security clearances Archives - The Automatic Earth

Maria Zakharova:

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

— Zlatti71 (@Zlatti_71) August 19, 2025

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

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

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

— Margarita Simonyan (@M_Simonyan) August 18, 2025

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

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

And… pic.twitter.com/w4YhWAYQUy

— Chay Bowes (@BowesChay) August 19, 2025

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

— Zlatti71 (@Zlatti_71) August 19, 2025

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

• Italy Opposes Western Troop Deployment To Ukraine (RT)

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

You go girl, and I do mean you.

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

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

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

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

They don’t care, they want war.

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

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

Yeah, while playing piano.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

IMMUNOLOGIST SAYS SURVIVE 10 YEARS AND LIVE 50 MORE

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

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

— Mario Nawfal (@MarioNawfal) August 19, 2025

Hegseth

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

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

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

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

Mackinac

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

— Massimo (@Rainmaker1973) August 18, 2025

Spa

Spa day for pup
pic.twitter.com/w7tOHwKxAq

— Science girl (@gunsnrosesgirl3) August 19, 2025

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

Foxfalcon

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

— Massimo (@Rainmaker1973) August 19, 2025

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

Debt Rattle February 10 2025

Feb 102025

February 10, 2025 Posted by Raúl Ilargi Meijer at 8:11 am Finance Tagged with: Bessent, CBS, diversity, DOGE, Elon Musk, Jan 6, Russophobic, security clearances, Treasury, Trump, USAID 56 Responses »

Jacopo Bassano The Miraculous Draught of Fishes 1545

• DOGE’s Targets (Burg)

• Musk Slams Ruling Blocking DOGE From Accessing Treasury Payment Systems (JTN)

• Musk Calls For Impeachment Of Judge Who Blocked DOGE Access At Treasury (ZH)

• Trump, Musk, and the Deep State: The Battle Over Transparency Begins (Kimball)

• Musk Says DOGE, Treasury Agree on New Anti-Fraud Measures (Ozimek)

• US Treasury Pays $100bn Annually To Unknown Recipients – Musk (RT)

• Musk Mocks Pro-Western ‘independent’ Media For Losing US Funding (RT)

• Trump’s USAID Purge Has Revealed US Scheming In Kiev, But Won’t Stop It (Amar)

• Designating Cartels as Terrorists Will Have Huge Consequences (Summers)

• Trump Stripping Security Clearances Of Numerous Antagonists (Devine)

• Trump Doubles CBS Harris Interview Lawsuit Damages to $20 Billion (ET)

• Freed Jan. 6 Prisoners Speak Out as They Begin to Rebuild Their Lives (Hisle)

• ‘Diversity Is Our Strength’ Dumbest Phrase In Military History – Hegseth (RT)

• Paris Backs Neo-Nazism in Ukraine – Moscow (RT)

• The EU’s Worst Enemies Are Its Own Russophobic Leaders (Marsden)

https://twitter.com/i/status/1888619828258214032

Bureaucracy
https://twitter.com/i/status/1888290487028560099

Bessent

WATCH: Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent Sets the Record Straight on @DOGE

"Elon and I are completely aligned in terms of cutting waste and increasing accountability and transparency for the American people. I believe that this DOGE program … is one of the most important… pic.twitter.com/F3vsrhzuKW

— Chief Nerd (@TheChiefNerd) February 8, 2025

Alina
https://twitter.com/i/status/1888260298617803027

Rubio

Marco Rubio on USAID. pic.twitter.com/dsEpEFFON6

— Defiant L’s (@DefiantLs) February 9, 2025

“They’re doing it at my insistence. It would be a lot easier not to do it, but we have to take some of these things apart to find the corruption.”

• DOGE’s Targets (Burg)

Moving at breakneck speed as President Donald Trump shakes up the executive branch, Musk’s engineers and advisers have accessed information technology (IT) systems in several federal departments. Anonymously sourced reports, not yet independently verified by The Epoch Times, allege DOGE is probing several other agencies, and groups are filing lawsuits to bar Musk’s advisers from accessing those departments’ computer systems. DOGE’s actions, which Musk says are aimed at reducing government spending and waste, have spurred a backlash from some Democratic lawmakers who describe it as a breach of congressional oversight by an unelected “special government employee.” Rep. Dan Goldman (D-N.Y.) cited cybersecurity concerns if DOGE is connecting to federal databases with “their own unvetted commercial servers.”

This week, during a House Oversight Committee on “Reducing Waste in Government,” Rep. James Comer (R-K.Y.) defended Musk’s unprecedented role in the executive branch, saying “real innovation isn’t clean and tidy.” President Donald Trump defended DOGE’s access to federal data systems on Friday, adding that the Pentagon and the Department of Education are next. “We’re going to be looking at tremendous amounts of money … being spent on things that bear no relationship to anything and have no value,” Trump said. “I’m very proud of the job that this group of young people … [are] doing. They’re doing it at my insistence. It would be a lot easier not to do it, but we have to take some of these things apart to find the corruption.”

So far, the DOGE team has accessed IT systems at agencies, including the Treasury Department, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), the Department of Energy, and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), while a coalition of labor unions has sued to block access at the U.S. Department of Labor. Additionally, students in California are suing the Department of Education, alleging that DOGE staffers are accessing confidential student data. The Epoch Times could not independently confirm other agencies—including the U.S. Office of Personnel Management and the U.S. Agency for International Development—where DOGE may have received access to internal systems or databases.The Treasury Department confirmed in a Feb. 4 letter to Congress that DOGE staff had been given “read-only” access to the agency’s nearly $6 trillion federal payments system.

According to the letter, Cloud Software Group CEO Tom Krause will work with the agency as a “special government employee” to review the Bureau of the Fiscal Service for operational efficiency and prevent abuse, fraud, and waste. The work will be done in conjunction with career Treasury officials.On Feb. 5, the Justice Department wrote in a court filing that it would, for now, restrict DOGE’s access to Treasury Department payment systems. DOGE was also granted access to systems and technology at CMS, the agency said on Feb. 5. CMS will be in direct collaboration with DOGE while two senior agency staffers will direct the effort. CMS, which is within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, oversees the Medicare and Medicaid programs. Medicare is a health insurance plan for older and disabled Americans, while Medicaid covers low-income enrollees.

