Sep 042023
 


Claude Monet Japanese Footbridge 1899

 

A Comprehensive Ukrainian Defeat Is The Only Possible Outcome (Scott Ritter)
US Intelligence Sending Mixed Messages On Ukraine (Larry Johnson)
About 280,000 Individuals Enlisted By Contract From January 1 – Medvedev (TASS)
Hungary Calls For ‘Security Guarantees’ For Russia (RT)
G20: Last Waltz In A World Torn Apart (Bhadrakumar)
Ex-UK Defense Chief Sparked Rift With US Over Helicopter Deal (RT)
NATO May Collapse By 2025 – Academic (RT)
No Respite For France As A ‘New Africa’ Rises (Pepe Escobar)
US Dollar A ‘Very Problematic’ Currency – Zakharova (RT)
Gold’s Role Rises As Dollar Hegemony Falls (ZH)
Soros Vows to Stop ‘MAGA-Style Republicans’ From Winning 2024 Election (Sp.)
US Congress is Older Than Ever, But Reform is Unlikely (Sp.)
Biden Asserts Executive Privilege on Hunter Emails, But Waived Trump’s (GP)
Fani Willis Possesses Evidence Exonerating Georgia’s Alternate Electors (Fed.)
Ivermectin Is a Proven Cure for Covid (Paul Craig Roberts)

 

 

 

 

RFK BlackRock

 

 

 

 

Fauci masks

 

 

 

 

Macgregor

 

 

 

 

“Having articulated the Russian-Ukrainian conflict as an existential struggle where the very survival of NATO is on the line..”

Russians see an existential threat to their country.

In response, NATO pretends to see an existential threat to their power structure.

Not the same thing.

A Comprehensive Ukrainian Defeat Is The Only Possible Outcome (Scott Ritter)

First and foremost, Ukraine must reflect honestly about the causes of this conflict, and which side bears the burden of responsibility for the fighting. ‘Denazification’ is a term that the Russian government has used in describing one of its stated goals and objectives. President Vladimir Putin has made numerous references to the odious legacy of Stepan Bandera, the notorious mass murderer and associate of Nazi Germany who is feted by modern-day Ukrainian nationalists as a hero and all but a founding father of their nation. That present-day Ukraine would see fit to elevate a man such as Bandera to such a level speaks volumes about the rotten foundation of Kiev’s cause, and the dearth of moral fiber in the nation today.

The role played by the modern-day adherents of the Nazi collaborator’s hateful nationalist ideology in promulgating the key events that led to the initiation of the military operation by Russia can neither be ignored nor minimized. It was the Banderists, with their long relationship with the CIA and other foreign intelligence services hostile to Moscow, who used violence to oust the former president of Ukraine, Viktor Yanukovich, from office in February 2014. From the act of illicit politicized violence came the mainstreaming of the forces of ethnic and cultural genocide, manifested in the form of the present-day Banderists, who initiated acts of violence and oppression in eastern Ukraine. This, in turn, triggered the Russian response in Crimea and the actions of the citizens of Donbass, who organized to resist the rampage of the Bandera-affiliated Ukrainian nationalists.

Mariupol

The Minsk Accords, and the subsequent betrayal by Kiev and its Western partners of the potential path for peace that these represented, followed. Ukraine cannot disassociate itself from the role played by the modern-day Banderists in shaping the present reality. In this, Kiev mirrors the militarists of Imperial Japan, whose blind allegiance to the precepts of Bushido, the traditional ‘way of the warrior’ dating back to the Samurai of 17th century Japan, helped push the country into global conflict. Part of Japan’s obligations upon surrender was to purge its society of the influence of the militarists, and to enact a constitution that deplatformed them by making wars of aggression – and the military forces needed to wage them – unconstitutional.

Banderism, in all its manifestations, must be eradicated from Ukrainian society in the same manner that Bushido-inspired militarism was removed from Japan, to include the creation of a new constitution that enshrines this purge as law. Any failure to do so only allows the cancer of Banderism to survive, festering inside the defeated body of post-conflict Ukraine until some future time when it can metastasize once again to bring harm. This is precisely the message that was being sent by Putin when, during the Saint Petersburg International Economic Forum this past July, he showed a video where the crimes of the Banderists during the Second World War were put on public display. “How can you not fight it?” Putin said. “And if this is not neo-Nazism in its current manifestation, then what is it?” he asked. “We have every right,” the Russian president declared, “to believe that the task of the denazification of Ukraine set by us is one of the key ones.”

As the Western establishment media begins to come to grips with the scope and scale of Ukraine’s eventual military defeat (and, by extension, the reality of a decisive Russian military victory), their political overseers in the US, NATO, and the European Union struggle to define what the endgame will be. Having articulated the Russian-Ukrainian conflict as an existential struggle where the very survival of NATO is on the line, these Western politicians now have the task of shaping public perception in a manner that mitigates any meaningful, sustained political blowback from constituents who have been deceived into tolerating the transfer of billions of dollars from their respective national treasuries, and billions more dollars’ worth of weapons from their respective arsenals, into a lost and disgraced cause.

Read more …

“Putin and his team are seen in the West as weak, control freaks who block the military from taking off the white gloves and making the magic happen..”

US Intelligence Sending Mixed Messages On Ukraine (Larry Johnson)

The U.S. Intelligence Community is not a monolith. It is more like a feudal society. The big three Feudal lords for intelligence analysis are the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), the National Security Agency (NSA) and the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA). All three produce “raw intelligence” — the CIA’s case officers produce reports from foreigners who have agreed to work in secret for the United States, the NSA scoops up all forms of electronic intelligence (e.g., phone calls, emails) and the DIA produces reports from U.S. Defense Attaches assigned to U.S. embassies around the world. Each jealously guards its own product and the employees of these three agencies can be considered the vassals. (Gots to have a vassal if you’re a feudal lord.)

Then there is the Director of National Intelligence (aka DNI). This position/office was created in the aftermath of 9-11 and is supposed to “manage” and “coordinate” all members of the Intelligence Community. The standard solution in Washington, DC is to create another layer of bureaucracy to solve a failure of already behemoth bureaucracies who rarely cooperate. The reality is something else — the Big 3 do not always kow tow to the DNI. I am hearing that the CIA and the DIA are doing a pretty good job of reporting honestly what is taking place on the ground in Ukraine — i.e., Ukraine is suffering terrible casualties and the counter offensive is failing. Unfortunately, as Sy Hersh has reported previously, Biden and his National Security team are ignoring those intelligence reports and are embracing “analysis” coming out of the Office of the DNI.

The DNI reportedly is proffering the meme that Ukraine is grinding down the Russian military and that the United States and NATO only need to be patient and wait for Russia’s inevitable collapse. Some of the U.S. military leaders — who are flat out ignorant of Russia’s recent history in dealing with a domestic radical Islamic insurgency — firmly believe that Russia cannot win a military victory over Ukraine, that the war is a stalemate and the Russia will be bogged down for years battling Bandera insurgents. The leaders of the USIC and the military still believe in their initial conclusion that Russia is weak because it did not steamroll through Ukraine and rout Zelensky off 12 months ago. They attribute Russia’s “failure” to inept and corrupt bureaucrats keen on reining in the Russian military.

Putin also gets a heavy share of the blame by these leaders for allegedly not listening to the Russian military leaders and Wagner chiefs to do what is necessary to achieve victory. Putin and his team are seen in the West as weak, control freaks who block the military from taking off the white gloves and making the magic happen. Because the US intelligence and military leaders are looking at the war in Ukraine through this prism, the analysts and their managers, for the most part, face enormous pressure to conclude that Russia is a feckless and incompetent near-peer adversary and cannot last.

