobody needs a war, and it’s not interested in one by any means. As for its strikes so far, Iran considers them quite successful; they succeeded in making a point and delivering ‘a clear message’ to the entire West that Tehran is no longer confining itself to verbal statements and that, in general, things are going to get very real. Furthermore, any potential response from Israel will now justify similar operations by Iran, which may become harsher and harsher every time. Besides, the moral victory also belongs to Iran. Tehran had held the situation in suspense all along, and the world witnessed strikes on military bases in the north of Israel and saw them take damage. Iran’s strike, albeit a token one, has happened. The Islamic Republic is beginning to act like the flagship power in the region.

In this case, Israel hardly needs a direct war with the Islamic Republic, especially with the Hamas issue not settled yet, Gaza still not demilitarized, hostages yet to be rescued, and Western allies offering nothing in terms of support but nice statements and condemnations. In the meanwhile, there are rather serious reasons to believe that Israel may not be able to keep its temper and strike, just for self-consolation. Expecting a response strike from Iran, Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz said, several days prior to the counterattack, that if Iran strikes from its territory, then Israel will attack in response. That means the Israelis could go further and continue their attacks. Yes, Netanyahu has changed his tone somewhat and tries to show now that he doesn’t want a big war. He, however, may be under pressure from the security wing, members of which yearn for revenge and want to blow off steam on Iran, which they think created the situation Israel has been in since October 7, 2023. If Israel does strike back, attacking Iranian territories and killing people, the situation will spin out of control and there will be no stopping the Iranians.

The goal of Iran’s counterattack against Israel was not to unleash a big war. This action can be seen differently: as a PR effort, a propaganda schtick, or muscle-flexing. Some may say that Iran failed to retaliate fully, as its attack didn’t achieve anything equal to the two generals and 11 diplomats that Israel’s strike had killed. The message of the counterstrike, however, was not only to take revenge for Iran’s dead. Tehran deliberately didn’t strike targets in major Israeli cities. Its strikes on Israel were limited, mostly targeting the occupied Golani Heights, which legally belong to Syria, and military installations in Negev desert, in order to avoid escalation and prevent further provocations on Israel’s part. Besides, Iran has proved that it can penetrate Israel’s air defenses and that Israel is not that well protected.

Therefore, Iran’s goal was to change the rules of the game in the region and, by and large, it succeeded. Tehran’s counterattack put paid to any talk of Iran not putting its money where its mouth is and brought the conflict between the two countries to a whole new level. This half-measure cannot be seen as a defeat, but it’s not exactly a victory either. Besides, Israel is not going to sit idle. The Jewish state will start reviewing its actions and correcting mistakes; after all, matters of its own security are the utmost priority for Israel.

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“These people that read various conspiracy-theory outlets that are just not accurate, and they actually model Russian propaganda.”

• Could the Russians Seize Congress? (Patrick Lawrence)

The Russians are coming — or coming back, better put. As the November elections draw near, let us brace for another barrage of preposterous propaganda to the effect Russians are poisoning our minds with “disinformation,” “false narratives,” and all the other misnomers deployed when facts contradict liberal authoritarian orthodoxies. We had a rich taste of this new round of lies and innuendo in late January, when Nancy Pelosi, the California Democrat who served as House speaker for far too long, asserted that the F.B.I. should investigate demonstrators demanding a ceasefire in Gaza for their ties, yes indeedy, to the Kremlin. Here is Pelosi on CNN’s State of the Union program Jan. 28: “For them to call for a cease-fire is Mr. Putin’s message. Make no mistake, this is directly connected to what he would like to see. Same thing with Ukraine…. I think some financing should be investigated. And I want to ask the F.B.I. to investigate that.”

O.K., we have the template: If you say something that coincides with the Russian position, you will be accused of hiding your “ties to Russia,” as the common phrase has it. Be careful not to mention some spring day that the sky is pleasantly blue: I am here to warn you—“make no mistake” — this is exactly what “Putin,” now stripped of a first name and a title, “would like to see.” There is invariably an ulterior point when those in power try on tomfoolery of this kind. In each case they have something they need to explain away. In 2016, it was Hillary Clinton’s defeat at the polls, so we suffered four years of Russiagate. Pelosi felt called upon to discredit those objecting to the Israeli–U.S. genocide in Gaza. Now we have a new ruse. Desperate to get Congress to authorize $60.1 billion in new aid to Ukraine, Capitol Hill warmongers charge that those objecting to this bad-money-after-bad allocation are… do I have to finish the sentence?

Two weeks ago Michael McCaul, a Republican representative who wants to see the long-blocked aid bill passed, asserted in an interview with Puck News that Russian propaganda has “infected a good chunk of my party’s base.” Here is the stupid-sounding congressman from Texas, as quoted in The Washington Post, elaborating on our now-familiar theme: “There are some more nighttime entertainment shows that seem to spin, like, I see the Russian propaganda in some of it — and it’s almost identical on our airwaves. These people that read various conspiracy-theory outlets that are just not accurate, and they actually model Russian propaganda.” I read in the Post that McCaul’s staff abruptly cut short the interview when Julia Ioffe, a professional Russophobe who has bounced around from one publication to another for years, asked him to name a few names.

So was this latest ball of baloney set in motion. A week after McCaul’s Puck News interview, Michael Turner, an Ohio Republican who, as chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, swings a bigger stick, escalated matters when, reacting to McCaul’s statements, reported that this grave Russian penetration was evident in the upper reaches of the American government, as again reported in The Washington Post: “Oh, it is absolutely true. We see directly coming from Russia attempts to mask communications that are anti–Ukraine and pro–Russia messages, some of which we even hear being uttered on the House floor.” Masked communications uttered on the House floor: Hold the thought, as I will shortly return to it.

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House Speaker Mike Johnson is about to get ousted. It’s all RINOs all the way down.

• White House Says It Opposes Standalone Israel Military Aid Bill (Antiwar)

The White House said on Monday that it opposes the idea of a bill that would give additional military aid to Israel without funding Ukraine and Taiwan. “We are opposed to a standalone bill that would just work on Israel, as we’ve seen proposed. We would oppose a standalone bill, yes,” said White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby. Kirby’s comments came a day after House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) said he would work on getting more military aid to Israel this week in the wake of Iran’s attack on Israeli territory, which came in retaliation for the bombing of Iran’s consulate in Damascus. Later on Monday, AP reported that Johnson told fellow GOP lawmakers that he plans to bring the package to the floor this week but will hold separate votes on funding for Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan.

Back in February, the Senate passed a $95 billion foreign military aid bill that included $60 billion for the proxy war in Ukraine, $14 billion to support the Israeli slaughter of Palestinians, and a few billion for Taiwan and other spending in the Asia Pacific region. While Johnson wants to hold separate votes, his plan is expected to send about the same amount of money to each country, and each measure will likely pass. He has been under increasing pressure from the White House and congressional hawks in both parties to bring the $95 billion bill to the floor for a vote. “Time is not on anyone’s side here in either case, so they need to move quickly on this,” Kirby said. “And the best way to get that aid into the hands of the IDF and into the hands of the Ukrainian soldiers is to pass that bipartisan bill that the Senate passed.”

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And Rand Paul.

• Rep. Massie Joins MTG In Calling For Speaker Johnson’s Ouster (ZH)

Kentucky Congressman Thomas Massie on Tuesday became the second representative to call for an end to Mike Johnson’s reign as Speaker of the House, joining Rep Marjorie Taylor Greene. He delivered that news directly to Johnson in a closed-door Republican conference meeting, telling the Louisianan “you’re not going to be the speaker much longer,” two representatives told Politico. Massie has criticized Johnson for backing aid packages for Ukraine and Israel, kick-the-can spending bills and the extension of warrantless NSA spying via the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act — while failing to bolster border security. In March, Greene — incensed at Johnson for collaborating with Democrats to push through a $1.2 trillion spending package over the objection of conservatives seeking spending cuts — filed a motion to “vacate the chair,” which would initiate a vote by House members on whether to fire Johnson from the job of speaker.

It’s unclear when Greene, Massie or someone else will call for a vote on the motion. Greene has said that she wants to allow time “for us to go through the process, take our time and find a new speaker of the House that will stand with Republicans and our Republican majority instead of standing with the Democrats.” She’s also expressed wariness over risking the GOP’s razor-thin House majority — which has withered in recent weeks as multiple Republicans announced they’re leaving Congress before finishing their terms. Massie says it’s only a matter of time before the House votes on Greene’s motion to vacate. “The motion is going to get called, OK? Does anybody doubt that? The motion will get called,” Massie told reporters after Tuesday’s meeting. “And then he’s gonna lose more votes than Kevin McCarthy. And I have told him this in private, like weeks ago.” Johnson’s predecessor, Kevin McCarthy, was himself dethroned in October via a motion to vacate the chair.

While Massie and Greene are far from alone in their disappointment in Johnson, many of their disgruntled colleagues are wary of a scenario in which Johnson is ousted and the House spends days or weeks struggling to settle on a successor. “We saw what happened last fall when this all went down — there’s not an alternative…You are not going to get a majority of votes for any new person,” Louisiana Rep. Garret Graves told Politico. Massie has asked Johnson to first allow the party to select a successor, and then voluntarily step down. On Tuesday, Johnson was defiant. “I am not resigning and it is in my view an absurd notion that someone would bring a vacate motion when we are simply trying to do our job,” he told reporters. Massie’s announcement in the closed-door meeting ruffled feathers. Ohio Rep. Jim Jordan voiced his discomfort with the idea, saying, “We don’t need that, no way. We don’t want that. We shouldn’t go through that again. That’s a bad idea.”

On Monday night, Johnson compounded conservatives’ anger when he announced he would bring four separate measures to a vote: aid to Ukraine, aid to Israel, aid to Taiwan and another bill with miscellaneous measures including a TikTok ban. As the New York Times explains, the goal is to cobble together legislation that would match what Democratic Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer is cooking up: If all four pieces passed the House, they would then be folded into a single bill for the Senate to take up, in an effort to ensure that senators could not cherry-pick pieces to approve or reject. “We’re steering toward everything Chuck Schumer wants,” said Massie. Decoupling the proposals also saps conservatives’ leverage to force more spending on border security. Greene called the plan “a scam” and added, “He’s definitely not going to be speaker next Congress if we’re lucky enough to have the majority.”

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“..officials from 15 federal agencies “knew in 2018 that the Wuhan Institute of Virology was trying to create a coronavirus like COVID-19.”

• Rand Paul Drops COVID Bombshell: “We Have 15,000 Samples In Wuhan” (ZH)

Last week Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) wrote in a Tuesday op-ed that officials from 15 federal agencies “knew in 2018 that the Wuhan Institute of Virology was trying to create a coronavirus like COVID-19.” “These officials knew that the Chinese lab was proposing to create a COVID 19-like virus and not one of these officials revealed this scheme to the public. In fact, 15 agencies with knowledge of this project have continuously refused to release any information concerning this alarming and dangerous research. Government officials representing at least 15 federal agencies were briefed on a project proposed by Peter Daszak’s EcoHealth Alliance and the Wuhan Institute of Virology.” -Rand Paul. Paul was referring to the DEFUSE project, which was revealed after DRASTIC Research uncovered documents showing that DARPA had been presented with a proposal by EcoHealth Alliance to perform gain-of-function research on bat coronavirus. New documents released by Drastic Research show Peter Daszak and the EcoHealth Alliance had applied for funds that would allow them to further modify coronavirus spike proteins and find potential furin cleavage sites.

Now, Paul points to an email between EcoHealth’s Daszak and “Fauci Flunky” David Morens from April 26, 2020 (noted days before by the House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic), when the lab-leak hypothesis was gaining traction against Fauci – who funded EcoHealth research in Wuhan, and Daszak’s orchestrated denials and the forced “natural origin” narrative. In it, Daszak laments the “real and present danger that we are being targeted by extremists” (for pointing out that they were manipulating bat covid down the street from where a bat covid pandemic broke out), and called Donald Trump “shockingly ignorant.” He also told David that he would restrict communications “to gmail from now on,” and planned to mount a response to an NIH request which appears to suggest moving out of Wuhan – to which Daszak says “Even that would be a loss – we have 15,000 samples in freezers in Wuhan and could do the full genomes of 700+ Co Vs we’ve identified if we don’t cut this thread.”

Which means Daszak, funded by Fauci, lied when he said “every single one of the SARSr-CoV sequences @EcoHealthNYC discovered in China is already published.” And Anthony Fauci concealed the ‘700 unknown coronaviruses’ in Wuhan. Meanwhile, an EcoHealth progress report referenced “two chimeric bat SARS-like CoVs constructed on a WIV-1 backbone.”

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“..Musk was just paid too damn much for creating a $1.2 trillion company by Nov 2021..”

• Tesla Asks Shareholders To Approve Musk’s $56 Billion Comp… Again (ZH)

At his peak, Elon Musk was worth $340BN (Nov 2021) and stood alone as the world’s richest man/women/other. According to Bloomberg’s billionaires list, he is now worth mere $175BN… sliding to just the fourth-richest in the world as Tesla’s share price has declined and after a Delaware judge decided in January that Musk was just paid too damn much for creating a $1.2 trillion company by Nov 2021. But now, he may be about to climb that wealth ladder back to the top once more as Tesla has asked shareholders to vote again on the same $56 billion compensation package that was voided by a Delaware court early this year. Tesla Chair Robyn Denholm criticized the Delaware Chancery Court’s January decision, writing in the proxy that it amounted to second-guessing shareholders who had approved Musk’s performance-based award in 2018.

“Because the Delaware Court second-guessed your decision, Elon has not been paid for any of his work for Tesla for the past six years that has helped to generate significant growth and stockholder value,” Denholm wrote. The filing went on to say that negotiating a new pay package would take time and lead to incurring billions of dollars in additional compensation expense. Therefore, ratifying the 2018 package will be faster and “avoid a prolonged period of uncertainty regarding Tesla’s most important employee.” Additionally, the filing shows Tesla considered nine other states as alternatives to Delaware before narrowing its choice down to California, Nevada, New York or Texas.

Finally, Bloomberg reports that, according to the filing, dozens of institutional shareholders have contacted Tesla and expressed support for the 2018 compensation plan, including four of the top 10. The carmaker also said that thousands of retail investors have sent letters and emails to the board expressing the same sentiment. Of course, if this passes the shareholder vote, we assume the honorable Chief Judge Kathaleen St. J. McCormick – who described the company’s directors as “supine servants of an overweening master” – will have problems asserting that they hadn’t looked out for the best interests of investors… since it was the investors themselves, now fully informed, that democratically voted for Musk’s compensation plan. …or does democracy (and capitalism) die in Delaware?

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When the 1st Amendment becomes a hindrance…

• NPR Editor Resigns After Suspension for Exposing Bias and Intolerance (Turley)

It appears that National Public Radio has solved the problem of the intolerance for opposing views, detailed in an article by award-winning editor Uri Berliner: he is now out of NPR. Berliner resigned after NPR suspended him and various other journalists and the CEO lashed out at his discussing their political bias. For those of us in higher education, it is a chillingly familiar pattern. Editors, journalists, and listeners at the public-supported outlet will now be able to return to the echo-chambered coverage without the distracting voice of a dissenter. After Berliner wrote his piece in the Free Press, NPR CEO Katherine Maher attacked Berliner and made clear that NPR had no intention to change its one-sided editorial staff or its coverage. Others at NPR also went public with their criticism of him and falsely portrayed his criticism as opposed to actual racial and other diversity of the staff.

In his article, NPR’s David Folkenflik acknowledges that the Berliner criticism “angered many of his colleagues.” Maher response was hardly surprising. After years of criticism over NPR’s political bias, the search for a new CEO was viewed as an opportunity to select someone without such partisan baggage. Instead, it selected Maher, who has been criticized for controversial postings on subjects ranging from looters to Trump. Those now-deleted postings included a 2018 declaration that “Donald Trump is a racist” and a variety of political commentary. Maher was unlikely to address the problem. She is the problem. Maher lashed out at Berliner, calling his criticism and call for greater diversity in the newsroom “profoundly disrespectful, hurtful, and demeaning.” So now Berliner has resigned rather than work at a media outlet where he was shunned and denounced. In social media post on Wednesday, Berliner published his resignation letter to NPR leadership and stated “I cannot work in a newsroom where I am disparaged by a new CEO whose divisive views confirm the very problems at NPR I cite in my Free Press essay.”

It is all-too-familiar to many of us in higher education where conservatives, libertarians, and republicans have been purged from most faculties. This is done through a mix of filling open slots with liberal academics while making life intolerable for those who remain. For years, a conservative North Carolina professor faced calls for termination over controversial tweets and was pushed to retire. Dr. Mike Adams, a professor of sociology and criminology, had long been a lightning rod of controversy. In 2014, we discussed his prevailing in a lawsuit that alleged discrimination due to his conservative views. He was then targeted again after an inflammatory tweet calling North Carolina a “slave state.” That led to his being pressured to resign with a settlement. He then committed suicide just days before his last day as a professor.


Elon Musk: “The software running in her head is the anti-Grok – hates truth & humor”

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“Orban said he intends “to come and take over Brussels,” reiterating his earlier warning to “occupy” the EU’s key institutions with his allies..”

• EU Leadership Must Go – Orban (RT)

The EU needs new leadership as the bloc’s current top officials have proven entirely unsuccessful, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has claimed. Orban made the comments at the European Parliament on Tuesday as part of a public discussion with Former Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki and the leader of the French National Rally party, Fabrice Leggeri. “Now we have a leadership in the EU with some major projects selected by themselves like green transition, RRF (Recovery and Resilience Facility) policy, migration, war [in Ukraine] and sanctions policy, and they all failed,” Orban said. “The present leadership of the European Union must go away. And we need new leaders,” the Hungarian prime minister insisted. Orban said he intends “to come and take over Brussels,” reiterating his earlier warning to “occupy” the EU’s key institutions with his allies in order to bring change to the bloc.

According to the Hungarian leader, the rule of law and conditionality system created by the current EU leadership has “proved to be… an instrument of political blackmailing. If you do not behave as we expect, you do not get the money.” Hungary has not received “a single penny” from the RRF because European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen has openly voiced dissatisfaction with Budapest’s reluctance to accept migrants and its opposition to the bloc’s gender policies, he said. The EU’s green transition “has failed because it has gone against [the] economic and industrial” interests of the bloc, Orban added. A switch towards climate neutrality should not be “politically motivated,” otherwise “it would destroy the competitiveness of the European economy. That is where we stand today,” he explained.

In contrast to many other EU members, the Hungarian leader has refused to provide arms to Ukraine and has consistently criticized the bloc’s sanctions against Russia over the conflict. According to Orban, the time has come for Brussels to define “what it should do with the issue of the war” in order to find a solution to the crisis and prevent similar ones in the future. Even goodwill gestures may “cause difficulties for the European economy,” such as the recent protests by farmers in Poland, France, Germany, and other nations partly caused by the preferences given by the EU to Ukrainian food suppliers, he explained. Orban also insisted that the issue of aid to Kiev should be “separated as much as possible from the issue of Ukraine’s accession to the EU,” formal negotiations for which were approved last year.

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Smart guy. Runs the company himself, with a crew of 30. 900 million daily users. No ads.

• FBI Wanted Telegram Backdoor to Spy on Users – Founder (Sp.)

The former Fox News anchor and conservative media personality divulged that he had set up an official Telegram channel for his Tucker Carlson Network, encouraging the public to “keep an eye on the announcements there.” The channel has already attracted more than 150, 000 subscribers. Speaking with Tucker Carlson, Russian-born IT entrepreneur and co-founder of the Telegram social network Pavel Durov focused on a variety of topics, including his visit to the United States. The 39-year-old revealed that he was closely watched and monitored by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) during his time in the country. “We got too much attention from the FBI, [and] the security agencies, wherever we came to the US,” Durov said during the interview released on Wednesday.

According to the businessman, one of his top employees once told him that he had been approached by the US government. “There was an attempt to secretly hire my engineer behind my back by [US] cybersecurity officers,” Durov claimed. He argued that those officers were trying to persuade the engineer to use “certain open-source tools,” which he would then integrate into Telegram’s code that, in Durov’s opinion, “would serve as backdoors” for hacking the platform. The entrepreneur stressed that he believes what the employee said was true, adding, “There is no reason for my engineer to make up [such] stories.” When asked if infiltrating Telegram’s systems would allow the US government to spy on its users, Durov stated that he did not dismiss the possibility, acknowledging that any government could potentially carry out such an action. “A backdoor is a backdoor, regardless of who uses it,” he underscored.

The 39-year-old tech tycoon noted that he had “personally experienced similar pressure” in the US, where law enforcement officials approached him on many occasions. “Whenever I would go to the US, I would have two FBI agents greeting me at the airport, asking questions. One time, I was having breakfast at 9 am and the FBI showed up at the house that I was renting,” the businessman asserted. According to him, FBI agents knew what he and his team were doing, but the agents wanted the details. “My understanding is that they [also] wanted to establish a relationship to in a way control Telegram better. I understand that they were doing their job. [But] for us running a privacy-focused social media platform, that probably wasn’t the best environment to be in. We want to be focused on what we do, not on government relations of that sort,” Durov pointed out.