While DOGE has said it wants to cut $2 trillion in government spending, the goal would likely be difficult to reach without reducing spending on health and social assistance programs. Medicare, Medicaid, the Children’s Health Insurance Program, and the Affordable Care Act marketplace health insurance subsidies made up 24 percent of the 2024 federal budget, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. However, Trump told reporters last week that there would be no impacts on Medicare, Medicaid, or Social Security unless his administration finds waste or abuse. “The people won’t be affected,” Trump said, referring to recipients of those benefits.

“How on Earth are we supposed to stop fraud and waste of taxpayer money without looking at how money is spent?”

• Musk Slams Ruling Blocking DOGE From Accessing Treasury Payment Systems (JTN)

Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk slammed an Obama-appointed federal judge for blocking his Department of Government Efficiency from accessing Treasury Department payment systems for at least one week. “This ruling is absolutely insane! How on Earth are we supposed to stop fraud and waste of taxpayer money without looking at how money is spent? That’s literally impossible! Something super shady is going [on] to protect scammers,” Musk wrote Saturday on X.

According to Manhattan-based U.S. District Judge Paul Engelmayer’s order, access to payment records would be limited to “civil servants with a need for access to perform their job duties within the Bureau of Fiscal Services who have passed all background checks and security clearances and taken all information security training called for in federal statutes and Treasury Department regulations.”

The reason the radical Dems don’t want an audit of social security fraud is because they’re the ones getting it … https://t.co/zLDCxNRj6J

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 9, 2025

The Dems went “judge-shopping” and found one willing to block DOGE, and even the Treasury Secretary, from accessing Treasury files.

• Musk Calls For Impeachment Of Judge Who Blocked DOGE Access At Treasury (ZH)

Elon Musk has called for the impeachment of an Obama-appointed judge who barred DOGE and the Treasury Secretary from accessing payment systems at the US Treasury. On Friday night, Democrats went ‘judge shopping’ to ask that Musk’s team be stopped from accessing Treasury systems, knowing that instead of receiving a judge by random selection, the only available judge would be Paul Engelmayer – who held an ex-parte hearing without DOJ lawyers. Engelmayer did not cite any case law or precedent for his ruling, which many have criticized for vast overreach. The order prohibits special government employees, along with those from outside the Treasury department, and the Treasury secretary himself, from accessing the systems. On Saturday, Musk posted to X: “A corrupt judge protecting corruption,” adding “He needs to be impeached NOW.”

A corrupt judge protecting corruption.

He needs to be impeached NOW! https://t.co/zgnwZuOz2Y

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 9, 2025

In an earlier post, Musk wrote “it’s time,” in response to the suggestion that activist judges should be impeached. Engelmayer’s ruling came in response to a lawsuit by 19 Democratic state attorneys general who panicked over DOGE investigating waste, fraud and abuse within the US government. “The Court’s firm assessment is that, for the reasons stated by the States, they will face irreparable harm in the absence of injunctive relief,” wrote Engelmayer in his decision. “That is both because of the risk that the new policy presents of the disclosure of sensitive and confidential information and the heightened risk that the systems in question will be more vulnerable than before to hacking.”

“..Engelmayer’s order came in response to a lawsuit filed on Friday by Letitia James..”

• Trump, Musk, and the Deep State: The Battle Over Transparency Begins (Kimball)

Tasked with the Herculean labor of unscrambling the byzantine Rube Goldberg device that is the 21st-century administrative state for furthering corruption, illegal payments, and partisan influence at home and abroad, DOGE commander Elon Musk and his laptop-and-algorithm-toting lieutenants have been patiently uncovering the pyramid of waste, fraud, and abuse that is the foundation of the United States government in its twenty-first-century incarnation. In a remarkable piece called “Override: Inside The Revolution Rewiring American Power,” a blogger known as EKO showed how it worked. Four young coders arrive at the Treasury Department in the wee hours of January 21. Within hours they have succeeded in tracing long-hidden payment directions. No committees. No approvals. No red tape. Just four coders with unprecedented access and algorithms ready to run.

“The beautiful thing about payment systems,” noted a transition official watching their screens, “is that they don’t lie. You can spin policy all day long, but money leaves a trail.” That trail led to staggering discoveries. Programs marked as independent revealed coordinated funding streams. Grants labeled as humanitarian aid showed curious detours through complex networks. Black budgets once shrouded in secrecy began to unravel under algorithmic scrutiny. The difference between Trump’s first term and his second (acknowledged) term can be explained in two words: velocity and preparedness. In 2017, Trump’s initiatives were hampered, blindsided, litigated, and smothered in red tape. This time the Leviathan’s usual expedients are impotent. “Their traditional defenses—slow-walking decisions, leaking damaging stories, stonewalling requests—proved useless against an opponent moving faster than their systems could react.

By the time they drafted their first memo objecting to this breach, three more systems had already been mapped.” And here’s the point: “Pull this thread,” a senior official warned, watching patterns emerge across DOGE’s screens, “and the whole sweater unravels.” He wasn’t wrong. But he misunderstood something crucial: That was exactly the point. The left gets it. And their heads are exploding. So far, their biggest gun was the creaky cannon Judge Robart wheeled out: the emergency injunction with immediate “nationwide effect.” The New York Times, a house organ for anti-Trump hysteria, has a long hand-wringing column about the latest wheeze. Paul A. Engelmayer, a U.S. District Judge appointed by Barrack Obama, just issued an “emergency order” to restrict Elon Musk’s and DOGE’s access to the Treasury Department’s payment and data system.