I continue to believe that the assumptions about Russia’s alleged failure is ignoring the contravening narrative:
• The Russian economy is robust and healthy despite Western sanctions.
• Russia’s political influence in the world is growing, not shrinking. BRICS is a case in point.
• Russia is inflicting enormous casualties on Ukraine’s military and decimating infrastructure critical to the Ukrainian military campaign.
• Russia’s defense industry has ramped up to levels of production that the West cannot match.
• Russia’s seemingly unlimited access to natural resources, energy and rare earth minerals strengthens Russia’s military position in the world.
• Russia enjoys a massive technological advantage over NATO in terms of electronic warfare, air defense systems, mine laying vehicles and hypersonic missiles.
• Russian leaders and their people genuinely believe they face an existential threat from the West.
• Ukraine is totally dependent on the West to provide money and weapons to continue to fight.

Read more …

No forced conscription.

About 280,000 Individuals Enlisted By Contract From January 1 – Medvedev (TASS)

Around 280,000 individuals were enlisted by contract with the Russian Armed Forces from January 1, 2023, Deputy Head of the Russian Security Council Dmitry Medvedev said. “Let us continue discussing the critical topic that gathered us here this time in the Far Eastern District. This time I meet heads of regions of the [Russian] Federation in person, in view of significant of the staffing work,” Medvedev said when opening the meeting. “According to data of the Defense Ministry, about 280,000 persons were enlisted by contracts to ranks of the [Russian] Armed Forces since January 1,” he noted. Some of them were in the reserve and the other ones are volunteers, Medvedev added.

Read more …

“..Russia does not pose a threat to Central Europe” because Moscow has not been able to accomplish a quick and resounding victory in the conflict..”

Hungary Calls For ‘Security Guarantees’ For Russia (RT)

A lasting peace following the Ukraine conflict can only be achieved if Russia receives security guarantees from the West, Gergely Gulyas, the minister in charge of the Hungarian prime minister’s office, has said. Speaking at a students’ event on Saturday, Gulyas stated that Kiev has no realistic chance of regaining the territories it claims as its own from Russia. He added that “it is also clear that Russia does not pose a threat to Central Europe” because Moscow has not been able to accomplish a quick and resounding victory in the conflict. According to Gulyas, peace talks between Russia and Ukraine are impossible without the involvement of the US.

He further stated that Kiev’s Western backers “must give security guarantees to Russia, but definitely not NATO membership to the Ukrainians,” adding that in the long run, peace between Moscow and Kiev could be maintained through the deployment of peacekeepers. Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban told former Fox News host Tucker Carlson last month that “without involving the Russians in a security architecture of Europe, we cannot provide a safe life for its citizens.” Hungary is not the only Western nation to call for Russian interests to be taken into account. Last December, French President Emmanuel Macron urged the West to think about how to provide security guarantees not only to Ukraine, but also to Russia, arguing that NATO must address Moscow’s concerns about the US-led military bloc “coming right up to its doors and deploying weapons that could threaten Russia.”

The debate over security guarantees for Russia heated up before the start of the Ukraine conflict when in December 2021, Moscow presented a list of demands to the US and NATO, asking the West to impose a ban on Ukraine entering the military bloc, while insisting that the alliance should retreat to its borders as of 1997 before it expanded. The overture, however, was rebuffed by the West. President Vladimir Putin has repeatedly said that Ukrainian neutrality is an issue of “fundamental importance” to Russia, arguing that Kiev’s push to join NATO was one of the key reasons behind the military operation in the neighboring country.

Read more …

“I am in blood / Stepped in so far, that, should I wade no more, / Returning were as tedious as go o’er.”

G20: Last Waltz In A World Torn Apart (Bhadrakumar)

The Modi government is not perplexed by the absence of Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping in the G20 Summit on September 9-10. Its intuitive cognition helps to be stoical. This is, arguably, a Shakespearean predicament — “I am in blood / Stepped in so far, that, should I wade no more, / Returning were as tedious as go o’er.” [..] One doesn’t have to be a rocket scientist to figure out that the common thread in the decisions taken in Moscow and Beijing is that their leaderships are not in the least interested in any interaction with the US President Joe Biden who will be camping in Delhi for four days with all the time at his disposal for some structured meetings, at the very least, some “pull asides” and the like at a minimum that could be caught on camera.

Biden’s considerations are political: anything that helps to distract attention from the gathering storm in US politics which is threatening to culminate in his impeachment that might in turn blight his candidacy in the 2024 election. Of course, this is not Biden’s Lyndon Johnson moment. Johnson made the tumultuous decision in March 1968 to retire from politics as a strong step toward healing the nation’s fissures, while agonising deeply that “There is division in the American house now.” But Biden is anything but a visionary. He was setting up a bear trap for Putin to reinforce his false narrative that if only the latter dismounted from his high horse, the Ukraine war would end overnight, whereas on its part, the Kremlin is well aware that the White House continues to be the strongest proponent of the thesis that a prolonged war would weaken Russia.

Indeed, Biden has gone to extraordinary extents that none of this predecessors ever dared to reach — aiding and abetting Ukrainian terrorist attacks deep inside Russia. In a way, Xi Jinping also faces a trap, as Biden administration is going to great extent to project itself as conciliatory toward China, as the beeline of US officials heading for Beijing recently would testify — Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken in June; Treasury Secretary and Climate Envoy John Kerry in July; and Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo in August. The New York Times on Tuesday carried a report titled U.S. Officials Are Streaming to China. Will Beijing Return the Favor? It chastised Beijing:

“China has much to gain from dispatching officials to the United States. It would signal to the world it was making an effort to ease tensions with Washington, particularly at a time when China needs to bolster confidence in its shaky economy. A visit could also help lay the groundwork for a potential, highly anticipated meeting between President Biden and China’s top leader, Xi Jinping, at a forum in San Francisco in November. “Beijing, however, has been noncommittal.”

Read more …

… and lost his job.

Ex-UK Defense Chief Sparked Rift With US Over Helicopter Deal (RT)

Former UK Defense Secretary Ben Wallace tried to derail a major deal to buy heavy military helicopters from the US, triggering a diplomatic row between the two long-time allies, The Times reported on Saturday, citing sources. The incident is said to have occurred after Washington reportedly shunned Wallace’s bid to become the next NATO secretary general, although the outlet’s sources insisted that the two issues were not related. According to the paper, Wallace, who resigned on Thursday, spent his last weeks in office trying to cancel the purchase of 14 Boeing Chinook H-47 two-motor lift helicopters. The former defense secretary reportedly had serious doubts about the £2.3 billion ($2.9 billion) deal and suggested canceling it to ease the pressure on the defense budget.

Wallace argued that Britain already has the largest heavy-lift fleet in Europe and favored investment in medium-lift support helicopters, which would have allowed London to save money, the article said. Another concern, according to the report, was that Britain lacked the communications, satellite technology, and transport means to carry out special operations involving US-designed aircraft. However, the initiative left many UK officials unhappy, with one describing it as “mad.” Another Times source suggested that Wallace “was trying to piss off the Americans.” As the diplomatic row was reportedly brewing, Karen Pierce, the UK ambassador to the US, is said to have warned London that canceling the deal would be a bad idea. UK officials reportedly scrambled to calm down their America counterparts, telling them that the tensions would be defused once Wallace was out of the government.

