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Debt Rattle November 20 2024

Nov 202024
 
 November 20, 2024  Posted by at 9:47 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , ,  72 Responses »


Caravaggio St. John the Baptist in the wilderness 1604

 

• Ukraine ATACMS Strike On Russia After Putin Lowers Threshold For Nukes (ZH)
• On Way Out, Reckless Biden Allows Deep Russia Strikes (Lauria)
• Biden Committing Unconstitutional Act Of War- Rep. Massie (RT)
• Kiev Has Permission To Launch Long-Range Strikes – Zelensky (RT)
• Ukrainian Attacks Could Merit Nuclear Response Against NATO – Medvedev (RT)
• New Russia Nuclear Doctrine: What Has Changed (Sp.)
• Kremlin Urges Foreign Nations To Study Russia’s New Nuclear Doctrine (RT)
• The Western World Has Degenerated Into Idiocy (Paul Craig Roberts)
• Can Trump End Ukraine’s ‘Endless War?’ (Victor Davis Hanson)
• Kremlin Reveals Why Ukraine Conflict Will Last ‘A Little Longer (RT)
• ‘Audit’ By Trump Would Be Nightmare For Zelensky – Moscow (RT)
• Secret British Military Cell Plotting To ‘Keep Ukraine Fighting’ (Klarenberg)
• Trump Confirms Plan To Use Military For Deportations (RT)
• Musk Goes All In On ‘Judge Dredd’ Matt Gaetz (ZH)
• Musk Mocks Pandemic Claim From Son of George Soros (RT)
• Diabetes Cases Quadruple Over 30 Years; WHO Urges Lifestyle Changes (ET)

 

 

 

 

Hammer

Trump tariffs

RFK

O’Leary

Scott Ritter

Jennings

Tucker

Shirt

 

 

 

 

Dems’ farewell present to America.

• Ukraine ATACMS Strike On Russia After Putin Lowers Threshold For Nukes (ZH)

About a day after President Biden authorized Ukraine to use the long-range US-made MGM-140 Army Tactical Missile System to strike deeper into Russian territory, a new report suggests that the Ukrainian Armed Forces have hit a military installation in the western Bryansk region. This comes after Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said Russia’s nuclear weapons doctrine was changed and signed by President Vladimir Putin, indicating “the use of Western non-nuclear rockets by the Armed Forces of Ukraine against Russia can prompt a nuclear response.” “For the first time, Ukraine’s Defense Forces struck Russian territory with ATACMS ballistic missiles,” RBC Ukraine news agency reported Tuesday. RBC Ukraine said the military facility near the city of Karachev in the Bryansk region was successfully hit with ATACMS. This location was about 115 kilometers (71 miles) from the border with Ukraine.

“Indeed, for the first time, we used ATACMS to strike Russian territory. The strike was carried out against a facility in the Bryansk region, and it was successfully hit,” one source told the local media outlet. Separately, media outlet Kyiv Post stated the 67th arsenal of the Main Directorate of the Missile and Artillery Directorate of Russia was hit. The facility reportedly had large stockpiles of anti-aircraft missiles, munitions for multiple launch rocket systems, artillery ammunition, and guided bombs, much of which was supplied by North Korea. Kyiv Post noted: “Russian media sources, including residents on social networks, reported explosions coming from within the Karachev district, and suggesting that a “military base” was being attacked.” The Russian Astra Telegram channel shared videos of the incident, while local reports said that there had been strikes on this arsenal in late 2023 and again in June and October this year.

Bloomberg revealed more details about the attack: Russian Defense Ministry confirmed Ukrainian armed forces launched a strike with US-made ATACMS ballistic missiles at a military object in Bryansk region on the border with Ukraine, Interfax reports. • 5 missiles were shot down, 1 damaged; no casualties reported • Missile debris caused fire in a military installation. Earlier, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told reporters that President Vladimir Putin signed new changes to Russia’s nuclear weapons doctrine. Peskov said the new modifications signify “the use of Western non-nuclear rockets by the Armed Forces of Ukraine against Russia can prompt a nuclear response.”

Peskov’s comments were made shortly after President Biden approved Ukraine’s use of ATACMS against military targets deep inside Russia. Additionally, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov addressed the nuclear doctrine, stating that the threshold for using nuclear weapons has been lowered, during an event in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, on the sidelines of the G20 Summit. Lavrov asserted that Russia’s position is that nuclear war won’t happen, and that fundamentally Russian nuclear doctrine doesn’t differ from the United States’ – which sees nukes as a ‘deterrent’. But still, he added, Russia will “react accordingly” to Ukraine firing a US long-range missile.

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The story of the presence of 10,000 or so North Korean troops in Russia/Ukraine is highly questionable. It does come in handy when used as the reason to let Ukraine fire long range missiles at Russian targets.

• On Way Out, Reckless Biden Allows Deep Russia Strikes (Lauria)

Biden ultimately sided with the Pentagon, and he couldn’t be more explicit why. He opposed a NATO no-fly zone over Ukraine fighting Russian aircraft, he said, because “that’s called World War III, okay? Let’s get it straight here, guys. We will not fight the third world war in Ukraine.” U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin at the time backed him up, saying: “President Biden’s been clear that U.S. troops won’t fight Russia in Ukraine, and if you establish a no-fly zone, certainly in order to enforce that no-fly zone, you’ll have to engage Russian aircraft. And again, that would put us at war with Russia.” But now Biden has reversed himself on his sensible positions and is defying the Pentagon to roll the dice that Russia’s warnings, repeated on Monday by Putin’s spokesman, won’t lead to nuclear conflict.

While he previously would not even authorize British long-range missile attacks into Russia in September, let alone U.S. ATACMS, on Sunday he authorized the ATACMS, risking Russia taking direct action against U.S. targets. So what changed Biden’s addled mind? [..] Biden staked his legacy on Ukraine. He was involved in the 2014 coup, in allegedly shady practices there with his son and then in provoking Russia to invade in 2022. He foolishly believed he would prevail in bringing down Putin with an economic, information and proxy ground war. All three are now decisively lost as the U.S. — still under Biden — prepares for the end game. Biden’s only face saver is for Ukraine to get back some of its lost territory by trading for it with Russian territory it seized in Kursk this summer.

So he is authorizing U.S. soldiers to operate ATACMS missiles from Ukraine to beat back a 50,000-man Russian force seeking to take back all of that Russian territory. Part of that force, according to the Pentagon spokesman, is a contingent of at least 10,000 North Korean troops invited by Moscow, thus operating legally on pre-war Russian territory. Yet the presence of these North Koreans has sent the Biden administration and its allied media into paroxysms of near insanity. The New York Times reported on Sunday: “Officials said Mr. Biden was persuaded to make the change in part by the sheer audacity of Russia’s decision to throw North Korean troops at Ukrainian lines. He was also swayed, they said, by concerns that the Russian assault force would be able to overwhelm Ukrainian troops in Kursk if they were not allowed to defend themselves with long-range weapons.”

It is not like Biden doesn’t know the potentially grave consequences he is recklessly unleashing. He was already warned about the no-fly zone and said “that’s called World War III, okay?” He was then warned by the Pentagon against allowing the British missiles and acted like a responsible statesman. But now, when it comes to his precious legacy, he doesn’t appear to give a damn about anything else. He was deprived of a second term (by traitors within his own party he no doubt thinks) and he will risk a NATO-Russia war to avoid the taint of utter defeat in Ukraine. This is what he’s ignoring, according to the Times:

“Some of Mr. Biden’s advisers had seized on a recent U.S. intelligence assessment that warned that Mr. Putin could respond to the use of long-range ATACMS on Russian soil by directing the Russian military or its spy agencies to retaliate, potentially with lethal force, against the United States and its European allies. The assessment warned of several possible Russian responses that included stepped-up acts of arson and sabotage targeting facilities in Europe, as well as potentially lethal attacks on U.S. and European military bases.” Where it goes from there, nobody knows. Thanks, Joe.

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“President Joe Biden has violated the US Constitution and ought to be impeached..”

“Biden is committing an unconstitutional Act of War that endangers the lives of all US citizens..”

“This is an impeachable offense, but the reality is he’s an emasculated puppet of a deep state..”

• Biden Committing Unconstitutional Act Of War- Rep. Massie (RT)

President Joe Biden has violated the US Constitution and ought to be impeached for permitting Ukraine to fire American-supplied long-range missiles into Russia, Congressman Thomas Massie has said. Multiple US outlets reported over the weekend that Biden had lifted the restrictions on Kiev’s use of US-supplied rockets. While the White House has neither confirmed nor denied the news officially, a volley of missiles was fired at Russia’s Bryansk Region early on Tuesday. “By authorizing long range missiles to strike inside Russia, Biden is committing an unconstitutional Act of War that endangers the lives of all US citizens,” Massie, a Republican from Kentucky, posted on X (formerly Twitter) on Monday. “This is an impeachable offense, but the reality is he’s an emasculated puppet of a deep state,” he added.

According to anonymous officials who spoke to the media, the US permission would “mostly” apply to the Kursk Region of Russia, which Ukraine invaded in August. The decision was reportedly triggered by the Ukrainian claim that 10,000 North Korean soldiers have been deployed to Kursk to aid the Russian troops. The US and its allies had placed certain restrictions on the use of the weapons they have supplied to Kiev since 2022, in order to maintain plausible deniability regarding their involvement in the conflict with Russia.Russian President Vladimir Putin has said that the use of long-range missiles would change the nature of the conflict and make NATO a direct participant in the hostilities. Moscow has also revised its nuclear doctrine to encompass conventional attacks by proxies.

Massie has served in the US House of Representatives since 2012 and won his latest re-election bid unopposed. His insistence on constitutionalism has often put him at odds with both the Democrats and his own party. Under the US Constitution, only Congress has the power to start a war. The last time this happened, however, was in 1942, when it was declared against Axis-aligned Hungary, Bulgaria, and Romania. Since 1991, the national legislature has passed three Authorizations for Use of Military Force (AUMF), twice against Iraq and once against Al-Qaeda. The AUMF targeted at Al-Qaeda has been stretched to justify the 2001 invasion of Afghanistan as well as subsequent interventions in Syria, Somalia, Yemen and elsewhere.

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“At least six long-range ATACMS missiles were fired into Russia’s Bryansk Region overnight..”

• Kiev Has Permission To Launch Long-Range Strikes – Zelensky (RT)

Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky has claimed that several Western countries have given Kiev permission to use their long-range missiles against internationally-recognized Russian territory. The New York Times reported on Sunday that US President Joe Biden had lifted some restrictions on the use of US-provided ATACMS missiles. The White House has neither confirmed nor denied the NYT article, which cited anonymous officials. “Now that there are relevant decisions, not just in the media, but also from the relevant countries, it is very important to add to these decisions the number of opportunities with which we can reduce the military potential of the Russian Federation, wherever it is,” Zelensky said on Tuesday at a press-conference in Kiev.

Speaking alongside Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen, Zelensky added that Ukraine is now “working to ensure that all countries support long-range capabilities,” urging Germany in particular to “take the appropriate decision” as well. The UK and France have also reportedly lifted restrictions on the use of the long-range missiles they have provided to Kiev, although they haven’t confirmed the move either. Germany and Italy have publicly said their policy remained unchanged, however, and that their weapons can only be used on Ukrainian soil.

At least six long-range ATACMS missiles were fired into Russia’s Bryansk Region overnight, Moscow’s Defense Ministry reported on Tuesday. Five of them were shot down, while debris from one reportedly caused a localized fire at a military base, causing no property damage. Russian President Vladimir Putin has repeatedly warned that long-range strikes with Western weapons would change the nature of the Russia-Ukraine conflict, making it a direct confrontation between NATO and Moscow. On Tuesday, Russia officially updated its nuclear deterrence doctrine to authorize an atomic response to conventional attacks from countries backed by nuclear powers. This has been widely interpreted as applying to Ukrainian strikes with weapons supplied by the US, UK and France.

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“Russia reserves the right to retaliate with weapons of mass destruction against Kiev and key NATO facilities, wherever they may be located,” Medvedev said. “This would amount to World War III..”

• Ukrainian Attacks Could Merit Nuclear Response Against NATO – Medvedev (RT)

Moscow’s revised nuclear doctrine permits retaliatory strikes against NATO for the kind of attacks that US President Joe Biden reportedly authorized last week, former Russian president Dmitry Medvedev has warned. Washington has reportedly granted Kiev permission to use ATACMS ballistic missiles deep inside Russian territory. Medvedev, who serves as deputy chairman of the Russian Security Council, warned on Tuesday that such actions would qualify as a threat warranting a nuclear response under the new doctrine, which President Vladimir Putin enacted earlier in the day. In response to such an attack, “Russia reserves the right to retaliate with weapons of mass destruction against Kiev and key NATO facilities, wherever they may be located,” Medvedev said. “This would amount to World War III,” he added.

Unrestricted strikes using Western weapons are part of Vladimir Zelensky’s ‘victory plan’, which he presented to the US president in September. The reported change in US policy, which was confirmed by several American allies, came after Donald Trump won the presidential election earlier this month. The Republican politician has claimed that he could end the Ukraine conflict in 24 hours, once he is back in office in January. Some of his close supporters have accused Biden of trying to railroad the incoming administration into prolonging hostilities with Russia with his decision.

While Washington has not issued an official statement on the matter, State Department Assistant Secretary for Western Hemisphere Affairs Brian A. Nichols told the Brazilian newspaper O Globo on Tuesday that strikes by Kiev as authorized by Biden may encourage Russia to negotiate peace. In September, Putin issued a warning to NATO member states, which Zelensky was lobbying to authorize long-range strikes on Russia. Kiev is incapable of launching Western weapons without direct help of donor states, so any such attack would put NATO and Russia directly at war with each other, the Russian leader said. The updated Russian nuclear posture introduces several changes, one of which states that an attack by a foreign nation that does not have weapons of mass destruction but is backed by a nuclear power should be considered as a joint attack by both.

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“.. the previous version of the doctrine contained no mention of Russia being authorized to use nuclear weapons if attacked by a non-nuclear state backed by a nuclear power.”

• New Russia Nuclear Doctrine: What Has Changed (Sp.)

The new Russian nuclear doctrine recently signed by President Vladimir Putin features several notable articles that were absent from the doctrine’s previous iterations, Russian military analyst Ret.Col. Viktor Litovkin tells Sputnik. “Firstly, the 2020 edition of the doctrine contained no mention of Belarus where we deployed our nuclear weapons and whom we had taken under our ‘nuclear umbrella’,” Litovkin explains. “Secondly, the previous version of the doctrine contained no mention of Russia being authorized to use nuclear weapons if attacked by a non-nuclear state backed by a nuclear power.” According to him, Russia thus sends a direct warning to the United States and NATO who supply Ukraine with long-range missiles and urge Kiev to use them, effectively waging a war against Russia by proxy.

“This is a serious warning that, if they go too far and long-range missiles are used against Russian territory – and these long-range missiles are programmed by NATO specialists because Ukrainian specialists lack the necessary equipment and expertise, not to mention NATO aircraft and heavy UAVs guiding these missiles – we would be empowered to strike against the sites these missiles are launched from,” he adds. Dmitry Stefanovich from the Moscow-based Institute of World Economy and International Relations at the Russian Academy of Sciences also points out that the new edition of the nuclear doctrine states that nuclear weapons could be used in case of a threat to Russia’s “territorial integrity and sovereignty” rather than in case of a threat to “the country’s very existence” as before.

The doctrine thus serves as a reaction to “global processes in the military-political sphere, not all of which are related to Ukraine,” Stefanovich notes. “Most importantly, the document still maintains that nuclear deterrence works only until nuclear weapons are used. One can only guess what would happen ‘beyond the nuclear threshold’ and I hope these speculations remain purely hypothetical,” he remarks.

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“..the weapons authorized by President Biden would enhance Ukraine’s defense capabilities and may encourage Russia to negotiate peace..”

• Kremlin Urges Foreign Nations To Study Russia’s New Nuclear Doctrine (RT)

Foreign leaders should carefully study Russia’s new nuclear doctrine, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has said, after President Vladimir Putin formally authorized the document. Published on Tuesday, the eight-page policy statement on Russian nuclear deterrence includes changes previewed by Putin in September. It is “extremely important” and should be “the subject of very deep analysis both in our nation and, probably, abroad,” Peskov told journalists during a regular briefing. Among the changes under the new rules, Russia will now consider an attack by a non-nuclear power backed by a nuclear one as a joint attack, and will also treat a massive air assault as warranting a nuclear response. Peskov highlighted specific wording in the doctrine “aimed at ensuring realization by the potential enemy of the inevitability of retaliation in case of aggression against the Russian Federation and/or its allies.”

Last week, US President Joe Biden reportedly granted Kiev permission to use American-made long-range weapons to deliver strikes deep into Russia. The policy change has been confirmed by some US allies, but not by Washington itself. Putin previously said that any such attack would amount to a direct war between NATO and Russia. Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky has included unrestricted attacks with Western weapons in his ‘victory plan’ for the conflict with Moscow, which he touted to Biden in September. Other points of his proposal include the deployment of a “conventional deterrence package” on Ukrainian soil. He reportedly requested the US to station Tomahawk cruise missiles in Ukraine and threatened to launch them against Russia.

Peskov was asked on Tuesday whether such a deployment would trigger a Russian nuclear strike under the new doctrine. He declined to answer directly, instead referring to the new provision about foreign attacks backed by nuclear states that Moscow wants to deter with the update. Moscow reserves the right to use nuclear weapons when its sovereignty and territorial integrity or those of its allies is at stake, the official added. On Tuesday, US State Department Assistant Secretary for Western Hemisphere Affairs Brian A. Nichols appeared to indirectly confirm the policy change when he claimed to the Brazilian newspaper O Globo that the weapons authorized by President Biden would enhance Ukraine’s defense capabilities and may encourage Russia to negotiate peace.

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“..it would make more sense for Trump to deport the Democrats and take in the Hispanics.”

• The Western World Has Degenerated Into Idiocy (Paul Craig Roberts)

The moron, Annalena Baerbock, Germany’s foreign minister, has threatened China for supporting Russia. What is it with Western politicians that they think they have authority over the foreign policy of sovereign countries and threaten powerful countries that can blow them off the face of the earth? Why do they so cavalierly stir up powerful enemies that can crush them? Annalena Baerbock is clearly a stupid person. The American Biden regime is even more stupid. The Biden morons have turned a contemptuous eye to Russian military doctrine and the Russian government’s statement that any missiles fired into Russia will be regarded as fired by the US and NATO and will receive a response that includes the possible use of nuclear weapons. The idiot Biden regime has thumbed its nose at Russia and, thereby, regarding the warning as “Putin’s bluff,” has invited nuclear war.

It is possible that Putin will accept Russia’s humiliation in order to spare the world, but he must know that sooner or later he must fight or surrender Russia to Washington. What is being gained from taking such an irresponsible risk? It would be one thing if it were only a risk the consequence of which would be borne only by the Biden morons. But it is another when the risk is borne by the entire world. Where is the world’s denunciation of the Biden idiots for exposing the world to nuclear war? What purpose justifies this extraordinary risk? Is the entire world as stupid as Biden? The notion that America whose government is demonstratively insane is a world leader is beyond absurdity. Such a threat to life as Washington presents cannot be made great. It can only be eliminated. If you care to understand how utterly stupid tens of millions of Americans are, note that about 45% of Americans who voted in the election voted for Democrats.

When almost half of the American population is totally mindless and supports with its votes military attack on Russia, how can Trump make America great again? Indeed, how can America even survive? If you think about it, it would make more sense for Trump to deport the Democrats and take in the Hispanics. America would be better off. To be great a country needs smart people, and clearly Hispanics are smarter than Democrats. We must hope that Trump has risen to the occasion, asked Putin to hold off, and promised to reverse the policy once inaugurated. To remind you, I warned that we would reach this dangerous point because Putin refused to use sufficient force to end the conflict with Ukraine before Washington could get deeply involved. Trying to avoid a larger war, Putin produced one. Note that the US and NATO are already in violation of this new doctrine.

For example, an Aegis Ashore facility, which is almost identical to the anti-ballistic missile Aegis Combat System carried by US naval vessels, just opened in Poland. This is the second such facility on the Russian border (the first is in Romania). Both facilities are armed with the dual-use Mark 41 launch system that can launch both ballistic and Tomahawk cruise missiles, which can be armed with nuclear weapons. The missiles arrive and are loaded into the launchers concealed in large crates that make it impossible for observers to ascertain which type of missile is being used. It is difficult to understand such provocative actions by Washington that clearly threaten the world with nuclear war.

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“..how could Putin reassure the Russian people of anything short of an absolute annexation of Ukraine after the cost of one million Russian casualties?”

1/ Russia doesn’t want to annex Ukraine. 2/ There are not nearly one million Russian casualties.

• Can Trump End Ukraine’s ‘Endless War?’ (Victor Davis Hanson)

Trump was elected in part on promises to avoid “endless wars” of the sort that cost American blood and treasure in Afghanistan and Iraq but without resulting in strategic advantage or civilized calm. Yet as a Jacksonian, Trump also restored American deterrence through punitive strikes against ISIS and terrorist thugs like Baghdadi and Soleimani—without being bogged down in costly follow-ups. During the last four administrations, Putin stayed within his borders only during the Trump four years. But upon entering office, Trump will likely still be faced with something far more challenging as he confronts what has become the greatest European killing field since World War II—the cauldron on the Ukrainian border that has likely already cost 1-1.5 million combined dead, wounded, and missing Ukrainian and Russian soldiers and civilians.

There is no end in sight after three years of escalating violence. But there are increasing worries that strategically logical and morally defensible—but geopolitically dangerous—Ukrainian strikes on the Russian interior will nonetheless escalate and lead to a wider war among the world’s nuclear powers. Many on the right wish for Trump to immediately cut off all aid to Ukraine for what they feel is an unwinnable war, even if that abrupt cessation would end any leverage with which to force Putin to negotiate. They claim the war was instigated by a globalist left, serving as a proxy conflict waged to ruin Russia at the cost of Ukrainian soldiers. They see it orchestrated by a now non-democratic Ukrainian government, lacking elections, a free press, or opposition parties, led by an ungracious and corrupt Zelensky cadre that has allied with the American left in an election year.

In contrast, many on the left see Putin’s invasion and the right’s weariness with the costs of the conflict as the long-awaited global proof of the Trump-Russian “collusion” unicorn. Thus, after the 2016 collusion hoax and 2020 laptop disinformation ruse, they see in some of the right’s opposition to the war at last proof of the Russophiliac Trump perfidy. They judge Putin, not China’s imperialist juggernaut, as the real enemy and discount the dangers of a new Russia-China-Iran-North Korean axis. And to see Ukraine utterly defeat Russia, recover all of the Donbass and Crimea, and destroy the Putin dictatorship, they are willing again to feed the war to the last Ukrainian while discounting escalating Russian threats to use tactical nuclear weapons to prevent defeat.

Trump has vowed to end the catastrophe on day one by doing what is now taboo: calling Vladimir Putin and making a deal that would do the now impossible: entice Russia back to its February 24, 2022, borders before it invaded and thus preserve a reduced but still autonomous and secure Ukraine.How could Trump pull that unlikely deal off? Ostensibly, he would follow the advice of a growing number of Western diplomats, generals, scholars, and pundits who have reluctantly outlined a general plan to stop the slaughter.

But how could Putin reassure the Russian people of anything short of an absolute annexation of Ukraine after the cost of one million Russian casualties? Perhaps in the deal, Putin could brag that he institutionalized forever his 2014 annexations of once Russian-speaking majority Donbass and Crimea; that he prevented Ukraine from joining NATO on the doorstep of Mother Russia; and that he achieved a strategic coup in aligning Russia, China, Iran, and North Korea in a new grand alliance against the West and particularly the United States, with the acquiescence if not support of NATO member Turkey and an ever more sympathetic India.

And what would Ukraine and the West gain from such a Trump art of the deal? Kyiv might boast that, as the bulwark of Europe, Ukraine heroically saved the country from Russian annexation as envisioned in the 2022 attempt to decapitate Kyiv and absorb the entire country. Ukraine subsequently was armed by the West and fought effectively enough to stymie the Russian juggernaut, wound and humiliate the Russian military, and sow dissension within the vastly weakened Russian dictatorship, as evidenced by the assassinated would-be insurgent Prigozhin.

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“..it started against the Kiev regime. And now it is continuing as a war between Russia and NATO. That is why it took a little bit longer and will take a little bit longer..”

• Kremlin Reveals Why Ukraine Conflict Will Last ‘A Little Longer (RT)

Russia’s military operation was initially aimed at Ukraine but quickly became a conflict with NATO, President Vladimir Putin’s press secretary Dmitry Peskov has said. Putin sent troops towards Kiev in February 2022 after the Ukrainian government openly rejected the Minsk Agreements and began shelling the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics in the Donbass. In an extended interview with Indian media on Tuesday, Peskov was asked why the hostilities have taken 1,000 days and counting, and if he could predict when they might end. “When all this started, it started against the Kiev regime. And now it is continuing as a war between Russia and NATO. That is why it took a little bit longer and will take a little bit longer,” the Kremlin spokesman said.

“It will come to an end as soon as we reach our goals,” Peskov said, adding that Russia would prefer to achieve its objectives through negotiations, but Ukraine has literally outlawed any talks with Moscow. “So that’s why we’re continuing the military operation, because the possibility of peaceful negotiations is now being denied, both by Kiev and their [bosses] in Washington,” Peskov told the Indian media. The initial spring 2022 peace talks between Russia and Ukraine were reportedly derailed by Boris Johnson, the British prime minister at the time, who told Kiev that the West was not ready to make peace with Moscow. The US and its allies have funneled almost $200 billion worth of aid to Ukraine since 2022, including weapons, ammunition and combat equipment such as artillery, tanks, fighter jets and long-range missiles, while insisting this did not make them a party to the conflict.

On Tuesday morning, Ukraine used long-range ATACMS missiles provided by the US to strike Russia’s Bryansk Region, confirming media reports that Washington had given Kiev permission to do so. Putin has warned that such a step would change the very nature of the conflict and make NATO a direct participant in the hostilities. He also updated Russia’s nuclear doctrine to allow a strategic response to a conventional attack by the proxy of an atomic power.