He also insisted that anyone who had access to those systems after January 20 “destroy any and all copies of material downloaded from the Treasury Department’s records and systems.” Fun part: even Scott Bessent, the Secretary of the Treasury, is prohibited from looking into the corrupt structures of his own department. Engelmayer’s order came in response to a lawsuit filed on Friday by Letitia James, Attorney General of New York and professional scourge of all things Trump, along with 18 other Democratic state attorneys general. What was the charge? The stated predicate was that by authorizing the investigation, Trump had failed in his Constitutional duty to “faithfully execute the laws enacted by Congress.” The real predicate was that Musk’s beavers were uncovering the inner mechanism of the deep state and the resulting truths were unbearable.

“Humankind,” said T. S. Eliot, in “Burnt Norton,” “cannot bear very much reality.” Similarly, Bureaucrats cannot bear very much transparency. Like vampires, the sunlight is fatal to them. How will Trump respond? We do not know yet. I hope it will be at least partly as Andrew Jackson is said to have responded in his contretemps with Chief Justice John Marshall. In 1834, the Supreme Court determined that the Cherokee Indians owned Northern Georgia. Nevertheless, Andrew Jackson evicted the Indians, reputedly observing that Marshall “has made his decision; now let him enforce it.” Lincoln responded in a similar fashion to Chief Justice Roger Taney in 1861. In April of that year, Lincoln suspended the writ of habeas corpus between Washington, D.C., and Philadelphia. This allowed military commanders to imprison suspected saboteurs without indictment.

Taney said (in “Ex Parte Merryman”) that Lincoln did not have the authority to do this. Lincoln basically ignored him, invoking the novel doctrine of “nonacquiesence.” As usual, Lincoln demonstrated his deep understanding of the issues involved. “Are all the laws but one to go unexecuted,” he asked Taney, “and the Government itself go to pieces lest that one be violated? Even in such a case, would not the official oath be broken if the Government should be overthrown when it was believed that disregarding the single law would tend to preserve it?” In my view, Trump’s actions to expose the partisan corruption of the administrative state are in response to an existential threat is as grave, if less bloody, than the Civil War. The permanent bureaucracy that rules us has for decades been erecting and fortifying a nearly impenetrable edifice from which to preserve its privileges and power, stifle criticism, and export its globalist agenda.

Donald Trump was elected to deconstruct that edifice. Elon Musk is one of his most potent aides in accomplishing that task. Of course, the left is hysterical. Their gravy train is being derailed before their eyes. The people who elected Trump are delighted. I suspect that the squeals and tantrums of the ruling party and its minions will amount to no more than theater. I further suspect that Trump will resort not only to “nonacquiesence” but also to non-payment. In 2022, New York received $383 billion in federal spending. There are many ways in which Trump could stanch the flow of federal dollars to obstreperous states. I think he should consider them all. I am also happy to see some official pushback. Rep. Darrell Issa, for example, just announced that he is “immediately introducing legislation next week to stop these rogue judges and allow Trump and DOGE to tell you where government is spending your money.” Good for him.

One final suggestion. If left-wing regime-party judges can issue emergency restraining orders with “immediate nationwide effect,” why couldn’t a politically mature district judge in, say, Alabama do the same, overturning the order issued by his left-wing colleague on an “immediate, nationwide basis?” I offer the idea free and for nothing.

Want to oppose finding fraud?

• Musk Says DOGE, Treasury Agree on New Anti-Fraud Measures (Ozimek)

Elon Musk said Saturday that the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) and the U.S. Treasury Department have agreed on new anti-fraud measures aimed at preventing tens of billions of dollars in fraudulent government entitlement payments each year. In a Feb. 8 statement shared on social media, Musk described the scale of the problem as “utterly insane,” citing estimates that at least $50 billion annually is being lost due to improper payments, including funds going to individuals without Social Security Numbers or even temporary ID numbers. Musk, who leads DOGE and has been designated a “special government employee” by President Donald Trump, revealed in the post that Treasury officials estimated that $100 billion in annual entitlement payments may be going to individuals without verifiable identification.

In a discussion with Treasury personnel, Musk said he asked for an estimate of how much of that is “obvious and unequivocal” fraud, and the consensus was that at least half—$50 billion per year, or around $1 billion per week—is fraudulent. “This is utterly insane and must be addressed immediately,” Musk wrote, adding that the DOGE team and Treasury have jointly agreed to a series of reforms. One of the most significant changes will be the requirement that all outgoing government payments include a payment categorization code. According to Musk, these codes are essential for financial audits, yet they are frequently left blank, making it nearly impossible to track where taxpayer dollars are going.

Under the new rules, every payment will also need to include a rationale in the comment field. Currently, many government payments lack any explanation, making it difficult to assess their legitimacy, Musk said. While he emphasized that no judgment will be applied to these rationales at this stage, requiring at least some justification for payments is expected to serve as a deterrent against waste and fraud. Another reform involves more effective implementation of Treasury’s Do-Not-Pay list, which is meant to prevent payments to fraudulent entities, deceased individuals, suspected terrorist fronts, and other entities or people who should not be paid by federal agencies. Musk said that this list has not been strictly enforced, with some payments still being made to flagged entities. He also pointed out that it can take up to a year for names to be added to the list, calling for weekly or even daily updates to prevent ongoing fraud.

Musk said that the above “super obvious and necessary” changes will be implemented by existing, long-time career Treasury employees; not anyone from the DOGE. His remarks in this regard align with Treasury Department Scott Bessent’s insistence that DOGE members have read-only access to Treasury data and that they have not been “tinkering” with sensitive payment systems at the department. The development comes as DOGE focuses its cost-cutting and efficiency-enhancing efforts at multiple federal agencies, including Treasury, as part of the Trump administration’s broader aim of reducing deficits and eliminating fraud, waste, and abuse from government.