“There has been a lot of reconciliation, just to keep the US reassured,” a source told the paper. The apparent controversy comes after US President Joe Biden refused to endorse Wallace’s candidacy to succeed long-serving NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg. According to a Daily Telegraph report in July, Wallace, who was once considered a front-runner for the job, failed to secure Washington’s backing because the UK announced a coalition to help Ukraine procure F-16 fighter jets without first consulting the US. A Times source categorically rejected the “pathetic” speculation that Wallace’s apparent attempts to cancel the helicopter deal were linked to his NATO ambitions. However, one source said that he was “deeply disappointed” that his aspirations to succeed Stoltenberg had come to nothing, which he is said to have blamed on the White House.

Read more …

Funny, Tucker Carlson predicted the demise of NATO just a few days ago…

NATO May Collapse By 2025 – Academic (RT)

The return of Donald Trump to the White House could spell the end for US military aid to Ukraine, leaving a divided Europe to foot Kiev’s bills and ultimately ending the NATO pact, academic Phillips Payson O’Brien claimed in The Atlantic on Saturday. Opposition to arming Ukraine is now the position of Trump’s supporter base, who O’Brien estimated account for three quarters of the Republican Party’s electorate. Trump has repeatedly vowed to use military aid as leverage to force Ukraine into peace talks with Russia “within 24 hours” of his inauguration, while his two nearest competitors for the GOP’s nomination – Ron DeSantis and Vivek Ramaswamy – have also discussed restricting support for Kiev.

Of the three potential candidates, Ramaswamy has gone the furthest, suggesting that the US recognize Russia’s territorial claims in Ukraine in exchange for Moscow distancing itself from Beijing. “If Trump or one of his imitators wins the presidency in November 2024, Europe could find itself faced with a new American administration that will halt all support for Ukraine,” O’Brien warned. In this scenario, he continued, European nations would be unable to make up for the loss of US military aid, resulting in a military defeat for Ukraine. With the US out of the picture, Europe would be divided on the issue too, he added, with the Eastern and Baltic nations eager but unable to keep the arms flowing to Kiev, and Western nations like France and Germany more likely to seek peace with Russia.

“The result could be a legacy of bitterness and distrust at best, and a permanent fracturing of European cooperation at worst,” he stated. A fervent supporter of Ukraine, O’Brien argued that European countries need to increase military production immediately to prepare for this possibility. However, with the Eurozone entering recession in the first three months of 2023 and industrial production down in Germany, European states are unlikely to be able to sustain the Ukrainian military on their own.

O’Brien’s predictions are based on the assumption that Ukraine will still be able to fight by 2025. According to Russian figures, Kiev lost 43,000 men in the first two months of its ongoing counteroffensive, without managing to penetrate the multiple layers of trenches and fortifications laid by Russia along the entire Kherson-Donetsk front line. Before the operation began in early June, multiple Western media reports suggested that continued US and NATO military aid to Kiev depended on the success of the offensive. Now, almost three months in, the counteroffensive is widely regarded as a failure.

Read more …

“..Over 30 percent of the population lives on less than $1 a day, and in over 60 percent of regions have zero access to healthcare and drinking water.”

No Respite For France As A ‘New Africa’ Rises (Pepe Escobar)

Africa still lags far behind its Eurasian cousins on the road toward breaking the shackles of neocolonialism. The continent today faces horrendous odds in its fight against the deeply entrenched financial and political institutions of colonization, especially when it comes to smashing French monetary hegemony in the form of the Franc CFA – or the Communauté Financière Africaine (African Financial Community). Still, one domino is falling after another – Chad, Guinea, Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger and now Gabon. This process has already turned Burkina Faso’s President Captain Ibrahim Traoré, into a new hero of the multipolar world – as a dazed and confused collective west can’t even begin to comprehend the blowback represented by its 8 coups in West and Central Africa in less than 3 years.

Military officers decided to take power in Gabon after hyper pro-France President Ali Bongo won a dodgy election that “lacked credibility.” Institutions were dissolved. Borders with Cameroon, Equatorial Guinea, and the Republic of Congo were closed. All security deals with France were annulled. No one knows what will happen with the French military base. All that was as popular as it comes: soldiers took to the streets of the capital Libreville in joyful singing, cheered on by onlookers. Bongo and his father, who preceded him, have ruled Gabon since 1967. He was educated at a French private school and graduated from the Sorbonne. Gabon is a small nation of 2.4 million with a small army of 5,000 personnel that could fit into Donald Trump’s penthouse. Over 30 percent of the population lives on less than $1 a day, and in over 60 percent of regions have zero access to healthcare and drinking water.

The military qualified Bongo’s 14-year rule as leading to a “deterioration in social cohesion” that was plunging the country “into chaos.” On cue, French mining company Eramet suspended its operations after the coup. That’s a near monopoly. Gabon is all about lavish mineral wealth – in gold, diamonds, manganese, uranium, niobium, iron ore, not to mention oil, natural gas, and hydropower. In OPEC-member Gabon, virtually the whole economy revolves around mining. The case of Niger is even more complex. France exploits uranium and high-purity petrol as well as other types of mineral wealth. And the Americans are on site, operating three bases in Niger with up to 4,000 military personnel. The key strategic node in their ‘Empire of Bases’ is the drone facility in Agadez, known as Niger Air Base 201, the second-largest in Africa after Djibouti.

French and American interests clash, though, when it comes to the saga over the Trans-Sahara gas pipeline. After Washington broke the umbilical steel cord between Russia and Europe by bombing the Nord Streams, the EU, and especially Germany, badly needed an alternative. Algerian gas supply can barely cover southern Europe. American gas is horribly expensive. The ideal solution for Europeans would be Nigerian gas crossing the Sahara and then the deep Mediterranean.

Read more …

“..the US initially proposed the dollar as an international currency “to make everyone’s life better, easier, more comfortable.”

US Dollar A ‘Very Problematic’ Currency – Zakharova (RT)

Ever more countries are turning to national currencies for trade rather than use the US dollar, which has become a “very problematic” means of payment, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova stated in an interview with the Turkish news outlet Aydinlik published on Sunday. According to Zakharova, the US initially proposed the dollar as an international currency “to make everyone’s life better, easier, more comfortable.” “They were very insistent on this, saying that it would bring the world economy to a new level and simplify our transactions and relationships… And at the time, those who made such a policy in the US and abroad… probably wanted to take that first step towards globalization honestly.” Now, according to Zakharova, the dollar is used to pressure Washington’s political opponents.

“What we faced last year is something completely different,” she stated, referring to the numerous Western sanctions placed on Russia over the Ukraine conflict, including an effective ban on Russia using the dollar in international transactions. “There is no simplifying or making our lives easier. The currency is being used as a tool of hegemony and a new kind of colonialism, used to punish, segregate, and make our lives a nightmare.” According to Zakharova, the process of de-dollarization, which Russia and a growing number of other countries have been pursuing in cross-border trade, is not a goal in and of itself but a simple fact of reality.

“They say de-dollarization is a kind of ultimate goal of different organizations or some countries. But it is not. This is not our target. This is just a reality… The dollar is a very problematic currency these days. This is not my political view, it is an objective economic fact.” Zakharova noted that most global economic problems originate in the US, including the 2008 global economic crisis. National currencies, on the other hand, are more stable, which is why an increasing number of countries are opting for them, she believes. They want to establish and create a kind of a guarantee, a financial guarantee system in order not to once again be a victim of an American crisis… It is up to the countries to decide [how to do it], but as I understand it, more and more countries want to do something to avoid becoming another victim of the American financial system,” the official said.

Russia has been reducing the use of the dollar in foreign trade since 2014, but last year’s sanctions forced the country to step up these efforts. For instance, the share of national and ‘friendly’ currencies in the country’s trade with the Eurasian Economic Union grew to nearly 80% in 2022, and is expected to reach 90% by the end of this year. Last week, reports emerged that the BRICS group of emerging economies – which presently comprises Russia, Brazil, India, China, and South Africa, but is due to add six new members next year – is also considering switching all cross-border trade to national currencies.