The interview comes just a day after Carlson published the first post on his newly-created Telegram page, the Tucker Carlson Network, where users will “get all the latest updates, behind-the-scenes insights, and exclusive content.”
There are already more than 150,000 subscribers for the channel, and their number is growing with every passing second.

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“..When it comes to the freedom of speech, those two platforms could, basically, censor whatever you can read, access on your smartphone..”

• Apple and Google More Dangerous Than Governments – Telegram Founder (RT)

Apple and Google “could, basically, censor whatever you can read, access on your smartphone,” Pavel Durov, the co-founder of the popular messaging app Telegram has told Tucker Carlson in an interview; he lamented that the pressure coming from the tech giants is stronger than that exerted by governments. The entrepreneur has also said he received warnings from both the Democratic and Republican parties after the January 2021 riots in the US Capitol. The rare discussion took place at the Russian-born IT entrepreneur’s office in Dubai, and was released on Wednesday. Carlson asked Durov to give an example of a request to build backdoors into Telegram that crossed into censorship, and could be considered spying, or violating people’s privacy. The messaging app claims to have over 900 million active users.

“There was a funny story related to your home country,” the tech entrepreneur replied. “After the events of January 6, we received a letter from, I believe, a congressman from the Democratic side, and they requested that we share all the data that we have in relation to what they called ‘that uprising.” On January 6, 2021, a mob loyal to then-US President Donald Trump stormed the US Capitol and forced lawmakers into hiding in an attempt to prevent Congress from formalizing Joe Biden’s victory in the presidential election. Durov said his team checked the letter and it “seemed very serious,” essentially saying: “if you fail to comply with this request, you will be in violation with the US Constitution.” “Two weeks after that letter, we got another letter, a new letter, from the Republican side of the Congress, and there we read that, if we give out any data [to the Democrats], it would be in violation of the US Constitution.

So we got two letters that said: whatever we do, we would be violating the US Constitution.” However, the most pressure on Telegram, according to Durov, comes from tech giants Apple and Google, Durov stressed. “I would say that the largest pressure is not coming from governments. It is coming from Apple and Google. When it comes to the freedom of speech, those two platforms could, basically, censor whatever you can read, access on your smartphone,” he said. “They make very clear that if we fail to comply with their guidelines, as they call it, Telegram could be removed from the [app] stores.” Durov dismissed any suggestion of links between Telegram and the Russian government, suggesting that competitors could be stirring up such rumours to discredit the company.

https://twitter.com/i/status/1780401691268931685

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“..through an “innocuous change” to the definition of “electronic communications surveillance provider” in the FISA 702 bill, the U.S. government could go far beyond its current scope..”

• NSA ’Just Days From Taking Over The Internet’ – Edward Snowden (Mitchelhill)

The United States National Security Agency (NSA) is only days away from “taking over the internet” with a massive expansion of its surveillance powers, according to NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden. In an April 16 post to X, Snowden drew attention to a thread originally posted by Elizabeth Goitein — the co-director of the Liberty and National Security Program at the Brennan Center for Justice — that warned of a new bill that could see the U.S. government surveillance powers amplified to new levels. The bill in question reforms and extends a part of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) known as Section 702. Currently, the NSA can force internet service providers such as Google and Verizon to hand over sensitive data concerning NSA targets. However, Goitein claims that through an “innocuous change” to the definition of “electronic communications surveillance provider” in the FISA 702 bill, the U.S. government could go far beyond its current scope and force nearly every company and individual that provides any internet-related service to assist with NSA surveillance.

“That sweeps in an enormous range of U.S. businesses that provide wifi to their customers and therefore have access to equipment on which communications transit. Barber shops, laundromats, fitness centers, hardware stores, dentist’s offices.” Additionally, the people forced to hand over data would be unable to discuss the information provided due to hefty gag order penalties and conditions outlined in the bill, added Goitein. The bill initially received heavy pushback from privacy-conscious Republicans but passed through the U.S. House of Representatives on April 13. Part of the pushback saw the bills’ proposed spying powers time-frame cut from five years to two years, as well as some minor amendments to the service providers included under the surveillance measures. However, according to Goitein, the amendment did very little to reduce the scope of surveillance granted to the NSA.

In her view, the amendment could even see service providers such as cleaners, plumbers and IT service providers that have access to laptops and routers inside people’s homes be forced to provide information and serve as “surrogate spies,” claimed Goitein. The bill has seen strong pushback from both sides of the political aisle, with several government representatives claiming the bill violates citizen’s constitutional rights. Democratic Senator Ron Wyden described the bill as “terrifying” and said he would do everything in his power to prevent it from being passed through the Senate. “This bill represents one of the most dramatic and terrifying expansions of government surveillance authority in history.” Republican Congressperson Anna Paulina Luna, who voted against the bill in the House of Representatives, said Section 702 was an “irresponsible extension” of the NSA’s powers. Luna added that if government agencies wanted access to data, they must be forced to apply for a warrant. The bill is slated for a vote on April 19 in the U.S. Senate.

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“..we already do not own anything..”

• The Great Dispossession Part 2 (Paul Craig Roberts)

In Part 1 ( https://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2024/04/11/the-great-dispossession/ ), I reported that we already do not own anything. The immediate response from readers is: what can we do to avoid dispossession? Offhand, the answer might appear to be debt-free property and gold and silver in personal possession. However, if the goal is that we own nothing and are controlled under a digital currency regime, these assets will be taken as well. Webb says if the billionaires and large financial institutions can be made aware of the situation, they could make Congress aware of the regulatory changes and force Congress to use its law-making power to undo the regulatory changes. After all, if there is no private financial property, there is no one to contribute to Congressional elections. Billionaires’ campaign donations elect the politicians, and what the regulatory changes do to billionaires is to reduce them to the same poverty as a homeless person. What the changes mean for large financial institutions such as Merrill Lynch, Schwab, etc., is their existence ceases.

Webb’s hope is the combined influence can undo the regulatory changes. The question is whether awareness can be generated. The fate of Congress is also at stake. In the Great Reset there is no input from the people and no function for Congress. As in all of my writings, I am trying to bring awareness. Little doubt the messenger will be shot. The purpose of Part 2 is to outline the regulatory changes that have been made that have turned our property in financial assets into the property of “secured creditors.” Webb terms them legal changes, which they are, but as I read it from regulatory, not legislative, action. Webb says the changes are global, but he only describes how the US and EU effected the changes for themselves. I am unable to imagine that Russia, China, Iran and any parts of the world not captured in the Western financial system are parties to the dispossession, especially under the regime of sanctions. As I read it, the dispossession that awaits is limited to the Western world and its captive countries. By global, perhaps Webb means the global operations of Western world financial organizations.

First some definitions: an “account holder” is you, your IRA, your pension plan, your stock and bond investments held at an “account provider” or “intermediary” or “depository institution” such as Merrill Lynch, Schwab, Wells Fargo. An “entitlement holder” is the definition of you whose ownership claim to your financial assets has been subordinated to the claims of “secured creditors” of the institution where you have your accounts. Please do understand that the dispossession of which I write is your dispossession. As reported in Part 1, a country’s securities are pooled in a Central Security Depository (CSD). Each national CSD is linked to the International Security Depository (ICSD), which in the words of a 2013 report by the Bank for International Settlements Committee on the Global Financial System, makes available to “secured creditors” all available collateral (all of our stocks and bonds) and provides cross-border mobility of collateral from the “collateral giver” to the “collateral taker.” Yes, these terms are explicitly used, indicating recognition that theft is taking place.

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“..stocks and real estate have been driven to unprecedented levels by years of zero interest rates. When this bubble pops, we will be dispossessed.”

• The Great Dispossession Part 3 (Paul Craig Roberts)

In Part 1, I explained that the next financial crisis will be bailed out not with central bank money creation but with our stocks, bonds and bank balances. In Part 2, I explained the multi-year quiet regulatory changes that dispossessed us of our property. In Part 3, I explain David Rogers Webb’s conclusion that a massive financial crisis is pending in which our financial assets are the collateral underwriting the derivative and financial bubble and will result in the loss of our assets but leave us with our debts as happened to those whose banks failed in the 1930s. Webb begins with the economic formula that the velocity of circulation of money times the money supply equals nominal Gross Domestic Product. V x MS = GDP. The velocity of circulation is a measure of how many times a dollar is spent during a given period of time, e.g., quarterly, annually. A high velocity means people quickly spend the money that comes into their hands. A low velocity means people tend to hold on to money.

Velocity impacts the Federal Reserve’s ability to manage economic growth with money supply changes. If the velocity of money is falling, an expansionist monetary policy will not result in rising GDP. In such a situation, the Federal Reserve is said to be “pushing on a string.” Instead of pushing up GDP, money supply increases push up the values of financial assets and real estate resulting in financial and real estate bubbles. Webb notes that falls in velocity are precursors of financial crises. A multi-year sharp fall in velocity preceded the stock market crash in 1929 and the Great Depression that gave birth to regulatory agencies. The 21st century is characterized by a long-term fall in velocity that has reached the lowest level on record, while stocks and real estate have been driven to unprecedented levels by years of zero interest rates. When this bubble pops, we will be dispossessed.

Will the bubble pop? Yes. The Fed suddenly and rapidly moved from zero to 5% interest rates, a reversal of the policy that drove up prices of stocks and bonds. The Fed raises rates by reducing money supply growth, thus removing the factor supporting high stock prices and collapsing the value of bonds. This results in a lowering of the value of stocks and bonds serving as collateral for loans, which, of course, means the loans and the financial institution behind them are in trouble. Bonds have already taken a hit. The stock market is holding because participants believe the Fed is about to reverse its interest rate policy and lower rates. Webb notes that the official data show that the velocity of money collapsed in the 21st century while the Fed introduced “quantitative easing.” He makes the correct point that when the velocity of money collapses, the Fed is pushing on a string. Instead of money creation fueling economic growth, it produces asset bubbles in real estate and financial instruments, which is what we have at the present time.

When after more than a decade of near zero interest rates, the Fed raises interest rates it collapses the values of financial portfolios and real estate and produces a financial crisis. As the authorities have set in place a system that bails out secured creditors with our bank deposits, stocks, and bonds, we will have no money and no financial assets to sell for money. People with mortgaged homes and businesses will lose them, as they did in the 1930s, when they lost their money due to bank failures. People with car payments will lose their transportation. The way the system works is you lose your money but not your debts. The secured creditors are the creditors of the troubled institutions. Ultimately, the secured creditors are the mega-banks defined as “privileged creditors.”

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“We are being steered directly into a brick wall because the globalists can’t take over the world with the US standing.”

• Driving America into a Brick Wall – Bill Holter (USAW)

Back in February, when everyone was predicting a Fed rate cut, precious metals expert and financial writer Bill Holter said rates would be going up and not down. Since that call, the 10-Year Treasury is up more than 30 basis points. It closed today at 4.67%. Now, Holter is still calling for higher interest rates that will coincide with higher gold and silver prices. Why? It’s called inflation, and it’s not temporary. Holter explains, “Foreigners are backing away from buying Treasuries. That is the only thing that has kept the doors open, so to speak, is the fact we are able to borrow an unlimited amount of money because we are the world reserve currency. Foreigners backing away from our debt is going to lead the Federal Reserve to be the buyer of last, and then, only resort. So, you will have direct monetization between the Fed and the Treasury. What that will cause is a currency that declines in purchasing power. It will decline in a big way, and it will decline rapidly. So, what I am describing is inflation that turns into hyperinflation.”

But that is not the end of our problems. Holter points out, “I do think it is going to get worse, and that means interest rates will go higher, and that will put on much more pressure. We are at 4.65% on the 10-Year Treasury now. We went from 3.75% to 4.65% (in a short amount of time). We run through 5% on the 10-year Treasury, and everything blows up. . . . The bottom line here is we are at the end game of a fiat currency. Young people have never experienced high inflation. . . . Where we are this time around, Paul Volker (Fed Head in 1979) was able to raise rates to 16% or 17% and crush inflation. He was able to do that because there was not a ton of debt. The U.S. debt back in 1980 was 35% of GDP. Now, it is 125% plus debt to GDP. If you raise rates to 6% to 8%, you will blow up the entire system because much of this debt was put on during the 1% to 3% interest rate time. . . . The inflation is going to push rates higher no matter what the Fed says.”

Gold is hitting one new record high after another. It’s not greed, but fear, and Holter says, “Big money is buying gold because they are looking for protection.” The other wild card is war, and Holter says, “War is a way to keep the system propped up.” In closing, Holter contends, what you are seeing is not a series of mistakes by incompetent people. Holter says, “This is too stupid for it not to be the plan. . . .This is not a Republican or Democrat thing. We are being steered directly into a brick wall because the globalists can’t take over the world with the US standing. They have to take the US down, and if they take the US down, so will the western financial system fall. If that happens, the globalists can have their way.”

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Brick wall right ahead.

• IMF Lambasts US Over Ballooning Debt (RT)

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has raised concerns about overspending by the US government, warning it has been reigniting inflation risks and undermining financial stability around the world. The US federal budget deficit jumped from $1.4 trillion in fiscal 2022 to $1.7 trillion last year, according to the latest World Economic Outlook, issued by the IMF on Tuesday. “The exceptional recent performance of the United States is certainly impressive and a major driver of global growth,” the IMF said. However, the report explained that this “reflects strong demand factors as well, including a fiscal stance that is out of line with long-term fiscal sustainability.” The ballooning US national debt, which exceeded $34 trillion in December, and the fiscal deficit threatened to exacerbate sky-high levels of inflation while posing a long-term risk to the global economy, according to the report.

“Something will have to give,” the IMF warned. The US exceeded its debt ceiling, which was legally set at $31.4 trillion, in January 2023. After months of warnings of an imminent and economically disastrous default from the US Treasury, President Joe Biden in June 2023 signed a bipartisan debt bill that suspended the cap until January 2025. This effectively allowed the government to keep borrowing without limits through next year. Debt spiked to $32 trillion less than two weeks after the bill was approved, and has been piling up ever since. The debt held by the public could surge by $19 trillion over the next decade to surpass the $54 trillion mark, owing to the mounting costs of an aging population and higher interest expenses, according to recent projections by the Congressional Budget Office (CBO).

Since entering office, Biden has spent trillions on Covid relief as well as on infrastructure. The US has also spent billions on aid for Ukraine. The Biden administration, however, has been insisting that tax cuts signed into law by then-President Donald Trump were to blame for the ballooning national debt. Last month, Biden unveiled a $7.3-trillion budget plan for 2025 which would push US debt over 100% of GDP, as he laid out a fiscal agenda that boosts spending but plans to save $3 trillion through higher taxes over ten years. Republicans in the House of Representatives have described the proposed budget as a “roadmap to accelerate America’s decline,” accusing the Biden administration of “reckless spending” and of engaging in a “runaway spending spree” that disregards fiscal responsibility.

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Dr Phil
https://twitter.com/i/status/1780432276536348760

 

 

Ladapo
https://twitter.com/i/status/1780338991906078826


https://twitter.com/i/status/1780336890639475072

 

 

Cloud seeding

https://twitter.com/i/status/1780546767232122903
https://twitter.com/i/status/1780631970667536551

 

 

Buster
https://twitter.com/i/status/1780260040672415826

 

 

Chickady’s Birdhouse
https://twitter.com/i/status/1780274925317574889

 

 

Bull dog

 

 

Wolf

 

 

Puppy
https://twitter.com/i/status/1780651680528261376

 

 

 

 

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

 

 

 

 

 

Debt Rattle September 21 2023

Sep 212023
 
 September 21, 2023  Posted by at 9:07 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , ,  58 Responses »


Willem de Kooning Gotham News 1955

 

• The Question About Biden (Patrick Lawrence)
• Jim Jordan: The Fix Is In (Kanekoa)
• Feds Thwarted Probe Into ‘Criminal Violations’ In 2020 Biden Campaign (JTN)
• Poland Announces It Will No Longer Arm Ukraine (ZH)
• McCarthy Refuses To Guarantee $24 Billion For Zelensky (RT)
• The ‘Kitchen Sink’ Is McCarthy’s Only Path To Avoid Shutdown (ZH)
• Rand Paul To Hold Up Any Spending Stopgap That Includes Ukraine Funding (Hill)
• Trump Silent On Peace Plan As Ukrainians Die – Zelensky (RT)
• With Gonzalo Lira In Ukraine Prison, Billions More For Ukrainian ‘Freedom’ (BB)
• Russian Announces Full Ceasefire Agreement For Nagorno-Karabakh (TASS)
• Jacinda Ardern Calls on the United Nations to Crack Down on Free Speech
• Putin Never Insults People: Peskov In Response To Biden (TASS)
• DHS Is Grooming Americans to Report on Each Other (Whitehead)
• The Bull Missed The Red Flag In The Russian Provincial Elections (Helmer)
• MEP Delivers Damning Message to the Global Tyrants (VN)

 

 

 

 

She’s the best
https://twitter.com/i/status/1704320986135290064

 

 

 

 

Nap Larry Johnson

 

 

Nap Ritter

 

 

 

 

Watters

 

 

 

 

Dystopia

 

 

Democracy is a pathetic belief in the collective wisdom of individual ignorance.

– H. L. Mencken

 

 

 

 

“Biden and his minders are not going to fight the impeachment process in committee rooms and courts because they cannot win on the evidentiary merits. They are going to fight this by mounting a propaganda op..”

• The Question About Biden (Patrick Lawrence)

A friend and colleague wrote in an unusually sage commentary a couple of years ago that Ukraine would prove “NATO’s Waterloo.” He called the brewing conflict there “a debacle-in-waiting.” This was two months before the U.S. provoked the Russian intervention in February 2022. Now that is prescience. Ukraine, indeed, has revealed NATO somewhat in the way of the old pun: No action, talk only. As Scott Ritter argued in a recent speech, it now appears the alliance is incapable of waging war in Ukraine or anywhere else in Europe. But let’s set NATO’s surprising weakness aside for now and consider who, as the Ukrainian sinkhole widens and deepens, is tumbling fastest into it.

Here I offer a confession: I take pleasure, not at all perverse, in watching Joesph R. Biden, Jr. and those around him panic as the bill comes due for all those years of conniving with Ukrainian crooks and as the unforgivable folly of the war he started is now everywhere understood, even among those who continue in public to pretend otherwise. It is not yet possible to discern just how our burbling president will go down, but go down he will. Of this we can now be certain. The time of comeuppance is near. My question as of last week is this: Is the Biden regime’s whatever-it-takes, as- long-as-it-takes commitment to the war tied to his escalating vulnerability to charges of corruption dating to his years as Barack Obama’s vice-president, when he carried the Ukraine portfolio? Does Biden have a personal interest in prolonging this war, to put this question another way?

It took the House of Representatives nearly a year, but last Tuesday Kevin McCarthy, the U.S. House speaker, directed the chamber to open an impeachment inquiry into Biden’s evidently extravagant grifting and influence peddling in Ukraine and elsewhere. It is hard to believe the Democrats’ response to this development. The Democratic machine and its clerks in the press pretended for years there was nothing to allegations that Biden and his son Hunter were on the take from a Ukrainian oligarch, as well as various other business people in China, Russia and Central Asia. They have more recently pretended there is no credible evidence of misconduct, even as investigators sent piles of it to the House Oversight Committee.

And now they pretend the imminent inquiry is so hollow and silly it is not worth bothering about. John Fetterman, the Democratic senator from Pennsylvania, struck the new pose as soon as McCarthy announced the inquiry: “Oh, my God, really? Oh, my gosh, it’s devastating,” Fetterman mocked. “Oooh, don’t do it. Please don’t do it.” You are now on notice, readers: Biden and his minders are not going to fight the impeachment process in committee rooms and courts because they cannot win on the evidentiary merits. They are going to fight this by mounting a propaganda op that is daring even for the party that concocted and then sustained the Russiagate hoax for five years. Here is Peter Baker, The New York Times’s chief White House correspondent, last Thursday:

“Forget the weighty legal arguments over the meaning of high crimes and misdemeanors or the constitutional history of the removal process. Mr. Biden’s defense team has chosen to take on the Republican threat by convincing Americans that it is nothing more than rank partisanship driven by the radical wing of the opposition party.” The oafish Baker then elaborates the strategy: “The White House and its allies have gone on the offensive, dismissing the allegations against the president as baseless and debunked, attacking the investigators for distorting the evidence, issuing fund-raising appeals to financial supporters and pressuring the news media to frame the conflict on Mr. Biden’s terms.”

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X “thread”.

• Jim Jordan: The Fix Is In (Kanekoa)

@Jim_Jordan: “The fix is in, even with a face-saving indictment last week of Hunter Biden, everyone knows the fix is in. For four and a half years, the Department of Justice has been investigating Mr. Biden. An investigation run by David Weiss that limited the number of witnesses agents could interview. An investigation that prohibited agents from referring to the President as the “Big Guy” in interviews. An investigation that curtailed attempts to interview Mr. Biden by giving his transition team a heads up. An investigation that notified Mr. Biden’s defense counsel about a pending search warrant. An investigation run by Mr. Weiss where they told Congress three different stories in 33 days.