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Put Musk and Ramaswamy and their investigators on it. They’ll have a ball.

• ‘Audit’ By Trump Would Be Nightmare For Zelensky – Moscow (RT)

A possible financial review under the administration of US President-elect Donald Trump must be a cause of alarm for Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky, Russia’s envoy to the UN Vassily Nebenzia has said. Trump’s election victory earlier this month, having made a critical approach to Ukraine part of his platform, poses a threat to Zelensky, because he could force an unfavorable peace deal on Kiev in order to deliver on his promise to end the fighting. Commenting on Monday at a UN Security Council meeting dedicated to Ukraine, Nebenzia said officials in Kiev likely have more personal reasons to be concerned.“The new authorities might want to check all the money that was sent to Ukraine and conduct a full audit of the assistance already provided,” the Russian envoy stated.

“This scenario… is much more frightening for Zelensky, because a significant part of the aid has been simply plundered and misappropriated by [him] and his entourage,” he added. Nebenzia cited media reports that Ukrainian officials had gone into panic mode after news of Trump’s victory. All Western support for Kiev is inherently vulnerable to graft, he claimed, stating that “the scale of the corruption is something we can only guess.” Trump has called Zelensky the “greatest salesman ever” over the Ukrainian’s repeated extraction of aid money from the incumbent Democratic US administration. Government graft has been consistently named by observers as a major problem for Ukraine since it gained independence in the 1990s. Transparency International last year ranked it 104th among 180 nations for which the West-sympathetic organization calculates its corruption perception index.

The Zelensky government claims that it has made great strides in tackling the problem. Kiev has reportedly complained about US Ambassador Bridget Brink, maintaining that she creates “unnecessary tensions” with Washington by pressing the corruption issue. Contrary to the assurances, the problem seems acute, Time magazine reported last November, citing a source claiming that Ukrainian officials are “stealing like there’s no tomorrow.” Pentagon Inspector General Robert Storch reported this week that “corruption continues to complicate Ukraine’s efforts to achieve its EU and NATO aspirations,” particularly due to multiple scandals in the Defense Ministry.

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Desperately seeking relevance.

• Secret British Military Cell Plotting To ‘Keep Ukraine Fighting’ (Klarenberg)

Emails and internal documents reviewed by The Grayzone reveal details of a cabal of British military and intelligence veterans which plotted to escalate and prolong the Ukraine proxy war “at all costs.” Convened under the direction of the British Ministry of Defense in the immediate aftermath of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, the cell referred to itself as Project Alchemy. As British leadership sabotaged peace talks between Kiev and Moscow, the cell put forward an array of plans “to keep Ukraine fighting” by imposing “strategic dilemmas, costs and frictions upon Russia.” The leaks obtained by The Grayzone expose a hidden hand behind Britain’s policy in Ukraine, showing in unusually granular detail how it aimed to engineer a long, grinding war through covert operations that stretched the bounds of legality.

Project Alchemy’s proposed schemes spanned every conceivable field of warfare, from cyber attacks to “discreet operations” to outright terrorism. The secret cell even put forward a plan to “aggressively pursue” and “dismantle” independent media outlets – including The Grayzone – through an aggressive campaign of legal harassment and online censorship, so they “would be forced to close.” The incendiary blueprints were fed to the highest levels of the British state and national security structure, where they were apparently well-received. Founded by a senior British Ministry of Defence official, Project Alchemy is composed of veteran military and intelligence operatives united by a desire for all-out war between the West and Russia. Some have trained Ukrainian forces in clandestine sabotage tactics. Members of the national security cabal tacitly acknowledged that their proposed operations stretched the bounds of British law.

Thus they suggested that London should be “prepared to creatively use the law” to meet its goals, and even be willing to erase “legal restrictions on UK deniable ops” against Russia. Some of Project Alchemy’s most extreme recommendations have already been implemented, often with calamitous results. These include the cell’s proposal to strike Crimea’s Kerch Bridge, which prompted a Russian escalation that saw punishing attacks on Ukraine’s electricity infrastructure. Alchemy also envisioned the construction of a secret, Gladio-style army of Ukrainian partisan fighters to carry out assassination, sabotage, and terror missions behind enemy lines. It appears the British premier, Keir Starmer, fell under the influence of the Project Alchemy cabal soon after his election in July, when he eagerly embraced the role of “wartime prime minister.”

After pledging to support Ukraine “as long as it takes,” however, Starmer is quietly backing away from the maximalist policy. In Kiev, Ukrainians are left to ponder how their “friends” in London got them into this mess, and why they can not, or will not get them out of it. The British spooks who gathered around Project Alchemy reasoned that the longer the proxy war continued, the more Russian president Vladimir Putin’s “credibility at home and abroad drops, and his ability to fight NATO is degraded.” Today, Project Alchemy’s gambit has clearly backfired, as Putin remains popular within Russia, while a crumbling Ukrainian army loses territory by the day despite constant re-arming by the West. But the war planners in London remain staunchly committed to escalation, refusing to shelve their diabolical proposals.

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“Under legislation from 1976, US presidents can declare national emergencies at their discretion..”

• Trump Confirms Plan To Use Military For Deportations (RT)

US President-elect Donald Trump has confirmed that he intends to declare a national emergency and use military resources to deport undocumented immigrants. During his re-election campaign, Trump vowed to launch “the largest deportation program” of criminals in US history, and repeatedly floated the possibility of involving the army. On Monday, Trump shared a post by conservative activist Tom Fitton on the Truth Social media platform. Fitton, who is the president of Judicial Watch, a public interest group dedicated to investigating government corruption, had written that Trump’s administration would “declare a national emergency and will use military assets” to address illegal immigration “through a mass deportation program.” Reposting Fitton’s comment, Trump wrote, “TRUE!!!” Under legislation from 1976, US presidents can declare national emergencies at their discretion and redirect funds designated by lawmakers for other purposes.

Trump’s plans regarding illegal migration include ramping up deportations, reinstating a “travel ban” for certain countries, and closing the border to asylum seekers. He’s also vowed to end birthright citizenship for infants born on domestic soil to undocumented migrant parents. Trump’s top immigration adviser Stephen Miller told The New York Times last year that the military could construct large-scale camps to hold people slated for deportation. According to Department of Homeland Security estimates, around 11 million people are in the US illegally. Trump declared a national emergency at the southern US border amid a surge in asylum seekers during his first term in 2019 and reappropriated military funds for the construction of a wall along the border with Mexico. When Joe Biden was elected president in 2021, further construction of the wall was halted.

Read more …

“Matt Gaetz has 3 critical assets that are needed for the AG role: a big brain, a spine of steel and an axe to grind..”

• Musk Goes All In On ‘Judge Dredd’ Matt Gaetz (ZH)

Elon Musk has come out swinging for Rep. Matt Gaetz, as the Florida lawmaker and President-elect Donald Trump’s pick for attorney general faces scrutiny over sexual misconduct allegations that may throw his Senate confirmation into disarray. “Matt Gaetz has 3 critical assets that are needed for the AG role: a big brain, a spine of steel and an axe to grind,” Musk wrote in a Tuesday post on X. “He is the Judge Dredd America needs to clean up a corrupt system and put powerful bad actors in prison,” Musk continued, adding “Gaetz will be our Hammer of Justice.” Musk also addressed the allegations, saying he considers them “worth less than nothing,” as “Under our laws, a man is considered innocent until proven guilty.

“If AG Garland (an unprincipled douchebag) could have secured a conviction against Gaetz, he would have, but he knew he could not. “Case closed.” Senators on both sides of the aisle are requesting more information into a House ethics probe of Gaetz which allegedly contains accusations that Gaetz paid for sex with a woman who was 17 at the time. The DOJ investigated the allegations, but decided in February of 2023 not to file any charges against him. Gaetz has denied the allegations.

Read more …

Scamdemic.

• Musk Mocks Pandemic Claim From Son of George Soros (RT)

SpaceX and Tesla boss Elon Musk has ridiculed a claim made by Alex Soros, son of billionaire financier George Soros, that Americans would be “screwed” if there was another pandemic. The comment appeared to target President-elect Donald Trump’s choice for the next US health secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. In a post on X (formerly Twitter) on Monday, Soros, heir to his father’s business and philanthropic empire, suggested that the plans for health agencies announced by RFK Jr. “could weaken a future pandemic response.” “They are playing with fire! Americans will be screwed if there is another pandemic!” Alex Soros wrote. ”*scamdemic,” responded Musk, a close confidant of Donald Trump, who played a prominent role in the former president’s re-election campaign.

RFK Jr., an anti-vaccine activist and environmentalist, has pledged to revise the work of US health agencies, claiming that the Food and Drug Administration’s “war on public health is about to end.” During the Covid-19 pandemic, RFK Jr. railed against response measures such as lockdowns and mandatory vaccinations, claiming they were more about power grabs than genuine public health concerns. Among RFK Jr.’s current healthcare policy priorities are reviewing vaccine safety and combating chemicals, pollutants, and additives that he claims contribute to chronic disease in the US. Critics argue that RFK Jr.’s views run contrary to the medical and scientific consensus.

Elon Musk has also slammed governments’ handling of the Covid-19 pandemic and mass inoculations, suggesting that the “vaccine is potentially worse” than the disease if administered to the whole population. The tech mogul said in 2021 that he and his family were vaccinated against the virus. Trump has nominated Musk for a role aimed at streamlining the work of the government, co-leading a Department of Government Efficiency – which will be an advisory body without the status of a department.

American investor and philanthropist Alex Soros is one of five children of Hungarian-American billionaire investor and liberal George Soros. The 39-year-old chairs the Board of Directors of the Open Society Foundations, and sits on the investment committee of Soros Fund Management. His father, 94-year-old George Soros, has an estimated net worth of nearly $7 billion. George Soros has for decades been a prominent US Democratic Party donor. In the run-up to the recent US presidential election, Musk earned the nickname “George Soros of the Right,” due to his large financial contributions to the Trump campaign. The Tesla CEO has on numerous occasions been critical of Soros, accusing him of trying to destroy Western civilization and of hating humanity.

Read more …

“Out of every $4 in health care spending in the United States, $1 was used for people diagnosed with diabetes..”

That Tedros guy still has a job? Whatever he urges, who will listen?

• Diabetes Cases Quadruple Over 30 Years; WHO Urges Lifestyle Changes (ET)

Hundreds of millions of people globally have become diabetic over the past 30 years, leading the World Health Organization (WHO) to call for “urgent action” to deal with the health crisis. The number of adults living with diabetes worldwide has more than quadrupled since 1990, the WHO said in a Nov. 13 statement citing the results of a recent study it supported. An estimated 828 million adults were living with the condition worldwide in 2022, an increase of 630 million from 1990. The lowest prevalence of diabetes was in “Western Europe and East Africa for both sexes, and in Japan and Canada for women.” The highest prevalence was in Polynesia and Micronesia, certain nations in the Caribbean, North Africa, and the Middle East, as well as Pakistan and Malaysia. In total, 14 percent of the world’s adults had diabetes in 2022, double the seven percent 30 years back.

“We have seen an alarming rise in diabetes over the past three decades, which reflects the increase in obesity, compounded by the impacts of the marketing of unhealthy food, a lack of physical activity, and economic hardship,” said WHO Director-General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus. “To bring the global diabetes epidemic under control, countries must urgently take action. This starts with enacting policies that support healthy diets and physical activity, and, most importantly, health systems that provide prevention, early detection, and treatment.”Nearly 450 million adults aged 30 and above with diabetes remained untreated in 2022. This represented 59 percent of all adults who have the condition, a 3.5-fold jump. Ninety percent of untreated adults were living in low- and middle-income countries.

According to data from the CDC, around 38 million Americans were living with diabetes in 2021, which was roughly one in 10 individuals. One in five didn’t know they had the condition. Nearly 100 million, or more than one in three Americans, suffered from pre-diabetes. A bipartisan group of senators in June announced legislation aimed at improving the early detection and screening of type 1 diabetes, titled “Strengthening Collective Resources for Encouraging Education Needed (SCREEN) for Type 1 Diabetes Act.” Early identification “can prevent life-threatening conditions like diabetic ketoacidosis and potentially allow for the use of therapeutics to delay the clinical onset of the condition, helping to improve patients’ quality of life and reliance on insulin,” said Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine).

A report from the American Diabetes Association last year found that the country’s annual cost of the illness was nearly $413 billion in 2022, which included more than $306 billion in direct medical costs. Out of every $4 in health care spending in the United States, $1 was used for people diagnosed with diabetes, it said.“In addition to its enormous physical and health burden, diabetes also carries an untenable cost burden that is often disproportionately borne by vulnerable and underserved communities,” said Charles Henderson, CEO of the organization. He pointed out that the medical costs for such people have risen by 35 percent over the previous decade. “Reducing the cost of diabetes is essential to improving the lives of all people with diabetes.”

Read more …

 

 

 

 

 

 

Naomi Wolf

 

 

Mercury

 

 

McCullough
https://twitter.com/i/status/1858659012796973480

 

 

Optimus

 

 

Cork

 

 

Swans

 

 

Coke
https://twitter.com/i/status/1858865116285968806

 

 

First date

 

 

Jaguar
https://twitter.com/i/status/1858833641519890711

 

 

Ducklings
https://twitter.com/i/status/1858903107104608555

 

 

Cran
https://twitter.com/i/status/1858755011142185146

 

 

 

 

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Debt Rattle November 17 2024

Nov 172024
 
 November 17, 2024  Posted by at 9:41 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , ,  75 Responses »


Jerry Bywaters Oil Field Girls 1940

 

• The Revolution of 2024 (Jeffrey A. Tucker)
• Trump Will Bring Justice, Not Revenge (Jim Rickards)
• Tulsi Gabbard, The New US Intel Chief (SCF)
• RFK Jr. Is Poised To Save The Health And Lives Of Millions Of Americans (Hill)
• What Could Trump 2.0 Mean for US Healthcare? (Sp.)
• Why Voters Trusted The GOP More On Democracy (Turley)
• Rachel Maddow Claims Trump is Trying To “Destroy The US Government” (MN)
• Pentagon Spends $187 Mln on Audit, Fails Seventh Year in a Row (Sp.)
• Trump Team To Write Off ‘Project Ukraine’ as Sunk Cost (Sp.)
• Zelensky Wants To Intensify Military Draft (RT)
• Ex-FM Warns Of Potential ‘Internal Collapse’ In Ukraine (RT)
• Moscow Continues To Warn The West About The Risk Of Nuclear Escalation (SCF)
• War Games Show UK’s Flagship Aircraft Carriers ‘Get Sunk’ Every Time (Sp.)
• The Novichok Attack Was A British Operation, Not A Russian One (Helmer)
• Climate-Change Debate ‘Heats Up’ With Collum, Keen, Fleckenstein (ZH)

 

 

 

 

Bannon

Rogan


https://twitter.com/i/status/1857708065191338428

Leavitt

Mollie
https://twitter.com/i/status/1857599848062628084

FBI J6
https://twitter.com/i/status/1857494322624737729

Alina
https://twitter.com/i/status/1857500858746835041

Jail

Trover

 

 

 

 

“We are barely ten days into the realization of what just transpired and the entire lay of the land seems different, like a tectonic shift in politics, culture, mood, and possibilities..”

• The Revolution of 2024 (Jeffrey A. Tucker)

People are out and about, smiling at each other. It’s been true since the morning after the election, the results of which defied every prediction. Who doesn’t like to see the smug elites who have ruled the world for five awful years taken down a peg? More than that, there are hints of a return to sanity. Mainstream advertisers are suddenly returning to X, putting their economic interest above their tribalist loyalties. The editor of pro-lockdowns Scientific American, which had long blessed totalitarian measures as true science, has resigned. The attempt to pillage InfoWars and give it to The Onion has been reversed by a federal judge. That might be a fluke or might not be: maybe the lawfare is dialing back too. The cabinet of the incoming administration is being filled by voices that were fully censored for years. Employees are reportedly packing their bags at the FDA and other agencies.

Mainstream news commentators are sputtering around with less bravado than they have shown in years. CNN is firing major personalities. Trump is talking about abolishing the income tax and granting $10K in tax credits per homeschooled child, not to mention blowing up college accreditation systems, among other sweeping changes. The American Bastille day is coming, not only freeing the political prisoners of January 6 but also many of the unjustly persecuted including Ross Ulbricht, Roger Ver, and Ian Freeman, among so many others. That will be a day of rejoicing. Oh, and peace seems to have broken out in some contentious areas of the world, for now. What is happening? This is not the usual transfer of the resident of the White House. This is starting to look like an actual transfer of power, not just from Biden to Trump but from the permanent government – ensconced in many sectors – that has been long in hiding to an entirely new form of government responsive to actual voters.

As it turns out, there was no late surge for Kamala Harris. All the polls were wrong, and the rest was media blather. What was correct were the betting odds on Polymarket, and only days later, the FBI raided the 26-year-old founder’s home and confiscated his phone and laptop. There are still many millions of missing voters, people who supposedly showed up for Biden in 2020 but stayed home this time. Meanwhile, there has been a historic shift in all races, ethnicities, and regions, with even the possibility of flipping California from blue to red in the future. After decades of academic slicing and dicing of the population according to ever more eccentric identity buckets involving race, ethnicity, gender, and sexual interest, along with countless thousands of studies documenting deep complexity over intersectionality, the driving force of the election was simple: class, and the few intellectuals and some wealthy entrepreneurs who understand that.

The division was not really left vs right. It was workers vs laptoppers, wage earners vs six-figure stay-at-homers, bottom half vs top 5 percent, people with actual skills vs weaponized resume wielders, and those with affection for old-world values vs those whose educations have beaten it out of them for purposes of career advancement. The silent majority has never been so suddenly loud. It just so happened that the heavily privileged had come to inhabit easily identifiable sectors of American society and, in the end, had no choice but hitch the whole of the overclass wagon to the fortunes of a candidate like themselves (Kamala) but who was unable to pull off a compelling masquerade. Not even a parade of well-paid celebrity endorsements could save her from total rebuke at the polls. Sylvester Stallone called Trump a second George Washington but another reference point might be Andrew Jackson.

The overwhelming victory for Trump is on a scale not seen since 1828 when, four years after the presidency was stolen from Jackson, Old Hickory came back in a wild landslide and cleaned up Washington. Trump arrives in Washington with a mandate for the same, with 81% of the public demanding that the government shrink in size and power. It has all happened so quickly. We are barely ten days into the realization of what just transpired and the entire lay of the land seems different, like a tectonic shift in politics, culture, mood, and possibilities. We are even seeing blunt and open talk about the horrendous Covid response that so utterly demoralized the country and the world, after years of silence on the topic. We have promised hearings coming, and court cases galore now on fast track. The sudden coming together of three great sectors of anti-establishment fury – MAGA, MAHA, and DOGE – in the last two months of the election of 2024 is one for the ages.

It provides the beginnings of an answer to the great question on our minds for decades: how precisely does an authentic revolution take root in an industrialized Western democracy? Are elections capable of delivering real results? For now, the answer seems to be yes. That should thrill any responsible observer of social, cultural, economic, and political affairs. It means that the early architects of the American system were not wrong. The intolerable costs of political upheaval of ages past can be mitigated by planting power firmly in the hands of the people through the plebiscite. This was their view and their gamble. All the evidence of our time points to the wisdom of the idea. In the darkest days of the last year of the first Trump presidency, the bureaucracy was riding high, in full revenge mode against an elected government it hated and sought to overthrow. The agencies were passing strange edicts that felt like laws but no one knew for sure. You are essential, you are not. You must stay home, unless you have an emergency. Your elective surgery needs to wait. The kids cannot go to school. That European vacation cannot happen.

You can eat at a restaurant but only if you are six feet away from other patrons and you must put this China-made cloth on your mouth if you get up to go to the restroom. The flurry of edicts was mind-boggling. It felt like martial law, because it was some form of exactly that. The best research points to the astonishing reality that this was never really a public-health response but a scheme by security and intelligence sectors to enact some kind of global color revolution, which is why the policies were so similar the world over. It was indeed an awesome display of power, one that invaded all our communities, homes, and families. No one knows this better than Team Trump, even if there has been near silence on the topic for all these years. They have had time to put the pieces together and figure out what happened and why. And they carefully, and in seclusion worthy of a Cistercian monastery, plotted their return, leaving nothing to chance.

Read more …

“The departments and agencies that have been weaponized will be completely overhauled.”

• Trump Will Bring Justice, Not Revenge (Jim Rickards)

The persecution and prosecution of President Donald Trump is finally winding down. Jack Smith, a primary player in the lawfare campaign against Trump, has filed to dismiss the case involving classified documents at Mar-a-Lago. Rep. Jim Jordan has instructed Special Counsel Smith to preserve all records related to the cases. The Deep State tried everything to make Trump lose. In total, 91 frivolous felony charges were thrown at the former president. All so they could brand him a felon, tie up resources and prevent him from campaigning. Then there was the January 6th “insurrection”, multiple Russian collusion hoaxes and countless media lies. The Deep State even prosecuted his advisers, such as 75-year-old famed economist Peter Navarro, who was the first former White House official ever imprisoned on a contempt-of-court charge. This dignified gentleman was frog-marched into prison as part of a political persecution campaign.

The entire affair was a disgrace to the nation. On Election Day, Americans rejected this vile lawfare. And soon, it will be time for justice. With GOP control over both sides of the Congress and a near-landslide win, Trump has a mandate from the American people to pursue it aggressively. President Trump has not been shy about his intentions, stating, “The departments and agencies that have been weaponized will be completely overhauled.” On day one, he promised to reissue his executive order allowing the President to remove “rogue bureaucrats” from their positions. Trump promised to “wield that power very aggressively” against the Deep State. Our once and future President even promised to establish a “Truth and Reconciliation Commission”, opening the books on issues including the JFK assassination, illicit spying, and government corruption. I can’t wait to see what it uncovers. Trump’s recent speech was packed full of details on how he plans to drain the swamp. He starts strong and keeps going:

“This is how I will shatter the Deep State and restore government that is controlled by the people and for the people… Make every Inspector General’s office independent and physically separated from the departments they oversee so they do not become the protectors of the Deep State… Launch a major crackdown on government leakers who collude with the fake news to deliberately create false narratives and to subvert our government and our democracy… Clean out all of the corrupt actors in our national security and intelligence apparatus… Push a constitutional amendment to oppose term limits on members of Congress. “Shatter the Deep State”. No ambiguity there.

Some will call what is coming revenge. But this will not be revenge. It will be justice. The distinction is important. I would fully support justice here if the shoe was on the other foot, and the GOP were the offending party. This type of behavior simply cannot stand. It undermines and corrupts the entire system. Re-establishing a just and fair government is critical. It will be difficult, but I believe Trump will succeed this time. He has learned from the mistakes of his first term. Trump has the right people around today. He has already rejected the idea of inviting Nikki Haley or Mike Pompeo to join the new administration.

This is an excellent sign of things to come. Given the mandate, the appointment of Attorney General will be particularly important. I have my eye on Mike Davis. He is the exact type of person this position calls for. Tough as nails, fair, and dedicated to cleaning up the system. I’ve met the man, and he’s just the type of person required for this job. The stage is set for a historic draining of the swamp. Of course, there is still the potential for last-minute desperation moves by the Democrats, including their plan to disqualify Trump using the “insurrection clause”. But given my prediction that Congress will be controlled by Republicans, I think we’ll be in the clear in that department.

Read more …

“..in The Atlantic, an establishment mouthpiece, Gabbard was denounced as a “threat to the security of the United States.” That’s a staggering charge to levy on the person who is going to be head of national security..”

• Tulsi Gabbard, The New US Intel Chief (SCF)

The nomination of Tulsi Gabbard as the United States intelligence supremo has sent shockwaves through the American and NATO establishments. The Western news media – always a dutiful echo chamber for deep-state policymakers – is reverberating with horror at her nomination by President-elect Donald Trump. That reaction is a good sign that something significant has happened. The potential appointment of Gabbard as Director of National Intelligence (DNI) could be the most consequential decision yet by Trump in forming his cabinet. If one move could signal the foreign policy direction under the 47th president, Gabbard’s nomination is the most salient and potentially the most constructive on the key issue of world peace. Time magazine headlined with the U.S. intelligence community’s response to Gabbard’s selection. “We are reeling,” it was reported. Reuters reported that the Western “spy world is vexed.” Meanwhile, in The Atlantic, an establishment mouthpiece, Gabbard was denounced as a “threat to the security of the United States.”

That’s a staggering charge to levy on the person who is going to be head of national security. It is almost hilarious to see the apoplectic reaction in the U.S. establishment and its servile mainstream media. CNN’s news anchor Jim Sciutto was distraught in sharing his concerns with colleague Richard Quest, remarking that Gabbard’s views “contradict” almost everything about U.S. foreign policies. If we may paraphrase that exchange, the sentiments were: Oh my God, how terrible! Whatever shall we say now about all the lies we have been spinning for years and getting fat salaries for? After all, as far as the U.S. corporate media are concerned, especially those channels and newspapers associated with the Democrats, the establishment, and the deep state intelligence apparatus, Tulsi Gabbard has been smeared as a “Russian asset.” It is indeed profoundly challenging – one might even say, earth-shattering – to the deep state if Gabbard becomes Director of National Intelligence.

As with Trump’s other cabinet picks, the nominations will have to be approved by Senate panels. So there is a while to go before her post is confirmed. A lot can change or be derailed. Trump’s cabinet picks this week have been keenly watched by observers trying to discern the future foreign policies of the next presidency, which begins in January after his inauguration. Trump’s early call-ups this week of hawkish figures Pete Hegseth for defense and Marco Rubio for secretary of state caused dismay among some critics of U.S. foreign policy who wanted a fundamental break from warmongering and hostility toward Russia, China, and Iran, among others. Then came Trump’s selection of Tulsi Gabbard. The former Congresswoman has gained wide popular American and international respect for her outspoken and independent criticism of U.S. militarism in the Middle East and Ukraine.