Read more …

“.. this increasingly beleaguered, self-destructive, debased and less popular US currency.”

Gold’s Role Rises As Dollar Hegemony Falls (ZH)

Rickards noted, “It’s the weaponization of the dollar… you’re not just stealing our money with inflation, you’re actually telling us we can’t get it back,” emphasizing that while the BRICS countries might not fully trust each other, they are more likely to trust a “common trading currency backed by gold.” Rule described the U.S. dollar’s previous “exorbitant privilege” advantage is coming to an end, thereby making things more expensive for Americans. “The enemy of the U.S. dollar isn’t in Beijing or Moscow or Riyadh, it’s in Washington.” For Piepenburg, the end-game is clear. Debt drives policy and debt drives current market directions. This debt will not and cannot be sustained by GDP growth or tax revenues,… …which means ultimately money printers will continue to de-value that world reserve currency,… …and hence devalue the once hegemonic respect for the US holder of that currency.

Piepenburg states, “America doesn’t seem to be the America that it was in 1944 or the America that it was under Kissinger in the early 70s,” indicating a significant shift in global economic dynamics. While all experts seemed to agree that gold could play an increasingly important role, Piepenburg was skeptical that national leaders and central bankers would willingly give up their power to print money at will, dubbing this the “Nietzsche thesis,” questioning why leaders would want to “relinquish that ability to print at will.” Overall, the panel agreed that the weaponization and debasement of the dollar have diminished its credibility, setting the stage for other forms of currency or assets like gold to gain importance in protecting investors from this increasingly beleaguered, self-destructive, debased and less popular US currency.

Read more …

At your age, you’re supposed to be planting trees whose shade you’ll never sit in.

Soros Vows to Stop ‘MAGA-Style Republicans’ From Winning 2024 Election (Sp.)

The Soros family has waged a years-long political war against Donald Trump and his supporters, with George Soros calling Trump a “danger to the world” and characterizing his ideas as a “threat to democracy.” Trump has alleged that “district attorneys hand-picked and personally funded by” Soros are behind the ongoing effort to put him behind bars. Last month, George Soros’ Open Society Foundations soft power empire announced a dramatic scaling back of funding for operations in Europe, sparking an outcry from liberal activists, NGOs, and think tanks regarding the impact the end of the financial gravy train will have on their operations.

Alexander Soros, the 37-year-old son of the Hungarian-born US billionaire who took the reins at the OSF in June, responded with a manifesto-style appeal this week explaining the shift in focus under his leadership, assuring that the OSF isn’t really “leaving Europe,” and that the region “remains of huge strategic importance.” Rather, Soros indicated, the shift in funding is the result of a shift in focus, from Western to Eastern Europe and the United States. “The future of accountable, democratic government in Europe is now being determined not just in Paris and Berlin but also in Warsaw, Kiev and Prague,” he wrote. “This isn’t about funding levels – it’s about priorities as the focus of funding shifts back to the continent’s east,” Soros Jr. noted, recalling that, after all, his father’s soft power meddling in nations’ political affairs began in Eastern Europe in the 1980s.

Spending in Ukraine won’t be affected by the cuts, Soros assured, recalling with “pride” the $250 million in cash funneled into the country since the 2014 Euromaidan coup, and which played “such an important role in Kiev’s resilience” amid the ongoing NATO-backed proxy war against Russia. The OSF will also continue to “support” operations in Moldova and the Western Balkans, per Soros, and Central European University – the Vienna-based school booted out of Budapest in 2019 amid allegations of meddling in Hungary’s politics. The reorganization will also include a redoubling of Soros foundations’ efforts against Donald Trump and MAGA-style Republicans, Soros indicated, expressing concerns over the impact Trump’s possible return to power in 2024 would have on the OSF’s global agenda.

“As someone who spends up to half their time working on the continent and thinks former United States President Donald Trump – or at least someone with his isolationist and anti-European policies –will be the Republican nominee, I believe a MAGA-style Republican victory in next year’s US presidential election could, in the end, be worse for the EU than for the US. Such an outcome will imperil European unity and undermine the progress achieved on many fronts in response to the war in Ukraine,” Soros opined. Accordingly, he noted, the OSF is being “adapted” to “be able to respond to whatever scenarios might emerge, on both sides of the Atlantic.”

Read more …

Same here: plant trees your grandchildren will enjoy.

US Congress is Older Than Ever, But Reform is Unlikely (Sp.)

McConnell is not the only prominent member of US legislature whose health became a point of discussion. Last year, media reported US lawmakers questioning the mental fitness of long-time US senator Dianne Feinstein, who has served as a member of the US Senate since 1992, representing California. In 2023, Feinstein, now aged 90, announced that she will not run for reelection in 2024. This illustrates a trend of US political class becoming older compared with the past, with the 80-year-old incumbent president, Joe Biden, being the most prominent example as the oldest sitting US leader. His predecessor and likely opponent during the 2024 election, Donald Trump, is not that far behind, being 77 years old. According to the FiveThirtyEight polling website, both House and Senate are older than ever before, with the median age for US representatives and senators being 57.8 and 65.3, respectively.

Similar to Feinstein and McConnell, many of those people have been in Congress for decades. “The US Congress and the Presidency constitute a gerontocracy, and I see no chance that such graybeards will reform themselves on that score anytime soon,” John Seery, the George Irving Thompson memorial professor of government and professor of politics at Pomona College, summarized the situation. This development has triggered a conversation about whether it is appropriate for a senior lawmaker to stay in power well into their old age, especially since there is no mechanism to remove them similar to the Constitution’s 25th Amendment, which outlines the procedures for replacing the president or vice president in the event of death, removal, resignation, or incapacitation.

While the both chambers of Congress can expel members with a two-third majority, only 20 lawmakers have been removed this way since 1789, with a majority of those cases involving support for Confederacy during the Civil War.
There have been proposals to introduce age limits for elected officials, which is also not that out of the ordinary, considering there are already minimum age requirements for holding political office. “Now that Americans are living longer, and the consequences of having octogenarians running the country (specifically President Biden and Senator McConnell) are apparent, a conversation around age limits in needed. Public opinion polling has shown that a majority of Americans are in favor of this.

It could also be a consideration for the Supreme Court, as it tends to have the same issues around older justices becoming unwell in post and potentially leaving the bench short of a member,” Clodagh Harrington, a lecturer in US politics at University College Cork, said. When asked whether a version of the 25th Amendment for members of Congress could be passed, the expert noted that even that addition to the constitution has been controversial. “The few times in the modern era that it has been considered in relation to, for example, President [Ronald] Reagan, have caused significant unease. No-one wants to be the person informing the president that they are no longer considered fit for office,” she explained.

Read more …

You cannot have two different justice systems for long.

Biden Asserts Executive Privilege on Hunter Emails, But Waived Trump’s (GP)

On Wednesday, America First Legal (AFL) revealed they obtained “over 1,000 emails between Rosemont Seneca and the Office of the Vice (OVP) President” from the National Archives (NARA) via a lawsuit. AFL started the thread on X by saying “The sheer volume of emails exchanged between Hunter and his associates at Rosemont Seneca and the Office of the Vice President is telling in itself.” Joe Biden asserted executive privilege over 200 emails because “release would disclose confidential advice between the President and his advisors, or between such advisors.” Meanwhile, President Trump’s executive privilege was obliterated by Joe Biden. The Biden White House worked directly with the Justice Department and National Archives to facilitate the investigation into Trump’s handling of documents, according to memos reviewed by investigative reporter John Solomon.