Republicans have praised DOGE’s efforts to identify government waste, while Democrats have denounced the body’s actions as an abuse of power and its operations as skirting congressional oversight. There have been protests over DOGE by members of Congress, federal employee unions, and privacy advocates, along with a number of lawsuits targeting its activities. Recently, a judge blocked DOGE’s access to the personal financial data of millions of Americans at the Treasury Department. Bessent recently defended DOGE’s actions at Treasury. He said in an interview with Bloomberg that the DOGE team is made up of highly trained professionals and “not some roving band running around doing things,” possibly in reference to claims by critics that DOGE has embraced and is applying the adage “move fast and break things,” which is part of the Silicon Valley start-up culture of being innovative, nimble, and disruptive.

Just one example of many.

• US Treasury Pays $100bn Annually To Unknown Recipients – Musk (RT)

Elon Musk, as head of the new Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), has said that the US Treasury pays over $100 billion annually to individuals without Social Security Numbers (SSNs) or temporary ID numbers. Musk has urged immediate reforms to address potential fraud and inefficiencies in payment systems. The CEO of SpaceX and Tesla and owner of X has been appointed a “special government employee” to lead the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) under US President Donald Trump’s administration and is currently among Trump’s key advisers. Despite its name, the agency is not a permanent federal executive department, but a temporary body dedicated to reducing government spending. The tech billionaire has set a goal of reducing the federal deficit by at least $1 trillion, which would require daily cuts averaging $4 billion.

“Yesterday, I was told that there are currently over $100B/year of entitlements payments to individuals with no SSN or even a temporary ID number. If accurate, this is extremely suspicious,” Musk posted on X. According to Treasury officials, approximately half of these payments, equating to $50 billion per year, or $1 billion per week, could be fraudulent, Musk stated. He described it as “utterly insane and must be addressed immediately.” Musk said that in response, DOGE and the Treasury Department have agreed to implement measures to enhance transparency and accountability in government payments. These include requiring all outgoing payments to have a payment categorization code. Musk pointed out that this field is frequently left blank, making audits challenging. Additionally, all payments must include a rationale in the comment field, which is currently often omitted.

Musk noted that it can currently take up to a year to get on the “Do-Not-Pay” list. The list includes entities known to be fraudulent, deceased individuals, probable fronts for terrorist organizations, and recipients not matching Congressional appropriations. Musk has asked for updates at least weekly, if not daily. He emphasized that these changes are being implemented by existing, long-time career government employees, not by anyone from DOGE. He expressed his astonishment that such obvious and necessary changes were not already in place. Last week DOGE announced that it had managed to save over $1 billion thanks to the elimination of contracts related to diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI). The published index lists 30 federal bodies, stating that 104 contracts with a “ceiling value” of over $1.2 billion were eliminated.

In a post on X on Monday, Musk described DOGE as “the wood chipper for bureaucracy.” Musk’s team has also gained access to the federal payment system, courtesy of US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, to oversee and curb government expenditures. This move has sparked concerns among some officials, who worry about potential conflicts of interest and the impact on sensitive taxpayer information. Lawyers with the US Justice Department have agreed to a proposed order that would temporarily restrict DOGE from accessing sensitive financial data at the Treasury Department.

“‘Independent media’ lmao…”

• Musk Mocks Pro-Western ‘independent’ Media For Losing US Funding (RT)

Elon Musk has derided pro-Western Russian and Ukrainian media outlets over their degree of perceived “independence,” as the publications now find themselves under severe financial strain following US President Donald Trump’s clampdown on the US Agency for International Development (USAID). Shortly after his inauguration, Trump suspended most of US foreign aid pending a three-month review, which primarily affected USAID, Washington’s agency for funding political projects abroad. Trump has called for the agency to be shut down altogether, citing rampant corruption and overall inefficiency. On Sunday, Elon Musk, the head of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) and also a fierce critic of USAID, mocked a Washington Post article entitled “Independent media in Russia, Ukraine lose their funding with USAID freeze.”

“‘Independent media’ lmao,” he wrote on X, employing the acronym meaning “laughing my a** off.” The WaPo report highlighted the dire financial situation many pro-Western media in Ukraine and Russia found themselves in following Trump’s return to the White House. The article noted that the lack of funds affected Ukraine’s small regional outlets and investigative websites. Detector Media, a Ukrainian journalism watchdog, warned last week that “We risk losing the achievements of three decades of work and increasing threats to Ukraine’s statehood, democratic values, and pro-Western orientation.” Natalya Ligachova, head of Detector Media, estimated that “more than 50%” of media outlets are dependent on American assistance, at least to some extent.

Meanwhile, The Moscow Times, an Amsterdam-based English- and Russian-language newspaper, reported, citing sources, that up to 90 Russian organizations operating outside of the country – many of which have been accused of spreading falsehoods about Russia – have lost US funding. Many of them may be forced to cease operations altogether, the report said. The Moscow Times itself has been designated “undesirable” by the Russian government for “discrediting” Russia’s foreign and domestic policies.

Prior to the USAID clampdown, Russian officials repeatedly accused the US of waging an information war, including by using numerous foreign-funded liberal outlets against the country to justify the West’s “hybrid aggression.” Following the escalation of the Ukraine conflict in 2022, Moscow took tough measures to curb the spread of falsehoods about the Russian military, imposing a maximum penalty of 15 years in prison for violations. Russian President Vladimir Putin said last September that despite the conflict in Ukraine, the media are still free to express their opinions, as stipulated by the Constitution. He stressed, however, that both domestic and foreign media are obliged to obey the country’s laws.

“..when Ukraine’s current past-best-by-date leader Vladimir Zelensky actually did face and win an election in 2019, his single concrete – and sensible – promise was to seek peace through negotiations..”

• Trump’s USAID Purge Has Revealed US Scheming In Kiev, But Won’t Stop It (Amar)

First, we now learn that almost the entire Ukrainian media sphere – 90 percent of news organizations – depended on USAID funding. Indeed, Olga Rudenko, editor-in-chief of the Kyiv Independent (the irony…), a staunchly info-warring publication, fears that losing access to the USAID trough “has caused harm to independent Ukrainian journalism on par with the COVID-19 pandemic and the onset of Russia’s full-scale war.” Hear, hear. More generally, a recent article in the Columbia Journalism Review is worrying that losing USAID money will threaten “independent” journalism worldwide. No wonder, as USAID itself has proudly claimed that the US government “is now the largest public donor to independent media development globally.”