They told this Committee on June 7, David Weiss said I have ultimate authority to determine when, where, and whether to bring charges. 23 days later, on June 30, he told this committee; actually, I can only bring charges in the District of Delaware. And then, to further confuse matters on July 10, he told Senator Graham, I have not sought Special Counsel status… An investigation run by Mr. Weiss that negotiated a plea deal that the Federal District Court declined to accept. A plea deal so ridiculous that the judge asked, “Is there any precedent for agreeing not to prosecute crimes that have nothing to do with the charges being diverted?” The DOJ lawyer responded, “I’m not aware of any, your Honor.”

A plea deal so ridiculous that the judge also asked, “Have you ever seen a diversion agreement where the agreement not to prosecute was so broad that it encompasses crimes in a different case?” The response from the DOJ lawyer? “No, Your Honor.” We have an investigation run by Mr. Weiss that not only had a sweetheart deal rejected, but according to The New York Times, there was an even sweeter earlier deal with Mr. Biden where he would not have to plead guilty to anything. Four and a half years and all that. And now we get a Special Counsel, and who does the Attorney General pick? David Weiss, the guy who let this all happen.” [“The one guy he knows will protect Joe Biden.”]

——-

The American administrative state is eliminating its primary opponent from a presidential race. At the same time, they run cover for the Biden family’s unregistered foreign lobbying, money laundering, and bribery operation that collected millions of dollars from Russian, Chinese, and Ukrainian oligarchs.

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“..you had this individual come in and cover Hunter Biden’s tax liability,” he added. “That’s kind of interesting. And then, was in fact that a contribution to Mr. Biden’s campaign when he ran for president?”

• Feds Thwarted Probe Into ‘Criminal Violations’ In 2020 Biden Campaign (JTN)

The FBI and IRS probed allegations that Joe Biden’s 2020 presidential campaign may have benefitted from “campaign finance criminal violations” by allowing a politically connected lawyer to help pay off Hunter Biden’s large tax debts but agents were blocked by federal prosecutors from further action, according to new information uncovered by congressional investigators. The previously unreported campaign finance inquiry was first alluded to in transcribed interviews by House investigators with two IRS agents and a retired FBI supervisor, and the allegations since have been augmented in recent weeks by new evidence uncovered by the House Ways and Means Committee, the House Judiciary Committee and the House Oversight Committee.

That evidence includes a case summary memo written by IRS Supervisory Criminal Investigative Agent Gary Shapley to his bosses dated May 3, 2021 in which he alleged that Lesley Wolf, a top prosecutor in the Hunter Biden case inside Delaware U.S. Attorney David Weiss’ office, waived agents off the campaign finance case. Shapley provided the information to Congress under the protections of whistleblower laws, and lawmakers voted the information to be public “This investigation has been hampered and slowed by claims of potential election meddling,” Shapley wrote in the memo, according to his now-public transcribed interview with House Ways and Means where he read verbatim a passage from the memo. “Through interviews and review of evidence obtained, it appears there may be campaign finance criminal violations.

“AUSA Wolf stated on the last prosecution team meeting that she did not want any of the agents to look into the allegation,” Shapley’s memo stated, according to his interview. “She cited a need to focus on the 2014 tax year, that we could not yet prove an allegation beyond a reasonable doubt, and that she does not want to include their Public Integrity Unit because they would take authority away from her. We do not agree with her obstruction on this matter.” House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, told Just the News on Tuesday evening that the campaign finance inquiry is a newer matter under investigation by his committee but it fits a pattern of other investigative avenues ranging from search warrants to interviews that were inexplicably turned down by prosecutors in the Hunter Biden case.

“We’re just getting into this issue and the concerns,” Jordan [said]. “But it wouldn’t surprise me if they were told to stand down because remember this investigation over a five-year timeframe was slow-walked.” “This is something that I think is a concern, because, you know, you had this individual come in and cover Hunter Biden’s tax liability,” he added. “That’s kind of interesting. And then, was in fact that a contribution to Mr. Biden’s campaign when he ran for president?”

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US next?

• Poland Announces It Will No Longer Arm Ukraine (ZH)

The dam is breaking on unified Western support for Ukraine, and the timing couldn’t be worse for Zelensky, given tomorrow he’s expected to meet with President Biden at the White House. On Wednesday evening there is monumental news out of Poland which could potentially change the entire course of the war. “Poland will no longer arm Ukraine to focus on its own defense,” Polish prime minister Mateusz Morawiecki announced just hours after Warsaw summoned Ukraine’s ambassador related to a fresh war of words and spat over blocked grain, according to the AFP. Warsaw has throughout more than a year-and-a-half of the Ukraine-Russia war been Kiev’s staunchest and most outspoken supporter. Will this massive and hugely significant about-face mark the beginning of the end? Are peace negotiations and ceding of territory in the Donbas inevitable at this point?

Within the last 48 hours relations between Poland and Ukraine quickly spiraled to their lowest point since the Russian invasion, and it is directly related to Warsaw leading a handful of EU countries to extend a grain export ban on Ukraine, amid continuing anger and outrage from Polish farmers who are suffering due to their country being flooded with cheap Ukrainian wheat. Crucially, Poland will hold parliamentary elections on Oct.15. The prior atmosphere of enthusiastic pro-Kiev rhetoric has drastically changed, now with comparisons likening Ukraine to a “drowning man”. As The Associated Press explains:

“Polish leaders have compared Ukraine to a drowning person hurting his helper and threatened to expand a ban on food products from the war-torn country. Meanwhile, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy suggested that EU allies that are prohibiting imports of his nation’s grain are helping Russia. Now, Polish officials, who are trying to win parliamentary elections next month with help from farmers’ votes, are expressing dismay over some of Ukraine’s latest moves, including a World Trade Organization complaint over bans on Ukrainian grain from Poland and two other EU countries.” In surprisingly blunt and terse words given to reporters on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly, Polish President Andrzej Duda said on Tuesday: “Ukraine is behaving like a drowning person clinging to anything available.”

He then said, “A drowning person is extremely dangerous, capable of pulling you down to the depths & simply drown the rescuer.” Given Ukraine’s battlefield losses and as it’s currently bogged down in a failing counteroffensive, the words no doubt stung. But as The Hill notes further of the domestic political context in Poland: Public sentiment around the issue, however, has started to deteriorate, putting the ruling party in a difficult position ahead of a close October election. The far-right Confederation party is hoping to capitalize on the waning support in the country. Reuters reported that a recent poll showed support for Ukrainian refugees fell from 91 percent when the war started to just 69 percent recently. The same survey showed a quarter of Poles are against supporting refugees, compared to 4 percent in early 2022.

In response to the grain ban, Zelensky during his UN speech had condemned the “alarming” behavior of allies regarding the import ban, but without naming Poland specifically. Further, Kiev has announced plans to sue Warsaw in the World Trade Organization while also holding out the possibility of its own embargo on Polish foodstuffs, including onions, tomatoes, cabbage, and apples. Again, all of this amounts to a full-blown diplomatic crisis for Zelensky which couldn’t come at a worse time, as he’s in D.C.

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“..Any money we give to Ukraine, we’re borrowing from our future.” “It’s not a good time for [Zelensky] to be here, quite frankly..”

• McCarthy Refuses To Guarantee $24 Billion For Zelensky (RT)

US House Speaker Kevin McCarthy has refused to commit another $24 billion to Ukraine, telling reporters that he “has questions” for Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky first. With American military aid to Kiev dried up, disagreement on authorizing another funding package threatens to grind Washington to a halt. Zelensky is due to meet with lawmakers on Capitol Hill during a visit to Washington on Thursday. Ahead of the meeting, McCarthy was asked on Tuesday whether he would pledge $24 billion in military and economic aid to the Ukrainian president, as US President Joe Biden has requested. “Is Zelensky elected to Congress?”McCarthy responded. “Is he our president? I don’t think I have to commit anything and I think I have questions for him.”

“Where’s the accountability on the money we’ve already spent?” the Republican leader continued. “What is the plan for victory? I think that’s what the American public wants to know.” In the US Senate, the top Republican and Democrat leaders – Mitch McConnell and Chuck Schumer – want the $24 billion attached to a wider funding bill that must be passed before the end of the month to keep the government running. McCarthy wants any money for Ukraine to be discussed as a standalone bill, while a small group of hardline conservatives in the House want the broad funding bill replaced with individual bills for individual government agencies. This group, dubbed the ‘Freedom Caucus’, backed McCarthy’s speakership last year in exchange for the right to remove him from the position.

Most members of the ‘Freedom Caucus’ are politically aligned with former President Donald Trump, and oppose further US aid to Ukraine. “There’s no money in the House right now for Ukraine. It’s not there,” Rep. Byron Donalds told The Recount on Tuesday. “To be blunt, we’re running a $2 trillion deficit. Any money we give to Ukraine, we’re borrowing from our future.” “It’s not a good time for [Zelensky] to be here, quite frankly,” Donalds added. The US has allocated a total of $113 billion in aid to Ukraine since Russia launched its military operation last February, including more than $43 billion worth of arms, ammunition, and other military equipment.

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“..the bill will then head to the Senate, where they’ll undoubtedly strip out key Republican demands, and send a revised bill back to McCarthy that will likely contain billions of dollars for Ukraine..”

• The ‘Kitchen Sink’ Is McCarthy’s Only Path To Avoid Shutdown (ZH)

With a shutdown looming in just over a week, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) has backed himself into a corner. On Tuesday, House Republicans were forced to cancel a procedural vote for a 30-day stopgap funding measure (Continuing Resolution) to keep the government’s lights on beyond Sept. 30. Hours later, five GOP lawmakers crossed the aisle to vote with Democrats to bring down the rule for the Pentagon’s spending bill. As Punchbowl News puts it: “Tuesday was a bad day for McCarthy and House Republicans.” The problem for Kevin is that he needs votes from members of the Freedom Caucus, who are demanding that the CR be spliced up so that it doesn’t fund ‘the election interference of Jack Smith,’ according to Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL).

Gaetz also wants McCarthy to sign a subpoena to better investigation Hunter Biden’s alleged “high crimes and misdemeanors,” – with the Florida rep going so far as to draft said subpoena for McCarthy to sign. McCarthy can also throw a Hail Mary and pander to Democrats for the votes he needs to pass the CR, however doing so would likely seal his fate over a looming threat by Gaetz and others to remove him from his post. The former Politico journalists at Punchbowl News – who have an uncanny read on inside baseball on the Hill, say that McCarthy’s only solution here is to cave to the Freedom Caucus (which might still screw him!) with a “kitchen sink” approach of acquiescing to all of their demands. McCarthy needs to take all of the conservatives’ demands and lump them together into one 30-day funding bill. Ignore how far-fetched or illogical these proposals are and accept what they represent — a means to an end. -Punchbowl News

Freedom Caucus member Ralph Norman (R-SC) told the outlet that he’d vote for the CR if McCarthy will commit to a $1.47 trillion discretionary spending cap, and a schedule for the 11 remaining FY2024 appropriations bills during the 30 days to which the CR applies. But the pain isn’t over for McCarthy – even if he bends the knee and Freedom Caucus members agree to pass it, the bill will then head to the Senate, where they’ll undoubtedly strip out key Republican demands, and send a revised bill back to McCarthy that will likely contain billions of dollars for Ukraine. McCarthy will then need to sell the CR back to House Republicans, who will either need to accept the reality of a divided government to avert a shutdown, or not. Oh, and the Freedom Caucus might still dick him…

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“..I will not consent to expedited passage of any spending measure that provides any more U.S. aid to Ukraine..”

• Rand Paul To Hold Up Any Spending Stopgap That Includes Ukraine Funding (Hill)

Conservative Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) announced Wednesday he will hold up any funding bill to keep the government open past Sept. 30 if it includes funding for the war in Ukraine. Today I’m putting congressional leadership & @POTUS on notice that I will oppose any effort to hold the federal government hostage for Ukraine funding. I will not consent to expedited passage of any spending measure that provides any more U.S. aid to Ukraine,” Paul wrote on X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter. That means if Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) wants to add Ukraine money to a stopgap measure to fund federal departments and agencies, he would have to go through the time-consuming process of filing cloture and scheduling a vote to end debate on the bill, which would take a few days.

The country risks a shutdown if Congress doesn’t pass what’s known as a continuing resolution (CR) to keep the government open past Sept. 30. The problem Schumer faces is that Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) hasn’t been able to muster up enough votes in the House to pass a CR and send it to the Senate. The impasse in the House is holding up action in the Senate, giving Paul leverage to threaten Ukraine funding. President Biden has requested $24 billion in security and humanitarian aid for Ukraine. Senators are scheduled to receive a classified briefing on Ukraine at 5 p.m. Wednesday ahead of a meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky scheduled for 10 a.m. Thursday in the Old Senate Chamber. Schumer on Tuesday declined to say whether he would add Ukraine funding and disaster assistance to the continuing resolution but observed the package would need support from Democrats and Republicans.

“We’d like to work on a bipartisan basis on the CR with the Republicans. We’ve gotten indications that they want to do that. We’ve done it very successfully on the appropriations process and hopefully we can come together bipartisan here as well,” he said. Schumer criticized House Republicans on Tuesday for reaching a deal on a continuing resolution that didn’t include Ukraine or disaster relief money. The Democratic leader could attempt to pass the continuing resolution through the Senate first by using a legislative vehicle passed earlier this year in the House, but he hasn’t made a decision on that yet. “Our first job is to get the House to pass something. We’ll see if they can but we need a bipartisan bill in each body,” Schumer said.

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You’re sending them out to die, not Trump.

• Trump Silent On Peace Plan As Ukrainians Die – Zelensky (RT)

If former US President Donald Trump actually believes that his claimed plan to resolve the Ukraine crisis in 24 hours is feasible, he should present it to the world rather than let hostilities continue at the cost of Ukrainian lives, President Vladimir Zelensky has said. Trump has repeatedly claimed that he would be able to swiftly resolve the conflict by striking a “fair deal.” He has said that his approach would involve pressuring both Russia and Ukraine into making concessions. Zelensky was asked about the idea by CNN’s Wolf Blitzer during an interview on Tuesday. “If he has this plan, why be afraid and wait?” he asked in Ukrainian, before switching to English. “If he has some smart idea, he could share it with us.”

“He can publicly share his idea now, not waste time, not to lose people, and say: ‘My formula is to stop the war and stop all this tragedy and stop Russian aggression’,” the Ukrainian president continued. Zelensky made clear that he would reject any Trump plan involving territorial concessions by Ukraine or one that would not end with Russian troops ousted from “our land.” “Otherwise, he is not presenting the global idea of peace. So [if] the idea is how to take the part of our territory and to give it to Putin, that is not the peace formula.” Zelensky suggested that Trump himself may not be the person who formulated his plan. He urged the US as a country to contemplate what it would “give to Putin from your territories” in exchange for Russia not using nuclear weapons.

Moscow considers the conflict in Ukraine to be part of a Western proxy war against Russia. In his public speeches, the Russian president has stated that his government would not hesitate to use all the weapons in its arsenal, in accordance with the nation’s military doctrine. Under the document, the nuclear option is reserved for contingencies where the existence of Russia is at stake. Putin has said he considers the risks posed by the Ukraine conflict are nowhere near that threshold. Zelensky arrived in the US on Monday to participate in the UN General Assembly and meet senior US officials. He seeks to convince them to maintain the flow of military aid to his country and provide more advanced weapons from the Pentagon’s stockpiles.

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What is Biden doing to free him?

• With Gonzalo Lira In Ukraine Prison, Billions More For Ukrainian ‘Freedom’ (BB)

The Biden administration is asking Congress to approve another $24 billion for Ukraine for now through the end of this year, which would add to the $113 billion that Congress has committed to the country since its war with Russia began in February of last year. President Biden on Tuesday at the United Nations argued that investment in Ukraine was an investment in “the future of every country that seeks a world governed by basic rules.” However, the administration has been much less vocal about Ukraine potentially violating the rights of an American journalist who is currently detained in Ukraine for his reporting; and in a speech at the U.N. almost entirely devoted to Ukraine, the status of Gonzalo Lira was not mentioned once by Biden.

Lira, a dual citizen of the United States and Chile who was living in the Ukrainian city of Kharkiv at the time of the Russian invasion, is reportedly facing between five to eight years in prison under Ukraine’s wartime propaganda laws. The American citizen journalist was initially arrested in May of this year on suspicion of producing pro-Russian propaganda on his YouTube channel, where he questioned the narratives around the war presented in the legacy media and from the Zelensky government, including suggesting that Moscow was provoked into invading by the Ukrainian government and the expansion east of the American-led NATO military alliance.

In July of this year, Lira posted messages on Twitter and YouTube claiming that he was going to try to cross the Ukrainian border into Hungary to claim asylum after being released from prison on bail. He has not posted on either platform since. In his final video message, Lira claimed that if he did not post after his attempt to cross the border, it would mean that he had been arrested again by the Ukrainian authorities. Lira said that in such an event, he would “die in prison” and begged the public to “raise a ruckus” about his arrest. The former red pill-style dating coach turned citizen journalist has maintained that he merely discussed publicly available information about the war. “The American State Department knows exactly who I am and the fate that awaits me,” he said before attempting to cross the border.

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Not going smoothly. Armenia=US here.

• Russian Announces Full Ceasefire Agreement For Nagorno-Karabakh (TASS)

A full ceasefire agreement between Azerbaijan and Nagorno-Karabakh has been reached through the mediation of Russian peacekeepers, the Russian Defense Ministry said in a statement. “A ceasefire agreement between the Azerbaijani side and representatives of Nagorno-Karabakh has been reached through the mediation of the command for Russia’s peacekeeping mission,” the statement reads. According to the Russian Defense Ministry, “the agreement will be implemented in coordination with the command for the Russian peacekeeping contingent.” The ministry said earlier that Russian peacekeeping forces in Nagorno-Karabakh continued to perform their mission amid rising tensions, providing all possible assistance to civilians. According to the ministry, a total of 2,261 civilians, including 1,049 children, are currently staying at the peacekeepers’ base camp.

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New Zealand should take her to court.

• Jacinda Ardern Calls on the United Nations to Crack Down on Free Speech

Jacinda Ardern may no longer be Prime Minister of New Zealand, but she was back at the United Nations continuing her call for international censorship. Ardern is now one of the leading anti-free speech figures in the world and continues to draw support from political and academic establishments. In her latest attack on free speech, Ardean declared free speech as a virtual weapon of war. She is demanding that the world join her in battling free speech as part of its own war against “misinformation” and “disinformation.” Her views, of course, were not only enthusiastically embraced by authoritarian countries, but the government and academic elite. In her speech, she notes that we cannot allow free speech to get in the way of fighting things like climate change.

She notes that they cannot win the war on climate change if people do not believe them about the underlying problem. The solution is to silence those with opposing views. It is that simple. While some of us have denounced her views as an attack on free expression, Harvard rushed to give her not one but two fellowships. While the free speech community denounced her for unrelenting attacks on this human right, Harvard praised her for “strong and empathetic political leadership” and specifically enlisted her to help “improve content standards and platform accountability for extremist content online.” I actually have no objection to the inclusion of Ardern as a Harvard fellow. She is a former world leader who is leading the movement against free speech. It is a view that students should consider in looking at these controversies.

However, Harvard has heralded her views with no acknowledgment of her extreme antagonism toward free speech principles. There is also little countervailing balance at the school with fellows supporting free speech as a human right. Rather, Harvard (which ranks dead last on the recent free speech survey) has become a virtual clearinghouse for anti-free speech academics and advocates. Free speech is now commonly treated on campuses as harmful. Rather than the right that defines us, it is treated as an existential threat. What is so chilling is to hear Ardean express her fealty to free speech as she calls on the nations of the world to severely curtail it to prevent people from undermining their policies and priorities. She remains the “empathetic” face of raw censorship and intolerance. She is now the virtual ambassador-at-large for global speech regulation and criminalization.

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True.

• Putin Never Insults People: Peskov In Response To Biden (TASS)

Russian President Vladimir Putin never allows himself to stoop to insults, Kremlin Dmitry Peskov said when asked about the chances of a stern response to US President Joe Biden who had described Putin as a “dictator.” “You know that our president never stoops to this – to the level of personal insults against his colleagues. He certainly has his own opinion about this style of rhetoric. But the president, I repeat again, has never stooped to this and will not do so,” Peskov said. According to the spokesman, what is most important is that Putin is supported by the overwhelming majority of Russians, as has been confirmed more than once during presidential elections.

“In his entire career as a politician, President Biden has never once garnered the same level of support as President Putin. This is what he should probably strive for,” Peskov said. He said Biden faces “a very, very difficult election.” “We understand that the US is now actively clearing the electoral field of undesirable competition. But we have our own concerns, which we will be dealing with,” the spokesman said.

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“See Something, Say Something”

• DHS Is Grooming Americans to Report on Each Other (Whitehead)

Are you among the 41% of Americans who regularly attend church or some other religious service? Do you believe the economy is about to collapse and the government will soon declare martial law? Do you display an unusual number of political and/or ideological bumper stickers on your car? Are you among the 44% of Americans who live in a household with a gun? If so, are you concerned that the government may be plotting to confiscate your firearms? If you answered yes to any of the above questions, you may be an anti-government extremist (a.k.a. domestic terrorist) in the eyes of the government and flagged for heightened surveillance and preemptive intervention. Let that sink in a moment.