Joe Biden’s spokeswoman has repeatedly claimed Joe Biden had no knowledge of the raid and that he found out about it in the media. According to the memos, the Biden White House instigated the criminal investigation by eliminating Trump’s claims to executive privilege. Joe Biden paved the way for his Justice Department to arrest his political opponent after he retroactively revoked Trump’s executive privilege. Biden revoking Trump’s executive privilege opened the door for the former president to be subpoenaed – the subpoena then opened the door for the Justice Department to charge Trump with federal crimes. “By May, [White House Deputy Counsel Jonathan] Su conveyed to the Archives that President Joe Biden would not object to waiving his predecessor’s claims to executive claims, a decision that opened the door for DOJ to get a grand jury to issue a subpoena compelling Trump to turn over any remaining materials he possessed from his presidency.” – John Solomon reported last August.

On May 10, 2022, Acting National Archivist Debra Steidel Wall sent Trump’s lawyers a letter revealing the Biden White House’s involvement. According to John Solomon, within two weeks of Debra Steidel Wall’s letter to Trump’s lawyers, the DOJ sent a grand jury subpoena to Trump’s counsel demanding he return documents stored at Mar-a-Lago. Shortly after Trump was subpoenaed, the feds showed up to Mar-a-Lago and retrieved some documents and told the former president to put an extra lock on the storage locker. Two months later the FBI descended on Mar-a-Lago and rummaged through Trump’s belongings without allowing any of his lawyers in the area.

By November 2022, shortly after the Mar-a-Lago raid, Jack Smith was appointed special counsel to investigate the documents stored at Trump’s Florida residence. By June 2023 Trump was indicted on 37 counts related to Jack Smith’s classified documents case – 31 counts for willful retention and the other 6 counts included conspiracy to obstruct justice, withholding a document or record, corruptly concealing a document or record, concealing a document in a federal investigation, scheme to conceal, false statements and representations. Meanwhile, Joe Biden hasn’t even been interviewed yet by the special counsel investigating his stolen SCIF-designated documents and he was able to assert executive privilege over 200 emails related to his son Hunter.

Read more …

I don’t see Fani last for much longer. What a mess.

Fani Willis Possesses Evidence Exonerating Georgia’s Alternate Electors (Fed.)

Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis possesses evidence that exonerates several Republicans she’s targeting in her legal crusade against former President Donald Trump and other Republicans for their lawful contesting of Georgia’s flawed 2020 election. In her Aug. 14 indictment, Willis alleged the existence of Republican electors for Trump constituted an unlawful “conspiracy” to overturn the Peach State’s 2020 election results. Among those charged for partaking in this so-called “conspiracy” are David Shafer, one of Georgia’s 2020 Republican electors, and Ray Smith, who served as one of Trump’s lawyers at the time of the contest. Specifically, Willis claimed Shafer and the other alternate electors “unlawfully falsely held themselves out” as Georgia’s “duly elected and qualified” presidential electors.

She further insisted these electors — with Smith’s assistance — intentionally attempted to “mislead” figures such as then-Vice President Mike Pence and Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensberger “into believing that they actually were such officers.” However, among the documents Willis obtained during her years-long investigation of Republicans was a meeting transcript refuting her allegations. A transcript of the Georgia Republican electors’ Dec. 14, 2020, meeting, obtained by The Federalist, explicitly shows the intent behind casting alternate electors was not to impersonate public officers, as Willis alleged, but to lawfully preserve Trump’s legal challenge to the state’s election results. At the meeting’s outset, Shafer specifically noted how he and his fellow Republicans were acting as “Republican nominees for Presidential Elector,” not as “duly elected and qualified” presidential electors.

“[President Trump] has filed a contest to the certified returns. That contest — is pending [and has] not been decided or even heard by any judge with the authority to hear it,” Shafer said. “And so in order to preserve his rights, it’s important that the Republican nominees for Presidential Elector meet here today and cast their votes.” For context, Shafer and Trump filed a lawsuit against Secretary of State Raffensberger in Fulton County state court on Dec. 4, 2020, alleging tens of thousands of illegal votes had been cast in the state’s presidential election. The suit came after a recount, requested by Trump, deemed Biden the winner of Georgia’s 16 electoral votes by a margin of 11,779. The recount prompted Raffensberger to recertify the election on Dec. 7 while Trump’s legal challenge remained ongoing.

By the time Dec. 14, 2020, arrived — the day on which nominees for presidential electors are required by federal law to meet — Trump and Shafer’s lawsuit was still pending. As such, Georgia’s Republican nominees, including Shafer, cast their electoral votes for Trump while the state’s Democrat nominees cast theirs for Biden. During the Dec. 14, 2020, meeting, Shafer further clarified the legal rationale for filing alternate electors in a conversation with Smith, asking Trump’s then-lawyer: “And so the only way for us to have any judge consider the merits of our complaint, the thousands of people we allege voted unlawfully, is for us to have this meeting and permit the contest to continue?” “That’s correct,” Smith replied.

Read more …

Coming from a Reagan economist.

Ivermectin Is a Proven Cure for Covid (Paul Craig Roberts)

The Covid years taught me that relatively few doctors are competent, capable of independent thinking, and have the interest to find approved medicines, such as Ivermectin, that are effective against new pathogens. Those doctors saved patients lives to the great distress of the Medical Establishment, and the doctors who saved their patients’ lives are still being punished for doing so. In September 2021, the corrupt American Medical Association told doctors to stop prescribing Ivermectin for COVID-19. In a statement, AMA, along with the American Pharmacists Association (APhA) and American Society of Health-System Pharmacists (ASHP), warned:

“We are alarmed by reports that outpatient prescribing for and dispensing of ivermectin have increased 24-fold since before the pandemic and increased exponentially over the past few months. As such, we are calling for an immediate end to the prescribing, dispensing, and use of ivermectin for the prevention and treatment of COVID-19 outside of a clinical trial.” “In addition, we are urging physicians, pharmacists, and other prescribers — trusted health care professionals in their communities — to warn patients against the use of ivermectin outside of FDA-approved indications and guidance, whether intended for use in humans or animals, as well as purchasing ivermectin from online stores.”

Dr. Joseph Mercola asks. “How many died unnecessarily as a result of these commands?” Mercola’s question is a good one. Those who died from Covid died because of a lack of treatment. For an untested vaccine to be put into use under “emergency use authorization” there must be no cures. Therefore the Medical Establishment, which serves as a marketing agent for Big Pharma, had to deny that there were any cures and to prevent doctors from curing patients with Ivermectin and HCQ before the knowledge of the cure spread. Otherwise the agendas served by the Death Shot would be blocked.

Now that the Medical Establishment has a new Covid variant with which to scare people and an updated dangerous vax, there is talk of a new round of vax, mask, and lockdown mandates. These measures are very dangerous and totally unnecessary. But they maximize profit and control, and that is their purpose. My advice is that if you have a doctor who warns you away from Ivermectin, you have a dumbshit or corrupt doctor who is very dangerous to your life and health. Quickly find another one who has the interest to know the facts and the determination to put his patients ahead of Big Pharma’s profits. And certainly do not trust any corporate hospital.