However, the U.S. political establishment and media have slandered her as a “traitor” and a “Russian asset” for her views criticizing Washington’s regime change wars in Syria and the Middle East. In 2017, Gabbard traveled to Syria and met with President Bashar al-Assad. She spoke out against Washington’s covert policy of sponsoring terrorist militia for regime change in Damascus. For telling the truth, she was vilified as an “apologist” for Assad. More recently, the “apologist” slur was thrown at her again after Gabbard opposed the U.S. and NATO’s arming of the Kiev regime and the proxy war against Russia. She said that the conflict in Ukraine could have been avoided if Russia’s security concerns about NATO’s threatening expansion had been taken into consideration. How refreshing to hear that sanity and objectivity.

In a twisted way, the CNN clapping seals are correct. Her views on the conflict in Ukraine do indeed contradict the U.S. establishment and media’s propaganda about “Russian aggression.” Her views unequivocally debunk the wall-to-wall “news” propaganda as false and serve as a warning to the public that NATO’s lies are dragging the world into a nuclear war. The role of Tulsi Gabbard in the second Trump administration – if she makes it through Senate vetting – cannot be overstated. In her DNI capacity, she is the intel supremo who oversees the CIA and NSA. Through her daily briefings to the president, Gabbard will play a crucial role in President Trump’s foreign policymaking. Given Trump’s freewheeling style, it can be fairly assumed that Gabbard’s input into policymaking will have much greater influence than the secretaries of defense or state. She will call the shots, and Trump will designate Hegseth, Rubio, and others to follow suit on the policies.

Wasserman

Read more …

“..the secretary of State, Defense, Treasury or Interior is a very important position. But measurable progress can often be incremental. But imagine being the “Secretary of Saving Human Lives.”

• RFK Jr. Is Poised To Save The Health And Lives Of Millions Of Americans (Hill)

What is the value of someone who has the potential to literally save millions of lives and improve the health of tens of millions of children and adults? We may be on the verge of revolutionizing America’s failing health care system for the better, and two men will be responsible: President-elect Donald Trump and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Trump has long been a fan of Kennedy’s intellect, independence from special interests, passion, empathy and connection with the American people. Trump also no doubt realizes that Kennedy’s value to his incoming administration is immeasurable, as RFK Jr. can wear multiple hats of expertise. Trump has picked him to run the Department of Health and Human Services. And it is from under that HHS hat that Kennedy will transform our “sick-care” industry and literally save millions of lives in the process.

Anyone paying attention to the utter catastrophe that has become America’s “health care” industry knows that this is not political hyperbole or an exaggeration. It is an outright obscenity that we are losing so many Americans to entirely preventable causes. Three days before the election, I wrote about “The 2 decisions that crushed Harris’s momentum.” One was Harris’s selection of Gov. Tim Walz as her running mate. The other, and more important of the two, was Kennedy suspending his campaign and endorsing Trump. “One of the main reasons is the ‘mom vote,’” I wrote. “Kennedy’s endorsement will potentially bring millions of previously ambivalent female voters to the table for Trump. Why? Because they are moms who are worried about the health and wellbeing of their children and have long believed that Kennedy was one of the few people in public life who would protect those children. This is a much bigger deal than the media realizes or will acknowledge. It is a real game changer. Toward that end, these moms want Trump to win so he will bring Kennedy into his cabinet.”

After the column ran, I heard from many mothers confirming that exact point. Said one: “Yep, as one of those ‘mom votes’ who was dying to vote for Robert F. Kennedy Jr. I will now vote for the unity party.” After Kennedy got out of the race and Trump welcomed him with open arms, the two created what future historians may record as the most important health care movement in the history of our nation. It is a grassroots phenomenon spreading like wildfire as more and more parents and adults wake up to the chemicals and poisons being introduced into their bodies against their will. On Nov. 6, Kennedy posted: “President Trump has asked me to do three things: 1. Clean up the corruption in our government health agencies. 2. Return those agencies to their rich tradition of gold-standard, evidence-based science. 3. Make America Healthy Again by ending the chronic disease epidemic.”

In the speech announcing the suspension of his campaign and his unequivocal endorsement of Trump, Kennedy ticked off some truly horrifying statistics. “We spend more on health care than any country on Earth,” he said. “Nobody has a chronic disease burden like we have … Two-thirds of American adults and children suffer from chronic health issues. Fifty years ago, that number was less than 1 percent. So, we’ve gone from 1 percent to 66 percent. In America, 74 percent of Americans are now overweight or obese, and 50 percent of our children… Half of Americans have pre-diabetes or type two diabetes…And this is a crisis that 77 percent of our kids are too disabled to serve in the United States military. What is happening to our country and why isn’t this in the headlines every single day?…

“Cancer rates are skyrocketing in the young and the old. Young adult cancers are up 79 percent … So, what’s causing this suffering? I’ll name two culprits. First and the worst is ultra-processed food. About 70 percent of American children’s diet is ultra-processed. That means industrial manufactured in a factory … The second culprit is toxic chemicals in our food and our medicine, in our environment … The assault on our children’s cells and hormones is unrelenting.” Unfortunately, what is also “unrelenting” is the opposition to Kennedy from Big Pharma, Big Agriculture and special interests that realize hundreds of billions in profits at the direct expense of the health of every man, woman and child in America. In opposing that massive force, Kennedy is in the fight for our lives.

To be sure, being the secretary of State, Defense, Treasury or Interior is a very important position. But measurable progress can often be incremental. But imagine being the “Secretary of Saving Human Lives.” If Kennedy is even halfway successful in his quest to save the American people — and especially our children — from the life-robbing threats of ultra-processed foods and toxic chemicals, he can potentially save or improve tens of millions of lives over the next four years. That “cure” that will transcend every demographic and income level. Under the direction of Trump, Kennedy may turn ignorance to acceptance, acceptance to hope, hope to belief and belief to results. Again, what is the value of someone who literally has the potential to save millions of lives and improve the health of tens of millions of children and adults? I suspect we are about to find out.

RFK

Dr. Oz

Read more …

“If we can come up with a plan that’s going to cost our people, our population, less money, and provide better health care than Obamacare, then I would absolutely do it.”

• What Could Trump 2.0 Mean for US Healthcare? (Sp.)

US President-elect Donald Trump has tapped Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to be his Department of Health and Human Services Secretary tasked with fixing America’s raging health crisis. Donald Trump has promised to “bring down costs” and increase the quality of US healthcare. What changes can be expected?
• During his first term, Trump tried but failed to repeal the Affordable Care Act (ACA), aka Obamacare. Trump called Obamacare “lousy health care” and floated replacing it, saying, “If we can come up with a plan that’s going to cost our people, our population, less money, and provide better health care than Obamacare, then I would absolutely do it.”
• Trump has vowed to protect Medicare, the federal health insurance program for people aged 65 or older and younger people with disabilities.
• Cuts to Medicaid, the largest government health-insurance program that covers low-income Americans, may be expected under Trump.
• During his first term, Trump proposed cutting the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) and eliminating the Medicaid expansion that was passed as part of the ACA.
• A work requirement might be added for some able-bodied adult beneficiaries, with federal spending on the program capped.
• Trump has promised to veto a federal abortion ban “under any circumstances”, saying, “It is up to the states to decide.”
• Trump didn’t rule out banning certain vaccines, promising to “make a decision” after Robert F. Kennedy Jr. – now tapped to be his HHS chief – hinted at the possibility of ending vaccine mandates. With an estimated 108,000 people dying from drug overdoses in the US last year, Trump blamed it on the migrant crisis. Although he criminalized all fentanyl-related substances in 2018, overdose deaths continued to soar.

Read more …

“..there is work to be done as a nation committed to the rule of law. We cannot win at any cost when that cost is the very thing that defines us.”

• Why Voters Trusted The GOP More On Democracy (Turley)

“People violate laws any time they want.” Those words, shrugging off an alleged unlawful move last week, did not come from some Chicago gangbanger or Washington car thief. Those words of wisdom came from Democrat Commissioner Diane Marseglia in Bucks County, Pennsylvania. They came in response to the fact that the Democratic majority on the election commission had decided to ignore a binding state Supreme Court ruling in an attempt to engineer the election of Democratic incumbent Sen. Bob Casey (D-Pa.). Rather than prompting a degree of introspection, the loss of both houses of Congress and the White House has had a curious effect on many Democrats, dropping any pretense of protecting democracy over partisanship.

Despite polls showing that the public trusted former president Donald Trump more than Vice President Harris in combatting threats to democracy, Democrats made “saving democracy” the thrust of this election. The polls reflected a certain common sense of the public when harangued with predictions from President Biden, Harris and a host of politicians and pundits that this would likely be our last election. Few believed that after over two centuries as the most stable and successful democracy in history, all three branches would collapse in unison and embrace dictatorship. Even fewer believed the predictions of the rounding up of homosexuals, journalists and political critics for camps in what some described as an American Third Reich. American voters are not chumps and what they saw were strikingly anti-democratic positions from those claiming to be the defenders of democracy, including:

• Seeking to strip Trump from ballots under an unfounded theory rejected unanimously by the Supreme Court.
• Fighting to block opponents of Biden from ballots in the primary and general elections.
• Suing to keep Robert F. Kennedy on ballots after his withdrawal in swing states, in order to confuse voters and reduce the vote for Trump.
• Calling for blocking dozens of incumbent GOP officials and legislators from ballots as “insurrectionists.”
• “Protecting democracy” through the most extensive censorship in history and the blacklisting of opponents.
• Engaging in open and raw lawfare in the prosecutions of Trump in places like New York.

Each of these efforts ultimately failed to stop Trump and was opposed by a majority of voters even before the election. So now, Democrats are dropping the pretense of raw partisanship. That was evident in Bucks County, when a motion arose to reject a challenge to count provisional ballots, including undated or invalidly dated mail ballots. It should have been easy. To its credit, the majority-Democratic Pennsylvania Supreme Court had already refused a Democratic push to change the rules shortly before the election and to ignore the plain language of the election laws. In ordering the rejection of ballots without dates, Justice Kevin Doughtery (joined by Chief Justice Debra Todd) wrote a concurrence declaring “‘This Court will neither impose nor countenance substantial alterations to existing laws and procedures during the pendency of an ongoing election.’ We said those carefully chosen words only weeks ago. Yet they apparently were not heard in the Commonwealth Court, the very court where the bulk of election litigation unfolds.”

It is apparently still not being heard. In the Bucks County hearing, Marseglia spoke as she and Democratic Board chairman Robert Harvie, Jr., dismissed the earlier rulings in order to accept ballots without required signatures or mandatory dates. She declared that she would not second the motion to enforce the rulings “mostly because I think we all know that precedent by a court doesn’t matter anymore in this country and people violate laws any time they want. So, for me, if I violate this law, it’s because I want a court to pay attention to it.” That was a lot of words to say that she does not really seem to care if this is lawful. For his part, Casey has shown the same abandon as he clings to his Senate seat at any cost.

That cost, in this case, was an alliance with Marc Elias, the controversial Democratic lawyer at the center of the infamous Steele Dossier scandal. Elias has been sanctioned in court and criticized for his work to flip elections. He is known for baselessly blaming voting machine errors for electing Republicans and pushing gerrymandering plans rejected by the courts as anti-democratic. Casey is unlikely to change the result without counting defective or challenged ballots. Fortunately, law and precedent “does matter in this country.” There are still officials who can transcend their political preferences to maintain the rule of law. After the last presidential election, many Trump appointees ruled against the former president, and many Democratic judges rejected the effort to strip Trump from ballots.

That does not mean that Democrats who value the weaponization of law will not continue to embrace lawfare warriors like New York Attorney General Letitia James (D). Others will use the rage of these times as a license to ignore legal and ethical obligations altogether. They are arguably the saddest manifestation of our political discord. They are people who have not just lost faith in our system but in themselves. They have become untethered from any defining principle for their own conduct. This election has left them adrift in a sea of moral and legal relativism, with only their rage as a following wind. They cling to that rage as reason vanishes like a distant shore. For the rest of us, there is work to be done as a nation committed to the rule of law. We cannot win at any cost when that cost is the very thing that defines us.

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She’s lost it all. But she can’t stop herself.

• Rachel Maddow Claims Trump is Trying To “Destroy The US Government” (MN)

MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow took a break from claiming she’s about to be thrown into a concentration camp to charge that president Trump is attempting to “destroy” the government. Maddow said, “I think the idea of the authoritarian promise is that everything shrivels in government other than the will of the leader, right?” She further claimed “You don’t necessarily put a Robert F. Kennedy Jr. in charge if you’re hoping for great things from HHS.” “Matt Gaetz, he has explicitly proposed abolishing the Justice Department, not specifically abolishing the FBI and the ATF but talking about abolishing the Justice Department,” she added. Maddow continued to blather, “Tulsi Gabbard as the Director of National Intelligence is, I mean, the idea that Tulsi Gabbard, in a normal circumstance, could get a security clearance to be like a Walmart-style greeter at any U.S. intelligence agency, let alone get past the security barriers, is insane.”

“So, you do that because you want the worst for these agencies, because you want the worst for the U.S. government because you think that the U.S. government is worthless,” she asserted. Why would Trump do all this? Well it’s all a big conspiracy to become a dictator… or something. “That’s part of consolidating power, to make the U.S. government nothing other than the leader and people who will do what he says,” Maddow claimed. She continued, “Steve Bannon used to say, it’s a sort of Leninist project, right? Destroy the state. This is the cabinet that you nominate to, not to run the U.S. government, to do anything, but to destroy the U.S. government.” “So that the U.S. government can be fundamentally reimagined as something much more like a unitary authoritarian or autocratic, for lack of a better term, system,” Maddow concluded, ending her paranoid rant. Or maybe, just maybe, people voted for reform and gave Trump a mandate to implement that, meaning putting people outside of the Washington establishment furniture into key positions.

Yeah, probably more likely that, right. As we highlighted earlier, all the right people are big mad at Trump’s appointments. Add to that list the disgraced former CIA Director John Brennan, who parroted absurd claims that Gabbard is some kind of Russian asset. “Clearly, Tulsi Gabbard has taken actions and made statements over the past several years that raise serious questions about her common sense, judgment, and political sympathies,” Brennan proclaimed. “Cozying up to Putin as well as to Bashar al-Assad shows she doesn’t have the type of perspective needed for someone who is going to head up these 18 intelligence agencies,” he further declared, labelling Gabbard “an unserious pick for a serious position.”

This coming from a guy who pushed the Russia hoax for years, and claimed the Hunter Biden laptop was a Russian psy op. He says everything is a Russian plot. His credibility is shot. Meanwhile, AOC ranted about Gabbard, ridiculously claiming she is “pro-war.” Anyone who has listened to Gabbard talk for more than five minutes knows this is the complete opposite of her actual position.

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“It has never passed, and is the only Cabinet-level department of the federal government never to do so.”

• Pentagon Spends $187 Mln on Audit, Fails Seventh Year in a Row (Sp.)

This year’s financial review, carried out by the DoD’s Office of the Inspector General and an independent accounting firm, employed 1,700 auditors and cost $187 million – slightly more than the entire defense budget of the West African nation of Mauritania. The US spent a record $824 billion on defense in 2024, $27 billion more than a year earlier. The US Department of Defense has failed its seventh consecutive audit, with more than half of its departments unable to provide auditors with sufficient data to accurately evaluate the status of hundreds of billions of dollars’ worth of assets under the Pentagon’s domain.

DoD comptroller and Chief Financial Officer Michael McCord – appointed by President Obama in 2014, and under whom the Pentagon failed every one of its independent audits since they began in 2017, assured in a statement that the Pentagon had “turned a corner in its understanding of the depth and breadth of its challenges” and promises to do better in the future. “Momentum is on our side, and throughout the Department there is strong commitment – and belief in our ability -to achieve an unmodified audit opinion,” McCord said. The Pentagon expects to receive a passing grade by 2028, as required in this year’s National Defense Authorization Act (the annual must-pass Congressional legislation approving the defense budget).

The audit’s failing grade was based on financial inspections of 28 subordinated bodies, with 15 receiving disclaimers (which means auditors were unable to obtain sufficient evidence to form an opinion on the financial statements being audited), nine unmodified audit opinions (that is, a reasonable level of assurance that financial statements represented a true and fair reflection of audit results), one a qualified opinion (issued when auditors identify material misstatements in financial statements), and three opinions which remain pending. Agencies that passed included the DoD’s Defense Commissary Agency (responsible for food supplies to servicemen and their families), the Defense Financial and Accounting Service (which oversees payments to servicemembers, employees, vendors and contractors), and the Defense Health Agency (supplying an ensuring the readiness of military medical commands).

The Defense Information Systems Agency, which provides IT and communications support to the services, the Military Retirement Fund, the National Reconnaissance Office (responsible for the operation of space and ground-based intelligence collection systems worldwide), the US Army Corps of Engineers’ Civil Works agency and the Defense Contract Audit Agency (responsible for contract audits and related financial advisory services) also passed. The Defense Threat Reduction Agency, mentioned in a series of damning intelligence briefings by Russia’s Radiological, Chemical and Biological Defense Troops on US illicit military biological activities in Ukraine and across the globe, also got a passing grade. McCord defended the results at a press conference on Friday.

“This was not a surprise and I know that on the surface it doesn’t sound like we are making progress,” he said. “I do not say we failed, as I said, we have about half clean opinions. We have half that our not clean opinions. So if someone had a report card that is half good and half not good, I don’t know that you call the student or the report card a failure,” he said. Passing an audit by the 2028 deadline is “achievable,” he said. Also this week, the DoD Inspector General’s Office calculated that Congress has now appropriated nearly $183 billion in assistance to Ukraine since February 2022, including $131.36 billion for security-related assistance and activities, and $43.84 billion for ‘governance and development’. The Department of Defense carried out its first independent audit in 2017, and has been legally mandated to do so since 2018. It has never passed, and is the only Cabinet-level department of the federal government never to do so.

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“They don’t feel “invested” in propping up Zelensky’s corrupt regime in the same way that the current Biden administration does..”

• Trump Team To Write Off ‘Project Ukraine’ as Sunk Cost (Sp.)

Donald Trump repeated his pledge to end the Ukraine conflagration as he addressed a gala organized by the America First Policy Institute at his Mar-a-Lago resort on November 15, saying that “the conflict has got to stop.” There is a general consensus within President-elect Donald Trump’s team that the failed “Project Ukraine” needs to be shut down, British political analyst Alexander Mercouris speculated on his YouTube channel. “Overall, despite different opinions and nuances among them, they have reached a general consensus that ‘Project Ukraine’ has absorbed a huge amount of energy and resources on the part of the United States, but it has not delivered what it promised. Ukraine has not been successful on the battlefield, there has been no economic collapse in Russia, and President Putin is still very firmly in control of things in Moscow,” the expert said.

In his opinion, these people, who come from the business world in many cases, have taken a simple “cost-benefit view”, and have agreed that “the time has come to close the whole thing down.” They don’t feel “invested” in propping up Zelensky’s corrupt regime in the same way that the current Biden administration does, according to the analyst. “They are resisting falling for the sunk costs fallacy, the one that says that you have already invested so much in terms of funding, weapons and resources that you can’t stop now,” Mercouris noted. Trump repeatedly said on the campaign trail that he could end the fighting “in 24 hours” if reelected; he slammed US aid to Kiev, and vowed not to put US troops on the ground in Ukraine.

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“..numerous Ukrainian officials – as well as their backers in the West – have proposed that Kiev lower the draft age even further..”

• Zelensky Wants To Intensify Military Draft (RT)

The tightening of mobilization rules earlier this year has failed to solve Ukraine’s manpower shortage on the battlefield, Vladimir Zelensky has admitted, adding that the relevant legislation should be adjusted. In an interview with Ukrainskoye Radio on Saturday, Zelensky said that Ukraine “has not mobilized” enough troops under two new laws were passed this spring after significant back-and-forth in parliament. The first lowered the draft age from 27 to 25, while the second cracked down on draft dodgers, forcing all citizens eligible for conscription to report to military authorities for “data clarification.”

At the same time, Zelensky rejected speculation that Ukraine had drafted half a million men while pointing to problems with the available replenishments for frontline units. “The brigades in the East are exhausted, rotation is needed. The guys are getting tired and leaving. They must be replaced with fresh units,” Zelensky said. He also admitted that the frontline situation is “really difficult” and that Russia has indeed managed to accomplish “slow progress.” Before this year’s tightening of the rules, Kiev had announced a general mobilization, barring most men between 18 and 60 from leaving the country. Recruitment has been marred by widespread bribery and draft-dodging, with some Ukrainians trying to flee the country at all costs, even at a serious risk to their lives.

Meanwhile, social media is filled with videos of military patrols trying to catch eligible men in the streets, shopping malls, and gyms, often resulting in clashes. Despite the intensification of the draft, Ukrainian soldiers have consistently complained of the lack of reinforcements and inadequate training for new recruits, leading to long rotations and exhaustion. In light of this, numerous Ukrainian officials – as well as their backers in the West – have proposed that Kiev lower the draft age even further. Some Ukrainian politicians have also argued that all the country’s citizens should dedicate themselves to fighting Russia either directly on the front lines or indirectly by helping the army in the rear.

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“..Trump “cannot afford for Ukraine to become his Afghanistan.”

• Ex-FM Warns Of Potential ‘Internal Collapse’ In Ukraine (RT)

Ukraine could face civil unrest and even a full-blown “collapse” if US President-elect Donald Trump reverses the outgoing administration’s policy of unconditional support for Kiev, former Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmitry Kuleba has warned. The election of Trump on November 5 prompted fears in Kiev that Washington would end financial and military aid and would strong-arm the country into an unfavorable settlement with Russia. “If the money were to dry up, a new dynamic would come into play, and not all of it on the battlefield. True, bereft of funding, Ukraine could lose ground completely,” Kuleba wrote in an op-ed published in The Economist on Wednesday. He argued that Ukraine could plunge into a civil conflict if the US forces it to sign a bad peace deal.

“If the Trump administration then imposed unpalatable peace terms on Ukraine, and if Mr. Zelensky agreed (an unlikely scenario), part of Ukrainian society would resist. Domestic unrest would risk the country’s internal collapse,” Kuleba wrote. This would give Russian President Vladimir Putin “the victory he has long desired, painting Ukraine as a failed state,” Kuleba suggested, warning that Trump “cannot afford for Ukraine to become his Afghanistan.” Throughout his election campaign, Trump claimed that he would quickly mediate a peace agreement between Kiev and Moscow, without specifying the terms. During a televised debate with Vice President Kamala Harris, he refused to directly answer a question on whether he wants Ukraine to win. “I want the war to stop,” he said at the time.

In June, Reuters reported that two of Trump’s advisers had drawn up a plan to reach a ceasefire based on the current front lines. The Trump campaign distanced itself from any concrete proposals, however. Kiev has long insisted that a peace deal can only be based on Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky’s ‘peace formula’, which includes the restoration of the country’s 1991 borders. Russia has rejected these terms wholesale, insisting that Ukraine should drop its aspirations to join NATO in favor of becoming a neutral country and renounce its claims on Crimea and other regions which voted in referendums to join Russia. Speaking to German Chancellor Olaf Scholz over the phone on Friday, Putin reiterated that the conflict “was a direct result of NATO’s long-standing aggressive policy” of ignoring Russia’s security concerns.

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“..authorization of the use of long-range missiles against targets deep inside Russia would place Moscow and NATO facing the near inevitability of a nuclear confrontation..”

• Moscow Continues To Warn The West About The Risk Of Nuclear Escalation (SCF)

Tensions over the issue of “deep” strikes continue to escalate. Kiev continues to demand permission to strike targets in the Russian Federation’s demilitarized zone, while Moscow continues to make it clear that it will interpret such maneuvers as a declaration of war by NATO. In a recent statement, Maria Zakharova, the spokeswoman for the Russian Foreign Ministry, emphasized how Ukrainians and their partners are “playing with fire” with such threats, promising an “immediate and devastating” response in the event of a long-range strike.

The Russian government has repeatedly stated that the long-range weapons systems supplied by the West to Ukraine cannot be operated without the presence of NATO specialists, who would provide the necessary training and logistical support to the Ukrainians. This is because such weapons are not compatible with the Ukrainian military infrastructure, which depends on continuous intelligence support and strategic guidance provided by the Atlantic alliance. Moscow’s position is clear: authorizing the use of these missiles for strikes outside the official conflict zone, in addition to representing an expansion of Western involvement, would constitute direct NATO intervention in the conflict. Russia would regard any use of these weapons in such circumstances as a direct aggression against its sovereignty by the Western countries themselves, which would require an “immediate and devastating” retaliation.

The discussion about the deployment of Storm Shadow missiles and other advanced weapons systems in “deep” Russian territory is a clear demonstration of the dangerous game the West is playing, ignoring all the limits imposed by Russia. NATO’s role in the war in Ukraine has been a sensitive issue since the beginning of the conflict. Although Western powers insist on their position of supporting Ukraine as a legitimate right to defend it against what they call a Russian “invasion”, many analysts and officials point out that the interventions of the powers of the Atlantic alliance, both in terms of weapons and intelligence, have led to an unnecessary prolongation of the conflict, dragging Ukraine into a proxy war that puts the world on the brink of a nuclear confrontation.

By offering more powerful and sophisticated weapons, the West is not only strengthening Kiev’s military capabilities – which seem to have little strategic relevance at the moment – but also risks turning the local conflict into a war of global proportions. Moscow’s concern is legitimate, considering that the absence of limits on Western involvement in Ukraine could lead to a situation of unrestricted aggression against the Russian people, including even demilitarized cities far from the zone disputed by Kiev.

Indeed, the eventual authorization of the use of long-range missiles against targets deep inside Russia would place Moscow and NATO facing the near inevitability of a nuclear confrontation. As spokeswoman Zakharova has made clear, Russia is on high alert for the use of advanced missiles against its territory. Moscow has repeatedly stated that if such attacks occur, Russia’s response will be strong and decisive. This would not only imply a military escalation, but also a redefinition of relations between Russia and the West, with the possibility of unpredictable consequences for international stability.

The recent changes in Russia’s nuclear doctrine, allowing a nuclear response to deep strikes by non-nuclear powers supported by nuclear states (just like in the Ukraine-NATO case), were a clear attempt by Moscow to de-escalate the current situation through rhetoric and indirect deterrence. At first, the measure seemed sufficient to calm public pressure from some NATO figures for the authorization of the strikes. However, it is difficult to predict what the Democratic “administration” plans to do in its final days in power, and it is possible that Biden and his team will go into “suicide mode” and put the entire global security architecture at risk, despite Russian warnings.