If you believe in and exercise your rights under the Constitution (namely, your right to speak freely, worship freely, associate with like-minded individuals who share your political views, criticize the government, own a weapon, demand a warrant before being questioned or searched, or any other activity viewed as potentially anti-government, racist, bigoted, anarchic or sovereign), you have just been promoted to the top of the government’s terrorism watch list. I assure you I’m not making this stuff up. So what is the government doing about these so-called American “extremists”? The government is grooming the American people to spy on each other as part of its Center for Prevention Programs and Partnerships, or CP3 program.

According to journalist Leo Hohmann, the government is handing out $20 million in grants to police, mental health networks, universities, churches and school districts to enlist their help in identifying Americans who might be political dissidents or potential “extremists.” As Hohmann explains, “Whether it’s COVID and vaccines, the war in Ukraine, immigration, the Second Amendment, LGBTQ ideology and child-gender confusion, the integrity of our elections, or the issue of protecting life in the womb, you are no longer allowed to hold dissenting opinions and voice them publicly in America. If you do, your own government will take note and consider you a potential ‘violent extremist’ and terrorist.” Cue the dawning of the Snitch State. This new era of snitch surveillance is the lovechild of the government’s post-9/11 “See Something, Say Something” programs combined with the self-righteousness of a politically correct, hyper-vigilant, technologically-wired age.

For more than two decades, the Department of Homeland Security has plastered its “See Something, Say Something” campaign on the walls of metro stations, on billboards, on coffee cup sleeves, at the Super Bowl, even on television monitors in the Statue of Liberty. Colleges, universities and even football teams and sporting arenas have lined up for grants to participate in the program. The government has even designated September 25 as National “If You See Something, Say Something” Awareness Day. If you see something suspicious, says the DHS, say something about it to the police, call it in to a government hotline, or report it using a convenient app on your smart phone. This DHS slogan is nothing more than the government’s way of indoctrinating “we the people” into the mindset that we’re an extension of the government and, as such, have a patriotic duty to be suspicious of, spy on, and turn in our fellow citizens. This is what is commonly referred to as community policing.

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“..of all the twenty leading countries in the world, only we have a flat tax scale..”

• The Bull Missed The Red Flag In The Russian Provincial Elections (Helmer)

Like men, bulls grow less intelligent, more stubborn and miscalculating with age. This is also a problem for the Communist Party of the Russian Federation (KPRF) whose leader, Gennady Zyuganov, has recently turned 79 years of age. He is compos mentis compared to the similarly aged leaders of the Democratic and Republican parties in the White House and US Congress. But that’s not saying much – not enough to have persuaded Russian voters to support the KPRF candidates in the regional, gubernatorial, and mayoral elections which were held across the country between September 8 and 10. [..] Zyuganov insists the KPRF still leads the opposition in the country. “We need to realise that this war has been declared against the entire Russian world, our civilisation,” Zyuganov says in an interview published on the party website on Monday.

“So we have only one way out — to win a complete and unconditional victory. But to do this, it is necessary to correctly assess the current situation, understand our strengths and weaknesses — and resolutely go on the offensive. It is necessary to unite society as much as possible, to mobilise resources, to master all the most advanced and freshest. And to be able to do it in conditions of unprecedented sanctions.” “Putin has changed his strategy four times over the past twenty years. He came to power after the ‘dashing 1990s’, during which more than 80,000 enterprises were destroyed and sold off, citizens’ savings were blown to the wind, and the Soviet government was shot. In the 1990s, the country turned itself into Uncle Sam’s wagging tail and decided to turn into an oil and gas pipe, a quarry, and a sawmill. But Putin realised it was necessary to change the strategy… But the remnants of the Yeltsin era [remain] in power. They still occupy many offices in the Kremlin and the government…”

“Putin made a very interesting and informative speech at the Fareastern Forum. But I would like to pay special attention to the part of his speech that concerned tax legislation. The oligarchy breathed a sigh of relief — the president says we will not change the situation with taxes. But of all the twenty leading countries in the world, only we have a flat tax scale, in which the same percentage of income is collected from both the poor and the leading rich! This is absolutely unfair and directly contradicts the interests of the state. Thanks to this policy, the oligarchs do not pay normal taxes…They continue to plunder the country at an unprecedented pace. In 2022 alone, $261 billion was transferred from Russia abroad. The total capital of our 25 richest oligarchs has already exceeded $300 billion. This is more than the entire Russian budget! And all this happens in the conditions of the special military operation, when help, support, and compassion are needed! When maximum consolidation and cohesion is needed!”

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German MEP Christine Anderson.

• MEP Delivers Damning Message to the Global Tyrants (VN)

“We just need to find a way to wake the people up. Because the point is simply this: it comes down to a choice. It’s either freedom, democracy, and the rule of law — or enslavement. “There is no such thing in between. There is no such thing as a little freedom, a little democracy, a little rule of law, just as there is no such thing as a little enslavement. So that’s the choice. It comes down to – it’s either the globalitarian misanthropists or the people. It comes down to – it’s either us or them. And that’s, I think, what this really is all about. “Now, when my colleagues and I were elected to this parliament, there was no question about it. We were on the side of the people because the people actually pay us to act in their best interests. That’s our job.

And once again, I will say to every single elected representative around the world, to every single member in every elected government around the world, if you do not unequivocally stand with the people and serve in their best interests, act in their best interests, you have no place in any parliament or in any government. You belong behind bars. You may even rot in hell for all I care at this point because that’s exactly what you deserve if you sell out the people.” Now, I would like to make a promise to the people, and I’m pretty sure I can speak or speak on behalf of my colleagues. We will continue to stand with you, the people. We will continue to fight for freedom, democracy, and the rule of law. We will not shut up, and we will not stop going after those despicable globalitarian misanthropists.

“But we would also like to have you make a promise to us. You may have heard it’s all coming back. The first country is already starting [to talk about] mask mandates in Israel. They’re already imposing it. I’ve heard of a few universities in the United States. They’re already bringing it all back. And I would really like for you, the people, to not go along. Simply say no! They want you to wear a mask; say no. They want you to put in another mRNA shot; say no. They want to impose a curfew on you; say no. That’s really all you have to do. “And it might not be or might sound a little hard, but it’s actually not that hard. Because once you have made it clear to them that you will no longer go along, once you’ve let them know, they cannot scare you anymore. Because as long as you are afraid of what they might do if you don’t comply, they have power over you.

Take the power away from them! Simply say no. Once you do that, they don’t have power over you anymore. You will feel so free. Simply say no. “And considering what we’ve heard today, and considering what we’ve seen in the last three years. Considering what we know they want to implement, heck, you might even be well within your right to tell them to screw themselves and go to hell! That’s where they belong. What will you get out of that? I can tell you. Once you’ve done that, once you’ve told them to just go to hell, they no longer have power over you. You will have an incredible feeling — kind of like a sensation of freedom will swap through your body. I promise you will feel so relieved. “And this is the state of mind that I would ask all of you to get to. Simply don’t let them grind you down anymore. You are worth it. You are deserving of just standing up for yourselves. And tell them all to go to hell. Thank you very much.”

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Cluster B

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Elephant electric fence
https://twitter.com/i/status/1704405411057524745

 

 

Baby dog
https://twitter.com/i/status/1704369650379747821

 

 

Snacks

 

 

Sinead

 

 

 

 

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

 

 

 

 

 

Debt Rattle May 13 2022

May 132022
 
 May 13, 2022  Posted by at 8:20 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , ,  53 Responses »


Margaret Gillies Charles Dickens 1844

 

• Rand Paul Blocks Fast-Track Senate Vote for $40 Billion Ukraine Funding (CTH)
• Finlandization of Ukraine, Ukraine-ization of Finland (Nuna Costa)
• The Guardian View On Expanding Nato: Putin Has Only Himself To Blame (G.)
• ‘Finland Will Be A NATO Backwater’ (ZH)
• Two Months of Operation Z (Malenica)
• ‘Russia Started the War’ and Other Fallacies (Whitney)
• The Destiny of Civilization – Michael Hudson (Norton)
• Diesel Fuel Shortage Sets Stage for Next Biden Created Crisis (CTH)
• Meet the Head of Biden’s New “Disinformation Governing Board” (Golinkin)
• Beijing Residents Swamp Supermarkets After Lockdown Rumours (CNA)
• “Genetically Edited” Food – The Next Stage of the Great Reset? (OffG)

 

 

I kid you not: People today blame NATO’s expansion on Putin.

 

 

Immune system shutdown
https://twitter.com/i/status/1524509732878548992

 

 

Russia has named 12 EU countries involved.

 

 

COVID vaccines have “rigorous standards that are much higher” than any in U.S. history

 

 

 

 

Glenn Beck Ecohealth

 

 

“Printing $40 billion to send to a deeply corrupt nation in Eastern Europe”. Rand Paul wants oversight of how the money will be spent. He can’t have it. None of the people who voted in favor have actually read the bill. There was no time. This will go into next week, giving them that time. How many do you think will read it?

• Rand Paul Blocks Fast-Track Senate Vote for $40 Billion Ukraine Funding (CTH)

Senator Rand Paul has blocked a fast-track senate vote on the additional $40 billion funding package created by Joe Biden and House Democrats. Both Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell approved a fast-track vote; however, senator Rand Paul (KY) stood defiant against their effort. Despite the high-profile pressure from the two Senate leaders, Rand Paul refused to move and that means the Senate will have to take procedural steps to overcome his objection, which could take several days. “My oath of office is the US constitution not to any foreign nation and no matter how sympathetic the cause, my oath of office is to the national security of the United States of America,” Paul said in his remarks before objecting to moving to swift passage of the bill. “We cannot save Ukraine by dooming the US economy.”


The $40 billion supplemental spending bill for Ukraine is more than the total military budget of Russia. The combined Ukraine aid packages now exceed $60 billion, more than the entire budget for the U.S. Dept of Homeland Security including border protection. Rand Paul is on the right side of history with his position, and the overwhelming majority of Americans agree with him. However, the opinion of the people is irrelevant to the Senate. Even democrat Senator Chuck Schumer seemed to admit this point when he said Rand Paul’s position “was not the opinion of the overwhelming majority here,” meaning in the senate. Schumer would have used other terms if he thought the American people agreed with him. They don’t, and he knows it.

Rand Paul

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“..if this “express” entry of the Nordic country into the Alliance goes ahead, it will suppose an increment of more than double the length of the current border between NATO and Russia.”

• Finlandization of Ukraine, Ukraine-ization of Finland (Nuna Costa)

The Finnish President and Prime Minister today announced their support for the country’s membership of NATO at the forthcoming summit in Madrid on 29-30 June. I have no illusions, this is bound to happen without the will of the Finns for which a popular referendum had been promised on the matter, or that it will even be submitted to Parliament, where it would be approved anyway. The main internal requirement for the admission of new countries is that they “add security” to the bloc. Since when does this move make Europe safer? But there are more conditions and clauses of the international legal framework that are being purposefully violated, and shameless disregard for signed agreements.

Let us not even mention the still pending demands that the Kremlin notified in writing to NATO in December, which NATO chose not even to respond to, and which obviously clash with the current situation. Russia had already made it known that the entry of Sweden and especially Finland into NATO is perceived as a threat. Perhaps it was reasonable to understand the Russian point of view. The President of Croatia has recently made it known that he will veto the planned extension as it is “a very dangerous adventure”, in the words of his MFA. Any country can and should oppose this clear provocation, but we know that if this happens, those who are interested in the militarisation of Europe will spin the issue one way or another, as there have never been legal or procedural limits of any kind to this complex.

So, if this “express” entry of the Nordic country into the Alliance goes ahead, it will suppose an increment of more than double the length of the current border between NATO and Russia. This should be viewed with great caution, since all members will be affected by whatever may happen from there. This has been said here before, but today the irresponsibility becomes clearer and the concomitant danger more imminent. After long years of discussion about the so-called possible and reasonable Finlandisation of Ukraine’ as a militarily neutral zone between Europe and the nuclear superpower Russia, we are now much closer to the Ukraine-ization of Finland. Do you know what that means?

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Willfully blind.

• The Guardian View On Expanding Nato: Putin Has Only Himself To Blame (G.)

Nato expansion has doubtless contributed to Mr Putin’s paranoid mindset. He sees the organisation as little more than an expression of US power. But it is primarily Russian aggression that has driven expansion, not vice versa. The fear of provoking Moscow tied the hands of its neighbour Finland, and Sweden, for years. Now the all-out assault on Ukraine has led many to conclude that there is nothing to lose – while Russia’s failures there have suggested that it may be less fearsome than they thought. Sweden and Finland joining Nato would leave Kaliningrad, home of Moscow’s Baltic Sea fleet, encircled. Predictably, Russia has vowed retaliation for the Finnish announcement. It had already said it would deploy nuclear weapons in the Baltic, though the real threat is more likely to come in the form of disinformation, cyber-attacks, and other provocations.


Yet Moscow should not be the alliance’s only concern. It must also look closer to home. In the US, 57 Republicans voted against the $40bn aid package for Ukraine in the House of Representatives and it faces Republican objections in the Senate. As the Democrats flounder, the spectre of Donald Trump – or someone like him – as the 47th president looms larger. And despite the defeat of Marine Le Pen in last month’s French presidential election, ambivalence or antagonism towards Nato has not vanished from Europe. In Italy, where a general election is due next year, most voters oppose the government’s decisions to increase defence spending and send arms to Ukraine. The alliance exists to counter the threat on its eastern borders. It can only do so by remaining vigilant to internal vulnerabilities.

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Will Russia cut off oil and gas to Finland? It gets 100% of both that way.

• ‘Finland Will Be A NATO Backwater’ (ZH)

A Kremlin spokesman earlier in the day warned that Finland joining NATO would “definitely” be a threat that would trigger “retaliatory steps” – but stopped short of identifying specific possible courses of action. “NATO is moving toward us. That’s of course why all of this will warrant a special analysis and the development of necessary measures needed to balance the situation and guarantee our security,” the initial Kremlin response stated. Later in the day Thursday – a number of hours after Finland’s president Sauli Niinisto and Prime Minister Sanna Marin announced the country will apply for NATO membership “without delay” – Russian Ambassador to the EU Vladimir Chizhov elaborated on Moscow’s likely response in an interview with Sky News.

“Russia will be forced to take retaliatory steps, both of military and other nature, in order to curtail the threats that arise to its national security in this regard,” Chizhov stressed in the interview when asked about its neighbor Finland as well as Sweden applying to NATO. The two countries first sent strong signals regarding this complete U-turn in historic policy last month in response to Russia’s ongoing military aggression against Ukraine. The Russian ambassador said further in the UK television interview that he’s “deeply disappointed and saddened” by the development, while saying in a somewhat condescending tone that Finland has been “pushing above its weight, having become in the last few decades a major power in promoting European security architecture.”

Further he said the Scandinavian neighbor which shares an 810-mile border with Russia would inevitably become a “NATO backwater” if it does move forward in entering the military alliance. Sky News also quoted Chizov as explaining the following possible change in defense posture: The ambassador said such a move would “certainly necessitate rethinking of Russian defence posture” but wouldn’t “necessarily [involve] troops and tanks, but certain preparations definitely… like radars, perhaps”.

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A long detailed overview.

• Two Months of Operation Z (Malenica)

From the author’s perspective, what is currently happening in Ukraine is a conflict between the Russian and Western concepts of war, that is, the concept of war as conceived by NATO. Among other things, this conflict is also a question of the prestige for the West, which has so far seen itself as the most militarily capable bloc on the planet. Having trained Ukrainian ground army[50] to NATO standards and equipped it with anti-tank and anti-aircraft portable systems, the West is now observing performance of these forces against Russian troops. This is, as well, one of reasons for the omnipresent Western propaganda campaign. Moreover, within this conflict, it is necessary to view Ukrainian media and propaganda sources as organic offshoots of Western intelligence agencies and public relations firms, of which at least 150 have participated in creating and spreading propaganda for Kiev since the beginning of hostilities.

Likewise, make no mistake, majority if not all intelligence at disposal of Kiev is of NATO origin. In an event that Ukrainian troops are defeated by Russian units, it will be clear that equipping and training army in accordance with NATO standards does not guarantee the highest level of combat capability. At the same time, the possible defeat of Ukraine will shake the reputation of NATO itself, especially the United States, whose last year’s debacle in Afghanistan is still fresh in memory. Russia’s eventual victory would be the second major case in modern times where forces equipped and trained by the West have been defeated by non-Western armies.

In this context, one should also observe the huge military aid that has been pouring into Kiev for two months now by countries of the West and European Union. As US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin recently pointed out, the United States wants “to see Russia weakened to the degree that it can’t do the kinds of things that it has done in invading Ukraine.”[53] This only confirms what many analysts have already pointed out, that Kiev and Moscow are not at war in Ukraine, but Russia against the collective West led by Washington. The United States needs, both for domestic and foreign policy, Russian defeat in Ukraine.

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“..the indivisibility of security..”

“..signatories to these treaties are not free to develop their own military capability to the point where it poses a danger to their neighbors..”

• ‘Russia Started the War’ and Other Fallacies (Whitney)

On Monday, Putin delivered the annual “Victory Day” speech celebrating Russia’s victory over Nazi Germany in 1945. The Russian president made none of the hyperbolic pronouncements the media had predicted but, instead, gave a brief recap of the events leading up to the war in Ukraine. There was none of the bravado you’d expect from a leader trying to gin up support for the ongoing war. Putin simply reminded the crowd that he had done everything he could to avoid the bloody conflict in which Russia is currently embroiled. Here’s part of what he said: “Last December we proposed signing a treaty on security guarantees. Russia urged the West to hold an honest dialogue in search for meaningful and compromising solutions, and to take account of each other’s interests. All in vain. NATO countries did not want to heed us, which means they had totally different plans. And we saw it.”

This is an accurate account of what took place in the months preceding the war. Putin tried to avoid a confrontation by repeatedly asking the US to address Russia’s reasonable security concerns. Unfortunately, the Biden administration brushed off Putin’s demands without even providing a response. The US and NATO insist that Ukraine has every right to choose whatever security arrangement it wants. But that’s clearly not the case. The United States and every nation in NATO have signed treaties (Istanbul in 1999, and Astana in 2010) that stipulate they cannot improve their own security at the expense of others. The principle underlying these agreements is called “the indivisibility of security”, which means that the security of one state can’t be separated from the security of the others.

In practical terms, that means that signatories to these treaties are not free to develop their own military capability to the point where it poses a danger to their neighbors. These terms are especially applicable to Ukraine which is seeking membership in a military alliance that is openly hostile to Russia. NATO membership has always been a “red line” for Putin who has stated repeatedly that he will not allow NATO bases, combat troops and missile sites to be located on Ukrainian soil where they’d be just a stone’s throw from Moscow. As one critic from Texas put it, “You wouldn’t let a rattlesnake make its home on your front porch, would you?” No, you wouldn’t, and neither would Putin.

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“..financial planning is short-termism; it’s short-term planning; it’s take your money and run. And that’s what is stripping and impoverishing the global economy today.”

• The Destiny of Civilization – Michael Hudson (Norton)

[..] finance capitalism is what has essentially de-industrialized the United States and turned the Midwest into a Rust Belt. Well, the alternative, obviously, are the societies that have not followed this neoliberal finance capitalist plan. And the most successful economy, obviously, has been China, which is why it has been spending so much time there. And China has done exactly what 19th-century United States, Germany, England, and France did. It has kept basic utilities, basic needs, housing, and above all, finance and banking, in the public domain, as public utilities. Instead of having an independent financial sector operating on its own self-interest, the Bank of China creates the money.

And the Bank of China lends money by deciding, where do we need to have investment in real estate to provide housing for the population at as low a price as we can make it? How do we build up the industry? How do we provide an educational system with training? How do we provide health? And the fact is that the central planning in an efficient socialist style, not the Stalinist planning that everybody refers to of Russia, but a mixed economy as you have in China, which is truly a mixed economy, with guidance, like the French planification. Well, that is obviously the way in which you survive and you avoid the kind of overloading the economy with debt service, with high rents, with high payments to the health-care monopoly in the United States, by avoiding all of this payment to a rentier class that has what the classical economists call unearned income, predatory income.

And instead of unseating them, we’ve put them in charge, and made the banks and Wall Street, and the city of London, and the Paris Bourse, the central planners. So we do have central planning much more centralized than anything that was dreamed by the socialists. But the planning, the centralized planning is done by the financial sector. And financial planning is short-termism; it’s short-term planning; it’s take your money and run. And that’s what is stripping and impoverishing the global economy today.

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“..shortages of diesel fuel on the East Coast may happen in the coming week at some stores..”

• Diesel Fuel Shortage Sets Stage for Next Biden Created Crisis (CTH)

It has often been said that if you chase the global climate change ideology to its natural conclusion, we end up in communal groups sitting around a tepid campfire eating some form of sustainable algae cakes and picking parasites off each other… Prior to Joe Biden that prediction might have seemed like hyperbole. Now, not so much. Indeed, the Green New Deal energy policy of Joe Biden creates massive downstream consequences. Unfortunately, the White House doesn’t seem to care. The high prices and scarcity of critical goods are a feature, not a flaw, as they chase their climate friendly Build Back Better agenda. Following the continuum of intended consequence, now we have diesel fuel shortages beginning to hit the U.S. economy; and with scarcity comes higher prices of an almost astronomical scale.