But any talk of “independence” here is, just like Rudenko’s complaint, obvious Orwellian-grade propaganda: Journalism that literally depends for its very existence on funding from an organization serving as a front for the foreign interests of the single most powerful and aggressive country in the world may be anything, but it cannot be – by definition – independent. You may, if that’s your thing, politically sympathize with such journalism or argue that you feel it is still, on balance, useful, if you wish, but please cut out the absurdity. In practice, Ukraine is a perfect illustration of how such media dependency-across-borders can easily end in catastrophe: Anyone who knows Ukrainian well enough – as I do – can have a look for themselves.

What they will find is a Potemkin village of pseudo-diversity, at best, with very few and embattled exceptions. In reality, the Ukrainian public sphere has been massively manipulated by a monotonous diet of pseudo-”patriotic” messaging. The single most urgent question concerning Ukraine’s own national interests, however, has been systematically maligned and made taboo: namely, if serving as proxy war cannon fodder for the West has been worth it. The second manner in which USAID has promoted this devastating war was, if anything, even worse, in the sense of more drastic and hands-on: It’s now almost forgotten, but when Ukraine’s current past-best-by-date leader Vladimir Zelensky actually did face and win an election in 2019, his single concrete – and sensible – promise was to seek peace through negotiations.

Clearly, at the time, that promise was a major factor in his unprecedented landslide victory. Once in office, for a very short moment, it seemed as if Zelensky was trying to keep that promise. But then – years before the 2022 escalation – he made a 180-degree turn and emerged as an uncompromising and shortsighted nationalist and a tool of the US – if a very expensive and occasionally capricious one. It is likely that he will soon be discarded, as tools can be. But the damage he has already done to his country is enormous. Many observers have long been puzzled by early Zelensky’s terrible turn. Was it fear of the powerful and aggressive Ukrainian far-right? Was it a misconceived play for even more popularity? Was it money? Was it Western pressure? We still don’t know the whole story, but we do know one important new thing: a wave of “popular” resistance “from below” and by “civil society” against Zelensky’s initial attempts to look for peace was not genuine.

Instead, it had massive Western backing, including from USAID. In particular, the organization was one of the key sponsors of a “joint statement” which presented a concerted threat to Zelensky in 2019, that is, almost immediately after he assumed office. On the surface the product of 70 Ukrainian NGOs, this was, in reality, a massive affront to democracy and the rule of law: Its sole purpose was to unconstitutionally constrain the newly elected president with so-called “red lines” and, in particular, nullify what so many of his voters wanted, namely an honest search for peace. None of this means that Zelensky is innocent. On the contrary, it was his duty and, literally, his job to resist such shameless pressure tactics and their foreign backers and stand up for his voters and the country as a whole. His failure to do so is his and will remain so forever.

Feels like a good idea.

• Designating Cartels as Terrorists Will Have Huge Consequences (Summers)

On Jan. 20, President Donald Trump signed an executive order that started a process by which international organized crime cartels would be designated as “Foreign Terrorist Organizations” or “Specially Designated Global Terrorists.” The designations would give the U.S. government power to go after the cartels’ finances, target those who supply them with weapons, and even carry out military strikes against cartel-owned facilities. With groups such as the Sinaloa cartel, MS-13 from El Salvador, and Venezuela’s Tren de Aragua posing a serious threat to the United States, analysts say these new terrorist designations could have far-reaching consequences. The Trump administration has not gone into detail about how it plans to use the new powers, but on Jan. 31, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said he would not rule out military strikes against the cartels.

On Feb. 3, following Trump’s tariffs threat, Canada announced it would invest $200 million and appoint a czar to investigate the fentanyl trade and would also designate the cartels as terrorist organizations. Ioan Grillo, a Mexico-based journalist and author of several books, including “El Narco, The Bloody Rise of Mexican Drug Cartels,” told The Epoch Times the terrorist designations would provide the U.S. government with more power to go after the cartels’ finances. He said it could also be used to target arms dealers in the United States who provide weapons for them. “You could go after people trafficking firearms to the cartels, you could arrest them for providing material to a foreign terrorist organization,” Grillo said.

Organized crime syndicates such as Tren de Aragua and the Sinaloa cartel will be put in the same basket as al-Qaeda, ISIS, and other groups listed as designated foreign terrorist organizations on the State Department’s website. Francois Cavard, a human rights activist who has spent years investigating the drug trade in Central and South America, told The Epoch Times that changing the legal status of cartels such as Tren de Aragua from “being considered just another criminal organization” to being designated as terrorists was “huge.” Cavard said the gang—whose name translates as the “Train of Aragua” and which began as a group of corrupt workers on a failed railway project, which was funded by a huge loan from China—was heavily involved in human smuggling, drug trafficking, and money laundering.

Greta Nightingale, an attorney and partner at O’Melveny, a firm of Washington-based international lawyers, and chair of its national security group, said that being designated as a “foreign terrorist organization” and a “specially designated global terrorist” were based on different statutes but have essentially the same effect. She told The Epoch Times that the assets of the designee are frozen and that if they come within the control of U.S. persons (such as a U.S. bank) they cannot access them. Nightingale said Americans are also not allowed to engage in any dealings with such designees or engage with third parties if they will benefit the designated party. “If a U.S. company does business with a Mexican company that is tied to one of these cartels, they risk an enforcement action,” she said.

“If the company is owned or controlled by a cartel, then such business is clearly illegal. But if the ties are more attenuated then the legal exposure is less clear.” Nightingale said that “the safest approach is to stay away if you have information that suggests that there are ties between a cartel and a Mexican business, as you invite reputational harm and also may undermine the safety of your employees.” Cavard said the most significant effect of the designation is that cartels and gangs such as Tren de Aragua were no longer considered to just be after illegal financial profit but are considered “to also have power and control purposes … that represents a serious and extremely dangerous threat to the security of the country.”