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“..large assets like the aircraft carriers are under heightened scrutiny to decide whether they are still a vital staple for modern warfare.”

• War Games Show UK’s Flagship Aircraft Carriers ‘Get Sunk’ Every Time (Sp.)

In a reflection of the UK’s host of internal political and economic problems, its Armed Forces have likewise been grappling with financial and operational woes. In most war games carried out by the UK military, its costly flagship aircraft carriers “get sunk”, The Times cited a source as saying. HMS Queen Elizabeth and HMS Prince of Wales, commissioned into the Royal Navy in 2017 and 2019, respectively, together cost £6.2 billion. (approx. $7.8 billion) to build but are reportedly vulnerable to missiles. A “whole load of scenarios” was run during war games to test the Royal Navy’s “ability to survive” against an “overwhelming force”, a British military source was quoted as saying, adding: “We stretch everything to the limit. At some point you will get to a scenario where it [the carrier] is sunk.”

The report cited Matthew Savill, director of military sciences at the Royal United Services Institute, as speculating that the great stride made in missile technology development was the ability to “locate and track” aircraft carriers. This comes amid an ongoing Strategic Defence Review commissioned by Britain’s Labor Prime Minister Keir Starmer, and overseen by the Defence Secretary John Healey. The review is due in the first half of 2025. Both ministers and military chiefs have been pressured to implement cost-cutting measures due to financial constraints. Hence, large assets like the aircraft carriers are under heightened scrutiny to decide whether they are still a vital staple for modern warfare.

“There will be casualties,” a source hinted, indicating that the prospect of scrapping at least one of the carriers was raised. Former Minister for Defence Procurement Lord Lee of Trafford told the outlet that the military was struggling to afford the requisite numbers of F-35 aircraft for the carriers, along with escort ships and support vessels. Decades of defense cuts by successive British governments have left the country’s military understaffed and underequipped, resulting in delays in production and upgrades. The HMS Queen Elizabeth and HMS Prince of Wales have both been plagued by technical malfunctions, with humiliating breakdowns affecting Britain’s ability to participate in large-scale joint NATO drills. Furthermore, the UK Ministry of Defence (MoD) is facing a £16.9 billion ($22.17 billion) deficit, the National Audit Office (NAO) revealed in 2023.

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“Hughes has also banned Yulia and Sergei Skripal from testifying at the Inquiry.”

• The Novichok Attack Was A British Operation, Not A Russian One (Helmer)

Yulia Skripal communicated from her bedside at Salisbury District Hospital on March 8, 2018, four days after she and her father Sergei Skripal collapsed from a poison attack, that the attacker used a spray; and that the attack took place when she and her father were eating at a restaurant just minutes before their collapse on a bench outside. The implication of the Skripal evidence, revealed for the first time on Thursday, is that the attack on the Skripals was not perpetrated by Russian military agents who were photographed elsewhere in Salisbury town at the time; that the attacker or attackers were British agents; and that if their weapon was a nerve agent called Novichok, it came, not from Moscow, but from the UK Ministry of Defence chemical warfare laboratory at Porton Down. Porton Down’s subsequent evidence of Novichok contamination in blood samples, clothing, car, and home of the Skripals may therefore be interpreted as British in source, not Russian.

This evidence was revealed by a police witness testifying at the Dawn Sturgess Inquiry in London on November 14. The police officer, retired Detective Inspector Keith Asman was in 2018, and he remains today the chief of forensics for the Counter Terrorism Policing (CTPSE) group which combines the Metropolitan and regional police forces with the Secret Intelligence Service (MI6) and the Security Service (MI5). According to Asman’s new disclosure, Yulia Skripal had woken from a coma and confirmed to the doctor at her bedside that she remembered the circumstances of the attack on March 4. What she remembered, she signalled, was not (repeat not) the official British Government narrative that Russian agents had tried to kill them by poisoning the front door-handle of the family home. The new evidence was immediately dismissed by the Sturgess Inquiry lawyer assisting Anthony Hughes (titled Lord Hughes of Ombersley), the judge directing the Inquiry. “We see there,” the lawyer put to Asman as a leading question, “the suggestion, which we now know not to be right, of course”. — page 72.

Hughes then interrupted to tell the witness to disregard what Skripal had communicated. “If the record that you were given there is right, someone suggested to her ‘Had you been sprayed’. She didn’t come up with it herself.” — page 73. Hughes continued to direct the forensics chief to disregard the hearsay of Skripal. “Anyway the suggestion that she had been sprayed in the restaurant didn’t fit with your investigations? A. [Asman] No, sir. LORD HUGHES: Thank you.” So far in in the Inquiry which began public sessions on October 14, this is the first direct sign of suppression of evidence by Hughes. Hearsay, he indicates, should be disregarded if it comes from the target of attack, Yulia Skripal. However, hearsay from British Government officials, policemen, and chemical warfare agents at Porton Down must be accepted instead. Hughes has also banned Yulia and Sergei Skripal from testifying at the Inquiry. The lawyer appointed and paid by the Government to represent the Skripals in the inquiry hearings said nothing to acknowledge the new disclosure nor to challenge Hughes’s efforts to suppress it.

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“Climate change could be roaring but the naked eye can’t see it.”

• Climate-Change Debate ‘Heats Up’ With Collum, Keen, Fleckenstein (ZH)

Steve Keen, while primarily an economist, is well-versed in the research and a firm believer in the danger climate change poses. Dave Collum, chemistry professor at Cornell, believes much of the science to be bogus. Legendary short-seller Bill Fleckenstein was kind enough to shepard them along. We hope you enjoy and that you give both Keen and Collum a fair shake: For those short on time, here were the highlights:

Poking holes in the ‘narrative’. Things heated up when Collum unleashed a flurry of charts documenting trends that run counter to what we hear from most climate alarmists: Today, we actually see fewer hurricanes, tornadoes, heat waves, and forest fires than decades past. Collum: “There’s no obvious change in the frequency of global hurricanes back to 1980… Back to 1990, it actually has a distinct downward trend… Here’s one that goes back to 1960. These are violent tornadoes. Again, downward trend.” “Climate change could be roaring but the naked eye can’t see it.”

“Potentially Suicidal”. Natural disasters aside, Keen brought his own charts showing the recent and rapid ascent of global temperature. If accurate, the rise in temperature in the last 150 years when viewed on an axis of millions of years is staggering. Keen: “That’s the real danger of climate change. We’ve built [civilization] in a stable period of the climate. We’re destroying that stability and thinking we can still have the social system we’ve designed… I just don’t think that’s true.”

Keen’s sources provided below: Judd, E. J., J. E. Tierney, D. J. Lunt, I. P. Montañez, B. T. Huber, S. L. Wing and P. J. Valdes (2024). “A 485-million-year history of Earth’s surface temperature.” Science 385(6715): eadk3705. https://www.science.org/doi/abs/10.1126/science.adk3705. Scotese, C. R., H. Song, B. J. W. Mills and D. G. Van Der Meer (2021). “Phanerozoic paleotemperatures: The earth’s changing climate during the last 540 million years.” Earth-Science Reviews 215: 103503. https://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.earscirev.2021.103503

Green New Deal? Assuming humanity put all its resources and minds together to avert the Earth’s heating… can it be done? Fleckenstein asked our distinguished guests whether they would support a “Green New Deal” (massive public spending effort to combat climate change): Collum: “My dad taught me this: Never ask the government to spend your money. They’ll do a terrible job.” “If we were serious about climate change… They should never put guys like John Kerry in charge as Climate Czar.” “Steve’s enthusiastic about intervening as scientists. But here’s the question I have is who is going to make these tough calls? Who has the right to sign off the informed consent to say we are going to cover the world with a blanket of particles to block the sun?” Keen argued that — while governments are inefficient — we do not have a choice. Keen: “I’ll go on record on saying that if we continue down the trends we’re doing right now… we’re going to destroy civilization before 2050.”

Read more …

 

 

 

 

SpaceX

 

 

Baron

 

 

Camelemon
https://twitter.com/i/status/1857448564957327748

 

 

Phare du Four

 

 

Coconut oil

 

 

Wolf

 

 

Doggy

 

 

Black hole
https://twitter.com/i/status/1857668215725285772

 

 

 

 

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Debt Rattle September 28 2021

Sep 282021
 
 September 28, 2021  Posted by at 8:49 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , ,  64 Responses »


Pablo Picasso Tête de femme 1926

 

• Covid-19 Mortality Risk Correlates Inversely With Vitamin D3 Status (medrxiv)
• Spike Protein, Dead Cells And Male Fertility (Chesnut)
• The Crazy Is Strong In This One… (Denninger)
• Pfizer CEO: “Normal Life” Won’t Return Without Regular COVID Vaccinations (SN)
• The Big Tell (Kunstler)
• Biden Says US Will Have A ‘Problem’ Until 98% Of Americans Are Vaccinated (RT)
• Gov. Hochul: New York To Deploy National Guard To Replace Unvaxxed Nurses (RCP)
• NY Healthcare Workers Who Refuse Vaccine Get No Unemployment Benefits (JTN)
• British Military To Deploy Trucks & Drivers Amid Fuel Supply Shortage (RT)
• AZ Audit Could Not Find the Identity of 86,391 Voters (GP)

 

 

 

 

Veritas
https://twitter.com/i/status/1442640198811242500

 

 

Aussie Senators
https://twitter.com/i/status/1442589710942027783

 

 

How many lives could have been saved?

• Covid-19 Mortality Risk Correlates Inversely With Vitamin D3 Status (medrxiv)

Background Much research shows that blood calcidiol (25(OH)D3) levels correlate strongly with SARS-CoV-2 infection severity. There is open discussion regarding whether low D3 is caused by the infection or if deficiency negatively affects immune defense. The aim of this study was to collect further evidence on this topic.

Methods Systematic literature search was performed to identify retrospective cohort as well as clinical studies on COVID-19 mortality rates versus D3 blood levels. Mortality rates from clinical studies were corrected for age, sex and diabetes. Data were analyzed using correlation and linear regression.

Results One population study and seven clinical studies were identified, which reported D3 blood levels pre-infection or on the day of hospital admission. They independently showed a negative Pearson correlation of D3 levels and mortality risk (r(17)=-.4154, p=.0770/r(13)=-.4886, p=.0646). For the combined data, median (IQR) D3 levels were 23.2 ng/ml (17.4 – 26.8), and a significant Pearson correlation was observed (r(32)=-.3989, p=.0194). Regression suggested a theoretical point of zero mortality at approximately 50 ng/ml D3.

Conclusions The two datasets provide strong evidence that low D3 is a predictor rather than a side effect of the infection. Despite ongoing vaccinations, we recommend raising serum 25(OH)D levels to above 50 ng/ml to prevent or mitigate new outbreaks due to escape mutations or decreasing antibody activity.

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“..the body being unable to clear the massive number of dead cells caused by the spike protein…”

• Spike Protein, Dead Cells And Male Fertility (Chesnut)

1) The continuous presence of spike protein will almost certainly cause male sterility via m6A methylation. Metformin suppresses m6A methylation! Covid-19 is not a blood vessel disease. It is a disease of impaired metabolism and autophagy (inducing senescence) caused by the spike protein’s massive upregulation of m6a methylation. The endothelial dysfunction is from the spike protein’s suppression of autophagy and simultaneous attack on ACE2 receptors. Epigenetic changes are reversible. A constant presence of spike protein will maintain the deleterious environment.

Once again, the medical establishment is completely incorrect as to the origins of the bioweapon that is SARS-CoV-2 and the disease that it causes. We are dealing with a VERY sophisticated bioweapon that impairs autophagy, metabolism and ion channels. I believe the hypercoagulation being observed is from the body being unable to clear the massive number of dead cells caused by the spike protein. The spike protein both causes massive damage and prevents its “cleanup. “

It has been determined that SARS-CoV-2 infection triggers a global increase in host m6A methylome, exhibiting altered localization and motifs of m6A methylation in mRNAs. M6A Methylation is also a hallmark of aging and is involved STERILITY. m6A modification could alter testosterone synthesis and develop oligospermia or azoospermia. These findings emphasize the essential role of m6A RNA modification in the regulation of autophagy and testosterone synthesis. THIS MAY RENDER MALES STERILE. As a result of increased m6A, m6A levels are increased on the mRNAs of ATG genes, and the transcripts of these genes became highly susceptible to degradation. Hence autophagy is suppressed. Recent research reveals that both m6A demethylases (FTO and ALKBH5) could positively regulate autophagy and showed that m6A modification is inversely associated with the autophagy process.

Several studies have suggested that there is a correlation between autophagy and the endothelial NO function. It has been shown that autophagy induction is associated with increased eNOS expression, whereas decreased autophagy is accompanied by down-regulation of the eNOS expression. It has been observed that in COVID-19 pathophysiological alterations lead to an imbalance NO production. Also, reduction of eNOS-derived NO production causes endothelial dysfunction, which represents a risk factor for severe COVID-19. It is without a doubt that repeated exposure to the spike protein must be avoided. Period.

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“..every “infection” reported now, over 100,000 a day, is another person who has no reason to ever accept a jab.”

• The Crazy Is Strong In This One… (Denninger)

Those who have refused thus far fall into three broad categories:

• They’ve seen others they know get the jab and have a very bad outcome. They’re unwilling because they know damn well its dangerous as they’ve seen it with their own eyes. You cannot bull**** those people with “safe” since they’ve watched a loved one, close associate or someone in their immediate vicinity get hammered after taking it, and they’re not going to put their own ass in that position. No way, no how. They may in fact be willing to kill anyone who tries to enforce such a mandate on them because, as they see it, taking the jab means they’re dead already, so there is no downside to taking you to Hell with them. I cannot argue with that logic. Just last afternoon I saw an ambulance outside a local drugstore that dispenses jabs while waiting for a traffic light; the doors were open and the lights on. That wasn’t a “pleasure call” and the several hundred people who witnessed it while at that intersection knew damn well what probably happened. Nobody who sees a life-threatening or fatal incident associated with these jabs and has more than 2 firing neurons in their head is going to allow you anywhere near them with a needle.

• They’re presumptively immune as they’ve had Covid-19 and recovered. The CDC claims that, as of this point, that’s 41 million Americans. For them there is zero benefit, prospective or otherwise, to taking the jab and they know it. Even Washington’s much-ballyhooed “mandate” to take the smallpox inoculation by his troops (which killed a decent number of them, by the way) is bull**** for those individuals; Washington did not inoculate himself because he previously had smallpox and survived. He wasn’t stupid and neither are these people. This is not a small percentage of the population; by the NEJM numbers about 20% of the US Population as of May had been infected with and recovered from Covid-19. Today, given the “summer surge”, that is very likely to be 25% or better and I would not take a bet it’s less than 1 in 3 since the CDC’s “tested positive” numbers exclude a huge number of people who were never tested but conclusively had Covid-19. Incidentally, I’m among them, as I’ve detailed in these pages yet neither I or two other close associates are in the CDC’s numbers as none of us were ever tested or saw a physician for the disease yet we all, quite-clearly, had it and recovered. Not accounting for that is criminally insane on the part of the Administration and legally, morally and ethically unsupportable. The “mandate” will, I predict, fail for this reason alone in the fullness of time and legal challenge. If I can self-attest to having had chicken pox (and I most-certainly can) then there’s no reason someone can’t in this case.

• They’ve seen others they personally know who got the jab and then got infected and hammered. They know the claim that it “prevents severe disease or death” is bull****. They’ve seen with their own eyes a close associate or family member go from no symptoms to near death in a couple of days or less and know damn well what an unvaccinated person gets when they’re infected and gets hammered as we’ve all seen that on the TeeVee, from the punditry and in the statistics; typically you get the virus, develop symptoms and a week or more later you’re in bad enough shape to go to the ER. When someone they know, who was jabbed, goes down the ****ter in 24 hours that irretrievably blows up any claim of “effective” and raises the specter of the jab making the infection worse. Those people are in the same bucket as the first if you try to force them to take it as they’ve seen what happened to someone else.

Biden’s problem with these “mandates” is that both the second and third group are rapidly growing in size; every “infection” reported now, over 100,000 a day, is another person who has no reason to ever accept a jab. Every ten days 1 million people are added to the group that have every legal, ethical, moral and medical reason to say “**** you!” to any Covid-19 jab mandate; these people got Covid-19 and survived; they have immunity and thus the jab offers them nothing. Push them hard enough and some percentage of them may go medieval on anyone and everyone they assign blame to and no, there aren’t enough cops to stop that (never mind that some cops may be among them since they’ve been exposed and infected as “essential workers” for the last 18 months!) if that happens.

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Don’t.

• Pfizer CEO: “Normal Life” Won’t Return Without Regular COVID Vaccinations (SN)

The CEO of the pharmaceutical giant Pfizer says that normal life will return within a year, but not for those who don’t have regular COVID-19 vaccinations. During an appearance on ABC This Week with George Stephanapoulos, Albert Bourla was asked about when he foresaw the end of the pandemic. “Within a year, I think we will be able to come back to normal life,” said Bourla, although he made it very clear that this statement only applies to those who are prepared to take regular coronavirus booster shots. “I don’t think that this means that variants will not be continuing coming,” Bourla added. “And I don’t think that this means that we should be able to live our lives without having vaccinations, basically.” Bourla said that the “most likely scenario” was “annual re-vaccinations” due to the emergence of “new variants.”


The Pfizer’s CEO’s comments on annual vaccinations are interesting given that the FDA has so far only approved booster shots for elderly people and “high risk individuals.” Bourla’s rhetoric is similar to that espoused by Moderna CEO Stephane Bancel, who said last week that even younger people will have to get vaccine booster shots at least once every three years. This once again underscores how a two tier society is being created where only those who submit to regular shots will be able to enjoy a relatively normal lifestyle. For those who continue to refuse to be vaccinated, travel, employment and potentially even basic leisure activities will continue to be curtailed, leaving them in a de facto state of lockdown indefinitely.

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“Is that what a “vaccine” is supposed to do? Enhance disease transmission? If the public is not already bamboozled enough, that one will probably seal the deal.”

• The Big Tell (Kunstler)

Meanwhile, New York state’s vax mandate for all health care workers goes into effect today. The order will cripple health care for certain now in a state already suffering crisis-level short-staffing in hospitals — largely due to the years-long effort of for-profit hospitals to shed employees, especially nurses, while padding the multi-million-dollar salaries of executives who run hospital conglomerates. Andrew Cuomo’s replacement, the disastrous new governor Kathy Hochul, declared hilariously last week that health care workers fired for vax refusal can be replaced by workers from foreign lands.

Of course, the US health care establishment was already imploding under the weight of embedded racketeering, and the mandated shots to workers will now deliver the coup-de-grace. This is on top of the fact that the public’s trust and respect for doctors is starting to edge out even its low esteem for the politicians who assist these racketeering operations. The medical profession that took for its motto first do no harm looks increasingly like an accomplice to mass murder — suppressing effective early treatments of Covid, promoting the known iatrogenic fiascos of intubation and Remdesivir, continuing to use the discredited PCR tests, and utilizing a VAERS system with such a defective website that doctors can’t be bothered to even report harmful reactions to vaccines while the medical bureaucrats hide and game whatever data leaks through their mighty filters. Not to mention developing the Covid-19 bioweapon in the first place and then a toxic vaccine to neatly finish the job.

In another pandemic development, CNN’s go-to doctor and vaccine pusher, Leana Wen of George Washington University, declared startlingly that vaccinated people are now a threat to the unvaccinated because the vaxed carry high viral loads, making them efficient Covid-19 spreaders. Is that what a “vaccine” is supposed to do? Enhance disease transmission? If the public is not already bamboozled enough, that one will probably seal the deal.

Which leads the non-bamboozled to suspect that we are in the midst of a monumental two-year psy-op by malevolent political forces bent on the totalistic domination of daily life in order to change it from the top down, mainly against the peoples’ wishes. There are many theories as to why. The most popular one is that the economic elite want to greatly reduce the global population for the good of the planet. That would be a pretty severe project if true. It’s hard to conceive of such megalomania outside a James Bond movie. But otherwise, you’re left with the somewhat unsatisfying conclusion that, as the old political weasel-phrase goes, mistakes were made. Yeah, for sure, but after making the first half-dozen or so mistakes, you’d think that honorable people would just cop to their errors and change course. That this hasn’t happened is the Big Tell.

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Note how the number keeps rising.

• Biden Says US Will Have A ‘Problem’ Until 98% Of Americans Are Vaccinated (RT)

US President Joe Biden had his third dose of Pfizer’s Covid-19 vaccine administered live before the White House press corps, insisting the ‘unvaccinated’ were a problem for America and urging everyone to get their shots. Biden was injected on Monday at a televised event inside the Eisenhower Executive Office building, telling the reporters he was doing so because the regulators had declared the Pfizer-made boosters “safe and effective.” A CNN reporter pointed out that Monday’s booster event was historic – the first time a sitting president was getting the coronavirus vaccine on camera. While Biden took both of his original doses on camera, that was before he was sworn in. His predecessor Donald Trump, who recovered from Covid-19 in October 2020, was reportedly vaccinated before he left the White House, but not publicly.

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recommended the boosters last week, but rejected the White House’s call to apply them to the general adult population. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) went a step further, expanding the booster advisory to “those in high risk occupational and institutional settings” on Thursday. Biden doubled down on calling the current situation with the coronavirus in the US “a pandemic of the unvaccinated,” and repeated a joke he made on Friday about being over 65 and therefore needing a booster shot. “Please, please do the right thing. Please get the shot,” he said at the event. “It can save your life. It can save the lives of those around you. And it’s easy, accessible, and it’s free.”

Asked how many Americans needed to be vaccinated, he said maybe 98%. “But I’m not the scientist. I think one thing is for certain. A quarter of the country can’t go unvaccinated and us not continue to have a problem,” he added. “About 23% haven’t gotten any shots, and that distinct minority is causing an awful lot of damage for the rest of the country,” he said. While some praised Biden for answering questions “all the way through” and not flinching at the needle, others pointed out that he refused to answer questions about the border crisis. According to the Department of Homeland Security, around 12,000 migrants from Haiti who had come across the US-Mexico border illegally have been released inside the country, though their makeshift camp under a bridge in Del Rio, Texas has been dismantled.

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Hochul
https://twitter.com/i/status/1442579915510005760

How cuckoo is this woman really?

• Gov. Hochul: New York To Deploy National Guard To Replace Unvaxxed Nurses (RCP)

New York Gov. Hochul said Friday that the state will deploy the National Guard to fill expected staff shortages as unvaccinated nurses and hospital workers are fired effective tonight. “Our top priority remains staying ahead of this constantly changing virus and protecting New Yorkers with effective, long-lasting vaccines,” said Gov. Kathy Hochul. “As we’ve heard from our federal and State medical and health experts, as with many other vaccines, the protection from the COVID-19 vaccine can wane over time. A booster dose of the COVID-19 vaccine will help particularly at-risk New Yorkers stay protected from the virus for longer. While the focus of our vaccination effort remains ensuring all unvaccinated New Yorkers get vaccinated, those who are booster eligible should waste no time receiving maximum protection from COVID-19 as soon as possible.”

https://twitter.com/i/status/1442629323870121989

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But of course. Worked their asses off for 20 months and here’s the reward.

• NY Healthcare Workers Who Refuse Vaccine Get No Unemployment Benefits (JTN)

Health-care employees in New York who are fired for refusing to comply with a state law requiring them to have the COVID-19 vaccine to continue working will not be able to collect unemployment benefits, according to the New York Department of Labor. Starting Monday, hospitals and nursing homes workers across the state must have received at least one dose of the vaccine. And employees working in home care, hospice and adult care facilities must be vaccinated by October 7. The mandate also applies to all out-of-state and contract medical staff who practice in New York, unless they present a doctor-approved request for medical accommodation.


“Workers in a healthcare facility, nursing home, or school who voluntarily quit or are terminated for refusing an employer-mandated vaccination” are not eligible for unemployment insurance because the employer has a “compelling interest” for its employees to be vaccinated, reads the New York Department of Labor website, according to Insider. New York Democratic Gov. Kathy Hochul has said she is prepared to call in medically trained National Guard members and workers outside the state to aid with a potential shortage of healthcare workers once the mandate takes effect and some people are no longer eligible to come to work, Insider also reports.

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A winter of disconnect.

• British Military To Deploy Trucks & Drivers Amid Fuel Supply Shortage (RT)

The British army could soon deploy its own fuel tankers to fill a major logistics gap caused by a lack of lorries and drivers, with some petrol stations running dry in some areas as deliveries have all but ground to a halt. UK Defence Secretary Ben Wallace announced the plans on Monday night, with the government stating that army tanker drivers would receive specialized training to “enable them to seamlessly work with industry to address the supply chain pressures.” “The men and women of our armed forces stand ready to alleviate the transport pressures where they are felt most. That is why I have authorised their increased preparedness so they are ready to respond if needed,” he said, as quoted by Sky News.

The announcement comes after several days of panic-buying across the UK, driven by fears of a possible fuel shortage, leaving some stations out of gasoline due to the sudden surge in demand. British officials, however, insist there is no supply shortage, but rather a lack of delivery trucks and drivers needed to distribute the fuel. Before Wallace’s statement, Environment Secretary George Eustice denied reports of any army involvement, saying that there were “no plans at the moment” to do such a thing, though he did acknowledge that military personnel would remain on “standby.” Business Secretary Kwasi Kwarteng submitted a Military Aid to the Civil Authorities (MACA) request to the army to secure drivers if needed.

He argued that while “the UK continues to have strong supplies of fuel,” the request was a “sensible, precautionary step,” adding that he expects demand to return to normal levels “in the coming days.” Nonetheless he said that the government is “aware of supply chain issues at fuel station forecourts and are taking steps to ease these as a matter of priority.” If required, the deployment of military personnel will provide the supply chain with additional capacity as a temporary measure to help ease pressures caused by spikes in localised demand for fuel. Echoing Kwarteng, Eustice noted that the spate of panic-buying, which continued through the weekend, was now “calming down” and that consumers were returning to “normal buying habits.”