“The national average price of diesel is now $5.54 per gallon, which is an increase of 22 cents from last week, which was when the most recent record was set. Data shows there’s no state that’s currently seeing diesel prices below $5.12 per gallon.” Making matters even worse is a drop in available inventory of diesel fuel which is about to become a crisis for the east coast of the U.S. Some Truck Stop operators like Love’s and Pilot are already warning their big rig customers they may not have fuel for truckers. […] “Love’s is monitoring the fluid situation on the East Coast, we have experienced minimal outages during low traffic hours,” Oklahoma-based Love’s Travel Stops said in an emailed statement. “The company has no plans to restrict purchases of diesel.”

[…] Earlier on Wednesday, the U.S. government’s Energy Information Administration said total inventories of distillates, which is mainly diesel fuel but also heating oil, fell last week to a 17-year low of 104 million barrels, which is 23% below normal. On the East Coast, the situation is even worse. The EIA said distillate fuel oil inventories in the so-called PADD 1 district that covers the Northeastern states fell by 1.1 million barrels last week to just 21 million barrels, the lowest ever recorded in data going back to 1990. Love’s truck stops, with some 550 locations across 41 states, also seemed to confirm reports on social media Wednesday that said Love’s and other truck stops such as Pilot were informing their fleet operators that shortages of diesel fuel on the East Coast may happen in the coming week at some stores.

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Azov whitewasher.

• Meet the Head of Biden’s New “Disinformation Governing Board” (Golinkin)

Late last month, the Joe Biden administration publicly confirmed that a “Disinformation Governing Board” working group had been created within the Department of Homeland Security. The news prompted a flood of concern about the impact of such an Orwellian organ on America. But there’s no need to engage in hypotheticals to understand the dangers. One has to only consider the past of Nina Jankowicz, the head of the new disinformation board. Jankowicz’s experience as a disinformation warrior includes her work with StopFake, a US government-funded “anti-disinformation” organization founded in March 2014 and lauded as a model of how to combat Kremlin lies. Four years later, StopFake began aggressively whitewashing two Ukrainian neo-Nazi groups with a long track record of violence, including war crimes.

Today, StopFake is an official Facebook fact-checking partner, which gives it the power to censor news, while Jankowicz is America’s disinformation czar. If the Biden administration is serious about combating threats such as white supremacy, perhaps it should first reflect on the old Roman question: Who will guard the guardians? StopFake was founded right after Ukraine’s 2014 Maidan uprising ousted the country’s president and swept a new, US-backed government into power. Formed by professors and students from the Kyiv Mohyla Journalism School, StopFake presented itself as a plucky, grassroots group wielding hard facts and semi-permanent smirks as it shredded Russian propaganda. It gained notoriety by producing slick videos hosted by dynamic disinformation warriors debunking the Moscow lies of the day.

Western reporters—and checkbooks—were paying attention. Shortly after its creation, StopFake began receiving funding from Western governments, including the National Endowment for Democracy—an organization mainly funded by the US Congress—and the British embassy in Ukraine. It was also supported by George Soros’s Open Society Foundation. (StopFake has run numerous episodes that cover Soros but fail to disclose this potential conflict of interest—a violation of basic tenets of journalism.) Among StopFake’s hosts was Jankowicz, a graduate of Bryn Mawr and the Georgetown School of Foreign Service who was already part of the burgeoning disinformation warrior industry while in Ukraine as a Fulbright Clinton Public Policy Fellow. On January 29, 2017, she hosted StopFake Episode 117, whose lead story dealt with a perennial obsession of Russian propaganda: Ukraine’s volunteer battalions.

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“I’ll be fine whether I’m required to stay home for three days or seven.”

• Beijing Residents Swamp Supermarkets After Lockdown Rumours (CNA)

Beijing residents rushed to supermarkets on Thursday (May 12) as Chinese officials tried to curb mounting panic over a rumour the capital would be placed under stay-at-home orders. The city has been trying to stamp out a wave of cases in recent weeks, closing subway stations and telling many residents to work from home, with hundreds of communities sealed off to contain cases. On Thursday there were rumours online that authorities were about to impose a strict lockdown, prompting many to rush to food stores and stock up. Beijing residents fear they may face draconian measures similar to those that have trapped most of Shanghai’s 25 million people at home for weeks – after what was initially described as a days-long shutdown.


No lockdown was announced Thursday, but officials confirmed they will start three more rounds of mass testing for residents in 12 of the city’s main districts and “recommended” that people stay home and “reduce movement” during that time. AFP saw staff at one local supermarket in central Beijing rushing to restock as shelves of vegetables were emptied out. Sui Xin, 41, told AFP that he had gone to the store after he read on social media that the capital’s officials might keep residents at home. “Everyone is stocking up,” he said, buying eggs and instant noodles. “I’ll be fine whether I’m required to stay home for three days or seven.” “I’m just buying some chicken wings and instant noodles, there’s nothing left,” a shopper surnamed Huang said, queueing at another packed supermarket.

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From “genetically modified” to “genetically edited”..

First you make them hungry, then you push their “new food” on them.

• “Genetically Edited” Food – The Next Stage of the Great Reset? (OffG)

But the part I found most interesting is the stated plan to “encourage agricultural and scientific innovation at home” via the proposed Genetic Technology (Precision Breeding) Bill. The proposed bill (which, for some reason is not available through the parliament website) follows on from DEFRA’s announced “loosened regulation” of genetic research back in January. To quote the National Institute of Agricultural Botany (NIAB), the legislation would “take certain precision breeding techniques out of the scope of restrictive GMO rules”. Essentially, this would see new “gene-edited” foods as distinct from old-fashioned “genetically modified” foods, and therefore not subject to the same rules and oversight.

The claimed distinction is that gene editing, as opposed to genetic modification, doesn’t introduce DNA from other species. Therefore, in effect, is merely speeding up what could potentially naturally happen over time. Now, you might think this is just semantics, and that such a law will just provide a loophole for ALL “genetically modified” foods to simply rebrand themselves as “genetically edited” foods, and thereby avoid regulation. But that is disgustingly cynical and shame on you for even thinking it. All in all, this is pretty on-message stuff, and not especially surprising. What’s noteworthy is – by pure happenstance, I’m sure – it appears to coincide with a renewed push on the GM food front in other countries all over the world.

In December 2021, Switzerland added an amendment to its moratorium on GMO crops, permitting the use of certain “gene editing” techniques. Last month, Egypt announced their new strain of GM wheat. Just two days ago, Ethiopia’s National Agricultural Biotechnology Research Center announced they had researched, and the country will now be growing, genetically modified cotton and maize. Despite Russia’s sweeping ban on the cultivation and/or importing of genetically modified crops, they have nonetheless created a 111 billion Ruble project to create up to 30 varieties of genetically edited plants and farm animals. Britain’s deregulation of GM food is always described as a “post-Brexit” move – with the EU chided around the world for its “precautionary principle” on GM crops – and yet as long ago as last April, the EU was calling for a “rethink” on GM crops.

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Madonna

 

 

 

 

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Debt Rattle March 16 2022

Mar 162022
 
 March 16, 2022  Posted by at 9:42 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , ,  35 Responses »


Henri Rousseau The sleeping gypsy 1897

 

• Ukraine Will Not Join NATO, Says Zelenskiy (G.)
• Zelenskiy Says Russia’s Position In Negotiations Becoming ‘More Realistic’ (G.)
• West Made A ‘Terrible Mistake’ Letting Putin Annex Crimea: Boris Johnson (F.)
• Thirsty Macron Jealous of International Media Fawning Over Zelenskyy (CTH)
• World Economy Braces For Supply Chain Chaos As COVID Closes China (ZH)
• Saudi Arabia May Accept Yuan Instead Of Dollars For Chinese Oil Sales (JTN)
• Safe and Effective? (Malone)
• Senate Votes To Repeal CDC’s Mask Mandate For Airline Passengers (JTN)
• Several States Mulling Lawsuit To End Biden Mask Mandate On Airlines (JTN)
• Dr. Flavio Cadegiani On How Pfizer Corrupts Science (Kirsch)
• These 6 Republicans Voted Against Ousting Fauci (DW)
• From 15 Days to Two Years (Kelly)
• A Closer Look at the Gatekeepers of Medical Research (NBW)

 

 

 

 

Alexa

 

 

The two most powerful people in US politics are well past their best before date. How is that not scary? These shaky fingers are on red hot buttons.

https://twitter.com/i/status/1503798141669285895

 

 

One demand down, two to go. No. 2 is recognition that Crimea is Russian territory. Since Crimeans have voted on this, why contest it? Third is the status of the Donbass. That’s tricky, Putin won’t want to leave any questions over this. And allegedly, Ukraine was planning large scale bloodshed there in early March. Zelensky will have to sell out the Azov batallion. But that could cost him his life.

• Ukraine Will Not Join NATO, Says Zelenskiy (G.)

Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy has acknowledged that Ukraine will not become a Nato member, in a significant concession on a day when Kyiv was pounded by Russian shells and missiles and the invading force tightened its grip on the capital. At least five people were killed in the latest artillery barrage on Kyiv, prompting its city hall to impose a 35-hour curfew from Tuesday night amid further signs that the focus of the Russian campaign has shifted to the destruction of residential areas and civilian infrastructure. Zelenskiy made his remarks about Nato while addressing leaders from the new Joint Expeditionary Force, a UK-led initiative bringing together 10 north Atlantic countries to create a capability for responding rapidly to crises.

“It is clear that Ukraine is not a member of Nato; we understand this,” the Ukrainian president said. “For years we heard about the apparently open door, but have already also heard that we will not enter there, and these are truths and must be acknowledged.” One of Vladimir Putin’s demands before unleashing his offensive on Ukraine was that its membership of Nato should be ruled out indefinitely. However, the size of the invasion force Putin amassed and his own justifications for the attack, have been widely seen as evidence he would have settled for nothing less than regime change and Russia’s unchallenged dominance of its smaller neighbour.

The White House announced on Tuesday that Joe Biden would travel to Europe next week to attend an extraordinary Nato summit on 24 March “to discuss ongoing deterrence and defence efforts” in the face of the Russian invasion, and also join a scheduled European Council summit. There were reports Biden would also visit eastern Europe on the same trip.

 

 

Children Donbass
https://twitter.com/i/status/1503696563230724097

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Zelesky preparing the world for the concessions he’s about to make. Carefully chosen wording.

• Zelenskiy Says Russia’s Position In Negotiations Becoming ‘More Realistic’ (G.)

Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy has said he sees possible room for compromise in talks with Russia ahead of a fresh round of discussions, despite Moscow’s stepped up bombardment Kyiv and as fears for the port city of Mariupol deepened. “The meetings continue, and, I am informed, the positions during the negotiations already sound more realistic. But time is still needed for the decisions to be in the interests of Ukraine,” Zelenskiy said in a video address early on Wednesday. “Efforts are still needed, patience is needed,” he said. “Any war ends with an agreement.” Top Ukrainian negotiator, presidential adviser Mykhailo Podolyak, said there were “fundamental contradictions” between the two sides but added that “there is certainly room for compromise.”


Another aide to Zelenskiy, Ihor Zhovkva, said the negotiations had become “more constructive” and that Russia had softened its stand by no longer airing its demands that Ukraine surrender. Talks were set to resume via video link on Wednesday. As the war approached its third week and heavy shelling of Ukraine’s cities continued, US president Joe Biden signed off on $13.6bn in aid. Zelenskiy thanked president Joe Biden and “all the friends of Ukraine” for the new support. An update from the Ukraine ministry of defence on Wednesday said the “worst situation remains in the area of Mariupol, where the opponent tries to block the city in the western and eastern outskirts of the city.” It came as the Associated Press reported Russian troops had seized a hospital in Mariupol and took about 500 people hostage during another assault on the southern port city late Tuesday, regional leader Pavlo Kyrylenko said.

 

 

Refugees Donbass
https://twitter.com/i/status/1503765994547855367

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Boris trying to be relevant.

• West Made A ‘Terrible Mistake’ Letting Putin Annex Crimea: Boris Johnson (F.)

The West made a “terrible mistake” by letting Russian President Vladimir Putin “get away” with invading Ukraine and annexing Crimea in 2014, wrote the U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson in the Telegraph newspaper Monday. He added the West “intensified” economic ties with Russia afterwards and took “more Russian gas than ever before,” leaving it dependent on the “goodwill of Putin” and more exposed to fluctuations in global gas and oil price. Johnson said the West must break its “addiction” to Russian hydrocarbons, which has “emboldened” Putin to invade Ukraine and subject the world to “continuous blackmail.” Johnson acknowledged that it will be “painful” for the world to give up Russia’s vast fossil fuel reserves but said it is the “only way to force Putin to cease his aggression.”


The U.K. has pledged to phase out Russian oil imports by 2023 and the U.S. has banned Russian oil and gas. The European Union, which imports a significant amount of fuel from Russia, has vowed to end its use of Russian hydrocarbons as soon as possible. Green, renewable energy sources “are the quickest and cheapest route to greater energy independence,” Johnson said. “They are invulnerable to Putin’s manipulations.”

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Macron acting a comedian. And it’s actually funny.

• Thirsty Macron Jealous of International Media Fawning Over Zelenskyy (CTH)

As the international media fawn over their latest social media star, the “Churchill in a T-shirt”, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, the former darling of EU media, French President Emmanuel Macron is apparently feeling slighted. Western PR teams have been working diligently to maintain the “better story,” as they advance the beatification of pop star Zelenskyy. The producers and directors for Volodymyr’s scruff and edgy leadership have kept his fans updated on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter, as Ride of The Valkyries echos as a background theme while team-Z dodge cruise missiles on their way to the local Starbucks. However, all of this unilaterally focused adoration does not sit well with King Macron of Paris.

In an effort to combat the rugged warlike appeal of St. Zelenskyy of Kyiv, the thirsty French president called for immediate poses of him in a series of similarly scruffy press shots. Thanks to social media adoration, Zelenskyy, the modern EU trendsetter, is making beatnik great again. There are already rumors of a run on vintage jeans, sneakers and T-shirts within Brussels, as several NATO leaders dispatch their aides looking for the hot, new and modern authentic war look. A daily series of live-streamed war summits are likely in the works as NATO leadership start catching up to the pop-optics by organizing burning barrels of diesel fuel in the background of their zoom calls. With resources allocated, thirsty Macron is going to climb back on top.

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Ukraine will soon be a small problem. Because this will not.

• World Economy Braces For Supply Chain Chaos As COVID Closes China (ZH)

The global economy is in disarray as the war in Ukraine unleashed a commodity shock with increasing risks of stagflation. Adding to the turmoil is an outbreak of COVID-19 in China that may unleash another supply chain crisis. News from China over the last day shows a new outbreak of the highly contagious omicron variant has infected more than 5,000 people, the most since the early days of the pandemic in early 2020. China’s zero-tolerance approach has shuttered factories and placed some 51 million people into some form of lockdown. Lockdowns have forced factories to idle production and risk snarling production from Apple iPhones to Amazon Echo & Alexa devices to Toyota SUVs to smart television to all sorts of other electronic devices. Disruptions to exports may induce shortages and drive up inflation, just as the Federal Reserve embarks on hiking interest rates to control inflation at four-decade highs.

A Bank of America Corp. survey of fund managers published on Tuesday showed confidence in global growth this year is the lowest since July 2008, and stagflation expectations have jumped to a whopping 62% of respondents. “You take all these little paper cuts and you start to add them up and you could be looking at a potential significant slowing of the global economy,” said Jay Bryson, chief economist at Wells Fargo & Co. China’s zero-tolerance policy has reminded us that supply chains are still subjected to massive disruptions. The lockdowns couldn’t come at a worse time, as spring tends to be one of the busiest shipping seasons of the year.

Shenzhen’s 17.5 million residents were placed under lockdown on Sunday. The city resides in Guangdong, a coastal province of southeast China known for its manufacturing hub and ports, which account for about 11% of China’s economy. The province accounted for 23% of China’s shipments in 2021. Bloomberg Economics warns that a prolonged lockdown in Shenzhen could unleash supply chain disruptions worldwide. “The forceful action to contain the worst COVID-19 outbreak since early March will deal a direct hit to the production and consumption sides of a province that accounts for 11% of GDP. Previous steps to contain virus flareups left manufacturing unscathed for the most part. This lockdown will hit output in key industries such as tech and machinery that feed into global supply chains,” Chang Shu, chief economist for Asia, said.

“Given that China is a major global manufacturing hub and one of the most important links in global supply chains, the country’s Covid policy can have notable spillovers to its trading partners’ activity and the global economy,” said Tuuli McCully, head of Asia-Pacific economics at Scotiabank. According to Stephanie Loomis, vice president of International Procurement, the global impact of lockdowns could roil supply chains once more. “If they don’t let any of these guys go to factories and produce goods, then nothing will move,” Loomis said. “It’ll just stop.”

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Biden really pissed off MBS.

• Saudi Arabia May Accept Yuan Instead Of Dollars For Chinese Oil Sales (JTN)

Saudi Arabia and China are in discussions to price some oil sales in yuan instead of U.S. dollars in a slap to the Biden administration that would decrease the dominance of the American currency in the international petroleum market, sources told The Wall Street Journal. While Beijing and Riyadh have been in discussions on and off for several years about yuan-priced oil contracts, talks have accelerated recently due to U.S. security policies under President Joe Biden, people familiar with the issue told the newspaper. The Saudis are angry with the United States for not assisting in their intervention in Yemen’s civil war, started by Iranian-backed Houthi rebels in 2014. The Kingdom is also upset over the Biden administration’s efforts to enter a nuclear deal with Iran.


Saudi officials also have expressed disapproval over Biden’s chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan in August 2021. “I don’t know which word to use, whether incompetence, carelessness, bad management — it was all a combination of those things,” Saudi Prince Turki Al-Faisal told CNBC last year. Saudi Arabia exports 6.2 million barrels of crude oil a day and has traded in dollars exclusively since 1974 when President Richard Nixon struck a deal with the kingdom by guaranteeing security. China buys more than a quarter of all Saudi oil exports, according to the WSJ. If the sales are priced in yuan, it would be a major boost to China’s currency as 80% of all global oil sales are done in dollars. Beijing introduced yuan-priced oil contracts in 2018, but has been unable to successfully beat the dollar in the global oil market.

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“warm base manufacturing”

• Safe and Effective? (Malone)

There is another important element in the national vaccine program, which is the requirement to keep the vaccine production facilities up and running. These facilities are producing a biological product; they must be kept in production or the process for re-licensure is onerous, if not impossible. In the case of seasonal flu, one of the justifications for the yearly vaccine is to keep the manufacturing plants running and ready for business in case of a truly severe strain of flu or some other, unknown pathogen become a threat. If those facilities are moth-balled, they can’t be brought back on line quickly. Bet you did not know that. One major reason for pushing annual influenza vaccines is to maintain influenza vaccine manufacturing capacity.

The industry term used is “warm base manufacturing”. Of course, this results in a very nice annual “cash cow” for the vaccine industry, one which gets annually milked for a tidy guaranteed profit. The term “rent seeking behavior” applies. The same is true of the various “biodefense” vaccines and products which are maintained in the “strategic national stockpile”. In the context of Smallpox, these include ACAM2000. These products have half lives, which is to say that even though they are (hopefully) not used, they still have to be replaced every few years. Again, nice predictable profit. The corporation “Emergent Biololutions” has become particularly adept at exploiting this “market opportunity”, and has managed to monopolize many of the biodefense-related vaccines and products which the US Government purchases for the Strategic National Stockpile, including ACAM2000.

So, there is more than one reason to vaccinate the entire population on a regular basis, and the government basically props up the entire vaccine industry with what are functionally major annual subsidies. Once a policy decision is made to acquire a vaccine product or establish a “standard of care” involving a vaccine, it is never re-evaluated. Any politician or government administrator that even considers rethinking whether a vaccine policy makes good sense is confronted by the specter of being blamed for any outbreak or cases of that disease that may arise – regardless of how (in)effective or risky that vaccine product may be.

[..] To bring this topic home: Is avoiding COVID-19/Omicron worth taking the known and unknown risks of serious adverse events? In some age categories, it might be. In most age categories, it is not worth much risk. For young people, it is not worth any risk, and for children, the risks of the Covid vaccine far outweigh the risks of Covid. The US Government had relentlessly promoted that “The vaccines are safe and effective,” the same words used for the modern smallpox vaccine. In both cases, safety is a matter of opinion and semantics – not science. Clearly, safety is relative, such as the precautions one might take when skydiving or riding a motorcycle (e.g., having a second parachute, wearing a helmet) – in order to reach the point that an activity is acceptably safe, all the while knowing it’s safer to just skip the activity.

If I proposed a person drink some potion, and said “This potion is safe, unless you are from a family with a history of heart problems,” few people would want the drink. If I added “Oh yeah, and the Mayo Clinic says the risk of side effects from this potion are too high to justify you drinking it, I’d have even fewer takers. Mandates, which are rigid by definition, seem a bad match for assessments of personal safety, which are, by our nature, flexible and variable. Since the word safe and the idea of safety means different things to different people, such decisions are best left to those who would be most affected by, in this case, vaccination.