Read more …

 

 

 

 

Lambs and birds

 

 

 

 

 

 

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

 

 

 

 

 

Apr 072022
 


Edward Hopper The Sheridan Theatre 1937

 

US Is Using Intel To Fight An Info War With Russia (NBC)
Video Appears To Show Ukrainian Soldiers Executing Russian Soldiers – NY Times (BI)
UK Delays Tariffs On Russian Whitefish (Pol.eu)
America’s Largest Farm Cooperative Warns Sanctions May Spark Fertilizer Shortages (ZH)
US Warns India Faces Significant Long-Term Costs If It Aligns With Russia (ZH)
Whistleblower To Release 450 GB Of Deleted Files From Hunter’s Laptop (DM)
Psaki Says Joe Biden And His Son Hunter ‘Were Not Office Mates’ (Fox)
President Macron Says He is “Opposed to Self-Defense” (SN)
‘Pushed to the Brink of Collapse’: Chaos Behind Shanghai Lockdown Measures (ET)
WHO Will Assume Total Control Of Future Pandemics (Kirsch)
‘Mandatory Vaccination’ For All Germans Over 60 Expected To Pass (ZH)
The Teen Girls Aren’t Going to Forget (Suzy Weiss)

 

 

 

 

 

 

Scott Ritter was banned from Twitter yesterday, and then reinstated.

Ukraine War Could Have Been Avoided, but Here’s Why Putin Will Achieve His Goals

 

 

US intel is very sophisticated and very credible.

US Is Using Intel To Fight An Info War With Russia (NBC)

It was an attention-grabbing assertion that made headlines around the world: U.S. officials said they had indications suggesting Russia might be preparing to use chemical agents in Ukraine. President Joe Biden later said it publicly. But three U.S. officials told NBC News this week there is no evidence Russia has brought any chemical weapons near Ukraine. They said the U.S. released the information to deter Russia from using the banned munitions. It’s one of a string of examples of the Biden administration’s breaking with recent precedent by deploying declassified intelligence as part of an information war against Russia. The administration has done so even when the intelligence wasn’t rock solid, officials said, to keep Russian President Vladimir Putin off balance.

Coordinated by the White House National Security Council, the unprecedented intelligence releases have been so frequent and voluminous, officials said, that intelligence agencies had to devote more staff members to work on the declassification process, scrubbing the information so it wouldn’t betray sources and methods. Observers of all stripes have called it a bold and so far successful strategy — although not one without risks. “It’s the most amazing display of intelligence as an instrument of state power that I have seen or that I’ve heard of since the Cuban Missile Crisis,” said Tim Weiner, the author of a 2006 history of the CIA and 2020’s “The Folly and the Glory,” a look at the U.S.-Russia rivalry over decades. “It has certainly blunted and defused the disinformation weaponry of the Kremlin.”

Four days before the end of the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962, the U.S. publicized spy plane photos to show the Soviet Union had deployed nuclear missiles not far from Florida’s coast. The Biden administration began releasing reams of intelligence about what it said were Putin’s plans and intentions even before the invasion of Ukraine began. Just this week, national security adviser Jake Sullivan stood at the White House podium and read out what officials said was more declassified intelligence, asserting that Russia’s pullout from areas around Kyiv wasn’t a retreat but a strategic redeployment that signals a significant assault on eastern and southern Ukraine, one that U.S. officials believe could be a protracted and bloody fight. The idea is to pre-empt and disrupt the Kremlin’s tactics, complicate its military campaign, “undermine Moscow’s propaganda and prevent Russia from defining how the war is perceived in the world,” said a Western government official familiar with the strategy.

Multiple U.S. officials acknowledged that the U.S. has used information as a weapon even when confidence in the accuracy of the information wasn’t high. Sometimes it has used low-confidence intelligence for deterrent effect, as with chemical agents, and other times, as an official put it, the U.S. is just “trying to get inside Putin’s head.” Some officials believe, however, that trying to get into Putin’s head is a meaningless exercise, because he will do what he wants regardless. After this story was published, a U.S. official told NBC News that “the U.S. government’s effort to strategically downgrade intelligence to share with allies and the public is underpinned by a rigorous review process by the National Security Council and the Intelligence Community to validate the quality of the information and protect sources and methods.” The official added that “we only approve the release of intelligence if we are confident those two requirements are met.”

US intel

Read more …

”Ukraine’s Defense Ministry said it was “precise work” by Ukrainian troops.”

Video Appears To Show Ukrainian Soldiers Executing Russian Soldiers – NY Times (BI)

Video posted on Telegram Monday appears to show Ukrainian soldiers killing captured Russian troops in a village near Kyiv, according to a report from The New York Times. The video was verified by The Times, however, the outlet decided not to publish it due to its graphic nature. Per The Times it shows a Ukrainian soldier shooting a Russian soldier three times while another man says “he’s still alive. Film these marauders. Look, he’s still alive. He’s gasping.” The video, The Times reported, also shows at least three other Russian soldiers dead near the victim — identified by white armbands commonly worn by Russian troops. One of the soldiers has an obvious head wound and his hands are tied behind his back, according to the report from The Times.

The soldiers are surrounded by equipment and are laying on the road near a BMD-2 — an infantry vehicle used by Russia’s airborne units, according to military scholar Rob Lee. In the video, which was not independently verified by Insider, Ukrainian soldiers are identifiable by their blue armbands and repeat “glory to Ukraine” but their unit is unclear. A Ukrainian news agency said the ambush was the work of the “Georgian Legion” a group of Georgian volunteers that formed in 2014 to fight for Ukraine, according to The Times report.

The video was filmed north of the village of Dmytrivka, about seven miles southwest of Bucha, according to the Times report. Earlier this week, graphic videos emerged of at least 300 civilians killed in Bucha during Russia’s occupation of the city. Ukrainian officials say they were attacked as Russian troops were retreating. Ukrainian forces ambushed Russian troops around March 30, according to the Times report. In a tweet, Ukraine’s Defense Ministry said it was “precise work” by Ukrainian troops.

Read more …

What the sanctions are really worth.

UK Delays Tariffs On Russian Whitefish (Pol.eu)

Plans to impose sanctions on Russian whitefish have been postponed by the U.K. government amid fears over the impact on Britain’s seafood industry. Whitefish was among the Russian exports set to be slapped with a 35 percent tariff by the U.K. in response to Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine. A U.K. government official said the sanctions have been “delayed while we sort some technicalities,” but stressed that “we are totally committed to them.” Any suggestion the plans had been dropped entirely was “totally untrue,” the official added. Roughly 30 percent of the U.K.’s whitefish originates from Russia, which controls between 40 to 45 percent of the global supply, according to industry body Seafish.


When the measure was first announced, Britain’s seafood processing industry and struggling fish and chip shops, which rely on the supply of Russian whitefish including cod, said they feared price rises as a result of the sanctions could squeeze their businesses. Andrew Crook, president of the National Federation of Fish Friers, said: “I think government wants more time to investigate the impact of sanctions on whitefish so have just held off for the time being. “We of course support any measures they deem suitable to bring the conflict to a speedier conclusion.” The whitefish sanctions were announced on March 15. However, unlike other Russian products targeted including cereal, cement and fertilizer, the tariffs were not imposed on whitefish when they came into force on March 24, according to Seafish, a public body that supports the U.K.’s seafood industry.

Read more …

It’s already done. Planting season is now.

America’s Largest Farm Cooperative Warns Sanctions May Spark Fertilizer Shortages (ZH)

America’s largest farmer cooperative sounded the alarm Wednesday about possible disruptions of fertilizer supplies from Russia due to Western sanctions on Moscow. CHS Inc., the largest agricultural cooperative in the US, said in an SEC filing that it’s concerned about obtaining Russian fertilizer because of sanctions making it “more expensive and difficult to do business with Russia.” CHS warned that sanctions could “cause delays with respect to, or prevent, shipments of fertilizer to us, cause inflationary pressures on and impact our ability to purchase fertilizer, disrupt the execution of banking transactions with certain Russian financial institutions and result in volatility in foreign exchange rates and interest rates, all of which could have a material adverse effect on our business and operations.”