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“If you can’t be found using these credentials, something is definitely wrong.”

• AZ Audit Could Not Find the Identity of 86,391 Voters (GP)

The Arizona audit could not find an identity match on 86,391 people. This is disclosed on Page 56 of the “Results Details” report. These Maricopa voters cast ballots in Nov 2020 and don’t seem to exist. The ones registered as Democrat or selected no party affiliation represent a whopping 73.8% of these unknown voters. That’s 63,757 ballots. Not selecting a party makes monitoring of nefarious registrations much harder as everything not R or D is bulked together as “Other”. Even the new State voter registration form now only has only 3 categories (R, D, Other) and some registration reporting reduced to similar. Cyber Ninja’s used Melissa Personator which is arguably the best commercial service to validate U.S. or Canadian identities.


It scours private and government databases including USPS and Social Security Administration. Cyber Ninja’s oddly concludes most of these “unknowns” might be real people that just have limited public records. Our name, DOB, SS#, and address are in every State and Fed database. If you can’t be found using these credentials, something is definitely wrong. The Ninja’s didn’t consider Maricopa’s history, it’s registration battles, or issues with non-citizen voters. They make no consideration the database might have been manipulated but know it was hacked Nov. 5th 2020. Had the Senate subpoenaed Maricopa’s VRAS servers and tasked CyFIR to investigate, we might know a whole lot more.

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Another day in Australia

 

 

 

 

 

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Debt Rattle September 24 2021

Sep 242021
 
 September 24, 2021  Posted by at 8:40 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , ,  78 Responses »


Vincent van Gogh A Restaurant at Asnieres 1887

 

• Why Are We Vaccinating Children Against Covid-19? (Elsevier)
• Full Covid Genome Found In Stools – Meaning For Prevention And Treatments (VC)
• Directed Evolution I – When Applied To People Is Eugenics (Anandamide)
• Directed Evolution II – Gates Got Your Tongue? (Anandamide)
• ‘Covid-19 Will Become Like Common Cold’ By Next Spring, Say Experts (INews)
• Covid-19 Pandemic Will Be Over In A Year – Moderna CEO (RT)
• You, In Fact, Have ALL The Power. Use It (Denninger)
• Scientists Slam Chris Whitty For Scare-mongering Over Unjabbed Children (DM)
• Americans Have No Clue What the True COVID Numbers Are (Mercola)
• DeSantis Acquires New Monoclonal Antibodies From UK Drug Firm (JTN)
• YouTube Promises Pullback On Covid Censorship (JTN)
• Arizona Audit for Dummies (Ivory Hecker)
• Agustín Carstens: Would You Buy A Dieting Régime From This Man? (Ward)

 

 

Perth nurses

 

 

Rebel News Melbourne

 

 

 

 

Toronto
https://twitter.com/i/status/1441015146609094659

 

 

Israel

 

 

The second narrative-damning report published by Science Direct in a week.

Robert W Malone, MD: “In summary, the value of these COVID-19 inoculations is not obvious from a cost-benefit perspective for the most vulnerable age demographic, and is not obvious from any perspective for the least vulnerable age demographic.”

“Thus, our extremely conservative estimate for risk-benefit ratio is about 5/1. In plain English, people in the 65+ demographic are five times as likely to die from the inoculation as from COVID-19 under the most favorable assumptions! ”

• Why Are We Vaccinating Children Against Covid-19? (Elsevier)

Adequate safety testing of the COVID-19 inoculations would have provided a distribution of the outcomes to be expected from ‘lighting the match’. Since adequate testing was not performed, we have no idea how many combustible materials are on the floor, and what the expected outcomes will be from ‘lighting the match’. The injection goes two steps further than the wild virus because 1) it contains the instructions for making the spike protein, which several experiments are showing can cause vascular and other forms of damage, and 2) it bypasses many front-line defenses of the innate immune system to enter the bloodstream directly in part. Unlike the virus example, the injection ensures there will always be some combustible materials on the floor, even if there are no other toxic exposures or behaviors.

In other words, the spike protein and the surrounding LNP are toxins with the potential to cause myriad short-, mid-, and long-term adverse health effects even in the absence of other contributing factors! Where and when these effects occur will depend on the biodistribution of the injected material. Pfizer’s own biodistribution studies have shown the injected material can be found in myriad critical organs throughout the body, leading to the possibility of multi-organ failure. And these studies were from a single injection. Multiple injections and booster shots may have cumulative effects on organ distributions of inoculant! The COVID-19 reported deaths are people who died with COVID-19, not necessarily from COVID-19. Likewise, the VAERS deaths are people who have died following inoculation, not necessarily from inoculation.

As stated before, CDC showed that 94 % of the reported deaths had multiple comorbidities, thereby reducing the CDC’s numbers attributed strictly to COVID-19 to about 35,000 for all age groups. Given the number of high false positives from the high amplification cycle PCR tests, and the willingness of healthcare professionals to attribute death to COVID-19 in the absence of tests or sometimes even with negative PCR tests, this 35,000 number is probably highly inflated as well. On the latter issue, both Virginia Stoner [85] and Jessica Rose [86] have shown independently that the deaths following inoculation are not coincidental and are strongly related to inoculation through strong clustering around the time of injection. Our independent analyses of the VAERS database reported in Appendix 1 confirmed these clustering findings.

Additionally, VAERS historically has under-reported adverse events by about two orders-of-magnitude, so COVID-19 inoculation deaths in the short-term could be in the hundreds of thousands for the USA for the period mid-December 2020 to the end of May 2021, potentially swamping the real COVID-19 deaths. Finally, the VAERS deaths reported so far are for the very short term. We have no idea what the death numbers will be in the intermediate and long-term; the clinical trials did not test for those. The clinical trials used a non-representative younger and healthier sample to get EUA for the injection. Following EUA, the mass inoculations were administered to the very sick (and first responders) initially, and many died quite rapidly. However, because the elderly who died following COVID-19 inoculation were very frail with multiple comorbidities, their deaths could easily be attributed to causes other than the injection (as should have been the case for COVID-19 deaths as well).

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HCQ and IVM.

• Full Covid Genome Found In Stools – Meaning For Prevention And Treatments (VC)

“You heard it here first, COVID-20,” said Dr. Sabine Hazan on Sept. 16 during a discussion with the Ventura County Reporter at the offices of Ventura Clinical Trials and ProgenaBiome in Ventura. “We are already starting to see COVID-20-associated diarrhea and rectal bleeding.” She agreed to talk about findings in a ProgenaBiome report currently undergoing peer review. It is the first study she is aware of that finds the entire genome — along with 33 different mutations — in the stools of those with SARS-CoV-2. The paper, “Detection of SARS-CoV-2 from Patient Fecal Samples by Whole Genome Sequencing,” authored by Dr. Andreas Papaoutis, Jordan Daniels, Skylar Steinberg, Dr. Brad Barrows and Dr. Sabine Hazan (all with ProgenaBiome) and Dr. Thomas Borody and Dr. Siba Dolai of the Center for Digestive Diseases. (1)

That paper reports on the existence of hundreds of thousands of replicas of the complete genome of the virus in the stool samples of people who tested positive by nasal swab PCR testing, both symptomatic and asymptomatic. By using Next Generation Sequencing (NGS) the researchers identified 33 unique variations of the virus, indicating a high propensity for mutations, potentially making treatment by something as fine-tuned as a vaccine extremely challenging. The report also shows the initial findings of the clinical trial studying whether a combination treatment protocol called HAZDPaC (which includes hydroxychloroquine, azithromycin, zinc and Vitamins C and D) or high dosages of Vitamin C, D and Zinc alone (the placebo in the trial) may prove effective in eradicating the virus from the gut, where it could potentially cause long-lasting problems if left to “percolate.”

Eleven of 14 trial participants were positive (nasal swab PCR) for the virus. Eight of those people were not treated and the full virus genome was found in each of their stool samples. A total of 33 unique mutations of the virus were identified in those eight participants. The remaining three people who had the virus were treated for 10 days with HAZDPaC or high dosages of Vitamin C; when retested, they had no trace of the virus in their stools. Three additional trial participants served as the “control.” Two were negative (nasal swab PCR); one was not tested. None were treated and no virus was detected in stools. Until the report is printed as a peer reviewed paper (currently in process) it cannot be relied upon for other clinical study or purposes. But Hazan is confident of the findings’ ultimate confirmation through peer review.

[..] The initial protocols used in the FDA trial were formulated as a hypothesis to reach the ACE-2 receptors but also to destroy the virus. The treatment ProgenaBiome is using occupies those spots. Zinc fills up the ACE-2 receptors so there is nowhere for the virus to “park,” helping to maintain the gut barrier. Vitamins C and D boost the good gut bacteria. Hydroxychloroquine’s role is to raise the pH of the lysosome, or stomach of the cells. “If you change the pH in lysosome with medication, you change the pH…to 9 or 9.5. It’s a super alkaline environment and the virus disappears, it cannot replicate on the next cell. And so you stop the reproduction.” (2) With nowhere to go and unable to replicate, the virus is quickly evacuated by the bowel.

“At least that’s the hypothesis from the mechanism of action of all these products brought together as one formula. It’s not a one-pill solution,” said Hazan. She thinks earlier studies involving hydroxychloroquine were flawed because they were only using that one drug approach.

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“To supercharge such a narrow directed evolution experiment, it is best to lower the defenses of the host. Tie all of their foot soldiers boots together.”

• Directed Evolution I – When Applied To People Is Eugenics (Anandamide)

Is there Spike Escape? This is hot debate stimulated by Geert Vanden Bossche. The critiques levied against his hypothesis (March 15th) are not completely compelling as more evidence matures demonstrating the waning protection of the vaccines and frequent transmission of the virus in Israel, Iceland and many other highly vaccinated countries. The premise of the argument against Geert appear to be rooted in a technophiles desire to always change the treatment. This is a desire to obtain the ultimate ring of power: A vax platform one can continually update (with no liability) and mandate to return freedom to its subjugates. I am more optimistic than Geert in that I believe many jurisdictions have enough natural immunity to thwart this experiment and the pandemic will cool down once all the vaccinated experience and develop immunity to the full 29kb virus.

So do we have Spike Escape? A frequent question these days but more akin to a retrospective “Oh Shit” inquiry. While it is deserving of its own captain obvious meme, it is important to explain why this is not only the expected outcome but how re-applying the same selective agent will only accelerate the escape. The more parsimonious response: If you can’t detect selection against the spike RNA sequence, you have no basis upon which to claim your vaccine has influence over this evolutionary experiment we have engaged in. This isn’t a small experiment. This is the grandest medical experiment ever imagined so it is important we reflect on the type of selection being applied.

These are non-sterilizing vaccines. There is a difference between being infected (RNA+) and being infectious (Virus+ and shedding). Non-Sterilizing vaccines leave the breakthrough patients as both. They can be PCR positive with a new virus. It can be replicative and have similar Ct scores as the unvaccinated control and the vaccinated can still transmit the virus. There are suggested benefits of these vaccines ( and risks) but one such benefit is not the reduction of RNA polymerase activity and evolution of the virus. The selection being applied is very narrow compared to how our bodies traditionally fight viruses and how most vaccines prior to 2020 fight viruses. 4,284 bases of this ~29,500 base pair virus (14% of the virus) encode the spike protein of a spike-only vaccine. This is a very narrow pressure point and is akin to using low dose antibiotics across the whole population… all at the same time.

In other evolutionary fights in medicine, narrow is naive. We fight sepsis with broad scale antibiotics. We fight cancer with cocktails that attack multiple pathways to prevent mutagensis. These are genomic diseases and one trick pony solutions are a hubristic trainwreck. To supercharge such a narrow directed evolution experiment, it is best to lower the defenses of the host. Tie all of their foot soldiers boots together. Get a good head start for your RdRp polymerase to kick into high gear. Promiscuous copying of viral genomes with low fidelity and a pinpointed selective pressure on a narrow region of the genome.

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“More than one way to skin a cat…. but dont skin cats!! We kill bats.”

• Directed Evolution II – Gates Got Your Tongue? (Anandamide)

This is an excellent presentation on the evolutionary trajectory of SARs-CoVs-2 and just as fascinating as the genomics, is the content that is explicitly not spoken about. You see, NextStrain and GISAID all have alot of uncle Bills grant money and he loves vaccines so much, that he has over $100M in BioNtech stock and CureVac stock tucked away in the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. As a result, many people in the Epi space we affectionately refer to as the Nerd Sweater Mafia…. they know to never speak ill of vaccines. See if you can find the word vaccine anywhere in the first 24 minutes of this very well done analysis on the directed evolution of this virus. The fascinating aspect of this presentation is that it highlights the mutational spectrum of C19 during 2021 and it is as clear as day that there is a massive enrichment for mutations in the spike protein compared to other parts of the genome.

There is also a lot of squid ink diverting the viewers attention as to the cause of this. Let’s look at the running hypothesis they float to explain such an enrichment of mutagenesis in spike. 1.Natural selection against Host immunity. Note the language.. not vaccine immunity.. host immunity. Blame the victim some more and redirect attention from the obvious selective pressure going on with “Spike only vaccination” to those immunocompromised people (the ones you need to get vaccinated to save). Note at 8:52 he mentions this is speculative as they didn’t see any of this happening in the Spring 2020 during the ‘first’ pandemic wave. Remember this point as the emergence date of C19 continues to back into October 2019 with WIV employees losing their sense of smell. The first wave (in Trevor’s eyes) is only the wave he could see with qPCR but he forgets that viruses with R0 this high are unlikely to be at their first rodeo when we wise up and point our sequencers at them.

They begin to see spike mutagenesis in the fall of 2020 but it really takes off in 2021. This is where they will play their magic tricks. They will claim this was witnessed before the vax roll out therefore the vax is innocent. Watch them like a hawk. A fly in their ointment: You will also see them speak about convergent evolution being evident (min 20+) in the data which refutes their own chronological argument that attempts to blame this on pre-vax “partially immune” people. Convergent evolution is where the same mutations appear to evolve independently over and over again around the world as similar selective pressures are applied. The polymerase doesn’t make random errors. It has propensity to make some of the same errors due to the sequence context of the virus.

This means an ORF8 deletion can occur in Africa and Australia independently without anyone traveling between the two continents to spread it there. There are also similar selective pressures being applied in geographically distant places. In some of these cases, we can see different RNA variants emerge across the globe which may differ at a RNA sequence level but code for the same amino acid change. Let’s take the UUC codon for Phenylalanine. You can mutate it to UUA or UUG and still code for the same alternative amino acid Leucine. More than one way to skin a cat…. but dont skin cats!! We kill bats.

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6 more months of misery.

“If you look at the trajectory we’re on, we’re a lot better off than we were six months ago… I think we’re over the worst of it now.”

• ‘Covid-19 Will Become Like Common Cold’ By Next Spring, Say Experts (INews)

Covid-19 could soon resemble the common cold as the virus weakens and people’s immunity is boosted by vaccines and exposure, two leading experts have said. Professor Sir John Bell, regius professor of medicine at Oxford University, has claimed the coronavirus could become like a cold by as soon as next spring. He also claimed the UK “is over the worst” of the pandemic and things “should be fine” once winter has passed. Professor Dame Sarah Gilbert, the co-creator of the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine, has made similar claims and said Covid-19 will become like a cold as it is unlikely to mutate into a dangerous variant. Speaking to a Royal Society of Medicine webinar last night, she said that viruses tend to become weaker as they spread.


She said: “We normally see that viruses become less virulent as they circulate more easily and there is no reason to think we will have a more virulent version of Sars-CoV-2 [Covid-19]. “We tend to see slow genetic drift of the virus and there will be gradual immunity developing in the population as there is to all the other seasonal coronaviruses.” Seasonal coronaviruses cause colds, and Dame Sarah said: “Eventually Sars-CoV-2 will become one of those.” Sir John was asked about the experts comments on Times Radio this morning, where he said the country’s position is much more promising than it was just six months ago. He said: “If you look at the trajectory we’re on, we’re a lot better off than we were six months ago… I think we’re over the worst of it now.” Sir John added that because cause numbers are currently high, immunity to Covid will increase substantially.

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This guy is a salesman, not a scientist.

• Covid-19 Pandemic Will Be Over In A Year – Moderna CEO (RT)

The CEO of US pharma giant Moderna, Stephane Bancel, has come up with a reassuring forecast, suggesting that increasing vaccine production could see the coronavirus pandemic finally coming to an end in mid-2022. “If you look at the industry-wide expansion of production capacities over the past six months, enough doses should be available by the middle of next year so that everyone on this Earth can be vaccinated,” Bancel said in an interview with Swiss newspaper Neue Zuercher Zeitung. There’ll be jabs available even for infants soon as well as booster doses for those who would require them, he said. “Those who don’t get vaccinated will immunize themselves naturally because the Delta variant is so contagious,” the chief executive pointed out.

According to Bancel, the situation with Covid-19 will become similar to the one with flu. “You can either get vaccinated and have a good winter. Or you don’t do it and risk getting sick and possibly even ending up in hospital.” When asked when humanity will be able to exit the pandemic, which already saw over 219 million people infected and more than 4.5 million dead, and return to normal life, he replied: “As of today, in a year, I assume.” Moderna’s two-dose Covid-19 vaccine is approved in some 100 countries, while also being one of three drugs used in the immunization campaign in the US. The jab boasts a high efficacy rate of 93% six months after the administration of its second shot, barely waning from the 94.5% reported during its phase-three clinical trials.

However, Bancel insisted that those vaccinated would “undoubtedly” need a refresher at some point to stay protected from the virus. He said he expects younger people to get a booster shot once every three years and older people – once a year. Moderna’s booster contains half a dose of the active ingredient compared to the original injection, which provides the company with a further opportunity to increase production, he said. “The volume of vaccine is the biggest limiting factor. With half the dose, we would have three billion doses available worldwide for the coming year instead of just two billion,” the CEO explained.

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“So let’s say your really don’t like the idea of a vexxing mandate on employers in your state or county. Fine. Find the appropriate legislators and picket their house.

That’s legal. It’ll******them off but so what?”

• You, In Fact, Have ALL The Power. Use It (Denninger)

You think OSHA has the power? Biden? Wrong. The Founders gave us a government structure intentionally designed to give the people the tools necessary to prevent what is being done right now. The closer to the people – that is, the smaller the division of government – the less-likely it is that anyone serving in said government in a legislative role is doing that on an exclusive, or nearly-so, basis. Most State Legislatures are part-time; that is, they meet for a couple months out of the year, plus the rare special session here and there. Essentially all County Commissions and City Alderman (or whatever they call them in your town) are. Every one of those people is utterly reliant on either a job or a business they own or control to put food on their table, keep their house and feed their family — just like you are. They’re just as vulnerable to attack on that means of earning a living as you are as well so why don’t you use it and go after them when they threaten to or actually do it to you?

Every single place I have ever lived required any business to obtain a county license, most business require state registration (even if only for sales tax) and a large percentage require licensing of either the firm, certain people in it, or both. The County or State can pass an ordinance requiring any non-discriminatory code of conduct they choose on said firms as a condition of that license. Refuse to comply, you’re closed right here, right now. Period. It doesn’t matter who you are — a hospital, a car dealer, a grocery store, a restaurant, etc. Done through regular legislative order these ordinances (or in the case of a state, laws) are presumptively valid and enforceable. So let’s say your really don’t like the idea of a vexxing mandate on employers in your state or county. Fine. Find the appropriate legislators and picket their house.

That’s legal. It’ll******them off but so what? There’s not a damned thing they can do about it. That’s personal pressure and it won’t be long before their spouse and kids start getting really unhappy. Which, of course, is the point — to make them unhappy enough that they fold. But the best pressure that can be applied through legal means is economic, which is exactly what they’re trying to do to you. So to really **** them up find the business or businesses they and their spouse, if any own, control or are part of — all this is public record and trivial to discover — and picket those, especially if they transact with the general public. Be targeted about it. Get 10, 20 or 100 other people in your local area and pick on one of them. Let’s say one of your County Commissioners owns a very popular tourist location in your town.

Picket it with the intent of destroying the customer volume he does at his business until and unless he, along with the rest of the Commission, do what you want. In this case, specifically, as a condition of a County Business License “no license holder or their agent may inquire of employee or customer personal medical status nor demand any medical treatment, prophylaxis or personal health record, effective immediately.” That eliminates the firm’s ability to put in place a vaccine mandate and arguably bars mask mandates too; they either comply or they’re done. You can’t operate without a business license; the Sheriff can and will come and chain the doors closed! Oh, they don’t want to pass that? Fine — put the first Commissioner’s business in the dirt and then move to the next one. Keep going until you get what you want.

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‘It is true that schoolchildren will mostly catch Covid, if unvaccinated. But it is a poor reason to vaccinate them.’

• Scientists Slam Chris Whitty For Scare-mongering Over Unjabbed Children (DM)

Unvaccinated children getting infected with Covid isn’t an issue because they face such a vanishingly rare chance of falling seriously ill, a scientist said today. England’s chief medical officer, Professor Chris Whitty, yesterday told MPs ‘virtually all’ unjabbed youngsters would eventually catch the virus. He revealed about half of youngsters have already had the virus but insisted others would get it ‘sooner or later’. Justifying the decision to roll-out jabs to millions of 12-15 year olds, Professor Whitty added: ‘Vaccination will reduce that risk’. But one academic today criticised the CMO’s reasoning, arguing the majority would probably still get infected even if they were inoculated.

Professor David Livermore, a medical microbiologist at the University of East Anglia, said the virus has evolved to be extremely transmissible — and that vaccines aren’t perfect at blocking the pathogen. And he said natural infection would be preferable to jabs for children because the virus poses little-to-no-threat of causing serious illness in youngsters, whereas the vaccines aren’t risk-free. Some studies even suggest immunity from infection is stronger than that produced by the vaccines. Despite the chief medical officers who advised the Government to extend the rollout claiming they did so after assessing the benefits to children themselves, critics view the move as one intended to protect adults by reducing the risk of transmission.

But a host of scientists are now suggesting the virus now amounts to little more than a common cold for the vast majority of vaccinated adults. Dame Sarah Gilbert, one of the chief scientists behind the AstraZeneca vaccine, last night claimed viruses tend to ‘become less virulent as they circulate’ through the population. And Professor Tim Spector, an epidemiologist at King’s College London, today said jabs had already drastically changed Covid’s tell-tale symptoms, effectively turning it into a bad cold for most who catch it. He said other warning signs like a sore throat, runny nose and sneezing should be added to the official list of symptoms.

Professor Livermore told MailOnline: ‘It is true that schoolchildren will mostly catch Covid, if unvaccinated. But it is a poor reason to vaccinate them. ‘First, vaccines provide only limited protection against infection and transmission, so children are going to be infected over time anyway regardless of whether they have been vaccinated. At most, vaccinating them will only delay this. ‘Secondly, Covid infection does healthy children little harm. They suffer mild disease and recover swiftly. The hazard from Covid is largely for the elderly, not children. ‘Thirdly, evidence from Israel shows natural immunity — which children will acquire from infection — is 13-fold more protective than vaccination.’

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What you get when the MSM spread misinformation:

“..for people aged 18–24, the share of those worried about serious health consequences is 400 times higher than the share of total COVID deaths..”

• Americans Have No Clue What the True COVID Numbers Are (Mercola)

Six months after the start of the pandemic, investment management organization Franklin Templeton Investments, in collaboration with Gallup,2 released a report about Americans’ understanding of the COVID-19 infection. The research focused on fundamental and undisputed facts of the risk for individuals and did not address any information that might be seen as controversial, such as treatment options and lockdown policies. In the report, the firm wrote:“Six months into this pandemic, Americans still dramatically misunderstand the risk of dying from COVID-19 … These results are nothing short of stunning. Mortality data have shown from the very beginning that the COVID-19 virus age-discriminates, with deaths overwhelmingly concentrated in people who are older and suffer comorbidities.


This is perhaps the only uncontroversial piece of evidence we have about this virus. Nearly all US fatalities have been among people older than 55; and yet a large number of Americans are still convinced that the risk to those younger than 55 is almost the same as to those who are older.” The Franklin Templeton-Gallup Economics of Recovery Study of Americans found there were misconceptions in the general population about the risks associated with infection. The analysts then separated the beliefs and compared those to the actual data. This is from the report: “On average, Americans believe that people aged 55 and older account for just over half of total COVID-19 deaths; the actual figure is 92%. Americans believe that people aged 44 and younger account for about 30% of total deaths; the actual figure is 2.7%. Americans overestimate the risk of death from COVID-19 for people aged 24 and younger by a factor of 50; and they think the risk for people aged 65 and older is half of what it actually is (40% vs 80%).

When the data were broken down by age groups they found that most people under age 65 really had no concept of the actual number of deaths for their age group. “The discrepancy with the actual mortality data is staggering: for people aged 18–24, the share of those worried about serious health consequences is 400 times higher than the share of total COVID deaths; for those age 25–34 it is 90 times higher.” Writing in Wirepoints, Mark Glennon commented on the findings saying, “The only good news there is that folks 65 and older are much more aware of the heightened risk for their own age group.” The report identified two major culprits of the fundamental misunderstanding of basic facts from a COVID-19 infection. Those culprits were misinformation predominantly shared on social media and the partisan bias for Democrats to “mistakenly overstate the risk of death from COVID-19 for younger people.”

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Best part:

“..the treatment is covered by the federal government. The Food and Drug Administration granted emergency authorization to the drug back in May..”

• DeSantis Acquires New Monoclonal Antibodies From UK Drug Firm (JTN)

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has arranged a shipment of a new monoclonal antibody medication to help treat those sick with COVID-19. The Republican governor on Thursday announced the shipment of 3,000 doses of the drug produced by U.K.-based GlaxoSmithKline, a direct response to the Biden administration’s abrupt rationing of other antibody drugs, like Regeneron. “That’s showing that we’re going to leave no stone unturned. And, if there’s somebody that needs a monoclonal antibody treatment, we’re going to work hard to get it to them,” DeSantis told a press conference in Tampa. According to the Epoch Times, one dose of the drug by GSK, known as Sotrovimab, costs approximately $2,100. However, the treatment is covered by the federal government.