“..all of this work we’re doing now with getting [illegal aliens] out, finding murderers on the street. … all of this that we’re doing is because of him allowing people to come into our country.”

• Trump Stripping Security Clearances Of Numerous Antagonists (Devine)

President Trump has ordered security clearances stripped from a new hit list of antagonists. Just days after revoking Joe Biden’s access to classified information and secure federal buildings — “because I don’t trust him” — Trump said his new top target is ex-Secretary of State Anthony Blinken, who orchestrated the “Dirty 51” letter from former intelligence officials on the eve of the 2020 election. The infamous missive falsely claimed that Hunter Biden’s laptop, the contents of which The Post revealed, was Russian disinformation. Blinken’s security clearances will be revoked, following the same presidential directive aimed at Biden and the 51 ex-spooks last week, Trump told The Post in an exclusive interview. “Bad guy. Take away his passes,” he said of Blinken. “This is to take away every right they have [revoking security clearances] including they can’t go into [federal] buildings.”

New York Attorney General Letitia James and Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg join the new group of eight Democrat foes Trump plans to punish by revoking any access to classified information and barring their entry to federal facilities. The president said they all will be given “exactly the same” punishment as Biden and the Dirty 51 as part of his administration’s vow to hold government officials accountable for actions he regards as election interference or the mishandling of classified information. Bragg prosecuted Trump last year in the so-called “hush money” case and James brought a civil fraud case against the president for supposedly exaggerating his wealth when applying for bank loans.

The move is regarded as more symbolic than consequential for the New York lawfare duo. But it could hamper them in carrying out their official duties by prohibiting them from entering courthouses, prisons, and law enforcement facilities in Foley Square in lower Manhattan, including the Thurgood Marshall and Daniel Patrick Moynihan courthouses, the Metropolitan Correctional Center, and the Jacob Javits Federal Building which houses the FBI’s New York field office. They also will not be able to set foot in the US Attorney’s offices for the Southern and Eastern Districts of New York, in Manhattan and Brooklyn. “It’s more an insult and a slap in the face than a real deterrent,” said attorney Bob Costello, a former Manhattan federal prosecutor who testified as a defense witness in Trump’s hush-money trial in Manhattan.

The other targets Trump disclosed to The Post include Biden’s former National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan, who also was chief foreign policy adviser to Hillary Clinton during her failed 2016 presidential bid when he notoriously helped foment the Trump-Russia collusion hoax. Also in Trump’s sights are Biden’s Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco, who was involved in overseeing lawfare investigations against Trump and coordinating the DOJ response to the Jan. 6 riot. She also helped orchestrate the Russia hoax while working as an aide to President Obama.

Next in line are anti-Trumpers Andrew Weissman, the lead prosecutor in Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s Russiagate investigation of Trump, who frequently maligns the former president in his role as an MNBC contributor; lawyer Mark Zaid, who represented Eric Ciaramella, the CIA analyst identified as the whistleblower in Trump’s impeachment in 2019 over a phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky; and Norm Eisen, special counsel to the Democrat-led House Judiciary Committee during the impeachment. Former Trump attorney Tim Parlatore says Trump’s action is largely symbolic and hard to enforce, especially on New York officials. But it will have a “major impact” on Zaid’s legal practice “because he fashions himself as a national security lawyer.” “He’s a whacky partisan guy [who] tweeted after Trump was inaugurated that it was time for a coup. He makes his money during Republican [presidencies] by going against the administration.”

Trump last week cut off Biden’s access to the daily intelligence briefings normally afforded former presidents, before stripping his security clearances, telling The Post he doesn’t “trust” his predecessor with such sensitive information. “I don’t trust him. He’s not worthy of trust … To safeguard national security,” He told the Post his administration had no plans to investigate his predecessor, while noting that Biden did not pardon himself when he pardoned his son Hunter and six other family members. “I wouldn’t do it specifically. If something comes up, he’s certainly prime time for investigation. … It’s not good what he did to our country. I mean, all of this work we’re doing now with getting [illegal aliens] out, finding murderers on the street. … all of this that we’re doing is because of him allowing people to come into our country.”

“It is beyond dispute that Defendants wanted Harris to win the Election, and indeed political gain for Harris was certainly Defendants’ intent behind their tampering with the Interview..”

• Trump Doubles CBS Harris Interview Lawsuit Damages to $20 Billion (ET)

President Donald Trump has expanded his lawsuit against CBS, doubling the damages sought to $20 billion and adding CBS parent company Paramount Global as a defendant. The amended complaint, filed on Feb. 7 at the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas, alleges news distortion, election interference, and financial harm caused by CBS’s handling of its “60 Minutes” interview with Democratic presidential candidate Vice President Kamala Harris. “It is beyond dispute that Defendants wanted Harris to win the Election, and indeed political gain for Harris was certainly Defendants’ intent behind their tampering with the Interview,” the amended complaint reads. “But Defendants’ primary motivation was commercial and pecuniary gain.”

Trump’s legal team claims that CBS deceptively edited Harris’s responses to make her appear more articulate and composed, while also diverting viewership from Trump’s media platform, Truth Social, reducing ad revenue. The complaint asserts that CBS intentionally aired different portions of Harris’s remarks on “Face the Nation” and “60 Minutes,” misleading the public about her full statements. “Once Defendants finally released the unedited version of the Interview, it became apparent that they had engaged in gross broadcast distortion cover-up and manipulated not only Harris’s Reply about Prime Minister Netanyahu, but the Interview in its entirety,” the amended complaint reads. CBS has dismissed the claims and maintains its edits were standard journalistic practice.