The cooperative said it holds no operations in Russia. However, it has $30 million in grain inventories sitting in silos in Ukraine and will have to take an “impairment charge” because of its inability to access those stockpiles. CHS warns there’s a risk the conflict in Ukraine “could lead to a much larger conflict and/or additional sanctions imposed by the United States government and other governments that restrict business with specific persons, organizations or countries or with respect to certain products or services.” And said if such an event did occur, it would wreck more global supply chains and “could materially adversely affect our business operations and financial performance.” For some context, Russia is one of the world’s largest fertilizer exports. Countries already afflicted by food insecurity, such as emerging market economies, will experience some of the first fertilizer and food shortages first. By the way, violent inflation protests are already beginning in Peru.

Famine
https://twitter.com/i/status/1511921482275999754

Read more …

The US is blind to its loss of power. Russia, India, the UAE, Brazil and Indonesia, China, that’s way more people than the US can strong-arm in 2022.

US Warns India Faces Significant Long-Term Costs If It Aligns With Russia (ZH)

Given that a handful of countries that rank among the top largest economies in the world have thus far been reluctant to firmly condemn Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, this could prove the significant monkey wrench in US-EU plans to severely isolate and wreak havoc on global Russian exports. Among these include the obvious – China, but also there’s India, the UAE, Brazil and Indonesia. India for example – standing just behind the UK as the 6th largest economy – remains the the single largest buyer of Russian weapons. India is also reportedly seeking more discounted Russian oil, in what looks to be a potential move away from Saudi crude. In early March, The New York Times noted that India was among those countries dependent on many Russian imports that’s attempting to “stay above the fray”.

“When India abstained from a United Nations vote and the chorus of Western condemnation against the Ukraine invasion, it appeared to be taking sides: offering tacit support for President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia,” the Times emphasized previously. And now Washington is putting New Delhi on notice that it faces ‘significant costs’ should it become aligned with Russia, and as a major export destination allowing Putin to side-step sanctions effects. The Biden administraiton’s Director of the National Economic Council of the United States Brian Deese has said the US remains “disappointed” with aspects of the Indian government’s reaction to the Ukraine crisis. “There are certainly areas where we have been disappointed by both China and India’s decisions, in the context of the invasion,” he said a Wednesday event in D.C.

He was cited as saying in Bloomberg: The US has told India that the consequences of a “more explicit strategic alignment” with Moscow would be “significant and long-term,” he said. India has so far rejected falling in line with the West’s anti-Russia sanctions, instead continuing to import Russian oil, which remains at an estimated 2% of its total oil imports.

Read more …

‘Very dear friends of mine, the sharp tip of the spear, were making welfare calls to me every day, basically to see if I was still alive.’

Whistleblower To Release 450 GB Of Deleted Files From Hunter’s Laptop (DM)

The source who distributed Hunter Biden’s laptop to congressmen and media has fled the US to Switzerland, saying he fears retaliation from the Biden administration. Jack Maxey gave DailyMail.com a copy of the hard drive from Hunter’s abandoned laptop in the spring of 2021. He also gave copies and material from it to the Washington Post, New York Times, and Senator Chuck Grassley in his role as ranking Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee – but he claims they all sat on it for months. For the past two weeks, Maxey has been in hiding in Zurich, working with IT experts to dig out more data from the ‘laptop from hell’. Maxey, a former co-host of ex-Donald Trump advisor Steve Bannon’s podcast the War Room, claims he and his colleagues have found ‘450 gigabytes of deleted material’ including 80,000 images and videos and more than 120,000 archived emails.

He said he intends to post them all online in a searchable database in the coming weeks. Hunter abandoned his laptop at a Delaware computer store in 2019. The owner, John Mac Isaac, gave a copy to Trump’s lawyer Rudy Giuliani, who passed it on to Maxey. ‘I came here so that we could do a forensic examination of Hunter’s laptop safely in a country that still respects human liberty and the ideals of liberal democratic principles,’ he told DailyMail.com. ‘I do not believe this would have been possible inside the United States. We had numerous attempts on us from trying to do things like this there.’ Maxey said that after contacting DailyMail.com about the laptop last year, black suburban SUVs appeared outside his house, and former US intelligence officer friends he shared copies with told him they received strange calls.

‘I showed this to a friend of mine in desperation in February [2021] because nobody would listen to me. No news organizations would take it. In fact, the very first major news organization to take it was the Daily Mail,’ he said. ‘Very dear friends of mine, the sharp tip of the spear, were making welfare calls to me every day, basically to see if I was still alive.’

Darryl Cooper

Read more …

She’s openly calling Hunter a liar now. Shouldn’t Joe stand up for “the smartest man I know”?

And also:

“In the email, Hunter Biden also requests keys for Gongwen Dong, whom he describes as an “emissary” for Ye Jianming — the chairman of CEFC Chinese Energy Co.”

Psaki Says Joe Biden And His Son Hunter ‘Were Not Office Mates’ (Fox)

White House press secretary Jen Psaki denied on Wednesday previous reports that claimed Hunter Biden and his father, President Biden, were “office mates.” Asked by Fox News White House correspondent Peter Doocy about “evidence that the president, at one point, was office mates with Hunter and his brother Jim here in D.C.,” Psaki said the reports were “not accurate.” Hunter Biden requested in 2017 that keys be made for his new “office mates,” listing his father, Jill Biden, and his uncle Jim Biden, for space he planned to share with an “emissary” for a chairman of a Chinese energy company, according to an email obtained by Fox News.


A Sept. 20, 2017 email obtained by Fox News shows Hunter requesting keys for Joe and Jill Biden, along with Jim Biden, for space he planned to share with an “emissary” for a chairman of a Chinese energy company. The email was sent to the general manager, Cecilia Browning, at the House of Sweden — a building in Washington, D.C., that contains multiple office suites and a number of embassies. “Please have keys made available for new office mates: Joe Biden, Jill Biden, Jim Biden,” said the email, with the subject “507.” In the email, Hunter Biden also requests keys for Gongwen Dong, whom he describes as an “emissary” for Ye Jianming — the chairman of CEFC Chinese Energy Co.

Read more …

“..because otherwise the country becomes the Wild West..”

Actually, that is what it is without self-defense…

Idiot.

President Macron Says He is “Opposed to Self-Defense” (SN)

After a farmer was charged with murder for shooting a man after four burglars broke into his home, French President Emmanuel Macron said people should not have the right to self-defense. Yes, really. “According to the initial investigation, the farmer fired twice with a large caliber rifle at a group of four burglars, killing one of them. The self-defense shooting took place last Friday, between 10 p.m. and 11 p.m., and the man was alone with his 3-year-old daughter at the time,” reports Remix News. However, Macron responded to the story by asserting that the 35-year-old farmer had no right to defend himself or his daughter in such a manner. “Everyone must be safe, and the public authorities have to ensure it,” Macron told Europe 1.


“But I am opposed to self-defense. It’s very clear and undisputable because otherwise the country becomes the Wild West. And I don’t want a country where weapons proliferate and where we consider that it’s up to the citizens to defend themselves,” said Macron. Presumably, the farmer should have just allowed the four burglars to ransack his home and potentially harm his young daughter without doing anything to intervene. Macron insisted that the farmer should have called the police, who in many areas of France are already stretched to the limit thanks to criminal gangs of migrants youths being in a perpetual state of war with them. “I’m not going to judge this news. I convey the rules,” said Macron, whose weak record on security and crime is under scrutiny.