The Food and Drug Administration granted emergency authorization to the drug back in May. During the press conference announcing the shipment of Sotrovimab, DeSantis blasted the Biden administration for withholding other antibody treatments that could potentially save the lives of thousands of Floridians. “We’re going to be able to use that Sotrovimab to bridge some of the gaps that are gonna be developing as a result of the Biden administration dramatically cutting medications to the state of Florida,” DeSantis said. According to the New York Times, Florida, alongside six other southern states, was consuming 70% of the federal government’s supply of the antibody drug, Regeneron. In response, the Biden administration began rationing the treatments due to a national shortage.

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“It has successfully appealed four removals, including the Sept. 14 meeting, but the county is tired of dealing with YouTube’s censorship..”

• YouTube Promises Pullback On Covid Censorship (JTN)

Speaking your mind about COVID-19 policies at a public meeting can trigger YouTube into holding your local government hostage until it deplatforms your voice. The Google-owned video platform removed an Illinois school board meeting for “medical misinformation,” the latest example of tech giants policing what is permissible to say on the ever-evolving debate over pandemic research, restrictions and treatments. Springfield District 186 said it assumed YouTube objected to the public comment portion of the June 21 meeting, according to The Center Square. As a result, board president Anthony Mares said its YouTube videos will exclude public comments going forward. A parent in the district claimed partial credit for the removal, citing his own public comment.

Ryan Jugan said that “witnessing censorship, suppression of medical professionals, science and data is appalling.” District spokesperson Bree Hankins told Just the News it never got specifics on the purported misinformation in the video and that YouTube denied the district’s appeal. While YouTube said it restored the video following The Center Square report — conducting a third review prompted by the media organization — Hankins said the company has yet to inform the district the video has been reinstated. The video platform has a contentious history with COVID-19 contrarians, including Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis. It pulled down a healthcare roundtable he hosted with former White House COVID advisor Scott Atlas, Harvard Medical School’s Martin Kulldorff, Stanford Med’s Jay Bhattacharya and Oxford’s Sunetra Gupta. DeSantis defiantly hosted another.

Reclaim the Net, which tracks digital censorship, shared several similar incidents that involve public meetings upon request. The St. Louis County Council is dumping YouTube completely after four removals in less than two months due to public comments against mask and vaccine mandates. It has successfully appealed four removals, including the Sept. 14 meeting, but the county is tired of dealing with YouTube’s censorship, information technology director Charles Henderson told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. It’s planning to sign a contract with BoxCast.

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Today. Open hearing.

• Arizona Audit for Dummies (Ivory Hecker)

It’s hard to keep up with it all! Arizona State Senator Wendy Rogers gives a preview ahead of Friday’s release of the report documenting results of an audit of the Presidential Election in Maricopa County, Arizona.

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“..the aim is to abolish physical cash within 27 months of right now.”

• Agustín Carstens: Would You Buy A Dieting Régime From This Man? (Ward)

The somewhat bulky gentleman to your left is the boss of the Bank for International Settlements (BIS), Agustín Guillermo Carstens Carstens. Clearly, one Carstens wasn’t enough for him…judging by his build, in fact, one of anything is never quite enough for Agustín. It’s the sort of build that could be Built Back Better…unless the aim is to Build Better Billy Bunter Backs & Bottoms. In 2018, he was demanding more BIS control over Central Banks, whom he accused of ‘piggy-backing’…I suppose if you have a piggy back yourself, that’s something about which you’re entitled to opinionate. In the last two days, he’s been pushing hard for complete digital control over all money. Many suggest that in calling for this, Aggy is punching above his weight; but if the bloke was any heavier, in the absence of 180 centimetre arms he’d be punching himself.

Carstens Carstens has been a regular feature of Davos meetings since 2010. Let’s face it, as a physical feature, il gran Mexicano is a topological man mountain worthy of his own personal contour lines: he’s a hard guy to miss, and impossible to mark absent. As a result of climbing his own mountain, he has become the 4th richest politician in Mexican history, with a personal wealth estimated at $27 million. If and when Agustín finally achieves his goal of “resetting” who gets what in the Brave New Normal, it’s hard to avoid the feeling that his sharing methodology might be “83 for me, 1 for you” and so forth. Take in this second shot of Senor Carstens: I met Robert Maxwell several times, and trust me – the bouncing Czech was borderline anorexic compared to this guy.

When not busy having doors widened in advance of his meetings outside the BIS, he’s a big wheel in The Innovation BIS 2025 project – a scheme that would be dear to the hearts of the Davos élite if they had such organs factory-fitted. By 2025, the BIS hopes to complete the digitalisation of all payment systems in the UK, the U.S, the EU and every nation State in their orbit. Note the use of the pronoun ‘by’ there, and work backwards: the aim is to abolish physical cash within 27 months of right now. In every context (especially those of France, Italy and Greece) that timetable is about as practical as the idea of picking a locked toilet door with a blade of grass when stricken with diarrhoea.

The BIS refers to electronic cash as central bank digital currency (CBDC), but even this is immensely misleading: the organisation’s project is nothing less than the establishment of a New World Order-valued virtual coinage without reference to any criteria beyond, um, well, er…what the Bank for International Settlements says it is – the clue’s in the name, and all that. But there’s a more than slightly concerning two-tier nature to CBDC. Carstens-Carstens “explains” as follows: “Like cash, a CBDC could and would be available 24/7, 365 days a year. At first glance, not much changes for someone, say, stopping off at the supermarket on the way home from work. He or she would no longer have the option of paying cash. All purchases would be electronic.”

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Debt Rattle May 16 2021

May 162021
 
 May 16, 2021  Posted by at 8:55 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , ,  56 Responses »


John French Sloan Sunday, Women Drying Their Hair 1912

 

• COVID Deaths Plummet As Excess Mortality Falls To Pre-Pandemic Levels (McMaken)
• Harvard Epidemiologist Locked Out Of Twitter For Criticizing Masks (JTN)
• CDC Chief Moves From ‘Impending Doom’ To No Masks In 45 Days (Fox)
• Multiple Governors Drop Mask Mandates As CDC Rewrites Guidance (JTN)
• CDC Tells Schools To Keep Students In Masks For Another Year (JTN)
• Disquiet In UK Schools As Easing Of Mask Restrictions Nears (G.)
• Sweden Records 30,000 Suspected Side Effects From Covid Vaccines (RT)
• More Than 60,000 Ex-Corona Patients At The Physio (AD)
• Toronto Cancels Entire Summer Of Events (ZH)
• A Glorified Drug Cartel: How Big Pharma Made Americans Addicted To Opioids (RT)
• Liz Cheney Lied About Her Role in Spreading “Russian Bounty” Story (Greenwald)
• Circling the Wagons (Jim Kunstler)

 

 

 

 

Joe Biden Clarence Thomas
https://twitter.com/i/status/1393543000211562496

 

 

“..excess mortality began to plummet in early January and is now back to levels below the 2015-2019 average..”

• COVID Deaths Plummet As Excess Mortality Falls To Pre-Pandemic Levels (McMaken)

In any given year during the past decade in the United States, more than 2.5 million Americans have died – from all causes. The number has grown in recent years, climbing from 2.59 million in 2013 to 2.85 million in 2019. This has been due partially to the US’s aging population, and also due to rising obesity levels and drug overdoses. In fact, since 2010, growth rates in total deaths has exceeded population growth in every year. In 2020, preliminary numbers suggest a jump of more than 17 percent in all-cause total deaths, rising from 2.85 million in 2019 to 3.35 million in 2020. The increase was not all due to covid. At least one-quarter to one-third appear to be from other causes.

In some cases, more than half of “excess deaths” were attributed to “underlying causes” other than covid. But whether due to untreated medical conditions (thanks to covid lockdowns), or drug overdoses, or homicides, total death increased in 2020. In other words, total excess mortality is a partial proxy for covid deaths. Whatever proportion of total deaths covid cases may comprise, it stands to reason that if total deaths decline, then covid deaths are declining also. Moreover, looking at total deaths helps cut through any controversies over whether or not deaths are properly attributed to covid. What has been the trend with these “excess deaths” in recent months? Well, according to data through mid-March reported by Our World in Data and by the Human Mortality Database, excess mortality began to plummet in early January and is now back to levels below the 2015-2019 average:

Excess mortality peaked the week of January 3 and then it began to collapse, dropping back to summer 2020 levels by mid February. By March 14, excess mortality was at 1 percent above the 2015-2019 average. All this occurred even as very few Americans were vaccinated. When excess deaths began to drop, less than one percent of Americans had been fully vaccinated. At the end of January, less than two percent of Americans had been fully vaccinated. By the end of March, when excess mortality returned to 2019 levels, 15 percent of the population had been fully vaccinated. As of May 11, only one-third of Americans had been fully vaccinated, although “experts” insist 60 to 70 percent of the population must be vaccinated before we can expect to see a drop-off in deaths like that which occurred earlier this year. Yet, as of the week of March 22—excess mortality was below both the 2015-2019 average and below the total for the last year before the official beginning of the covid pandemic (2019).

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Twitter knows better than Harvard.

• Harvard Epidemiologist Locked Out Of Twitter For Criticizing Masks (JTN)

A high-profile Harvard epidemiologist this week was locked out of his Twitter account after publicly challenging the mainstream pandemic orthodoxy on face masks. Martin Kulldorff, a professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and a biostatician and epidemiologist, on Friday wrote that “some older high-risk people” had been “naively fooled to think that masks would protect them,” leading some of them to “not socially distance properly” and consequently die from COVID-19. “Tragic,” he wrote further. “Public health officials/scientists must always be honest with the public.” Kulldorff was subsequently locked out of his account. Pictures circulated on Twitter of an apparent message from the company informing him the tweet had “violat[ed] the policy on spreading misleading and potentially harmful information related to COVID-19.”

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It’s mask day today, and confusion reigns.

• CDC Chief Moves From ‘Impending Doom’ To No Masks In 45 Days (Fox)

In just about a month and a half, the leader of The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has dramatically changed her tone on COVID-19 and mask mandates. Today, the CDC announced it has revised its mask guidance again, now enabling those who are fully vaccinated to forgo wearing masks both indoors and outdoors. “Anyone who is fully vaccinated can participate in indoor and outdoor activities — large or small — without wearing a mask or physically distancing,” said CDC Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky. “Based on the continuing downward trajectory of cases, the scientific data on the performance of our vaccines and our understanding of how the virus spreads, that moment has come for those who are fully vaccinated,” she continued.

Just 45 days ago, on March 29, Walensky warned the nation of dire days ahead. “I’m going to lose the script, and I’m going to reflect on the recurring feeling I have of impending doom,” she said during a White House Covid-19 Response Team briefing. “But right now I’m scared. I know what it’s like, as a physician, to stand in that patient room gowned, gloved, masked, shielded, and to be the last person to touch someone else’s loved ones, because their loved ones couldn’t be there.” Walensky continued in the March livestream. The fearful sentiment from a top player in the response team sent a clear signal that though the rising vaccination rates were a positive indicator, there was not enough confidence to ditch the mask or change protocol.

In the weeks following Walensky’s March 29 comment, there was a surge in people running to get their vaccines. A month after her doom comments, and with a bump in new vaccination numbers, Walensky announced a mask revision on April 27 to allow people who are fully vaccinated to do most things outdoors, with some precautions. “We continue to recommend masking in crowded outdoor settings and venues such as packed stadiums and concerts where there is decreased ability to maintain physical distance, and where many unvaccinated people may also be present.”

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Shouldn’t they all do the same thing when reading the same guidance?

• Multiple Governors Drop Mask Mandates As CDC Rewrites Guidance (JTN)

Several state governors this week scrambled to drop the mask mandates they had unilaterally imposed last year following reissued CDC guidance stating that vaccinated individuals largely do not have to wear them. Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam on Friday announced the rollback of his mask mandate, stating that current case numbers compelled him to “move up the timeline for lifting mitigation measures in Virginia.” “Virginians have been working hard, and we are seeing the results in our strong vaccine numbers and dramatically lowered case counts,” Northam claimed.


Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan on Friday also announced the impending removal of his own mask mandate. “Our long, hard-fought battle against the worst global pandemic in more than a century is finally nearing an end,” Hogan declared in the announcement, also announcing the end to the capacity limits he had imposed on the state. North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper also declared on Friday he would remove his mask mandate “for most settings” in the state. “We can take this step today because the science shows our focus on getting people vaccinated is working,” Cooper said.

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Only masks for those least at risk. Makes sense.

• CDC Tells Schools To Keep Students In Masks For Another Year (JTN)

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention told schools nationwide on Saturday they should plan to keep students in masks for the 2021-22 school year because of the limited vaccinations of children. “CDC recommends schools continue to use the current COVID-19 prevention strategies for the 2020-2021 school year,” the agency said in new guidance for students issued just days after it cleared vaccinated adults to ditch their masks in most instances.


“All schools should implement and layer prevention strategies and should prioritize universal and correct use of masks and physical distancing,” it added. The agency also recommended regular testing in schools to “identify individuals with SARS-CoV-2 infection and vaccination for teachers and staff.” While vaccines are widely available for adults, they have not been distributed for most children. The Biden administration only in the last few days authorized Pfizer and BioNTech vaccines be administered for children as young as 12.

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Those poor kids. “Evie Hickman, 13, from Dorking, liked wearing a mask to avoid “talking to people“.

• Disquiet In UK Schools As Easing Of Mask Restrictions Nears (G.)

Teachers, pupils and parents have greeted the easing of coronavirus safety measures in schools from Monday with a mixture of relief and, in the light of concern over the Indian variant, dismay and confusion. The government has announced that students will no longer need to wear face coverings in schools. But some areas in the north of England are being advised to continue measures, following rising numbers of cases of the new variant, known as B.1.617.2. For many pupils, wearing a face mask is one of many sacrifices they have made in the fight against the pandemic, and they are pleased the rules have changed. Jessie Wright, 12, from High Wycombe, said she would be “relieved” not to have to wear one in the classroom. “

The masks would get in the way of our learning. They are nice to wear when the weather is cold, but they’re uncomfortable when it’s hot.” Some teachers, she said, would let you “pull down your mask sometimes” at the end of the school day to allow yourself to “get your breath back”. “But other teachers would give you detention if you don’t wear your mask. It’s their decision,” she added. Evie Hickman, 13, from Dorking, liked wearing a mask to avoid “talking to people”. “I’m not going to wear a mask from Monday, but they were useful,” she said. “I’m quite anxious to not cough on others. I do wonder if people will get bullied if they continue to wear masks after next week, though.”

The Department for Education said on Saturday that “the latest data shows infection rates continuing to decrease” and that not having to wear masks would “improve interaction between teachers and students”. However, Bury and Bolton councils have written to parents, advising schoolchildren to “retain the use of face coverings as per the current arrangements, until further notice”, while Bedford borough council has called for all residents aged 16 and over to be vaccinated due to a rise of the variant first discovered in India.

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That would be about a million in the US?!

• Sweden Records 30,000 Suspected Side Effects From Covid Vaccines (RT)

An official tally of suspected side effects resulting from Covid vaccination in Sweden has surpassed 30,000, with the majority of cases occurring in people inoculated with AstraZeneca’s shot. According to the Swedish Medical Products Agency, as of last week, the Scandinavian nation had received 31,844 reports of adverse reactions linked to the rollout of Covid-19 vaccines. Sweden is currently offering three variants of the drug. There are currently 2,103 reports of side effects from the Moderna shot, while the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine has been associated with 9,117 health issues. But the number of suspected adverse reactions from the two shots seems relatively small when compared to the 19,961 reports linked to AstraZeneca’s Vaxzevria.

The most common side effects for all three drugs were fever and headache. Other reported adverse reactions included nausea, joint pain, and dizziness. Notably, the AstraZeneca shot only accounts for about 26% of the roughly 2.7 million vaccines that have been administered so far in Sweden, but makes up around 63% of the side effects reports. Of the nearly 32,000 reports, 663 cases have been registered where it’s unclear which vaccine was administered. Two-thirds of the reports have been submitted by the general public. The agency cautioned that individual reports do not necessarily demonstrate a correlation between the medical episode and the vaccine.

Ebba Hallberg, an official with the Medical Products Agency, told Swedish media that it was unusual to receive so many reports of side effects, but noted that the figure was likely high because of public focus on the new vaccines. Healthcare providers are likely only reporting more “serious” side effects, the official theorized. Hallberg also said that it was possible that AstraZeneca was overrepresented in the data because the shot was given to many young people and healthcare workers, who are more tech-savvy and would therefore be more likely to report an issue. According to one Swedish outlet, the agency has received more reports of suspected side effects over the past several months than it typically does over four years.

Read more …

Google translate from Dutch.

• More Than 60,000 Ex-Corona Patients At The Physio (AD)

Sixty to seventy-five thousand Dutch people with long-term corona complaints are being treated by a physiotherapist. Their number has more than doubled since the turn of the year. This is evident from a calculation based on data from the National Physiotherapy Database, in which some of the Dutch physiotherapists keep track of which treatments they perform. At the end of last year, an estimated 28,000 ex-Covid patients received help from a physical therapist. The treatment duration is an average of eighty days. According to the professional association, this means that a treatment period of several hundred days is no exception. The complaints for which people are treated, according to the KNGF, range from breathing problems, fatigue and loss of muscle mass to psychological problems, or a combination thereof.

Some of them are no longer able to work or participate in social activities. This site recently reported that many ex-Covid patients experience many problems with their brain in addition to physical discomfort. Physiotherapists therefore often work together with, for example, occupational therapists and psychologists. Some people who are being treated with corona have been in hospital, but according to physiotherapist Anne-Loes van der Valk it is 80 percent of people who went through their infection at home. “They are of all ages. I also see students aged 17, 18 who have to temporarily stop their studies. ” Van Woerkom says he expects that the number of ex-Covid patients needing physiotherapy will increase even further. Many people who became infected during the third wave have yet to turn to for help.

Due to the large increase in the number of patients, the pressure on physiotherapy practices is also high. Patients often require longer and more frequent treatment than regular patients, the KNGF warns. The professional association calls on the cabinet to extend the temporary rehabilitation care scheme with which these treatments are reimbursed. Van Woerkom: “The figures show that a lot of physiotherapy is still needed. An arrangement that would expire in three months would leave a huge number of patients out in the cold. ”

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So you go somewhere else

• Toronto Cancels Entire Summer Of Events (ZH)

Despite widespread vaccination availability and even the U.S. CDC saying that vaccinated people no longer need to wear masks, Toronto has decided to cancel an entire summer’s worth of social functions. The city has cancelled “all major in-person events for a second straight summer,” CBC reported on Friday. As the city continues to fight off large numbers of Covid cases during the pandemic’s third wave (whatever that even means at this point), it has made cancellations all the way through Labour Day. Previously, provincial officials had been hoping for normalcy beginning in July or August. That doesn’t look like it’s going to be the case. The city has cancelled events like the Canadian National Exhibition, Taste of the Danforth, the Caribbean Carnival and Salsa in Toronto.

The city is making the decision in May because organizers asked for “as much advanced notification as possible”. So now they have it: Toronto will officially have nothing going on during the summer. Mayor John Tory said that he thought the city would be in better shape by late summer, but he wasn’t sure it would be safe to be “shoulder to shoulder” with large groups of people. Darrell Brown, Executive Director of the Canadian National Exhibition called the news “devastating for the community and staff” who will now face layoffs. “At this point in time we’re living on borrowed money in the short-term and will be completely out of funds by December,” he said. The event has lost more than $70 million in revenue over the course of the pandemic and it generates $128 million for the Ontario economy each year.

Last year was the first time the event was closed since World War II. Despite asking the government for relief, it has only gotten $20,000 from Ontario’s small business relief fund. Tory said: “I am working with the Canadian National Exhibition to help the fair through this difficult year and prepare for a bigger and better in-person event in 2022.” Toronto, meanwhile, has delivered 1.6 million doses of Covid vaccines. The city’s population stands at about 3 million. Despite this, the city’s stay at home order will remain in place until “at least” June.

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Pluck them clean.

• A Glorified Drug Cartel: How Big Pharma Made Americans Addicted To Opioids (RT)

A new HBO documentary called ‘The Crime of the Century’ lays bare how firms like Purdue used bribery, dodgy marketing, and shady political deals to make fortunes by getting millions hooked on super-strong painkillers. What would it look like if an illegal international drug cartel were allowed to advertise? Perhaps it might take the form of slick music videos and glossy magazine ads promising an ‘end to pain’. Certainly, they would minimise the negative effects of their drugs on your life, your future, and your loved ones. If questioned about what they were doing, we can imagine them blaming those who use their drugs, not themselves for providing them. It sounds mad – madder still that anyone would believe them – but this is exactly what has been allowed to happen with large pharmaceutical companies and their marketing of highly addictive opioid drugs.

At least, this is the argument put forward in a new two-part HBO documentary series released this week entitled, ‘The Crime of the Century’. Across its nearly four-hour run-time, director Alex Gibney lays bare the bribery, underhanded marketing tactics, and shady political dealings that enabled the devastating overproduction and over-distribution of synthetic opiates. In devastating detail, the documentary portrays American pharmaceutical companies and the doctors who recklessly doled out prescriptions as elements of a glorified drug cartel – dealers in lab coats, suits and ties. Systematically overselling the benefits of synthetic opioids and downplaying the risk of addiction, the documentary traces how drug companies are driven to pursue ever stronger and more exotic medications as patents on old treatments run out and profits dry up.

In many ways, it traverses territory that is already well known, but is no less useful for highlighting in shocking detail just how much these companies have become a major risk to public health. This is particularly true in their penchant for ‘discovering’ and treating ever more chronic conditions. While the efficacy of opioids for treatment of acute pain and end-of-life care has been well known, there is little incentive to develop and provide drugs solely for such patients, who tend to be few and far between and whose needs are often short-term. No, the real money is in long-term use in greater numbers. And this is where the dangers of pushing these drugs on patients with any kind of pain became increasingly clear.

Read more …

Family recipe.

• Liz Cheney Lied About Her Role in Spreading “Russian Bounty” Story (Greenwald)

In an interview on Tuesday with Fox News’ Bret Baier, Rep. Liz Cheney (R-WY) denied that she spread the discredited CIA “Russian bounty” story. That CIA tale, claiming Russia was paying Taliban fighters to kill U.S. troops in Afghanistan, was cooked up by the CIA and then published by The New York Times on June 27 of last year, right as former President Trump announced his plans to withdraw troops from Afghanistan. The Times story, citing anonymous intelligence officials, was then continually invoked by pro-war Republicans and Democrats — led by Cheney — to justify their blocking of that troop withdrawal. The story was discredited when the U.S. intelligence community admitted last month that it had only “low to moderate confidence” that any of this even happened.

When Baier asked Cheney about her role in spreading this debunked CIA story, Cheney blatantly lied to him, claiming “if you go back and look at what I said — every single thing I said: I said if those stories are true, we need to know why the President and Vice President were not briefed on them.” After Baier pressed her on the fact that she vested this story with credibility, Cheney insisted a second time that she never endorsed the claim but merely spoke conditionally, always using the “if these reports are true” formulation.

Liz Cheney, as she so often does, blatantly lied. That she merely spoke of the Russian bounty story in the conditional — “every single thing I said: I said if those stories are true” — is completely and demonstrably false. Indeed, other than Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA), there are few if any members of Congress who did more to spread this Russian bounty story as proven truth, all in order to block troop withdrawal from Afghanistan. In so doing, she borrowed from a pro-war playbook pioneered by her dad, to whom she owes her career: the former Vice President would leak CIA claims to The New York Times to justify war, then go on Meet the Press with Tim Russert, as he did on September 8, 2002, and cite those New York Times reports as though they were independent confirmation of his views coming from that paper rather than from him.

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Still not over.

• Circling the Wagons (Jim Kunstler)

Perhaps Arizona can adopt California’s new minority-friendly math curriculum before the election audit ordered by the Arizona State Senate is completed in a month or two. Under that new system of math, or maff, two plus two doesn’t equal four, it equals more, five plus five equals a lot more, and 1,672,143 minus X equals don’t-bother-me-with-your-racist-numbers. It’ll take some kind of math or maff to unravel the mystery of Arizona’s 2020 election results, and the people who run Maricopa County — that is, Phoenix and its suburban asteroid belt, or about 60 percent of the AZ population — don’t want that mystery solved. So, they are not responding to a court-ordered subpoena to produce the evidence, namely, the vote tabulation files from their Dominion Systems voting machines, the county’s server routers, or the chain-of-custody records of the precinct batches of paper ballots.

The county’s servers indicate that the folder containing the database of election results was deleted sometime after the election, so the county has no record of the vote. Hmmmm…. By a previous subpoena, the state Senate took possession of 2.1 million ballots and nearly 400 Dominion election machines and turned them over to the company, Cyber Ninjas, hired to do the audit. Problem was, the county didn’t hand over the passwords to the Dominion machines. Officials claim they never had the passwords, which suggests that the County Board of Elections never had control over their own elections, for which they are legally responsible. A curious situation, because the county says it conducted a previous examination of its voting machines weeks after the election. How’d they do that without the Dominion passwords?

Maybe the data was not stored on the Dominion machines but booted onto external hard drives, which would be against the rules. Or maybe the Dominion machines were connected to the Internet and information was booted into the Dominion machines from somewhere else on Planet Earth. That would be very very against the rules. If that was so, the log files on the machines would show time-stamps and where the outside information originated. Would that be enough for the State Senate to de-certify the Arizona election results? Or prompt audits in other states where the outcome is still contested: Georgia, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin?