“We are posting the same transcripts and videos of our interview with Vice President Kamala Harris that we provided to the FCC [Federal Communications Commission],” the network said in a Feb. 5 statement. “They show–consistent with 60 Minutes’ repeated assurances to the public–that the 60 Minutes broadcast was not doctored or deceitful. CBS further stated that a longer portion of Harris’s response aired on Face the Nation while a shorter one aired on 60 Minutes for the sake of brevity. “As the full transcript shows, we edited the interview to ensure that as much of the vice president’s answers to 60 Minutes’ many questions were included in our original broadcast while fairly representing those answers,” the network stated. “60 Minutes’ hard-hitting questions of the vice president speak for themselves.”

The uncut transcript reveals that some of Harris’s answers were cut roughly in half and clarifies her full response to a question about the Israel–Hamas war, which Trump’s campaign claimed was awkwardly phrased and was unfairly edited to improve her image. The transcript also shows that Harris’s complete answer was a combination of the two aired clips. “Well, Bill, the work that we have done has resulted in a number of movements in that region by Israel that were very much prompted by, or a result of many things, including our advocacy for what needs to happen in the region. And we’re not going to stop doing that. We are not going to stop pursuing what is necessary for the United States to be clear about where we stand on the need for this war to end,” Harris said, per the transcript.

Reacting to the transcript’s release, Trump wrote in a post on social media that it shows CBS had removed Harris’s “horrible election changing answers” and replaced them with better ones and that this was election interference and “election fraud at a level never seen before.” He also called for CBS to lose its broadcasting license.

“..he justified that decision by pointing out that the convicted Jan. 6 defendants had already been locked up for years, often in “inhumane” conditions..”

• Freed Jan. 6 Prisoners Speak Out as They Begin to Rebuild Their Lives (Hisle)

Prosecutors acted with “unrelenting integrity,” Attorney General Merrick Garland said, as the Justice Department pursued cases against 1,583 people for events on Jan. 6, 2021—a date etched into the American psyche with unforgettable images of vandalism and violence at the U.S. Capitol. President Donald Trump, who had attracted a massive crowd to Washington that day amid a dispute over his 2020 election loss, decried these cases as “political persecutions.” He tossed out the prosecutions upon his return for a second presidential term on Jan. 20. Saying he was ending “a grave national injustice that has been perpetrated upon the American people over the last four years,” Trump commuted sentences for 14 serious Jan. 6 offenders and issued full pardons to all remaining defendants—1,569 people, based on federal data.

Trump showed mercy even to those convicted of assaulting officers—a controversial move. He previously stated that only peaceful, nonviolent offenders deserved consideration. But he justified that decision by pointing out that the convicted Jan. 6 defendants had already been locked up for years, often in “inhumane” conditions. They were targeted for political reasons and were punished more harshly than many people who committed worse offenses, including killings, he said. A half-dozen of the former Jan. 6 prisoners told The Epoch Times their side. The publication also reviewed Justice Department statements about each interviewee and dozens of other resources for this story. The interviewees, ranging from a 25-year-old entrepreneur to a 55-year-old former New York police officer, say much information has been suppressed and distorted.

They, like many Americans, continue to question why security in and around the Capitol was clearly insufficient on Jan. 6. They also suspect a government setup—and a coverup. Although officials have rejected such claims, a government watchdog’s recent report reignited questions over the actions of “confidential human sources.” Twenty-six of these informants were present on Jan. 6, the Inspector General’s report said. Four of the informants entered the Capitol; 13 others entered restricted areas on the grounds—without FBI permission. The FBI didn’t authorize the informants to encourage violence, either.

But the report left it unclear whether informants obeyed that order. The interviewed Jan. 6 defendants say many Americans still incorrectly believe that police officers were killed in the melee; 140 officers were hurt, none fatally, despite initial reports. It’s unclear how many civilians were injured, but Trump supporters were the only people who died that day. Police fatally shot Ashli Babbitt, 35, and beat Roseanne Boyland, 34, who was knocked unconscious in a stampede; her cause of death remains in dispute. Investigators cleared officers of wrongdoing in both cases.

“All branches of the US military are facing some of the worst recruiting shortfalls in their history.”

• ‘Diversity Is Our Strength’ Dumbest Phrase In Military History – Hegseth (RT)

US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth spoke out on Friday against diversity initiatives in the armed forces, blasting the phrase “diversity is our strength” as the “dumbest” in military history. Addressing Pentagon staff, he said his leadership would focus on unity and fairness while eliminating diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs. “In this department, we will treat everyone equally,” Hegseth told the audience in the Pentagon auditorium. “We will treat everyone with fairness. We will treat everyone with respect, and we will judge you as an individual by your merit and by your commitment to the team and the mission.” Hegseth, a former Fox News host and US National Guard veteran, has moved to end DEI, arguing such programs are divisive. He has also halted identity month celebrations, such as Black History Month and Women’s History Month.

In his speech, he said such efforts “put one group ahead of another” and “erode camaraderie and threaten mission execution.” Hegseth also talked about global security, saying recent events had damaged perceptions of American strength. He pointed to the chaotic US withdrawal from Afghanistan, the Ukraine conflict, and the October 7 Hamas attack on Israel as signs of instability. “Chaos happens when the perception of American strength is not complete,” he maintained. “And so we aim to reestablish that deterrence.” He pledged accountability for the Afghanistan withdrawal in 2021 when the US-backed government in Kabul collapsed faster than expected.

The withdrawal from Afghanistan, planned by President Donald Trump in his first term, followed a 20-year military campaign that cost billions of dollars and killed tens of thousands. Former President Joe Biden was roundly criticized for his handling of the pull out, in which 13 American service members were killed, and for leaving thousands of allied Afghans behind. “We are going to look back at what happened in Afghanistan and hold people accountable,” he said. “Not for retribution, but to understand what went wrong and why there was no accountability for it.” President Trump has pushed back on DEI within the federal government since assuming office on January 20. After being sworn in, he signed a series of orders rolling back protections for transgender individuals and terminating DEI initiatives.