Read more …

“Let me reiterate, do not bother checking your health cloud, it’s all a negative result. Only we will notify you when you have tested positive.” The caller responded, “So what we see is all fake?” She said, “That’s right.”

‘Pushed to the Brink of Collapse’: Chaos Behind Shanghai Lockdown Measures (ET)

While Shanghai continues its lockdown and massive PCR testing campaign as COVID-19 surges through the city, a CDC expert’s complaint about chaotic PCR test reports that have confused people was recently exposed online. Shanghai CDC issued a notice demanding staff answer public inquiries “in line with the policy.” There have been complaints about the conflicting PCR test results on Chinese social media because people receive a negative test result on their cell phones but then receive a positive test result from the CDC. Shanghai adopted the Healthcare Cloud app as its integrated Internet and Healthcare services platform. Locals register through the app for a PCR test and receive the test result on their cell phones.

However, many people received a negative test notice via the app but still were then notified by CDC that they had tested positive and were thus subject to quarantine. Complaints have flooded the Shanghai CDC hotline. A recently leaked recording of a CDC expert responding to a caller revealed how the app has been problematic, how overloaded health workers have been stymied by a lack of transparency in pandemic prevention, and how the pandemic has become a political issue. In the recording, the expert said, “We have received hundreds of calls every day, but our jobs are epidemiological investigations. We can’t solve your problem.” She said, “Let me tell you the facts: There’s no ward, the quarantine sites are filled, and there’s no ambulance.”

A male was heard complaining, “But we have no way to address our issue, even Weibo is blocked.” The expert said, “I have brought this up too many times; as an expert, I have suggested that the mild to no symptom patients stay at home. Does anyone listen? No!” She continued, “Let me reiterate, do not bother checking your health cloud, it’s all a negative result. Only we will notify you when you have tested positive.” The caller responded, “So what we see is all fake?” She said, “That’s right.”

Read more …

No, they won’t. Wanna bet?

WHO Will Assume Total Control Of Future Pandemics (Kirsch)

Thanks to Mike Yeadon for alerting me to this. Here’s Mike’s message to me (excerpt): “Steve, I’ve heard about this from half a dozen sources & I’m sorry to say that the concerns expressed are wholly justified. It’s a mad idea, but since certain individuals & nations have pretty much taken over the WHO, I think it’s a certainty that, if this new treaty gets signed, within a few years at most, a “public health emergency of International concern” will be declared, and all currently sovereign nations will become controlled subsidiaries of WHO. … No government should even have the power to throw their country over to a third party. If that happened, they’d never give it back. U.K. parliament signed up to emergency powers on the occasion of the first lockdown over two years ago. That temporary bill has never been repealed. We have no rights whatsoever if they decide we don’t. This is the main reason we emigrated.

Here’s the best practical reason not to sign such a treaty, aside from its anti-democratic central problem: Imagine there’s a new pathogen spreading across the world. Nobody, anywhere, knows what the best response should be. By definition it’s not known. History teaches us that we alight most rapidly upon probable best courses of action, not from modeling, but from empirical evidence. Running a large number of experiments, based on the smartest public health, medical & scientific brains, will quickly tell us what kinds of responses are helpful & which are not. Maintaining very good communication makes sure lessons learned are shared quickly. The worst conceivable response would be to place the decision making power in the hands of a single body. They’ll likely run one experiment. We’ll never learn the counterfactual. On this basis, I don’t even understand why anyone would fall for the idiotic notion that letting WHO have the controls would be a great idea. Even if they were honest & competent.

Please let me know if I can help in any way.

Best wishes

Mike

Read more …

Mandatory adverse effects.

‘Mandatory Vaccination’ For All Germans Over 60 Expected To Pass (ZH)

The COVID pandemic has largely subsided in Europe (although health authorities have warned about an uptick in cases caused by subvariants and hybrid variants of the omicron strain). But this hasn’t stopped German lawmakers from pushing for a new law that would legally require people age 60 and older to be vaccinated. But that’s not all. The deal struck by members of Germany’s ruling “stop sign” coalition, which includes Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s Social Democratic Party, the Greens and the ‘classical liberal’ Free Democrats, also includes an option for making COVID shots mandatory for everybody age 18 and older. That second provision will depend on how the next wave of the pandemic develops during the fall, according to Bloomberg, which cited a local report.


According to other provisions in the proposed law, the government would initially try to “encourage” the unvaccinated to voluntary submit to inoculation (Germany still has millions of unvaccinated citizens, not unlike the US). Fortunately, even if the proposal becomes a law (it’s due for a vote on Thursday), it will also include provisions that would reverse the situation if enough people receive their COVID shots voluntarily before the summer. Lawmakers told Bloomberg that the goal of the proposal is “effective prevention.” “We are united by the goal of effective prevention through the highest possible level of basic immunity for all adults for the fall, because in this way we can prevent the health system from being overwhelmed,” they added. Germany is still recording more than 200,000 cases and more than 300 deaths from the virus on most days. But with more than 75% of its population vaccinated, the pressure on the country’s health-care system has significantly lessened since the depths of the pandemic.

UK jab effectiveness

Read more …

“it’s like a sci-fi show where people went to sleep and woke up two years later, and the world has moved on but they haven’t.”

The Teen Girls Aren’t Going to Forget (Suzy Weiss)

Lily May Holland, 16, remembers the long, lonely days during lockdown when her parents, both doctors, were at work. She’d watch “Gilmore Girls” and “Gossip Girl” and “Grey’s Anatomy” over and over. She stopped eating and started doing Chloe Ting workouts. “I’d have gum and a smoothie all day,” she said. They lived in the sticks north of Charlottesville, Virginia, on a dirt road between farms and trailer parks and the occasional Baptist church, and she didn’t have a license, so she couldn’t go anywhere or meet any friends. Teachers would post assignments online, but it was like—who cared? Everything happened in isolation, like they were atoms. “I would’ve gone to parties, and me and my friends were planning to go to concerts, and homecoming,” Lily said. “I had crushes freshman year. But all that fell away.”

Teenagers need a social life. Every single study and report and piece of data tells us so. But we don’t need studies to tell us what we all already know. Ask yourself: What would it have been like if you had spent your thirteenth year in solitude? It was more than a year, actually. Millions of American kids had gone a year-and-a-half mostly alone. And every single girl I spoke to said the same thing about the experience: They felt like they were sinking, or being swallowed up. So it almost seemed like an understatement when, in December 2021, the Surgeon General, Dr. Vivek Murthy, said the effect of the lockdowns had been “devastating” for young people’s mental health. “Usually, kids would be learning to disobey their parents and stay out late and figure out the consequences, but there was just none of that,” said Regine Galanti, a clinical psychologist in New York who specializes in adolescents with anxiety disorders.

The impact of all that emptiness—the zig-zagging from one hazy, blue-ish screen to another and then to another—was starting to come into focus, and it was scary. Lily said that, at some point mid-lockdown, she got sick of communicating with other human beings via iPhone. So then she stopped communicating at all. Galanti said, “It’s almost like a volcano that we set ourselves up for.”It was an unprecedented volcano. In the past, Earth-shaking events—the Great Depression, World War II, Vietnam—had forced kids to grow up. Teenagers got jobs or were deployed overseas, and when they came back they settled down and had kids or left home and fled to the big city. The point is that they started their lives.

Covid did the opposite. Instead of nudging young people out the door, it anchored them to their parents, to their bedrooms and to their screens. And now that the madness is finally ebbing, they’re unsure how to proceed. Galanti said, “it’s like a sci-fi show where people went to sleep and woke up two years later, and the world has moved on but they haven’t.”

Read more …

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Tsernigov

 

 

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