The smallpox vaccine shows us what the CDC means when they say something is “safe,” and it isn’t what most people using the word would mean. With risk must come choice. This is the bedrock foundation of modern bioethics and medicine. After all that we have been through over the last two years, and the admission the the CDC has been withholding data from all of us for political reasons and to avoid “vaccine hesitancy” (which is another way of saying if you knew what the data really show you would not accept the product), who are you going to trust? Your own lying eyes and brain, or what the CDC, HHS, legacy media and the “factchecking” industry tell you?

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“House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., may not even allow the House to vote on the measure.”

• Senate Votes To Repeal CDC’s Mask Mandate For Airline Passengers (JTN)

The Senate voted Tuesday to repeal the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s COVID-19 mandate requiring masks on public transportation, including airplanes. Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., introduced the resolution that received bipartisan support with a 57 to 40 vote. Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah, was the only Republican to vote against the measure. Eight Democratic senators voted in support of the resolution: Michael Bennet, Jacky Rosen, Catherine Cortez-Masto, Maggie Hassan, Mark Kelly, Joe Manchin, Kristen Sinema and Jon Tester. The resolution, which was first introduced in February, expresses disapproval of the CDC’s mask mandate.

The resolution still faces significant challenges to become law. It did not receive enough votes to override the veto that President Joe Biden has threatened to do. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., may not even allow the House to vote on the measure. “Today, the Senate said enough is enough, and sent a message to unelected government bureaucrats to stop the anti-science, nanny state requirement of travel mask mandates,” Sen. Paul wrote in a press release after the vote. “Since March 2020, unelected bureaucrats have incessantly declared that we should ‘follow the science.’ But the same bureaucrats continue to defy science by imposing an ineffective and restrictive mask mandate for individuals travelling on public transit and airplanes,” the senator, who is also a doctor, wrote.

Sen. Paul has fought against what he sees as an abuse of power from White House medical advisor Dr. Anthony Fauci. “As the entire world is learning to live with COVID, the federal government still uses fear mongering to stubbornly perpetuate its mandates, rather than giving clear-eyed, rational advice on how to best protect yourself from illness,” Paul said. “That is why, I forced this vote, and I applaud the Senate for rejecting this nonsense.”

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“There are a lot of boxes you have to check before you jump on a lawsuit..”

• Several States Mulling Lawsuit To End Biden Mask Mandate On Airlines (JTN)

Several states are considering a lawsuit to end one of the Biden administration’s last COVID-19 mandates requiring airline passengers to wear masks, Indiana Republican Attorney General Todd Rokita told Just the News. “We are having discussions about that right now,” Rokita told the Just the News TV show on Real America’s Voice on Tuesday night, saying Florida is taking the lead on the idea. The Transportation Security Administration last Thursday extended its mask mandate on public transportation through April 18 after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) announced relaxed mask guidance at the end of last month.


“I know that several states may be filing very, very soon, maybe being led by the state of Florida,” Rokita told Just the News Editor-in-Chief John Solomon and co-host Amanda Head. Indiana is currently “examining” if they can join the lawsuit, Rokita said. “It’s just not as easy as when I was in Congress, just to jump on a lawsuit like we’re jumping on a bill,” the former congressman said. States must show that they have legal standing and actual injury before joining a lawsuit, the Rokita explained. “There are a lot of boxes you have to check before you jump on a lawsuit,” he added. A group of 16 Republican lawmakers on Monday filed a lawsuit against the CDC for what they said was an “illegal mask mandate for individuals traveling on commercial airlines,” Newsweek reported.

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Flavio Cadegiani is a doctor in Brasilia, capital of Brazil.

“Dr. Cadegiani reveals an astonishing statistic on the number of vaccine injured: 85%.”

• Dr. Flavio Cadegiani On How Pfizer Corrupts Science (Kirsch)

Dr. Cadegiani just published a new research paper (“Pfizergate 2.0 – Active actions against competitive anti- COVID drugs? The case of the anti-androgens.”) that shows that there is no rational explanation for the corruption of clinical trial results other than deliberate sabotage by Pfizer to ensure that there are no viable competitors to Pfizer’s products. I interviewed him just minutes before he published the paper. In the video, he talks about Proxalutimide, an anti-androgen drug he tested that is effective against variants prior to Omicron. But his main issue is in the trials of enzalutamide (another anti-androgen) and how it was conducted. At the very end, Dr. Cadegiani reveals an astonishing statistic on the number of vaccine injured: 85%.

 

 

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Rand Paul keeps pushing.

• These 6 Republicans Voted Against Ousting Fauci (DW)

Six Republican senators voted against an amendment Tuesday that would eliminate the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) position, which is held by Dr. Anthony Fauci. Senators voted on Kentucky Republican Rand Paul’s amendment to replace the NIAID with three separate national research institutes on Tuesday morning in Washington, D.C. Republican Senators Richard Burr of North Carolina, Susan Collins of Maine, Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Mitt Romney of Utah, and Jerry Moran of Kansas each voted against the amendment. “We’ve learned a lot over the past two years, but one lesson in particular is that no one person should be deemed ‘dictator-in-chief,’” said Paul when he introduced the amendment Monday, adding, “No one person should have unilateral authority to make decisions for millions of Americans.”


“This will create accountability and oversight into a taxpayer funded position that has largely abused its power, and has been responsible for many failures and misinformation during the COVID-19 pandemic,” the senator continued. Paul and Fauci have repeatedly sparred in Senate hearings over Fauci’s insistence on restricting the American public throughout the coronavirus pandemic, and the Kentucky Republican has called many times for Fauci to be ousted from his position. When Fauci suggested on “CBS This Morning” that Republicans — and former President Donald Trump — have a “misplaced perception about people’s individual right to make a decision that supersedes the societal safety,” Paul said that his comments showed a “casual disregard for what this country was founded upon.”

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“They want people stripped of wealth, isolated, and terrified.”

• From 15 Days to Two Years (Kelly)

On Saturday morning, my daughter in college texted me: “I got sent home two years ago today. Feels like a dream.” After I responded, she sent an uncharacteristically brief reply: “Sad.” To say the least. In March 2020, once-free citizens around the world surrendered their liberty and livelihoods in a futile attempt to “stop” a virus. The most technologically advanced civilization in the history of mankind quickly adopted medieval fixes that bordered on quackery, sold by snake oil salesmen in the credentialied class and news media, codified through executive fiat by elected leaders of both parties. “Just 15 days,” we were told on March 16, 2020, “to slow the spread.” Do your part to promote the “common good”—the historical rallying cry of every wannabe despot—or be branded a heartless heretic.

And it worked, far better than the original architects probably anticipated. On the same day my daughter left her college dormitory in upstate New York, not to return to a normal campus life for two years, I posted this on Twitter: This is what the Left wants. They want people stripped of wealth, isolated, and terrified. They want sources of joy—church, sporting events, vacations, large social gatherings—eliminated. This is how they get control. And it’s far scarier than any virus. To say that was a very unpopular view at the time would be an understatement. But having covered the climate change movement for years, I recognized a familiar approach to the spread of COVID-19 hysteria: use flawed data to whip up a public frenzy and shut down all debate in fealty to “science!”

Any disagreement over the data, no matter how unreliable or untested the data happened to be—and in the early months, the only available data came from China—made you a “science denier,” or worse. This time around, sadly, the hysteria wasn’t pushed solely by lefty environmental activists but also by President Donald Trump, Republican governors, and “conservative” influencers throughout the media. Once that buy-in was made, all hope was lost. Trump’s catastrophic decision to acquiesce to the demands of Drs. Anthony Fauci and Deborah Birx—the former a charlatan, the latter a dunce—and shut down the country two years ago this week was by far the worst moment in his presidency and rivals the worst moment in any presidency. As usual, however, Trump’s first instinct (the one he suppressed to appease those demanding we honor The Science™) was the right one.

The cure should not be worse than the disease, he fretted. He knew it, but he listened to the quacks anyway. The cure, of course, got worse. Emboldened by their success in forcing Trump to authorize the first 15-day shutdown, the then-adored Fauci and Birx took it a step further. With two dubious projection models in hand, the pair went to the White House at the end of March 2020 and convinced Trump to extend the lockdowns another month. The decision sealed his electoral fate; the booming economy he helped build entered a death spiral.

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“..viruses are worth A LOT of money (and will continue to appreciate exponentially for obvious reasons).”

• A Closer Look at the Gatekeepers of Medical Research (NBW)

First, it is necessary to understand where the majority of funds go for health research. For this, we’ll rely on an article published in Health Research Policy and Systems titled The 10 largest public and philanthropic funders of health research in the world: what they fund and how they distribute their funds. According to the researchers, in 2013, the National Institute of Health (NIH) granted $4.8 billion dollars towards infectious disease research (including $113 million towards respiratory infections and $2.8 billion to HIV/AIDS research). They also gave grants to research involving cardiovascular disease ($1.9 billion), lung cancer ($208 million) and mental health ($2.1 billion). The European Commission, Medical Research Council (MRC) and Wellcome Trust also direct the majority of their grants towards research involving infectious diseases.

A paper published in The Lancet, titled UK investments in global infectious disease research 1997–2010: a case study found that between 1997-2010, virology was the highest funded category of infectious disease research and the largest funders of such research in the UK were the Wellcome Trust (£688 million) and the MRC (£673 million). The Bill and Melinda Gates foundation also direct the majority of their “philanthropical” efforts towards combating infectious diseases, with less than 3% of their budget being directed towards non-communicable disease. So what does all this mean? Well, it means that viruses are worth A LOT of money (and will continue to appreciate exponentially for obvious reasons).

Perhaps this explains why the claim that Sars-Cov-2 doesn’t exist is treated with such ardent censorship and disdain compared to the germ-friendly “lab-leak” theory which has now wormed its way into the mainstream narrative, supported even by those on the more alternative side. Whether true or untrue, what many people fail to consider is the extent to which this theory favours the pharmaceutical industry. In fact, not only does it favour Big Pharma, it favours the WEF hoaxsters by strengthening the “deadly virus” narrative, it favours vaccine manufacturers, it favours virologists, it favours the Western powers, it favours the bankers, it favours Hollywood, it favours the CDC, and it favours the WHO!

The “lab-leak” hypothesis favours just about every organization or group associated with the Covid scamdemic. And let’s not forget that theories of mutant viruses escaping from laboratories certainly favour any researcher who could benefit from the massive amounts of money sloshing around in the kitties of the world’s medical gatekeepers. But who are these gatekeepers who control, direct and manipulate medical research for control and profit? That is the main subject of this article.

Read more …

 

 

 

Most of the time they do.

 

 

US biolabs and pathogens
https://twitter.com/i/status/1503682999887581191

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2015

 

 

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

 

 

 

Debt Rattle January 14 2022

Jan 142022
 
 January 14, 2022  Posted by at 9:51 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , ,  70 Responses »


Caravaggio Adoration of the Shepherds 1609

 

• Clinical Outcomes Among Patients Infected With Omicron (medRxiv)
• Omicron 91% Less Likely To Be Fatal Compared To Delta: CDC Study (NYP)
• Supreme Court Blocks Biden’s OSHA Vaxx Mandate (ZH)
• Not Surprising, And Deserved By All (Denninger)
• Rand Paul Labels Fauci ‘Juvenile Political Creature’ For Playing The Victim (SN)
• Dr. Oz Calls Fauci A ‘Petty Tyrant,’ Challenges Him To Debate (Hill)
• Florida Family Fighting for Ivermectin: Appeals Court Expedites Case (ET)
• Do Antigen Tests Work If You Are Asymptomatic? (Kirsch)
• Why DID The Science Establishment Try So Hard To Silence Lab Leak Theory? (DM)
• Dems’ Voting Bill Is ‘Crass Power Grab’ By ‘Clown Car’ Running DC (JTN)
• “Mother Of All” Supply Chain Shocks Looms As China Locks Down Ports (ZH)
• What The West Gets Wrong About Putin (Malmgren)
• US Envoy In Europe Says ‘Drumbeat Of War Is Sounding Loud’ (Hill)

 

 

The most vaccinated state in the Union:

 

NHS nurse

 

 

Lord Frost
https://twitter.com/i/status/1481574856827232258

 

 

First time (?!) I see a science report claim deaths from Omicron. Well, sort of:

“Rates of ICU admission and mortality after an outpatient positive test were 0.26 (0.10-0.73) and 0.09 (0.01-0.75) fold as high among cases with Omicron variant infection ..”

We now have 1 case reported in UK, 1 case US (debunked), 1 case Israel (no evidence), and yesterday 1 case in Greece, “with” Omicron.

As case numbers have gone up 5 fold everywhere. If Omicron is at all capable of killing people, we should have seen a lot more reports like these. We do not.

• Clinical Outcomes Among Patients Infected With Omicron (medRxiv)

Background: The Omicron (B.1.1.529) variant of SARS-CoV-2 has rapidly achieved global dissemination, accounting for most infections in the United States by December 2021. Risk of severe outcomes associated with Omicron infections, as compared to earlier SARS-CoV-2 variants, remains unclear.

Methods: We analyzed clinical and epidemiologic data from cases testing positive for SARS-CoV-2 infection within the Kaiser Permanente Southern California healthcare system from November 30, 2021 to January 1, 2022, using S gene target failure (SGTF) as assessed by the ThermoFisher TaqPath ComboKit assay as a proxy for Omicron infection. We fit Cox proportional hazards models to compare time to any hospital admission and hospital admissions associated with new-onset respiratory symptoms, intensive care unit (ICU) admission, mechanical ventilation, and mortality among cases with Omicron and Delta (non-SGTF) variant infections. We fit parametric competing risk models to compare lengths of hospital stay among admitted cases with Omicron and Delta variant infections.

Results: Our analyses included 52,297 cases with SGTF (Omicron) and 16,982 cases with non-SGTF (Delta [B.1.617.2]) infections, respectively. Hospital admissions occurred among 235 (0.5%) and 222 (1.3%) of cases with Omicron and Delta variant infections, respectively. Among cases first tested in outpatient settings, the adjusted hazard ratios for any subsequent hospital admission and symptomatic hospital admission associated with Omicron variant infection were 0.48 (0.36-0.64) and 0.47 (0.35-0.62), respectively. Rates of ICU admission and mortality after an outpatient positive test were 0.26 (0.10-0.73) and 0.09 (0.01-0.75) fold as high among cases with Omicron variant infection as compared to cases with Delta variant infection. Zero cases with Omicron variant infection received mechanical ventilation, as compared to 11 cases with Delta variant infections throughout the period of follow-up (two-sided p<0.001). Median duration of hospital stay was 3.4 (2.8-4.1) days shorter for hospitalized cases with Omicron variant infections as compared to hospitalized patients with Delta variant infections, reflecting a 69.6% (64.0-74.5%) reduction in hospital length of stay.

Conclusions: During a period with mixed Delta and Omicron variant circulation, SARS-CoV-2 infections with presumed Omicron variant infection were associated with substantially reduced risk of severe clinical endpoints and shorter durations of hospital stay.

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There we go again: “..just one of the 52,297 people infected with Omicron died..”.

Really? Where is the case description? Where are the details? It would be so unique that surely it would make headlines.

Walensky gives it away:

“We MAY see deaths from Omicron but I suspect that the deaths that we’re seeing now are still from Delta. ”

• Omicron 91% Less Likely To Be Fatal Compared To Delta: CDC Study (NYP)

Omicron poses a “substantially reduced risk” of serious illness compared to Delta — and is more than 90 percent less likely to kill those infected, according to a federally funded study. The study, released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Wednesday, said it proved “compelling evidence of an intrinsically less severe infection” from the variant that currently accounts for 90 percent of cases in the US. The evaluation of more than 70,000 infected Californians saw those with Omicron less than half as likely to need hospitalization as those with Delta — and about 75 percent less likely to need intensive care. Those hospitalized also needed to stay approximately 70 percent less time, with a median treatment time of 1.5 days compared to five days for those with the previous dominant variant.


Even though the study looked at three times as many people with Omicron, none of them needed to go on a ventilator in the hospital — compared to 11 in the far smaller group with Delta. Most encouragingly, just one of the 52,297 people infected with Omicron died — a reduction of 91 percent compared to 14 deaths in the 16,982 studied with Delta. It did not say how old those who died were, or if they were vaccinated. CDC director Rochelle Walensky told reporters that it likely means the recent increase in deaths is a lagging effect of the Delta variant, not the one rapidly replacing it. “We may see deaths from Omicron but I suspect that the deaths that we’re seeing now are still from Delta,” Walensky revealed.

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Threatening people’s lives and livelihoods over taking medicines, experimental or not, has always been a no-go. SCOTUS should not be needed for that. And they still leave the mandate for healthcare workers in place.

• Supreme Court Blocks Biden’s OSHA Vaxx Mandate (ZH)

Despite the misinformation spewed forth by Justice Sotomayor, The US Supreme Court has blocked the Biden administration’s vaccine-or-test rule for US businesses, but allows vaccine mandate for most health care workers. The National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB) argue against the Department of Labor, in the Court’s first hearing, that: “OSHA’s sweeping regulatory dictate,” will “irreparably injure the very businesses that Americans have counted on to widely distribute COVID-19 vaccines and protective equipment to save lives—and to keep them fed, clothed, and sustained during this now two-year-long pandemic.” The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) rule would have required 80 million workers to get shots or periodic tests. The OSHA ruling vote was 6-3 with Breyer, Sotomayor, and Kagan in dissent.

“Permitting OSHA to regulate the hazards of daily life – simply because most Americans have jobs and face those same risks while on the clock – would significantly expand OSHA’s regulatory authority without clear congressional authorization.” Chief Justice John Roberts, who was appointed by President George W. Bush, said during arguments that he thinks it’s hard to argue that the 1970 law governing OSHA “gives free reign to the agencies to enact such broad regulation.” The court allowed a separate rule to take effect requiring shots for workers in nursing homes, hospitals and other facilities that receive Medicare and Medicaid payments from the federal government (which will be interesting given that California just allowed COVID positive healthcare workers to go back to work).

The vaccine mandate for healthcare workers vote was 5-4 with Thomas, Alito, Gorsuch, and Barrett in dissent, which means Roberts and Kavanaugh joined liberal justices in allowing the HHS mandate on healthcare workers to stand. So with over 1 million COVID cases per day, record high inflation, Sinema blew out the filibuster, record low approval rating, and now his vaxx mandate in tatters, this seems to sum things up rather well… “This must be Biden’s worst day in office.”

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Karl is overdoing the I told you so. At some point, it gets ugly.

• Not Surprising, And Deserved By All (Denninger)

The OSHA ruling got blown up by the Supremes, 6-3 as I expected. This leaves all the private-sector employers who issued mandates in front of it fully exposed for any and all bad side effects. I expect the lawsuits to start imminently and they will bankrupt plenty of people. Good. I hope every single virtue-signaling CEO and HR Karen gets in the ass. They deserve it. “OSHA has never before imposed such a mandate. Nor has Congress. Indeed, although Congress has enacted significant legislation addressing the *****–19 pandemic, it has declined to enact any measure similar to what OSHA has promulgated here.” Exactly and as I noted the Senate explicitly declined to approve such a measure in the last couple of months and in fact explicitly disapproved it.

Yes, it went nowhere in the House as expected but you need both houses of Congress to concur when it comes to an authority. I said this would get official notice by The Supremes and it did. “In fact, the most noteworthy action concerning the ******* mandate by either House of Congress has been a majority vote of the Senate disapproving the regulation on December 8, 2021. S. J. Res. 29, 117th Cong., 1st Sess. (2021).” With the Senate explicitly disavowing same and nothing in the Congressional Record nor acts over the last two years this was clearly doomed and died a well-deserved death. Now onto CMS. Here I predicted the most-likely outcome was a split decision upholding the mandate in nursing homes and other non-consensual situations.

What we got was a 5-4 upholding it on technical grounds and, having read the opinion, you won’t like why it happened. Let’s be blunt: You ****ed yourself, America, and you deserve this outcome. You put the Federal Government in charge of what it pays for when it comes to medical care. You let them, not you or your doctor, make those decisions. You have in fact cheered this on and allowed it. You even allowed it when Trump promised to stop it during the campaign, along with all of its corruption, and then on election night all three planks dealing with the medical monopolies, which were a mere start, disappeared and yet fully half the nation continued to suck his dick.

[..] Actions — and deliberate inactions — have consequences. I don’t like the outcome but it wasn’t illogical considering what was argued and what we, the people have permitted and set in motion over the last three decades. The solicitors on the State side failed to argue that (1) these are experimental injections and (2) as of now they don’t even ****ing work and even Pfizer’s CEO admits it.

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“Does he not realise I have people arrested once every month or two who have threatened to attack me, plus I have been attacked, and he’s going to come and blame his attacks on me?”

• Rand Paul Labels Fauci ‘Juvenile Political Creature’ For Playing The Victim (SN)

Following the explosive latest exchange between Rand Paul and Anthony Fauci Tuesday, Fauci ran to CNN and MSNBC to complain more about how the Senator is attacking him for his own political gain, prompting Paul to label the NIAID head “juvenile”. On Chris Hayes’ show Fauci, stated “What you saw at the hearing today was pure ad hominem. And I called him [Paul] out because that’s exactly what he’s doing: he’s raising money.” Note that during the hearing Fauci did not present any evidence to counter Paul’s claims that the NIAID Director has continually lied under oath and has actively attempted to shut down scientists and doctors who disagree with him. Fauci attempted to shift the narrative to personal attacks against him.