Read more …

 

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Debt Rattle January 2 2021

Jan 022021
 
 January 2, 2021  Posted by at 10:06 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , ,  53 Responses »


Pierre-Auguste Renoir Les Grands Boulevards 1875

 

• Israel Zooms Past 1 Million Vaccinations In Sprint To Vanquish Pandemic (ToI)
• 100s Of Israelis Get Infected With COVID19 After Receiving Pfizer Vaccine (RT)
• Fauci Says Mandatory COVID19 Vaccines Possible For Travel, School (NYP)
• Fauci Says US Will Not Delay Second Doses Of COVID Vaccine (G.)
• The Missing Flu Riddle: ‘Influenza Has Been Renamed COVID’ (JTN)
• 2 Minnesota Lawmakers Demand Nationwide Audit of COVID19 Deaths (ET)
• All Primary Schools In London To Remain Closed After U-turn (G.)
• Ireland Covid Cases Surge As Health Official Warns Virus Is ‘Absolutely Rampant’ (G.)
• Judge Rejects Election Lawsuit Against VP Pence (JTN)
• Janet Yellen Made Millions In Wall Street, Corporate Speeches (Pol.)
• Paper Dollars in Circulation Globally Spike amid Hot Demand (WS)
• Schumer Begins 2021 Promising To Fight – Then Immediately Surrenders (DP)
• Forecast 2021 (Jim Kunstler)

 

 

 

 

ISRAEL: 11.5%; UK: 1.39%; US: 0.84%; GLOBAL AVERAGE: 0.13%

• Israel Zooms Past 1 Million Vaccinations In Sprint To Vanquish Pandemic (ToI)

Israel has vaccinated 1 million people against COVID-19, more than a tenth of its population, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Friday, as the country’s inoculation drive cemented its status as the world’s most rapid thus far. Netanyahu was on hand to mark what he said was the millionth Israeli to receive a vaccine, in the Arab town of Umm al-Fahm. Netanyahu called it a moment of “great excitement.” “We are breaking all of the records. We brought millions of vaccines to the State of Israel,” he said. We are ahead of the entire world… with our excellent HMOs.” Arabs make up around 20 percent of Israel’s population and have been relatively slow to embrace the vaccination campaign, prompting Netanyahu to launch a series of visits to Arab localities, his first in years, in what is also seen by many as an attempt to score political points ahead of the March elections.


Netanyahu said that “it’s important for me that the Arab public in Israel will get vaccinated quickly” as “it’s saving lives.” He delivered the same message at a vaccination center in Tira, another Arab town, on Thursday. The Jewish state has so far greatly outpaced other countries, per capita, with 11.55% of the population inoculated, according to statistics from the Our World in Data website operated by Oxford University. Second place is held by Bahrain with 3.45%, followed by the UK with 1.39% (though the latter’s data is a few days old). The US stands at 0.84%. The world average is 0.13%. Israel is currently in its third nationwide lockdown to contain the outbreak. It has reported more than 426,000 cases and at least 3,338 deaths since the pandemic began.

Read more …

Not great PR.

• 100s Of Israelis Get Infected With COVID19 After Receiving Pfizer Vaccine (RT)

With the vaccine not providing immediate immunity to the coronavirus, over two hundred Israeli citizens have been diagnosed with the disease days after getting the Pfizer/BioNTech jabs, local media reported. The number of those who got Covid-19 despite being vaccinated was at around 240 people, according to data from Channel 13 News. The Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine, which the Israeli health authorities rely on, doesn’t contain the coronavirus and can’t infect the recipient. But time is needed for the genetic code in the drug to train the immune system to recognize and attack the disease.

The course of the US-made vaccine requires two shots. According to the studies, immunity to Covid-19 increases only eight to ten days after the first injection and eventually reaches 50 percent. The second jab is administered 21 days from the first one, while the declared immunity of 95 percent is achieved only a week after that. And, of course, there’s still a five percent chance of getting infected even if the vaccine is at its full potential. Israeli news outlets which reported the figures urged the public to remain vigilant and thoroughly follow all Covid-19 precautions during the month after the first shot of the vaccine is administered.

The Jewish state is currently undertaking a massive vaccination campaign, which already saw over one million people or almost 12 percent of the population getting the Pfizer/BioNTech jab. That’s the largest span per capita in the world, according to Oxford University. The first phase of the program aims to immunize medics and elderly people before expanding on to other categories. Around one in a thousand people have reported mild side effects after the injection, including weakness, dizziness and fever as well as pain, swelling and redness in the spot where the shot was given. Only a few dozen of them required medical attention, the Health Ministry said.

Read more …

A passport stating you had a jab that doesn’t protect people around you. Logic?

• Fauci Says Mandatory COVID19 Vaccines Possible For Travel, School (NYP)

Dr. Anthony Fauci said it’s possible that COVID-19 vaccines will become mandatory in order to travel to other countries or attend school. “Everything will be on the table for discussion,” Fauci, who will be chief medical adviser to President-elect Joe Biden, told Newsweek. The director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases stressed that it’s “not up to me to make a decision,” but added that “these are all things that will be discussed [under the Biden administration].” “I’m not sure [the COVID-19 vaccine] going to be mandatory from a central government standpoint, like federal government mandates,” Fauci said, though he added that he’s “sure” that some individual institutions will require the shot.


Fauci said vaccine requirements in schools are “possible,” but they would come from mandates at the state or city level. “A citywide school system might require it in some cities but not other cities. And that’s what I mean by things not being done centrally but locally,” Fauci said. In regard to travel, Fauci said the US could potentially issue COVID-19 vaccine passports — similar to the ones planned for Israel that would allow residents to travel abroad without being tested for coronavirus. The coronavirus vaccine might also become required by other countries to go there, Fauci said. “So we, in this country, don’t require [people] to get a yellow fever vaccine when you go someplace. It’s the place to which you are going that requires it,” he said.

Read more …

The UK is playing around with what the producer says should be done.

• Fauci Says US Will Not Delay Second Doses Of COVID Vaccine (G.)

The American infectious disease expert Dr Anthony Fauci has said he does not agree with the UK’s approach of delaying the second dose of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine. On Friday, Dr Fauci told CNN that the United States would not be following in the UK’s footsteps and would follow Pfizer and BioNTech’s guidance to administer the second dose of its vaccine three weeks after the first. Despite an outcry from doctors, the UK’s chief medical officers defended their plans this week to delay the second dose of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine to patients, meaning people would now wait up to 12 weeks. The change is to prioritise giving more people their first dose.


Dr Fauci told CNN: “We know from the clinical trials that the optimal time is to give it on one day and for [the Moderna jab which is also approved in the US] wait 28 days and for Pfizer 21 days later.” He added that while you can “make the argument” for stretching out the doses, he would not be in favour of doing that. Pfizer and BioNTech also warned that the two doses were crucial to achieving maximum protection against Covid, saying that they did not have evidence that the first dose alone would protect patients after three weeks. In the UK, the new move will apply to people who were expecting to have their second dose of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine after 4 January. Patients getting the first jab of the newly approved AstraZeneca/Oxford vaccine will also have to wait up to 12 weeks.

Read more …

The numbers are stark:

“This week one year ago, the positive clinical rate was 22%, where now it stands at 0.1%.”

• The Missing Flu Riddle: ‘Influenza Has Been Renamed COVID’ (JTN)

Rates of influenza have remained persistently low through late 2020 and into 2021, cratering from levels a year ago and raising the puzzling specter of sharply reduced influenza transmission rates even as positive tests for COVID-19 have shattered numerous records over the last several weeks. Where have all the flu cases gone? Epidemiologist Knut Wittkowski thinks he can answer the riddle. “Influenza has been renamed COVID in large part,” said the former head of biostatistics, epidemiology and research design at Rockefeller University. “There may be quite a number of influenza cases included in the ‘presumed COVID’ category of people who have COVID symptoms (which Influenza symptoms can be mistaken for), but are not tested for SARS RNA,” Wittkowski told Just the News on Thursday.


Those patients, he argued, “also may have some SARS RNA sitting in their nose while being infected with Influenza, in which case the influenza would be ‘confirmed’ to be COVID.” The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s weekly influenza surveillance tracker reports that the cumulative positive influenza test rate from late September into the week of Dec. 19 stands at 0.2% as measured by clinical labs. That’s compared to a cumulative 8.7% from a year before. The weekly comparisons are even starker: This week one year ago, the positive clinical rate was 22%, where now it stands at 0.1%. Those low numbers continue trends observed earlier in the year in which flu rates have remained at near-zero levels. The trend is not limited to the U.S. Worldwide, health authorities have all reported sharply decreased influenza levels throughout what is normally peak flu season in the northern hemisphere.

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Of course you must have this.

• 2 Minnesota Lawmakers Demand Nationwide Audit of COVID19 Deaths (ET)

Two Minnesota legislators who believe their state’s COVID-19 death count is inaccurate are calling for a nationwide audit to find out how many people died from something other than the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus but were added to the pandemic death totals. Republican State Rep. Mary Franson said she has enlisted a team to examine data provided by Minnesota’s health department. Her team allegedly found that COVID-19 was blamed for some deaths clearly not linked to the respiratory disease. “We found clear-cut examples from the Minnesota Department of Health’s own files—public records—of suicide, a drowning, an auto accident where the passenger was ejected from the vehicle, we found dementia … and strokes,” Franson said during an interview with Fox News, adding that she was “so shocked at what I found that I just could not keep silent.”


“The citizens of our country are being led in fear, and that fear is leading them to make irrational decisions based on the governors with their shutdowns,” she added. “So we need this audit. We need the truth.” Franson was joined by Republican State Sen. Scott Jensen, a practicing physician. Jensen has become the subject of two state probes earlier this year for arguing that the federal and state guidelines on reporting COVID-19 deaths could pressure local authorities to misclassify and inflate their numbers, and that doctors and hospitals are motivated to do so for more health care dollars. “If you could hit a threshold of 161 admissions to your hospital with COVID-19 diagnosis between January and June, you received $77,000 of additional money for each one of those admissions” through the CARES Act, Jensen told Fox News. “I don’t think there’s any questions that reverse incentives have been created.”

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Make it up as you go along.

• All Primary Schools In London To Remain Closed After U-turn (G.)

All primary schools in London are to remain closed for the start of the new term after the government bowed to protests and legal pressure from the capital’s local authorities. Under the government’s initial plan, secondary schools and colleges were set to be closed to most pupils for the first two weeks of January, while primary schools within 50 local authorities in London and the south of England were also told to keep their doors shut until 18 January. But the list omitted several London areas where Covid-19 transmission rates remain high including the borough of Haringey, whose leaders said they were prepared to defy the government and support any schools that decided to close to protect staff and pupils.


The protests from local authority leaders came to a head with a letter to the education secretary, Gavin Williamson, from nine London authorities asking for their primary schools to be closed to all except vulnerable children and those whose parents were key workers. The action provoked an emergency Cabinet Office meeting on New Year’s Day, which signed off on the revision, adding the remaining 10 London education authorities to the government’s “contingency areas”. Dr Mary Bousted, joint general secretary of the National Education Union, said primaries across the country should close. “What is right for London is right for the rest of the country,” she said. “It is time for the government to protect its citizens, and in particular its children, by shutting all primary schools for two weeks in order for the situation to be properly assessed, schools made much safer and children and their families protected.”

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“The virus is absolutely rampant now in the community. Everybody is at extreme risk of contracting the virus.”

• Ireland Covid Cases Surge As Health Official Warns Virus Is ‘Absolutely Rampant’ (G.)

Ireland is bracing for 9,000 more Covid cases to be added to the official tally as the system struggles to handle a surge in positive results, with health officials warning hospitals will not be able to cope if the trend continues. The sharp rise in positive results led to delays in formal reporting, said Professor Philip Nolan from the National Public Health Emergency Team (NPHET), though he said it “does not affect case management or contact tracing or our overall monitoring and modelling of the pandemic”. On Thursday, NPHET estimated the number of positive tests still pending registration was 4,000, more than doubling to 9,000 the following day. On Friday, Ireland formally reported a daily record 1,754 confirmed cases, surpassing 1,500 daily cases for the fourth day in a row. Chief medical officer Dr Tony Holohan said the biggest worry was the rapid rise in hospitalisations.


“We are now admitting between 50 to 70 people a day to our hospital system. Unfortunately, we expect this to get worse before it gets better. Our health system will not continue to cope with this level of impact.” “We have also seen a significant increase in positive laboratory tests in recent days reflecting a true increase in the incidence of the disease as well as the delay in people coming forward for testing over the Christmas period. As our systems catch up with these effects it places significant pressure on our reporting system.” On New Year’s Eve, Ireland entered a level-five lockdown, with non-essential shops closing, a 5km travel limit, restrictions on household gatherings and schools staying closed. Paul Reid, CEO of the Health Service Executive (HSE), told RTÉ Radio 1: “The virus is absolutely rampant now in the community. Everybody is at extreme risk of contracting the virus.”

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“..the Court lacks subject matter jurisdiction over this case and must dismiss the action..”

• Judge Rejects Election Lawsuit Against VP Pence (JTN)

A federal judge dismissed a lawsuit Friday night against Vice President Mike Pence filed by a Texas congressman seeking to reject Joe Biden’s electors when Congress certifies the election next week. U.S. District Judge Jeremy Kernodle ruled that Rep. Louie Gohmert lacked standing to bring the legal action that would prevent Pence from confirming Joe Biden’s electoral victory. “Plaintiff Louie Gohmert, the United States Representative for Texas’s First Congressional District, alleges at most an institutional injury to the House of Representatives. Under well-settled Supreme Court authority, that is insufficient to support standing,” the judge ruled.


“The other Plaintiffs, the slate of Republican Presidential Electors for the State of Arizona (the “Nominee-Electors”), allege an injury that is not fairly traceable to the Defendant, the Vice President of the United States, and is unlikely to be redressed by the requested relief. Accordingly, as explained below, the Court lacks subject matter jurisdiction over this case and must dismiss the action,” he added.

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… and you ain’t in it..

• Janet Yellen Made Millions In Wall Street, Corporate Speeches (Pol.)

In the past two years, President-elect Joe Biden’s pick to be Treasury secretary, Janet Yellen, has raked in more than $7.2 million in speaking fees from Wall Street and large corporations including Citi, Goldman Sachs, Google, City National Bank, UBS, Citadel LLC, Barclays, Credit Suisse, Salesforce and more. Yellen’s financial disclosure is one of three filed by the Biden team at the end of 2020 that could become politically problematic with the left wing of the Democratic Party when confirmation hearings begin in January. A Biden transition official said they filed the forms “mid-week” before the Office of Government Ethics posted the forms late Thursday, New Year’s Eve.

Yellen, the former chair of the Federal Reserve, brought in nearly $1 million giving nine speeches to Citi alone. She earned more than $800,000 speaking to Citadel, a hedge fund founded by the Republican megadonor Ken Griffin. She also spoke to the law and lobbying firm Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman. In addition to Yellen, Antony Blinken, Biden’s nominee to be secretary of State, disclosed the clients he advised through WestExec Advisors, the consulting firm he co-founded with other Obama administration alumni. Those clients included the investment giant Blackstone, Bank of America, Facebook, Uber, McKinsey & Company, the Japanese conglomerate SoftBank, the pharmaceutical company Gilead, the investment bank Lazard, Boeing, AT&T, the Royal Bank of Canada, LinkedIn and the venerable Sotheby’s auction house.

The disclosures cracked open WestExec’s closely held client list, which the firm had previously refused to divulge. WestExec has paid Blinken nearly $1.2 million over the past two years, according to the filing, with another estimated $250,000 to $500,000 owed for his work this year.

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To the mattresses.

• Paper Dollars in Circulation Globally Spike amid Hot Demand (WS)

The amount of “currency in circulation” – the paper dollars wadded up in people’s pockets and purses, stuffed under mattresses, or packed into suitcases and safes overseas – jumped again in the week ended December 30 to a new record of $2.09 trillion, according to the Federal Reserve’s balance sheet, where currency in circulation is a liability, not an asset. This was up by 16%, or by $293 billion, from February before the Pandemic. The amount has doubled since 2011. This amount of currency in circulation is a function of demand – and that demand has been red hot: US Banks have to have enough paper dollars on hand to satisfy demand at ATMs and bank branches.

Foreign banks will also request paper dollars from their correspondent banks in the US, or return unneeded cash to them. When there is demand for paper dollars, banks buy more of them from the Fed. They pay for them usually with Treasury securities they hold or with excess reserves they have on deposit at the Fed. The surge of paper dollars is a sign of hoarding, not of increased payments. In the US, the share of paper dollars for payments has been declining for years, replaced by electronic payment methods, such as credit and debit cards, PayPal, Zelle and similar systems, all kinds of smartphone-based payment systems, the automated clearinghouse (ACH) system, and checks every now and then.


During periods of uncertainty, people load up on cash, as they have done leading up to Y2K, during the Financial Crisis, and now during the Pandemic. But much of the hoarding of US dollars takes place overseas, with demand for those paper dollars then winding its way to the US banking system via the correspondent banks. These paper dollars also lubricate all kinds of corruption, drug trafficking, and other activities – and laundering this cash is a big profitable industry.

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The stench….

• Schumer Begins 2021 Promising To Fight – Then Immediately Surrenders (DP)

Senator Bernie Sanders spent New Year’s morning making one last attempt to halt the defense bill in order to force Republican leader Mitch McConnell allow a vote on $2,000 checks — and Democratic leader Chuck Schumer spent the morning treating everyone like we’re gullible idiots. “I just took to the floor again to demand a vote on $2000 survival checks,” Schumer declared, and he slammed Republican lawmakers for objecting. He promised: “Democrats will not stop fighting.” Then moments later, Schumer and most Senate Democrats surrendered — live on C-Span for everyone to see, they obediently voted for McConnell’s motion to move forward the defense bill for final passage, so that the Senate can close down without any vote on the $2,000 checks. Most Democrats then voted for final passage as well.

Put another way: Schumer tweeted out his promise to fight for starving Americans, while knowing that moments later he would be on live television surrendering to Republicans. Democrats didn’t even muster enough votes on the procedural motions to keep it close enough to force Georgia incumbents Kelly Loeffler and David Perdue off the campaign trail to help McConnell — a scenario that could have provided a huge boost to Democratic candidates Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock, who have been campaigning hard for the $2,000 checks.

[..] Schumer, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and president-elect Joe Biden played particularly pernicious roles helping McConnell slash the original stimulus bill in half. And Schumer’s behavior today — pretending to be fighting hard, while voting with McConnell — was the icing on the cake. Liberal pundits and billionaire-owned media corporations outed themselves as absurdly-detached elitists — making the fake argument that the $2,000 survival checks might go to some people who don’t really need help, and the baffling claim that Americans will probably just save the checks because they can’t go to restaurants (which are still fully open in most states) or travel on airplanes (yes, people are still flying).

The only players who come off well in any of this are the handful of Democratic senators who had the guts to vote against all of McConnell’s key procedural motions (Sanders, Markey, Merkley, Warren, Wyden and Van Hollen) and rank-and-file House Democrats who were willing to use their power to pass the $2,000 checks (and yeah, Pelosi deserves some credit for quickly delivering the $2,000 checks amendment to the Senate).

Read more …

A long column.

• Forecast 2021 (Jim Kunstler)

Life in the USA, and other “advanced” nations will reset, but not in the way that most people blabbering about “the Great Reset” think or say it will. Surely, there are groups, gangs, claques, and covens of people in the world who have some consensual agreement about how things might work, and how they would run them to their benefit, in their hypothetical ideal disposition of things. For instance, the so-called “Davos Crowd.” What are they? A convocation of bankers, market movers, politicians, business moguls, tech entrepreneurs, Hollywood catamites, black ops runners, and PR errand boys who have plenty of financial and political mojo in their own realms, but not enough collectively to carry out the kind of global coup that comprises the standard paranoid Great Reset fantasy.

That they meet-up in an ultra-luxurious setting out of a James Bond movie every year stokes terrific fascination, envy, anger, and paranoia that they are capable of anything beyond a festival of ass-kissing, mutual self-congratulation, and status-jockeying, which are the actual activities at the Davos meet-up. For another thing, in the USA, at least, there are too many pissed-off people with small arms, hardened by years of proffered bad faith and dishonesty from the political/media/higher-ed complex, to just bend over and take it up the back-door from a gang of seditious, would-be aristo-totalitarians with lèse-majesté dreams of nostalgie-de-la-boue Marxist redemption. If you have any doubt about how disruptive angry people with small arms and lots of ammo might be to condescending elites, just review the events in the Middle East the past twenty years and imagine those dynamics transferred to Kansas.

What does the “reset” fantasy supposedly include? A “new world order,” a phantasm of a unified world government, which is preposterous because the macro-trend at this moment of history worldwide is the opposite of consolidation and centralization of power, but rather breakup, downscaling, and re-localization. Why? As you saw in the Econ chapter, because the scale, pitch, and range of all our activities must be reduced to survive in the post-industrial conditions of resource and capital scarcity. And it will happen whether we like it or not and despite anybody’s objections. What else is in the Reset grab-bag? Supposedly a single world currency, also absurd for reasons already stated — unless you are talking about gold and silver, which may eventually become the universally-accepted medium of exchange (and store of value, index of price) if the post-industrial contraction is severe and destructive enough.

But fuggeddabowt “digital currencies,” especially in the USA because too many people are “un-banked,” or otherwise depend on cash-money in the informal “gray” economy of just-getting-by (and there will be a lot more of these types as the middle-class gets pounded further down into the mud), plus a large cohort of digitally-capable people just plain ornery about being herded into an IRS surveillance cul-de-sac — and the whole lot of them will fight like hell to prevent government-sponsored crypto-dollars from replacing what used to be considered money. And, if, in the unlikely event that rebellion fails, it’s back to gold and silver by default — and that might literally mean by default.

Read more …

 

 

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Slouching Out of the Fog Toward Pennsylvania Avenue

Nov 142020
 
 November 14, 2020  Posted by at 1:33 pm Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , , ,  21 Responses »


Pierre Dumonstier II The right hand of Artemisia Gentileschi holding a brush 1625

 

 

Two Dr. D pieces in one week. That election stuff must be inspiring! I was wondering, after seeing Sidney Powell claim she has evidence of fraudulent things happening in connection with Dominion software, which would be a weird claim if she didn’t have that evidence, that we need to wonder what the next step(s) would be.

Since 29 states use the software, should they all be recounted by hand? Or perhaps only the swing states? Or should there be a nationwide recount, or even a full (hand-counted) re-election? Here’s that video again of Powell, and then Dr. D’s thoughts on it all:

Sidney Powell: “I’m going to release the Kraken”

 

 

Dr. D: Since this was all set up on a White House supercomputer, with many possible branches on the logic tree, but still generally drifting toward some permutation of election fraud and a Legislative fix, I’m hazily seeing a further possibility materializing out there.

This is hard since you have to get wrapped around the well-defined legal Constitutional process preventing election fraud, and promoting fairness between big and small states, by having an election, set and run by sovereign states, who then affirm their process was legal and true in the State Legislatures before referring them to the Federal level via the Electoral College. So this could go strictly popular vote as it usually does, via state legislature, as has happened, or even via Congressional House of Representative at an impasse, which has also happened. Despite media sputtering, none of this is made-up, none of this is new. It is very well-written and well-defined for exactly the reasons the Framers knew well and we have seen this year. They have even just sat down in a smoky room and made it up outside of all Constitutional processes whatsoever, and as no one objected, there was nothing to prevent it. Other than the people, of course, the real masters, maintaining as they do the overwhelmingly large, real armed body.

So let’s suppose, as seems to be happening now, that there is some election fraud. And although given more than a month, as we know the clock unwinds very quickly in legal terms — like lightning. We are already halfway through. If it were only one state, like Pennsylvania, perhaps that state’s Legislature can and should vote in their own electors. And that appears to be happening as they take the first steps of an Legislative audit, going right ‘round the Governor and Courts. Leaving their legal blocks instantly disarmed.

But Michigan is calling for a Legislative audit too, and Wisconsin looks set for a recount. Georgia is already in one, and there are several others.

This is where people lament “No matter what happens, half the nation will think the election is stolen!” Civil war, all that. Which I doubt, given that for four years half the nation ALREADY thought it was stolen by by a Russian caterer with a $10,000 loan (correct me if I’m wrong) and ALREADY are in violent insurrection to burn down, murder, and expel Federal forces from Portland for 200 days, barely making a mark on the nation nor even much impression on their very-large state.

But that’s only if we WANT it to go that way – there’s no special reason we should. America is that land that “Will always do the right thing, having exhausted every alternative” as Churchill would say.

Suppose, seeing 6 states in Legislative stop of Electors, and 29 states in question due to now widely-reported flaws in the Dominion voting system, the Republicans see an easy victory EITHER by state level voting OR by Congressional election, and in a legal, required, “continent election” it is one state, one vote – perhaps 32 v 18. This question then runs to the House of Representatives, where Nancy Pelosi can even attempt to refuse to seat anyone and refuse to hold such a vote.

But what are we really after here? With the States, the House, the Constitution, the Military on one side, and a critical mass of the people duly annoyed, can they really expect to succeed here? We have a nationwide bad election, Republican Legislature and States have all the leverage, and we have no remaining time.

So what CAN happen is that Pelosi can hold a House vote. Trump can call for one. The Courts will demand one – I fail to see how any other option could exist.

OR

Trump, Pelosi, and Biden COULD, if they feel like it, hold it all off and call for a national recount, even a completely new re-election. Now that would not be “Legal” in a certain sense as the President must be un-seated in January, but in a certain sense the law is something we make up in our heads. And they have already “just done it” once previously. Perhaps the House, with a 2/3 vote would make Trump the acting President instead of President Pelosi for the interim months, perhaps until Election #2 + 30 days = March.

Everyone would have the chance to do this again without massive nationwide fraud, and the concession that reveals this and smooths over the “stolen election/civil war” would go towards a quid pro quo of not arresting everyone involved and hanging them down the long boulevard of Pennsylvania Avenue until the U.S. Military runs out of rope. Everyone sunsets and the nation moves on. …With some laws passed on election integrity. And Presidential power, one hopes.

Such are the level of crazy times we are in now. And that’s sensible, since in such crazy, extreme times, unthinkable things happen. Like wars. Or also unthinkable peaces and reconciliations. Which we must have and have had many times before.

 

 

 

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Debt Rattle November 13 2020

Nov 132020
 
 November 13, 2020  Posted by at 10:27 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , ,  29 Responses »


Pablo Picasso Les femmes d’Alger 1955

 

• PA Court: Secretary Of State Lacked Authority To Change Voting Deadline (Fox)
• Michigan State Senators Request Full Election Audit (ET)
• Trump’s New Pentagon Sets Up Clash Over Afghanistan Pullout (Pol.)
• Trump Could Be Banned From Twitter After He Leaves Office (Ind.)
• Obama: ‘Americans Spooked By Black Man In White House’ (JTN)
• This Is What Happens To Us When The Great Global Reset Comes (Kitco)
• Three-Quarters Of England’s Care Workers Earn Below ‘Real’ Living Wage (G.)
• Unemployment Fiasco in Europe Is Kept out of Official Rates (WS)
• Introduction to The New Economics: A Manifesto (Steve Keen)
• Watch This! (Dmitry Orlov)

 

 

Prof Appel Dominion

 

 

 

 

Limited impact.