Trump banned transgender people from serving in the US military in 2017. Biden repealed the ban shortly after taking office in 2021, only to have Trump reverse that in his second term. The Pentagon repealed its “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy in 2011, allowing gay and lesbian troops to serve openly. Gender dysphoria, the clinical diagnosis for many transgender people, was still considered cause for involuntary discharge until 2016. All branches of the US military are facing some of the worst recruiting shortfalls in their history. Republican lawmakers have blamed the problem on the Pentagon’s prioritization of diversity over military readiness. A 2021 report commissioned by Republicans on the Senate Armed Services Committee found that the US Navy was focusing more on “wokeness” and diversity than winning wars.

“Paris is officially supporting some kind of incredible and insane force of neo-Nazism, which has flourished in Ukraine,” Zakharova said..” “Moreover, the neo-Nazism in Ukraine has already turned into terrorism, it has mutated.”

• Paris Backs Neo-Nazism in Ukraine – Moscow (RT)

The French authorities have unquestionably supported the rise of neo-Nazism in Ukraine, Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova has said. She emphasized that the Kiev regime has turned into an international terrorist cell with the connivance of its Western backers. Moscow has repeatedly accused the current Ukrainian government of embracing Nazi ideology, and listed the denazification of the country as one of the key objectives of its military operation, along with demilitarization and enforcing neutrality. “Paris is officially supporting some kind of incredible and insane force of neo-Nazism, which has flourished in Ukraine,” Zakharova said in an interview with RIA Novosti published on Sunday. “Moreover, the neo-Nazism in Ukraine has already turned into terrorism, it has mutated.”

The spokeswoman mentioned a series of atrocities allegedly conducted by Ukrainian soldiers in the village of Russkoye Porechnoye in the Russian region of Kursk, which are currently being probed by the country’s Investigative Committee, in the latest instance of what she branded “a fusion of Nazism and fascism with new technological capabilities and a terrorist nature.” Earlier this year, Russian investigators reported multiple incidents related to the village, located 10km north of Sudzha, which had been occupied by the Ukrainian army since last August. The officials charged that Ukrainian soldiers raped, tortured, and murdered local residents. Some of the allegations have been confirmed by Ukrainian soldiers captured during the liberation of the settlement.

“All these [war crimes] are being backed by Paris via supplies of weapons and money, via lending political support, via encouraging [Kiev], and of course via saying no word of condemnation,” Zakharova maintained. The spokeswoman concluded that officials in Paris prefer not to notice that killings of civilians and journalists “through the use of the weapons supplied to Ukraine by Western backers, including France, do not match with the ethics supported by the French authorities on the international scene.”

Earlier this week, French Defense Minister Sebastien Lecornu announced that the Ukrainian military had received the first batch of fourth generation Mirage 2000-5 aircraft that French President Emmanuel Macron promised to supply last year. Lecornu added that the jets would be operated by Ukrainian pilots who have undergone training in France. Commenting on the move, Russian lawmaker Leonid Ivlev said that the transfer of the fighter jets would inevitably lead to the involvement of France in a military conflict with Russia. Meanwhile, a representative of Russian defense conglomerate Rostec said the jets would be swiftly destroyed if Kiev uses them near the front line.

“..an energy crisis that’s heavily contributed to voters across the bloc turning against establishment parties..”

• The EU’s Worst Enemies Are Its Own Russophobic Leaders (Marsden)

It’s a big day for the EU, says the bloc’s top diplomat, Kaja Kallas. All because three former Soviet states – Latvia, Lithuania, and her home country, Estonia, where she previously served as prime minister – have just swapped out their historically reliable Russian electricity entirely for a system regulated by the folks in Brussels, whose recent energy security strategies have included imploring citizens to dress in sweaters, like turtles, and to consider group showers. “Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia will permanently disconnect from Russia’s power grid tomorrow,” Kallas wrote on social media on February 7th. ”Russia can no longer use energy as a tool of blackmail. This is a victory for freedom and European unity.”

Yeah, Western Europeans are united, alright. On the fact that the EU has triggered an energy crisis that’s heavily contributed to voters across the bloc turning against establishment parties in recent national elections. The skyrocketing cost of living, largely attributed to a lack of affordable energy, was even cited by the EU’s own Eurobarometer report last year as a motivating factor for 42% of Europeans in last summer’s EU parliamentary elections. Those elections saw the arrival in Brussels of “more MEPs on the far-right benches than before,” Le Monde wrote, characterizing the rise of anti-establishment populism, notably on the right.

While loudly shunning cheap Russian energy, the EU has nonetheless been importing record levels of it, in the form of LNG, at several times the price. Russian oil being shipped to the EU has surged by putting on a fake mustache and arriving on European shores from Türkiye, India, and China, with Foreign Policy magazine underscoring just last month that Europe “somehow still depends on Russian energy.” The end result is essentially a virtue tax that gets passed on to the consumer. All this to impress the EU’s girlfriend, Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky, whose country was raking in about a billion dollars a year just for him kicking his feet up and watching Russian gas flow across Ukraine to the EU. Easiest job in the world, right? With the added bonus of pocketing cash from Russia that it can’t spend on the battlefield, according to typical EU logic. But Ukraine and the EU colluded to even put an end to that, creating an even bigger financial sinkhole for themselves to fill. Brilliant.

The EU has also become heavily dependent on the US – now to the benefit of President Donald Trump’s agenda. Which hopefully Brussels loves, because it has already set itself up to finance it as a result of its overdependence on the US as a means of sticking it to Putin. Trump has made it clear that he views the EU’s lack of sufficient dependence on the US as some form of abuse – of the US. “I told the European Union that they must make up their tremendous deficit with the United States by the large scale purchase of our oil and gas. Otherwise, it is TARIFFS all the way,” Trump wrote last December on social media. What a mess. How did it all go so wrong?

RFK

Pain is the touchstone of growth. Struggle shapes character.

Through adversity, Bobby Kennedy has emerged as a leader who understands suffering, redemption, and the fight for something greater than himself. pic.twitter.com/G0QXQrwnAk

— MAHA Alliance (@MAHAalliance) February 8, 2025

Pachamamba
https://twitter.com/i/status/1888315624755253330

Levitation