Appearing on Fox News, Paul shot back, claiming that Fauci is now going even beyond saying he ‘is science’ and cannot be questioned, by suggesting that questioning him is encouraging violence. “It was a cheap shot by a politician, not a scientist,” Paul said, further noting “he’s blaming me for a death threat, but when [Republican members of Congress] were shot at by a Bernie Sanders supporter [in 2017], not one Republican stood up and said, oh, this is Bernie Sanders’s fault”. “We were not juvenile enough to do that,” Paul continued, adding “But he [Fauci] came to the hearing today and accused me of somehow inciting some lunatic person.” Paul further urged, “Does he not realise I have people arrested once every month or two who have threatened to attack me, plus I have been attacked, and he’s going to come and blame his attacks on me?”

“I think he has lied to the American public. I think that he funded the lab in Wuhan that in all likelihood this virus came from. I think he as ignored natural immunity. I think he has told people to wear a cloth mask when they don’t work,” Paul emphasised. In a further appearance, Paul said of Fauci “He didn’t answer the question why is he smearing these three doctors? I’m proud of the fact people go to RandPaul.com raising money to fire Fauci because he is a menace.” “Everything he said has been incorrect. And I think he is part of the problem, Paul continued, adding “Even from the very beginning the fact that this virus came from a lab in Wuhan he has denied it and worked to cover it up and denigrated anybody who raises this question as a conspiracy theorist.”

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I wouldn’t trust Oz at the far end of a ten foot pole, and this makes me think his campaign team is looking for -cheap- publicity, whether over the back of Fauci, or that of Rand Paul.

• Dr. Oz Calls Fauci A ‘Petty Tyrant,’ Challenges Him To Debate (Hill)

GOP Pennsylvania Senate candidate Mehmet Oz, more commonly known as “Dr. Oz” from his TV program “The Dr. Oz Show,” called infectious disease expert Dr. Anthony Fauci a “petty tyrant” and challenged him to a debate on COVID-19. “It’s past time Fauci faces the fact that he got COVID wrong. So, doctor to doctor – let’s debate. This Doctor is in, are you?” Oz said in a tweet Thursday while posting a campaign ad attacking Fauci. “Let’s get the facts straight here. You and me. Let’s have a debate, doctor to doctor, and give the American people the truth about COVID-19. I’m game. Anytime. Anywhere. Dr. Fauci, are you in?” Oz said in the campaign video.


Fauci has been under attack by Republicans throughout the pandemic, as many in the party disagree with how the country’s leading infectious diseases expert has guided the U.S. through the coronavirus. Oz said on Newsmax on Thursday that he wants to debate Fauci on vaccine mandates, natural immunity from COVID-19 infections and delays with drugs such as monoclonal antibodies. “He is a petty tyrant. He got COVID wrong. He continues to get it wrong,” Oz told the outlet, noting that “doctors like me” think Fauci has not managed the pandemic correctly.

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Mayo Clinic would rather have people die than give in. That redefines “shameless”.

• Florida Family Fighting for Ivermectin: Appeals Court Expedites Case (ET)

Florida’s First District Court of Appeal has expedited the process to decide a lawsuit filed by the family of a COVID-19 patient on a ventilator at a Jacksonville hospital. Attorneys for Mayo Clinic Florida have until 10 a.m. Jan. 13 to respond to the appeal filed by the family of 70-year-old Daniel Pisano. Then the family’s attorneys will have until Jan. 14 to file additional arguments. At that time, a three-panel judge could be appointed to decide the case. Mayo Clinic has said Pisano, who has been on a ventilator 22 days, has a slim chance of survival. But an outside doctor, who is not affiliated with Mayo Clinic, testified in an emergency hearing Dec. 30 that there’s still a good chance to save him—although there’s no time to delay, the physician said.

In a desperate attempt to save their loved one, the Pisano family has begged Mayo Clinic to try a protocol widely used by independent physicians around the country and developed by the Front Line COVID-19 Critical Care Alliance. Mayo Clinic officials have refused and attorneys have fought the family’s wishes vigorously in court. Claudia Pisano, Daniel Pisano’s wife of 51 years, and their son, Chris, have power of attorney and legally have the right to ask for the treatment of their choice, their attorneys have argued. But Daniel Pisano is declining fast and running out of time, they say. The family’s trusted doctor, Dr. Eduardo Balbona of Jacksonville, testified that in order to save him the hospital must quickly allow treatment—with ivermectin and other drugs and supplements—he’s used to help dozens of critically ill COVID-19 patients recover.

Being on the ventilator is doing harm to Pisano and other patients fighting COVID-19, Balbona testified. After considering the testimony in the three-hour hearing, Judge Marianne Aho, of Florida’s Fourth Judicial Circuit, denied the family’s plea to force Mayo Clinic doctors to step aside and let Balbona treat their dying loved one. Aho wrote, “An individual’s right to privacy is one of self-determination, the right to accept or refuse. It is not a right to demand a particular treatment. It is not a right to substitute one’s judgment as to which treatments must be made available by others. There is no right, constitutional or otherwise, of a patient to substitute one’s judgment for a medical professional.” The family disagrees saying the Florida Patient’s Bill of Rights gives them the right to choose between treatment options and they’ve offered to release Mayo Clinic from all liability in following through with that care. They filed an appeal Jan. 9.

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Stop testing healthy people.

• Do Antigen Tests Work If You Are Asymptomatic? (Kirsch)

Here’s what you need to know about antigen rapid tests: 1/ In general, each test brand will test for a specific antigen. They may or may not tell you which antigen they detect. 2/ Each brand has a different sensitivity. For low sensitivity tests, it will be fruitless to test if you are not symptomatic because it will almost certainly be negative. It would be nice if they correlated the results with PCR cycle thresholds, but those are non-standard as well. Unfortunately, as far as I know, there are no standards to inform you on 1 and 2 above. There is no “reference standard” that they compare to.


This of course means that you can be wasting serious money taking tests when you are asymptomatic because the certain brands will never be positive if you are asymptomatic. I want to thank Dr. Byram Bridle for pointing this out to me. They really should tell you, “Hey, if you aren’t symptomatic, don’t bother to take our test.” The manufacturers are never going to tell you that (since they aren’t required to), but I thought you should know.

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How about a Special Counsel?

• Why DID The Science Establishment Try So Hard To Silence Lab Leak Theory? (DM)

There are now two core questions over the birth of this pandemic: did Covid emerge through some kind of scientific mishap or through natural transmission from animals? And why did the science establishment work so hard to silence dissident voices? Indeed, it seems incredible that not only does Farrar remain in a job in which he directs so much crucial medical research, but even saw his annual salary rise by £28,000 to £512,000 last year, according to latest accounts. For Sir Jeremy is a pivotal figure in the sequence of secretive events that followed the emergence of a new disease in Wuhan in late 2019. Many of the growing concerns revolve around a secretive teleconference Farrar led on February 1 2020, as fears over the emerging pandemic exploded.

And the more we learn through leaks, freedom of information requests, interviews and tenacious investigations, the more it smacks of an establishment conspiracy to stifle debate over high-risk science – ironically by accusing those who challenge the consensus of being conspiracy theorists. The call involved the two most influential scientists in America – controversial presidential adviser Dr Anthony Fauci and Dr Francis Collins, then head of the US major funding body financially supporting high-risk research into bat coronaviruses conducted in Wuhan – plus 11 experts including Sir Patrick Vallance, our government’s chief scientific adviser. We know from Farrar’s book and previous email disclosures that several key participants, including Farrar, were concerned the deadly new virus was linked to research in Wuhan, home to several labs carrying out research into bat coronaviruses.

One Australian-based virologist said he was ‘80 per cent sure this thing had come out of a lab’ while another key participant was ‘60 to 70 per cent’ convinced. After their hour-long discussion, Farrar remained uncertain, saying ‘this will remain grey unless there is access to the Wuhan lab’. Yet, following that call and the airing of those views, the scientists’ public stance changed with bizarre speed for such a vexatious scientific conundrum – especially given the lack of data from Wuhan or any assistance from Beijing. They began publishing punchy statements dismissing lab leaks in the most prestigious science journals, some of which have extensive commercial ties to China. And they were backed by patsy politicians and supine journalists, whose hostility was inflamed by then President Donald Trump’s allegations about the ‘China virus’.

The result was this vital debate was set back at least a year. Farrar and two other Wellcome Trust experts signed a key statement in the Lancet medical journal praising Chinese efforts to tackle the disease while saying they ‘strongly condemn conspiracy theories suggesting that Covid does not have a natural origin’. It later emerged the article was covertly organised within days of the call by Peter Daszak, a British scientist whose New York organisation funnelled US funds to research partners at Wuhan Institute of Virology, China’s top biosafety lab. Farrar also quietly assisted five scientists, four of whom were on that call, to write a commentary in Nature Medicine that firmly stated the authors ‘do not believe that any type of laboratory-based scenario is plausible’. This hugely-influential statement has been accessed 5.62 million times and cited by more than 2,000 academic papers.

Read more …

Come for the headline, stay for the content.

• Dems’ Voting Bill Is ‘Crass Power Grab’ By ‘Clown Car’ Running DC (JTN)

Former Ohio Secretary of State Ken Blackwell, a proponent of election integrity reform, said Wednesday that the bills currently making their way through Congress that are designed to federalize elections are part of “the same clown car that has driven this constitutional republic to a disastrous edge.” He made the comments following President Joe Biden’s and Vice President Kamala Harris’ speeches on Tuesday in Georgia regarding Democrats’ voting legislation. Blackwell, former mayor of Cincinnati, told the John Solomon Reports podcast Wednesday that the Democrats’ election bills are “a crass power grab by the … clown car that is now running Washington, D.C.”

After listing the Biden administration’s unpopular policies and political failures, such as “soaring inflation” and the supply chain crisis, Blackwell explained how the Democrats want to unconstitutionally federalize elections. “[E]lections take place at the local level, in a decentralized way, because, one, that is where you have transparency, that’s where you have familiarity, that’s where you have buy-in,” he said. “And if you start to take it away from states and localities, you run the risk of the same clown car that has driven this constitutional republic to a disastrous edge taking control of our elections. It won’t stand.”

Blackwell criticized Democrats for their inconsistency on showing ID to vote versus providing proof of vaccination as Washington, D.C.’s vaccine mandate — which includes showing a vaccine card and photo ID at venues such as restaurants and gyms — goes into effect Saturday. Regarding voter ID, he said, “To equate these common-sense reforms that states are putting in place to ensure the integrity of the election system as being a throwback to Jim Crow is an insult to all Americans, especially those in the African-American community.”

Read more …

Zero covid will mean zero supplies.

• “Mother Of All” Supply Chain Shocks Looms As China Locks Down Ports (ZH)

Over the past month, as Wall Street turned increasingly optimistic on US growth alongside the Fed, with consensus (shaped by the Fed’s leaks and jawboning) now virtually certain of a March rate hike, we have been repeatedly warning that after a huge policy error in 2021 when the Fed erroneously said that inflation is “transitory” (it wasn’t), the central bank is on pace to make another just as big policy mistake in 2022 by hiking as many as 4 times and also running off its massive balance sheet… right into a global growth slowdown.


And, as we have also discussed in recent weeks, one place where this growth slowdown is emerging – besides the upcoming deterioration in US consumption where spending is now being funded to record rates by credit cards before it encounters a troubling air pocket – is China and its “covid-zero” policy in general, and its covid-locked down ports in particular. But what until recently was a minority view confined to our modest website, has since expanded and as Bloomberg writes overnight, the effects of restrictions in China as the country maintains its Covid-zero policy “are starting to hit supply chains in the region.” As a result of the slow movement of goods through some of the country’s busiest and most important ports means shippers are now diverting to Shanghai, causing the types of knock-on delays at the world’s biggest container port that led to massive congestion bottlnecks last summer that eventually translated into a record number of container ships waiting off the coast of California, a glut that hasn’t been cleared to this day.

With sailing schedules already facing delays of about a week, freight forwarders warn of the impact on already back-logged gateways in Europe and the US and is also why HSBC economists are warning that the world economy could be headed for the “mother of all” supply chain shocks if the highly infectious omicron variant which is already swamping much of the global economy spreads across Asia, especially China, at which point disruption to manufacturing will be inevitable. “Temporary, one would hope, but hugely disruptive all the same” in the next few months, they wrote in a research note this week first noted by Bloomberg. For those who have forgotten last year’s global shockwave when China locked down its ports for several days, a quick reminder: it led to an unprecedented hiccup in global logistics and shipping which hasn’t been resolved to this day. That’s because China is the world’s biggest trading nation and its ability to keep its factories humming through the pandemic has been crucial for global supply chains.

Read more …

Disappointing. Advisor to 3 different presidents, Malmgren, tells me nothing I don’t already know about Putin. And he doesn’t appear to say what it is the west gets wrong.

• What The West Gets Wrong About Putin (Malmgren)

In 1999, Vladimir Putin suddenly sprang from bureaucratic obscurity to the office of Prime Minister. When, a few months later, Yeltsin unexpectedly resigned and Putin was voted in as President, governments around the world were taken by surprise yet again. How could this unknown figure have amassed national voter support with so little media attention? I had first met Putin seven years before and was not surprised by his rapid domination of the new Russia. We were introduced by Yevgeny Primakov, widely known as “Russia’s Kissinger”, who I had met in Moscow multiple times during the Cold War years when I advised Presidents Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon and Ford. Primakov was a no-nonsense thinker and writer. He was also a special emissary for the Kremlin in conducting secret discussions with national leaders around the world.

When Yeltsin tasked his advisor Anatoly Sobchak with identifying and recruiting Russia’s best and brightest, Putin, then a local politician in his hometown of St Petersburg, was top of his list — so Primakov took Putin under his wing to tutor him in global power and security issues. Eventually, Primakov introduced Kissinger to Putin, and they became close. That both Primakov and Kissinger took time to coach Putin on geopolitics and geosecurity was a clear demonstration that they saw in him the characteristics of a powerful leader. It also showed Putin’s capacity for listening to lengthy lessons on geopolitics — as I was soon to learn.

In 1992, I received a call from a meeting organiser at the CSIS think tank inviting me to join a US-Russia St Petersburg Commission to be chaired by Kissinger and Sobchak. The purpose would be to help the new Russian leadership in opening channels of business and banking with the West. Most of the Western members would be CEOs of major US and European companies, as well as key officials of the new Russian government. I would attend as an expert. I was told that a “Mr Primakov” had personally asked if I could make time to participate. I could hardly refuse such a request, and I was intensely curious about the emerging Russian leadership, especially about Putin.

Arriving at the first meeting, I saw several people gathered around Kissinger and a man I was told was Putin. An official identified himself to me and said he had been asked by Primakov to introduce me to Putin. He interrupted the conversation with Kissinger to announce my arrival; Putin warmly responded that he was looking forward to chatting with me about how I see the world from inside Washington. We spoke on several occasions between meetings, and he arranged to sit next to me at a dinner, accompanied by his interpreter. At that dinner, he asked me: “What is the single most important obstacle between your Western businessmen and my fellow Russians in starting up business connections?”

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The neocons are with Biden now.

• US Envoy In Europe Says ‘Drumbeat Of War Is Sounding Loud’ (Hill)

Washington’s envoy in Europe on Thursday issued a stark warning of war in Eastern Europe amid Russia’s military buildup on Ukraine’s border but said the U.S. and the majority of its allies support ongoing dialogue to tamp down tensions. “We’re facing a crisis in European security. The drumbeat of war is sounding loud, and the rhetoric has gotten rather shrill,” said Michael Carpenter, the U.S. ambassador to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE). Carpenter spoke with reporters following a meeting of the OSCE focused on advancing diplomacy between the U.S., Europe and Russia, the conclusion of an extraordinary session of three diplomatic meetings on the continent this week and in response to Russian military provocations.


“There’s close to 100,000 troops on the Russian side of its border with Ukraine. Their presence and the live fire measures being carried out are raising many questions about Moscow’s intention,” Carpenter said. The OSCE meeting, which took place in Vienna on Thursday, was the first inaugural permanent council meeting of 2022 but was overtaken by discussions surrounding Russia’s military buildup on Ukraine’s border. Both nations are members of the security group. It was the first time Russian and Ukrainian officials met in person to discuss what Moscow calls its security concerns and followed bilateral talks between the U.S. and Russia in Geneva on Monday and between Russia and NATO on Wednesday in Brussels.

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Aftter an 8-hour shift wearing a properly fittted N95 mask:

 

 

 

The only half mask that works, according to Steve Kirsch.

 

 

 

Carson

 

 

 

 

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Debt Rattle January 12 2022

Jan 122022
 
 January 12, 2022  Posted by at 9:50 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , ,  88 Responses »


Caravaggio Burial of St. Lucy 1608

 

• Rand Paul Driving Violent Threats Against Me, Fauci Says (R.)
• Fauci Confronts Rand Paul Over Murder Plot (RT)
• A 30-year Lie On Misplaced Vaccines (Girardot)
• Omicron May Be Headed For A Rapid Drop In US and Britain (AP)
• Medical Experts Shred Latest CDC COVID-19 Study (JTN)
• Spain First EU Country To Suggest Downgrading Covid To ‘Like The Flu’ (Sun)
• Repeated Covid Boosters Not Viable Strategy Against New Variants – WHO (G.)
• It Turns Out That, If You Doubted Covid’s Deadliness, You Were Correct (AT)
• Quebec Plans To Hit Unvaccinated With A ‘Significant’ Tax (NP)
• Scots May Have To Wear Facemasks In Public For Years To Come – Sturgeon (DM)
• Covid Loses 50% Of Ability To Infect After 10 Seconds In Office Air (NYP)
• Biden Backs Calls To Abolish Key Senate Procedure (RT)
• Biden, Harris Bash Republicans As ‘Totalitarian’, Wanting ‘Jim Crow 2.0’ (JTN)

 

 

 

 

 

 

Djokovic

 

 

Fauci started out saying that who disagrees with him is against science. This is a lot more dangerous. Now anybody who disagrees with him is trying to kill him.

• Rand Paul Driving Violent Threats Against Me, Fauci Says (R.)

Dr. Anthony Fauci, the top U.S. infectious disease official, on Tuesday accused Republican Senator Rand Paul of spreading misinformation that has sparked threats of violence against him and his family while distracting the public from the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic. At a Senate health committee hearing, Fauci had his latest heated back-and-forth with Paul, a lawmaker from Kentucky and supporter of former President Donald Trump. Fauci said Paul was focused on misinformed attacks rather than oversight aimed at addressing the health care crisis that has so far killed more than 800,000 people in the United States. Paul’s website accuses Fauci of “ignoring good advice, and lying about everything from masks to the contagiousness of the virus” and on Tuesday the senator accused Fauci of smearing other scientists who disagreed with him.


Fauci said Paul was distorting the truth. “There you go again, you just do the same thing every hearing,” Fauci told the senator, accusing him of making personal attacks that had no relation to reality. ‘ “He’s doing this for political reasons,” Fauci continued, pointing to fundraising appeals on Paul’s website next to a call to have Fauci fired. “It distracts from what we’re all trying to do here today, (which) is get our arms around the epidemic and the pandemic that we’re dealing with, not something imaginary,” Fauci said. Fauci has faced sharp criticism from some conservatives and death threats from people who object to measures such as vaccination and masking that he has advocated to halt the pandemic. Fauci said misinformation had fueled such threats. “What happens when he (Paul) gets out and accuses me of things that are completely untrue is that all of a sudden, that kindles the crazies out there and I have … threats upon my life, harassment of my family and my children,” Fauci said.

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“A planner who believes he is The Science leads to an arrogance that justifies in his mind using government resources to smear and destroy the reputations of other scientists that disagree with him..”

• Fauci Confronts Rand Paul Over Murder Plot (RT)

Senator Rand Paul (R-Kentucky) has accused Dr. Anthony Fauci of being responsible for over 800,000 US deaths from the coronavirus. The Biden administration’s covid czar said Paul’s criticism put his life in danger. The latest clash between Paul and Fauci came on Tuesday at the Senate Health Committee hearing on the US response to Covid-19 variants. At one point, President Joe Biden’s chief medical adviser held up a printout of a page on the Kentucky senator’s website, with a “Fire Dr. Fauci” banner, to claim that such rhetoric inspired a California man arrested last month for allegedly plotting to murder him. The man, arrested in Iowa on December 21, had an AR-15 rifle and multiple magazines, and told police he was driving to Washington, DC to kill Fauci, the doctor told senators.

“You are making a catastrophic epidemic for your political gain,” Fauci told Paul. Paul pointed to Fauci, as the lead architect of the US government’s pandemic response, and asked how he could call any of it – the lockdowns, mask and vaccine mandates, boosters – a success when over 800,000 people have died. The libertarian-leaning Republican also called out Fauci for being a central planner whose arrogance led to compounding mistakes. “The idea that a government official like yourself would claim unilaterally to represent science and that any criticism of you would be considered a criticism of science itself is quite dangerous,” Paul said. “A planner who believes he is The Science leads to an arrogance that justifies in his mind using government resources to smear and destroy the reputations of other scientists that disagree with him,” the senator added.

“This is not only antithetical to the scientific method, it is the epitome of cheap politics and it is reprehensible.” This was a reference to last month’s revelations that Fauci had worked with National Institutes of Health (NIH) Director Francis Collins in 2020 to discredit critics of lockdowns who signed the Great Barrington Declaration. Emails released by Congress showed Collins asking Fauci for a “quick and devastating published take down of its premises” and later praising him for an “excellent” job.

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“How can an injection in the deltoid stimulate an immunity in the mucus?”

• A 30-year Lie On Misplaced Vaccines (Girardot)

In the accelerated development of anti-COVID vaccines, the focus was essentially on developing the right “code” to transfer to the immune system, mainly on the relatively narrow Spike protein, as you all know by now. They also focused on the best delivery vehicle – the lipid nanoparticle – and optimal manufacturing processes. However, vaccine effectiveness depends on many other factors. A systems approach was needed, not a pinpoint solution approach. It’s not enough to find and to present the right antigens – with the right quality – to the immune system, even packed into the latest and greatest technology…

Unfortunately, after a year of vaccination and 9.5 billion doses, vaccine failure is visible to everybody to acknowledge: unforeseen transmission, explosion of cases… If you believe “Our World In Data”, we’ve had 240 million infections in 2021 – when we vaccinated like never before. We only had 70 million in 2020 when we had no vaccines… Based on case numbers, the vaccine is not even putting a dent in the epidemic. Either by media-induced panic, by sheer incompetence, or possibly by customary corruption, vaccine stakeholders have presented a completely false narrative on anti-COVID vaccine effectiveness.

For nearly a year now, I have been exposing two critical inconsistencies in terms of the location of the vaccine-induced immunity that make it nearly impossible for these vaccines to be effective: How can an injection in the deltoid stimulate an immunity in the mucus? Respiratory virus like SARS-COV-2 typically propagate in the mucus: mouth, nose, digestive tract and lungs. For propagation to be stopped in the mucus, notably in the lungs, a preemptive immune arsenal needs to be stimulated there. This is exactly what occurs once recovered from a natural infection: a sterilising immunity is provided by potent resident memory T and B-cells – along with neutralising IgA antibodies – that are positioned in large numbers as a sentinel force to kill in-the-egg any starting infection.

I have addressed this at length in my June article comparing natural immunity and vaccine-induced immunity as well as in my August article on pre-existing immunity. I am not alone in thinking along these lines; many renowned scientists share a similar perspective that intramuscular vaccines cannot work for mucosal viruses. [..] .. it is very unlikely that any intramuscular vaccines can ever work to stop COVID; the vaccines are injected in the wrong location: the muscle, too far away from the virus entry point to stimulate any response there. This is not related to mRNA or DNA technologies, attenuated virus vaccines are also de facto ineffective. This is simply a question of location of where the vaccine is delivered… And the fact that millions have been vaccinated against the flu in the arm every year for decades, most likely uselessly shouldn’t change this reality …

Given the emphasis of vaccine manufacturers and public health authorities on antibodies, you’re all probably thinking: – “Hey Marc ?! What about neutralising antibodies?” The question is: What can antibodies do to stop a propagation that is cell-to-cell? To start, vaccine-induced antibodies are also misplaced … circulating in the blood away from the mucus. And, even if a few antibodies were to migrate to the mucus, they would very much be useless against a virus that propagates cell-to-cell. Fundamentally, cell-to-cell propagation means the virus expansion happens out-of-reach of antibodies (at least before Omicron). Antibodies can’t bind with viruses that are inside cells, only T-cells can chase down virions inside cells by instructing infected cells to self-destruct…

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..“simply because everybody who could be infected will be infected..”

• Omicron May Be Headed For A Rapid Drop In US and Britain (AP)

Scientists are seeing signals that COVID-192 s alarming omicron wave may have peaked in Britain and is about to do the same in the U.S., at which point cases may start dropping off dramatically. The reason: The variant has proved so wildly contagious that it may already be running out of people to infect, just a month and a half after it was first detected in South Africa. “It’s going to come down as fast as it went up,” said Ali Mokdad, a professor of health metrics sciences at the University of Washington in Seattle. At the same time, experts warn that much is still uncertain about how the next phase of the pandemic might unfold. The plateauing or ebbing in the two countries is not happening everywhere at the same time or at the same pace.

And weeks or months of misery still lie ahead for patients and overwhelmed hospitals even if the drop-off comes to pass. “There are still a lot of people who will get infected as we descend the slope on the backside,” said Lauren Ancel Meyers, director of the University of Texas COVID-19 Modeling Consortium, which predicts that reported cases will peak within the week. The University of Washington’s own highly influential model projects that the number of daily reported cases in the U.S. will crest at 1.2 million by Jan. 19 and will then fall sharply “simply because everybody who could be infected will be infected,” according to Mokdad.

In fact, he said, by the university’s complex calculations, the true number of new daily infections in the U.S. — an estimate that includes people who were never tested — has already peaked, hitting 6 million on Jan. 6. In Britain, meanwhile, new COVID-19 cases dropped to about 140,000 a day in the last week, after skyrocketing to more than 200,000 a day earlier this month, according to government data. Kevin McConway, a retired professor of applied statistics at Britain’s Open University, said that while cases are still rising in places such as southwest England and the West Midlands, the outbreak may have peaked in London. The figures have raised hopes that the two countries are about to undergo something similar to what happened in South Africa, where in the span of about a month the wave crested at record highs and then fell significantly.

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More about the “Covid leads to diabetes” nonsense.

• Medical Experts Shred Latest CDC COVID-19 Study (JTN)

Even as CDC Director Rochelle Walensky has started sounding more like COVID-19 policy skeptics, the agency continues promoting research that fits its agenda but quickly provokes professional challenge. For the second time in less than a month, medical experts pounced on the methodology of a study published in the agency’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, which is not peer-reviewed. The CDC’s COVID and diabetes researchers found that children and teens who recovered from infections are “up to” 2.5 times likelier to develop diabetes, which was uncritically reported across mainstream media Friday. The increased risk to this age group shows the importance of COVID prevention, “including vaccination for all eligible persons,” researchers wrote. “Prevent COVID-19 by using tools like masks and #vaccines for those eligible,” the agency tweeted.

Medical professors at the University of Pittsburgh, University of California San Francisco and Harvard’s medical and public health schools quickly provided informal — and highly critical — peer review. The study has “really really major limitations,” according to Walid Gellad, director of Pitt’s Center for Pharmaceutical Policy & Prescribing, citing its own disclosures. The researchers used a “single ICD-10-CM code, did not include laboratory data at the time of diagnosis, and could not reliably distinguish between type 1 and type 2 diabetes,” the study says. It’s also missing information on “covariates” including obesity that “could have affected the association” between infection and diabetes. “The CDC is back with a new piece of propagan— I mean, a new publication,” UCSF’s Vinay Prasad wrote in a lengthy analysis, calling the study “embarrassing.”

The analysis “hinges on the idea that age-sex matched kids without covid should be comparable to the kids who got covid in terms of risk of diabetes,” but the infection may be more likely to affect “kids of lower socioeconomic status, of certain races, and kids who were already overweight or suffering from medical problems,” he wrote. “Does the CDC attempt to correct for any of these confounders? Not at all,” Prasad said. Also not considered: “the true denominator” of infections as determined by seroprevalance and the increased blood tests for kids who get treated for COVID. He was baffled why the CDC claimed the study showed the need for child vaccinations, “a topic of wide global debate, with differing recommendations by nation (US vs UK).”

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How do you get 27 different countries to agree on this though?

• Spain First EU Country To Suggest Downgrading Covid To ‘Like The Flu’ (Sun)

SPAIN could be the first European country to downgrade Covid-19 to a” flu-like” status – just two years after clocking 1,000 deaths a day from the virus. Spanish PM Pedro Sánchez pushed his EU counterparts to debate the possibility of treating Covid like the flu. The European leader told a local radio channel the situation in Spain “is not what we faced a year ago” and that it was time “to evaluate the evolution of COVID to an endemic illness”. The move would see lockdowns and daily infection counts scrapped in favour of a system that would track Covid cases like the regular flu. It comes as a string of positive studies show Omicron is milder than other strains, with data revealing the risk of hospitalisation is 50 to 70 per cent lower than with Delta. Covid booster jabs protect against Omicron and offer the best chance to get through the pandemic, health officials have repeatedly said.


The Sun’s Jabs Army campaign is helping get the vital extra vaccines in Brits’ arms to ward off the need for any new restrictions and protect the NHS. The measure is set to meet stiff resistance from Germany and France where vaccinations rates remain low and where French President Emmanuel Macron has promised to make engaging in public life as tough as possible for the unvaccinated. Sánchez cited Spain’s “exemplary” vaccine uptake which has seen more than 90 per cent of the population over 11 years old become fully vaccinated and 85 per cent of over 60s get a booster as a case for the radical change. Spain has also seen their fatality rate drop to 1 per cent, down from 13 per cent at the height of the first wave of Covid-19 when it experienced 1,000 deaths a day. In the UK, 83 per cent of the population aged 12 and over are fully vaccinated while 63 per cent have had their booster jab, according to the latest government figures.

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Houston, we have a problem.

• Repeated Covid Boosters Not Viable Strategy Against New Variants – WHO (G.)

World Health Organization experts have warned that repeating booster doses of the original Covid vaccines is not a viable strategy against emerging variants and called for new jabs that better protect against transmission. “A vaccination strategy based on repeated booster doses of the original vaccine composition is unlikely to be appropriate or sustainable,” the WHO Technical Advisory Group on Covid-19 Vaccine Composition (TAG-Co-VAC) said in a statement published on Tuesday. The group of experts, who are working to assess the performance of Covid-19 vaccines, called for the development of new vaccines that not only protect people who contract Covid against falling seriously ill but also better prevent people from catching the virus in the first place, in order to deal with emerging Covid variants such as Omicron.

“Covid-19 vaccines that have high impact on prevention of infection and transmission, in addition to the prevention of severe disease and death, are needed and should be developed,” the advisory group said. This, it said, would help lower “community transmission and the need for stringent and broad-reaching public health and social measures”. It also suggested that vaccine developers should strive to create jabs that “elicit immune responses that are broad, strong, and long-lasting in order to reduce the need for successive booster doses”. As the virus evolves and until new vaccines are available, “the composition of current Covid-19 vaccines may need to be updated”, the group said.

According to the WHO, 331 candidate vaccines are being worked on around the world. The UN health agency has so far given its stamp of approval to versions of eight different vaccines. A growing body of evidence indicates that the Omicron Covid variant is not only far more transmissible than previous variants, but also better at dodging some vaccine protections. Earlier this week, Pfizer Inc chief executive Albert Bourla said a redesigned Covid-19 vaccine that specifically targets the Omicron variant is likely to be needed and his company could have one ready to launch by March.

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“We know now that two-thirds of deaths for Americans with COVID are people with six or more comorbidities.”

• It Turns Out That, If You Doubted Covid’s Deadliness, You Were Correct (AT)

Walensky has acknowledged that, when it comes to vaccinated people who still died from COVID, almost 80% of them had one foot in the grave and one foot on a banana peel: “The overwhelming number of deaths, over 75%, occurred in people who had at least four comorbidities. So, really, these are people who were unwell to begin with. And yes, really encouraging news in the context of Omicron; this means not only just to get your primary series but to get your booster series. And yes, we’re really encouraged by these results.” The study, from the CDC, says: “Among 1,228,664 persons who completed primary vaccination during December 2020–October 2021, severe COVID-19–associated outcomes (0.015%) or death (0.0033%) were rare. Risk factors for severe outcomes included age ≥65 years, immunosuppressed, and six other underlying conditions. All persons with severe outcomes had at least one risk factor; 78% of persons who died had at least four.”

Another interesting thing that emerged during the same appearance is that, as with any other virus, people are most contagious when they’re not yet symptomatic. This renders much of the ten-day lockdown period irrelevant, as even Walensky conceded: “Isolation, we talk about isolation in the context of people who’ve had a positive test, who know that they are infected. And we now have dozens of studies referenced on the CDC website that have demonstrated that you are most infectious in the one to two days before your symptoms and the two to three days after your symptoms. So by five days after your symptoms, the vast majority of your contagiousness is really behind you.”

Dr. Scott Atlas appeared on Tucker Carlson to discuss Walensky’s revelations and was unimpressed. When it comes to morbidity, he said, it’s long been known, only it was kept from the American public. Atlas also reminded Tucker and his audience that there’s a huge difference between being hospitalized for COVID and being hospitalized with COVID. As even Fauci conceded, the latter was mostly true for children. Atlas then said something truly surprising that will further devastate those on the left: “We know now that two-thirds of deaths for Americans with COVID are people with six or more comorbidities.” In other words, unless your health is fragile to begin with, you’re going to be fine

Tucker Atlas

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This is all about control, not health. Otherwise this tax would be levied on smokers and fat people too.

• Quebec Plans To Hit Unvaccinated With A ‘Significant’ Tax (NP)

The Quebec government wants to impose a “significant” financial penalty on the “small minority” of Quebecers who refuse to get vaccinated against COVID-19. Premier François Legault made the announcement — which would be a first in Canada — during a press conference on Tuesday. He said he was working on the tax with Finance Minister Eric Girard while also reviewing the measure’s legality. “Unfortunately, there is still a small minority, about 10 per cent of the population, that refuses to get vaccinated,” Legault said. “I sense the frustration from Quebecers towards that minority that … is clogging our hospitals.” “That is why I am announcing that we are currently working on a health contribution that will be charged to all Quebec adults who refuse to get vaccinated,” he continued, adding that people with medical exemptions would be excluded from the new tax.


Legault did not announce any details nor a date for the new tax, nor did he specify the amount except to say that it would be “significant.” The premier said that unvaccinated Quebecers currently occupy 50 per cent of intensive care unit beds in the province, despite being one tenth of the population. “It is shocking,” he said. “People who refuse to get vaccinated impose a burden on (health care) personnel and an important financial burden on the majority of Quebecers.” “All adults in Quebec who don’t accept to go get at least a first dose in the next few weeks will have a bill to pay because there are consequences on our health system and its not up to all Quebecers to pay for that,” he added. The measure, which is sure to be controversial both in the province and in Canada, was immediately criticized by opposition party Québec Solidaire as “radical” for “completely” forgetting vulnerable people such as the homeless or those suffering from severe mental health issues.

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WTF guidance.

• Scots May Have To Wear Facemasks In Public For Years To Come – Sturgeon (DM)

People in Scotland may have to wear masks in public places for years to come, Nicola Sturgeon has warned. The First Minister insisted that tough curbs dramatically imposed on hospitality venues and large gatherings from Boxing Day had stemmed the spread of Covid, despite official figures showing that Scotland’s virus rate is higher than England’s. And furious business leaders said Miss Sturgeon’s ‘gamble’ with restrictions must end after they failed to make ‘any meaningful difference’ to infections in Scotland. Speaking ahead of today’s announcement about extending restrictions beyond next week, Miss Sturgeon said face coverings ‘might be required in the longer-term to enable us to live with it [Covid] with far fewer protective measures’.

In England, Covid restrictions could start to be lifted this month after Michael Gove said Britain was moving towards a situation where it could ‘live with’ the virus. Downing Street is examining options to lift Plan B measures in stages if cases remain too high to remove them all in one go. Extending Covid passes, due to expire on January 26, would require another bruising clash with Tory backbenchers, which No10 wants to avoid.

But some ministers are pushing for the WFH guidance to be removed first, arguing that it causes the most damage to the economy. Miss Sturgeon told STV’s Scotland Tonight: ‘Sometimes when you hear people talk about learning to live with Covid, what seems to be suggested is that one morning we’ll wake up and not have to worry about it any more, and not have to do anything to try to contain and control it. ‘That’s not what I mean when I say “learning to live with it”. Instead, we will have to ask ourselves what adaptations to pre-pandemic life — face coverings, for example — might be required in the longer-term to enable us to live with it with far fewer protective measures.’

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Is this a good thing, or not?

• Covid Loses 50% Of Ability To Infect After 10 Seconds In Office Air (NYP)

The coronavirus loses about 50 percent of its ability to infect about 10 seconds after it becomes airborne in a typical office environment, according to a new study about how the deadly bug survives in exhaled air. “People have been focused on poorly ventilated spaces and thinking about airborne transmission over meters or across a room,” said Prof. Jonathan Reid, director of the University of Bristol’s Aerosol Research Centre, the Guardian reported. “I’m not saying that doesn’t happen, but I think still, the greatest risk of exposure is when you’re close to someone,” said Reid, the lead author of the study, which has not yet been peer-reviewed. “When you move further away, not only is the aerosol diluted down, there’s also less infectious virus because the virus has lost infectivity (as a result of time),” he added.


The UK university researchers’ findings highlight the impact of short-range transmission — and stress the importance of physical distancing and masking up as the best way to avoid infection. While still worthwhile, ventilation was deemed to be less effective, the news outlet reported. The study determined that viral particles quickly lose moisture and dry out after they are expelled from the lungs. The particles’ pH also rises rapidly when the carbon dioxide in their environment drops, the news outlet reported. The relative humidity of the surrounding air affects how fast the particles dry out. When under 50 percent, such as the relatively dry air in an office, the virus had become half as infectious within 10 seconds. But at 90 percent humidity, 52 percent of particles remained infectious after five minutes, dropping to about 10 percent after 20 minutes.

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“..Though Biden had spent 36 years in the Senate and repeatedly defended the filibuster when Democrats were in the minority..”

• Biden Backs Calls To Abolish Key Senate Procedure (RT)

US President Joe Biden has called for the Senate to change the rule requiring 60 votes to move a bill forward, saying it was the only way to pass the two Democrat initiatives federalizing elections and ensure “majority rule.” Speaking in Atlanta, Georgia on Tuesday, Biden declared “this is the moment to decide to defend our elections, to defend our democracy.” He said he’d been having “quiet conversations” about the change with members of Congress over the past two months. “I’m tired of being quiet,” Biden said, raising his voice. “Today, I’m making it clear. To protect our democracy, I support changing the Senate rules whichever way they need to be changed, to prevent a minority of senators from blocking actions on voting rights.” “The majority should rule in the US Senate,” he added.

While Democrats have a nine-vote majority in the House of Representatives, the Senate is split 50-50, with Vice President Kamala Harris acting as the tie-breaker. While this 51-vote majority has been used to approve Biden’s nominations, the long-standing filibuster rule requiring at least 60 votes to pass bills stands in the way of the Freedom to Vote Act and the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act. Both have been proposed by Democrats as a way of imposing a federal standard on US elections in response to what they called “voter suppression” bills passed by Republican state legislatures after the controversial 2020 vote. Repeating that accusation on Tuesday, Biden argued that “history has never been kind to those who sided with voter suppression over voter rights,” and compared anyone opposed to the bills to racists and segregationists.

Though Biden had spent 36 years in the Senate and repeatedly defended the filibuster when Democrats were in the minority, on Tuesday, he argued that “the threat to our democracy is so grave that we must find a way to pass these voting rights bills.” Last week, on the anniversary of the January 6 Capitol riot, Biden called the 2020 election “the greatest demonstration of democracy in the history of this country.” Officially, Biden won the highest number of votes in US history.

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On track to lose the midterms.

“..Jan. 6, which he described as a moment “so stark” it “stopped time”..”

• Biden, Harris Bash Republicans As ‘Totalitarian’, Wanting ‘Jim Crow 2.0’ (JTN)

President Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris at a rally Tuesday in Georgia bashed Republicans several times throughout voting rights speeches. Former President Donald Trump and the GOP were accused by Biden and Harris of making it more difficult for people to vote, trying to create a totalitarian state and being on the side of Confederate President Jefferson Davis. Both officials mentioned the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol. “Across our nation anti-voter laws could make it more difficult for as many as 55 million Americans to vote. That is one out of six people in our country,” Harris said during her push to institute national election reform through the Democrat-led Freedom to Vote Act and the John Lewis Voting Rights Act. Republicans have stood against these laws, which they say will eviscerate state voter ID laws and create more election fraud.

“The proponents of these laws are not only putting in place obstacles to the ballot box, they are also working to interfere with our election to get the outcomes they want and to discredit those that they don’t,” Harris jabbed at the GOP over Jan. 6 and possibly over the discredited Trump-Russia scandal. “If we stand idly by, our entire nation will pay the price for generations to come,” Harris grimly said. She also voiced her support for abolishing the filibuster, which she said was not constitutionally protected. “Senate Republicans have exploited arcane rules to block these bills. And let us be clear: the Constitution of the United States gives the Congress the power to pass legislation and nowhere, nowhere does the constitution give a minority the right to unilaterally block legislation.”

Biden began his speech by reflecting on Jan. 6, which he described as a moment “so stark” it “stopped time” and divides “all that came before and everything that followed.” He also said Jan. 6 was a “dreadful day when a dagger was literally held at the throat of American democracy.” While several Jan. 6 rioters have been charged with carrying knifes, such as Douglas Jensen who allegedly carried a knife with a 3-inch blade in his pocket at the time, there is no evidence to support anyone “literally” brought a dagger into the Capitol, much less held it against someone’s throat.

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GOAT

 

 

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