• PA Court: Secretary Of State Lacked Authority To Change Voting Deadline (Fox)

A Pennsylvania judge ruled in favor of the Trump campaign Thursday, ordering that the state may not count ballots where the voters needed to provide proof of identification and failed to do so by Nov. 9. State law said that voters have until six days after the election — this year that was Nov. 9 — to cure problems regarding a lack of proof of identification. After the Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruled that mail-in ballots could be accepted three days after Election Day, Pennsylvania Secretary of State Kathy Boockvar submitted guidance that said proof of identification could be provided up until Nov. 12, which is six days from the ballot acceptance deadline. That guidance was issued two days before Election Day.


“[T]he Court concludes that Respondent Kathy Boockvar, in her official capacity as Secretary of the Commonwealth, lacked statutory authority to issue the November 1, 2020, guidance to Respondents County Boards of Elections insofar as that guidance purported to change the deadline … for certain electors to verify proof of identification,” Judge Mary Hannah Leavitt said in a court order. This was in line with the Trump campaign’s argument, which was that there was no basis in the state’s law to extend the identification deadline, and that Boockvar did not have the power to unilaterally change it. The court had previously ordered that all ballots where voters provided proof of identification between Nov. 10 and 12 should be segregated until a ruling was issued determining what should be done with them.

Matt Gaetz: Dead people don’t always vote. But when they do, they prefer to vote by mail.

Read more …

“Every citizen deserves to have faith in the integrity of the election process and its outcome..”

• Michigan State Senators Request Full Election Audit (ET)

At least two Michigan Republican state senators have requested a full election audit, asking the Michigan secretary of state’s office for a full recount before the election results are certified, according to a letter they sent to her office on Thursday. State senators Lana Theis and Tom Barrett wrote that Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson and canvassers that are reviewing allegations of irregularities and voter fraud made in lawsuits filed by President Donald Trump’s campaign. They are requesting a “full audit” of the election, saying it needs to be done before the state certifies the election results. “Every citizen deserves to have faith in the integrity of the election process and its outcome,” they said in letters.

“It is our responsibility, as elected public servants, to assure the people of Michigan of the process’s integrity through complete transparency and the faithful investigation of any allegations of wrongdoing, fraud, or abuse.” Their letters made reference to allegations made by Trump’s legal team, claims of witnesses about irregularities at polls, and a glitch that switched 6,000 votes from a Republican official to a Democratic official in Antrim County that was later corrected and acknowledged by the secretary of state’s office, although the Michigan GOP said the same software – Dominion Voting Systems – was used in dozens of other counties.

“The erroneous reporting of unofficial results from Antrim county was a result of accidental error on the part of the Antrim County Clerk. The equipment and software did not malfunction and all ballots were properly tabulated. However, the clerk accidentally did not update the software used to collect voting machine data and report unofficial results,” Benson said in a statement last week about Antrim County’s election results. Other allegations from the two lawmakers include ineligible ballots being counted, poll workers being told to backdate ballots, counting the same ballots several times, and other claims.

Read more …

The shameless backlash against bringing the troops home is stunning.

• Trump’s New Pentagon Sets Up Clash Over Afghanistan Pullout (Pol.)

President Donald Trump’s decapitation strike on the Pentagon this week is raising fears that the U.S. will accelerate the withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan, putting newly installed leaders on a collision course with top generals and others who are urging a more deliberate drawdown. Current and former administration officials say Trump fired Defense Secretary Mark Esper Monday in part over his opposition to accelerating troop drawdowns worldwide, and especially in Afghanistan. The upheaval accelerated on Tuesday with the resignation of three high-level civilians and the installation of loyalists who are expected to ram through Trump’s agenda, and continued on Wednesday when retired Army Col. Douglas Macgregor, an outspoken critic of the war in Afghanistan, was brought on as senior adviser to new acting Defense Secretary Chris Miller.

Any move to accelerate withdrawals would set up a clash with the nation’s top generals and other civilians, who have argued publicly against leaving Afghanistan too quickly while the security situation remains volatile. It would also complicate President-elect Joe Biden’s pledge to leave a small number of troops in the country to guard against terror attacks.

“A precipitous and what appears to be near total withdrawal of U.S. forces from Afghanistan — not on a conditions-based approach advocated by our military, political and intelligence leadership but rather on an old campaign promise by President Trump now carried out by hyperpartisan Trump loyalists installed in a last-minute purge of DoD — is both reckless and will not make America safer,” said Marc Polymeropoulos, a retired CIA senior operations officer. Concerns are also growing within the national security community that the personnel churn portends other major policy shifts, such as military actions abroad and in the U.S. Yet current and former administration officials believe the moves were more about rewarding allies and punishing those who resisted the president’s agenda than they were about major changes in direction.

Read more …

And the New York Times will stop writing about him?

• Trump Could Be Banned From Twitter After He Leaves Office (Ind.)

Donald Trump will no longer be protected by Twitter’s public interest guidelines when he leaves office in January, meaning he will be suspended or banned if he continues to break the platform’s rules. Twitter’s policy regarding public figures, which was formalised last year, means only “current or potential member of a local, state, national, or supra-national governmental or legislative body” receive special treatment . The US President’s Twitter account was flagged more than a dozen times in the days following the election for posting misinformation and misleading claims about the election. Several prominent Democrats called for Twitter to suspend Mr Trump’s account until all states finish counting the votes, however the platform’s public interest guidelines prevent it from being suspended or removed.


After his lead in several key states began to dwindle to challenger Joe Biden, Mr Trump attempted to undermine the electoral process by calling for a halt to the counting of mail-in ballots. “They are trying to STEAL the Election,” he tweeted. Democratic Congressman David Cicilline described Mr Trump’s tweets as a “threat to democracy”, while fellow congressman Gerry Connolly tweeted, “This is pure disinformation.” Warnings placed on Mr Trump’s tweets meant they were not immediately visible on his timeline and engagement with the tweets was restricted. One warning explained: “Some or all of the content shared in this tweet is disputed and might be misleading about how to participate in an election or another civic process.” The rate of violations would typically lead to an account suspension, either temporarily or permanently. However, public figures are protected by a “public-interest exception” policy.

Read more …

Not by his politics?

Oh well, Barry has a new book out.

• Obama: ‘Americans Spooked By Black Man In White House’ (JTN)

Just before President George W. Bush left the White House after two terms, he declared he wouldn’t be weighing in with thoughts on his successor, following the model of his father, George H.W. Bush. But Barack Obama made no such pledge. And now, just days after the 2020 election, the 44th president is hawking a new book so get ready to hear a lot more from him. Obama, the first biracial man to be elected president, makes an incendiary charge in his book, “A Promise Land,” which comes out Tuesday. President Trump, he claims, “promised an elixir for the racial anxiety” of “millions of Americans spooked by a black man in the White House.”

Those Americans – whom Obama implies appear racist – were prey to “the dark spirits that had long been lurking on the edges of the modern Republican party – xenophobia, anti-intellectualism, paranoid conspiracy theories, an antipathy toward black and brown folks.” Obama continues: “It was as if my very presence in the White House had triggered a deep-seated panic, a sense that the natural order had been disrupted. Which is exactly what Donald Trump understood when he started peddling assertions that I had not been born in the United States and was thus an illegitimate president.” Obama writes that “he came to regard Trump’s media ubiquity and characteristic shamelessness as merely an exaggerated version of the Republican Party’s attempts to appeal to White Americans’ anxieties about the first Black president – a sentiment he said ‘had migrated from the fringe of GOP politics to the center – an emotional, almost visceral, reaction to my presidency, distinct from any differences in policy or ideology,'” CNN reported.

The 768-page memoir is reportedly just volume one of his latest memoirs. Obama also writes about his shortcomings, like his failure to pass immigration reform, which he called “a bitter pill to swallow.” But he said his agenda was always correct, though voters swept out a slew of Democrats in the 2010 midterm election, two years into his presidency. “As far as I was concerned, the election didn’t prove our agenda had been wrong,” Obama writes of 2010. “It just proved that … I’d failed to rally the nation, as FDR had once done, behind what I knew to be right. Which to me was just as damning.”

Read more …

“..we have created so much debt and this is a worldwide phenomenon, so we can’t have normal interest rates anymore”

• This Is What Happens To Us When The Great Global Reset Comes (Kitco)

We’re in the end game of a dollar-based system, and a new monetary system will emerge with gold as the anchor, said Willem Middelkoop, founder of the the Commodity Discovery Fund. “We’re in a rough period. It doesn’t matter which president will be next, he can only avoid a deep depression by printing trillions and trillions. As an investor, we concentrate on that part of the story,” he said. Fixing the fundamental problems in our economy, including excessive debt, will require more than just a continuation of past policies. “I think we have created so much debt and this is a worldwide phenomenon, so we can’t have normal interest rates anymore. We have seen the IMF coming out with a statement last week saying that we need a new Bretton Woods moment,” he said.


“We had a cover on Time magazine calling for the Great Reset. We had the World Economic Forum calling for a Great Reset. I wrote a book on the topic, published in 2014, it was called The Big Reset.” A new global system will require an overhaul of many monetary pillars that we currently have, Middelkoop noted. “We need a debt restructuring. IMF and the United Nations have been quite clear about that; we need debt restructuring first for the poor countries but later for the rich countries, we all have too much debt on our books. We need to find a new anchor for the world monetary system,” he said. Until then, trillions more in stimulus will be issued by governments around the world to avoid a global depression like that of the 1930’s, Middelkoop said.

Read more …

Without COVID, this would have gotten zero attention.

• Three-Quarters Of England’s Care Workers Earn Below ‘Real’ Living Wage (G.)

Almost three-quarters of frontline care workers in England are earning below the “real” living wage, which experts say is the bare minimum to allow families basics such as a secondhand car and a week’s annual UK self-catering holiday, research has revealed. The proportion of care workers below the threshold is even higher in northern areas, where care homes have been hit hardest by Covid-19. In the north-east, 82% of care staff earned less than the England-wide real living wage of £9.50 per hour, while the proportion was 78% in the north-west. One care worker in Lancashire earning £8.72 per hour who recently had her pay cut told the Guardian some colleagues have been using food banks.

The figures apply to more than 832,000 frontline care workers, more than 600,000 of whom are earning below the minimum thresholds. In Hillingdon, the borough that contains Boris Johnson’s Uxbridge and South Ruislip parliamentary constituency, more than 3,000 care workers earn so little that if they are the main breadwinner in a family of four with their partner on similar wages, they could not afford the £112 a week they require for food, according to analysis by Loughborough University that underpins real living wage calculation. When Johnson was London mayor he supported the London living wage campaign as “making economic sense”.

The figures were calculated by the Living Wage Foundation and come amid growing calls for reform of the social care sector to create parity with the NHS, where all nurses earn above the threshold. On Thursday, Jeremy Hunt, the chairman of the Commons health and social care committee, called for a 10-year funding plan for social care akin to the national consensus that established the NHS in 1948. New polling revealed 82% of the public now back government investment in social care to fund a pay rise for care workers according to new polling by Survation for Citizens UK.

Read more …

But what are the true rates?

• Unemployment Fiasco in Europe Is Kept out of Official Rates (WS)

In Europe, people who are furloughed are paid under government programs via their employers. Many of these programs have been created during the Pandemic. In theory, these people still have jobs. In practice, they’re not working, or are working heavily reduced hours. But they do not count as “unemployed” and are not reflected in the “unemployment” numbers. So throughout the Pandemic, the official unemployment rates barely ticked up, compared to the last crisis, and remain low for the EU era, despite tens of millions of people who’d stopped working due to the lockdowns (chart via Eurostat):

The UK adopted a sweeping job retention program at the beginning of its last lockdown. Each government pays companies, who in turn pay employees between 60% and 84% of their monthly wage. In some cases, the workers work fewer hours for less pay; in others, they don’t work at all. The workers take a hit to their income but their jobs remain intact, at least for the duration of the program. Under the UK program, businesses can claim 80% of a staff member’s regular monthly salary, up to a maximum of £2,500. The money must be passed on to the employee and can also be topped up by the employer.


But the unemployment rate has begun to rise as people come off furlough, and those whose jobs disappeared entered official unemployment. The unemployment rate ticked up to 4.8% in the three months to September, from 4.5% in Q2 and from 3.9% a year earlier, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS). In London, the unemployment rate surged by 1.2 percentage points from the previous quarter, to 6%. It was the largest quarterly increase in unemployment since the ONS started tracking the data in 1992.

Read more …

“I’m writing a book for Polity Press entitled The New Economics: A Manifesto. It has a long way to go, but this is the reasonably complete first chapter.”

• Introduction to The New Economics: A Manifesto (Steve Keen)

Even before the Covid-19 crisis began, the global economy was not in good shape, and nor was economic theory. The biggest economic crisis since the Great Depression began late in first decade of the 21st century. Called the “Global Financial Crisis” (GFC) in most of the world and the “Great Recession” in the USA, it saw unemployment explode from 4.6% of the US workforce in early 2007 to 10% in late 2009. Inflation turn into deflation— inflation of 5.6% in mid-2008 fell to minus 2% per year in mid-2009—and the stock market collapsed, with the S&P500 Index falling from 1500 in mid-2007 to under 750 in early 2009. The economy recovered very slowly after then, under the influence of an unprecedented range of government interventions, from the “cash for clunkers” scheme that encouraged consumers to dump old cars and buy new ones, to “Quantitative Easing”, where the Federal Reserve purchased a trillion-dollars-worth of bonds from the financial sector every year, in an attempt to stimulate the economy by making the wealthy wealthier.

This crisis surprised both the policy economists who advise governments on economic policy, and the academic who develop the theories and write the textbooks that train the vast majority of new economists. They had expected a continuation of the boom conditions that had preceded the crisis, and they in fact believed that crises could not occur. In his Presidential Address to the American Economic Association in January 2003, Nobel Prize winner Robert Lucas declared that crises like the Great Depression could never occur again because “Macroeconomics … has succeeded: Its central problem of depression prevention has been solved, for all practical purposes, and has in fact been solved for many decades. (Lucas 2003 , p. 1 ; emphasis added). Just two months before the crisis began, the Chief Economist of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), the world’s premier economic policy body, declared that “the current economic situation is in many ways better than what we have experienced in years”, and predicted that “sustained growth in OECD economies would be underpinned by strong job creation and falling unemployment.” (Cotis 2007 , p. 7; emphases added)

How could they be so wrong? Economists could be excused for this failure to see the Great Recession coming if the crisis were something like Covid-19, when a new pathogen suddenly emerged out of China. That such a plague would occur was predicted as long ago as 1995 (Garrett 1995). But predicting when the pathogen would emerge, let alone what its characteristics would be, was clearly impossible. However, the epicentre of the Great Recession was the US financial system itself: the crisis came from inside the economy, rather than from outside. Surely there were warning signs? As Queen Elizabeth herself put it when she attended a briefing at the London School of Economics in 2008, “If these things were so large, how come everyone missed them?”

Read more …

Good to see Dmitry!

• Watch This! (Dmitry Orlov)

I first realized that the USA was going to follow the general trajectory of the USSR back in 1995. I also immediately realized that the USSR was rather well prepared for collapse whereas the USA was about to be blindsided by it, and so, as a public service, I thought I should warn people. “And a fat lot of good that did!” some of you might immediately exclaim. [..] And so I had my “Eureka!” moment in 1995, and a decade later, in 2005, I went public with my observations. I got a surprisingly sympathetic response from some particularly enlightened people (even if they said so themselves). And now, a quarter of a century after my initial insight, as the US enters national bankruptcy and institutional collapse, the whole world is being treated to an end-of-empire spectacular election extravaganza starring none other than the consummate showman and impresario extraordinaire Donald Trump.

He used to run beauty pageants, while this one is more of an ugliness pageant, but then beauty is rare and always fades while ugliness is commonplace and usually just gets uglier, making it a much safer bet. And so let’s accept it as a parting present to the world from a vanishing nation that gave us horror flicks, reality television and three-ring circuses with sideshow freaks. Within the sweeping panoramic tableau of the 2020 election, Trump (our hero) appears bathed in a golden sunset glow of nostalgia for lost American greatness which he forever promises to rekindle. Rest assured, Trump or no Trump, America will never be great again. But Trump’s magic halo extends out from his resplendent orange cranial plumage and enfolds all those who pine for the lost Pax Americana and fear and loathe what America is fast becoming—which is, to put it bluntly, a holding tank for degenerates of every stripe presided over by a freak show.

They pine for a time when men were manly and women womanly, when secretaries were flattered when their bosses took time away from their busy schedules to rub up against them, and when everyone was either a WASP, or worked hard on trying to look and act like one, or kept to their assigned station in life and knew better than to get too uppity. Arrayed against our fearless orange-hued leader, who at 74 is no spring chicken himself, is a ghoulish gaggle of geriatric gerontocrats. There is Joe Biden, 77, whose brain ran away and joined a circus some years ago but who imagines himself to be president-elect, or senator, or vice-president, or something. Having spent eight years lurking in the shadows as Obama’s VP, Biden is as fit to lead as a pig is kosher after rubbing its side against a corner of a synagogue. To assist Biden in his dodderings there is his party-appointed nanny, Kamala Harris, a mere slip of a girl at 56.

Also haunting the balcony of the American mausoleum is Nancy Pelosi, 80, who still runs the House of Representatives even though proper employment for her at this point would be up on a pole keeping the birds off the corn. There is also Bernie Sanders, 79, a sad pagliaccio whose permanent role in the political Commedia dell’Arte that the Democratic Party stages every four years is to simulate democracy by cheerleading crowds of young imbeciles in Act I, to feign death after falling off his pogo stick in Act II, and to stagger to his feet, wave and smile for the curtain call. Last but not least, there is the horrid harpy Hillary Clinton, who is relatively young at 73 but whose putrid smell and cadaverous, ghastly visage are not longer fit for public display except in most delicately contrived circumstances. Hidden even further backstage is the suppurating cadaver of George Soros who, at 90, is still pulling the strings and wreaking havoc in the US and around the world.

Read more …

 

 

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What makes us fragile is that institutions cannot have the same virtues (honor, truthfulness, courage, loyalty, tenacity) as individuals.
– Nassim Nicholas Taleb in The Bed of Procrustes

 

 

COVID Tracking Project

 

 

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Debt Rattle December 11 2017

Dec 112017
 
 December 11, 2017  Posted by at 10:27 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , ,  9 Responses »


MC Escher Balcony 1945

 

• Bitcoin Futures Top $18,000, Soar 20% From Open – Halted for Second Time (ZH)
• Investors Told to Brace for Steepest Rate Hikes Since 2006 (BBG)
• The Struggle To Maintain The “Standard Of Living” (Roberts)
• China Audit Finds Provinces Faked Data and Borrowed Illegally (BBG)
• Markets Tell You What To Do If You Listen (Peters)
• UK Seeking ‘Canada Plus Plus Plus’ EU Trade Deal (BBG)
• Brexit’s Just A Distraction To The Real Problem: UK’s Clapped-Out Economy (G.)
• Poland Risks Being the EU’s Rogue State (BBG)
• Pentagon To Undergo First Ever Audit (ZH)
• ‘A Christmas Carol’, Money, Debt, and Success (MW)
• Mass Starvation Is Humanity’s Fate (Monbiot)
• Monsanto Offers Cash To US Farmers Who Use Controversial Chemical (R.)

 

 

You don’t have to own bitcoin anymore to bet on it.

• Bitcoin Futures Top $18,000, Soar 20% From Open – Halted for Second Time (ZH)

Update: At 10:05pm ET, the CFE halted trading in Cboe Bitcoin Futures (XBT), in accordance with CFE Rule 1302(i)(ii) which defines the threshold for the halt as a 20% surge. XBT will re-open for trading approximately five (5)minutes from the time of the halt. Bitcoin Futures have topped $18,000 for the first time… It was reopened at 10:10pm ET. All of which is odd because Bob Pisani and the rest of the mainstream said that the opening of Bitcoin Futures would bring about the demise of the cryptocurrency due to the ability to short?

Update: At precisely 8:31pm ET, the CBOE instituted the first ever XBT trading halt, which lasted for two minutes according to a notice on Cboe’s website. XBT contracts have since resumed trading. As a reminder, the Cboe can halt trading for 2 minutes after 10% swings, and 5 minutes at 20%, an attempt to prevent wild swings.

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Things are a-changing.

• Investors Told to Brace for Steepest Rate Hikes Since 2006 (BBG)

Wall Street economists are telling investors to brace for the biggest tightening of monetary policy in more than a decade. With the world economy heading into its strongest period since 2011, Citigroup Inc. and JPMorgan Chase & Co. predict average interest rates across advanced economies will climb to at least 1 percent next year in what would be the largest increase since 2006. As for the quantitative easing that marks its 10th anniversary in the U.S. next year, Bloomberg Economics predicts net asset purchases by the main central banks will fall to a monthly $18 billion at the end of 2018, from $126 billion in September, and turn negative during the first half of 2019. That reflects an increasingly synchronized global expansion finally strong enough to spur inflation, albeit modestly.

The test for policy makers, including incoming Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, will be whether they can continue pulling back without derailing demand or rocking asset markets. “2018 is the year when we have true tightening,” said Ebrahim Rahbari, director of global economics at Citigroup in New York. “We will continue on the current path where financial markets can deal quite well with monetary policy but perhaps later in the year, or in 2019, monetary policy will become one of the complicating factors.” A clearer picture should form this week when the Norges Bank, Fed, Bank of England, European Central Bank and Swiss National Bank announce their final policy decisions of 2017. They collectively set borrowing costs for more than a third of the world economy. At least 10 other central banks also deliver decisions this week.

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Again, from an article with much more info and many more graphs.

• The Struggle To Maintain The “Standard Of Living” (Roberts)

Economic cycles are only sustainable for as long as excesses are being built. The natural law of reversions, while they can be suspended by artificial interventions, cannot be repealed. More importantly, while there is currently “no sign of recession,” what is going on with the main driver of economic growth – the consumer? The chart below shows the real problem. Since the financial crisis, the average American has not seen much of a recovery. Wages have remained stagnant, real employment has been subdued and the actual cost of living (when accounting for insurance, college, and taxes) has risen rather sharply. The net effect has been a struggle to maintain the current standard of living which can be seen by the surge in credit as a percentage of the economy.

To put this into perspective, we can look back throughout history and see that substantial increases in consumer debt to GDP have occurred coincident with recessionary drags in the economy. No sign of recession? Are you sure about that?

There has been a shift caused by the financial crisis, aging demographics, massive monetary interventions and the structural change in employment which has skewed the seasonal-adjustments in economic data. This makes every report from employment, retail sales, and manufacturing appear more robust than they would be otherwise. This is a problem mainstream analysis continues to overlook but will be used as an excuse when it reverses. Here is my point. While the call of a “recession” may seem far-fetched based on today’s economic data points, no one was calling for a recession in early 2000 or 2007 either. By the time the data is adjusted, and the eventual recession is revealed, it won’t matter as the damage will have already been done. As Howard Marks once quipped: “Being right, but early in the call, is the same as being wrong.”

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You need an audit for that?

• China Audit Finds Provinces Faked Data and Borrowed Illegally (BBG)

China found some local governments inflated revenue levels and raised debt illegally in a nationwide audit, a setback for Beijing in its bid to boost the credibility of economic data after a run of scandals. Ten cities, counties or districts in the Yunnan, Hunan and Jilin provinces, as well as the southwestern city of Chongqing, inflated fiscal revenues by 1.55 billion yuan ($234 million), the National Audit Office said in a statement on its website dated Dec. 8. Of that, 1.24 billion yuan was from the Wangcheng district in the provincial capital of Hunan, where officials faked the ownership transfer of local government buildings to boost income. The inspection, which covered the third quarter, also found that five cities or counties in the Jiangxi, Shaanxi, Gansu, Hunan and Hainan provinces raised about 6.43 billion yuan in debts by violating rules, such as offering commitment letters.

The findings are a blow to China’s bid to rein in data fraud, which has been widespread in some of the poorer provinces where officials were incentivized to inflate the numbers as a way of advancing their careers. Concern from investors wanting to be able to trust data out of the world’s second-largest economy led to the government trying to crack down on the practice, with President Xi Jinping saying in March that data fraud “must be throttled,” according to the state-run Xinhua News Agency. Rigid stability in provincial data on growth and employment has long sparked questions from economists, with the rust-belt province of Liaoning, in China’s northeast, famously admitting back in January that it had fabricated fiscal data from 2011 to 2014. Some regions and cities in Jilin province and Inner Mongolia also falsified reports, the Communist Party said in June, without providing details.

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“Near the highs, few opportunities exist to earn substantial returns, so you should take little risk..”

• Markets Tell You What To Do If You Listen (Peters)

Anecdote” “What are the odds we come across an opportunity in the coming 4yrs to earn 20%?” the investor asked his team. “High,” they answered. “The odds are 100%,” he said, having seen this movie a few times. “So our cost of capital is 5% per year (20% divided by 4yrs), plus the 1% we earn on cash,” he said. His team nodded. “Under no circumstances should we deploy capital unless it earns well more than 6% per year from here on out.” It made sense. “What do we see that earns more than this hurdle?” he asked. His team’s list was as short today as it was long in 2016, 2011, 2009, 2003, 1998, 1997, 1994, 1992, 1990, 1987, etc. Today’s few opportunities have much in common with previous peaks: negative convexity, complexity, illiquidity, leverage, and/or all the above. “Investors confuse a 7.5% average annualized return target with a 7.5% annual return target,” he explained. “They’re entirely different things.”

Targeting average annualized returns allows you to accept what the market gives you, while targeting annual returns forces you to leverage investments near peak valuations to hit your bogey. “Typical pension and endowment boards want incoming investment returns to consistently exceed outgoing flows.” So most investors attempt to produce the highest return every year, no matter what it takes. “But that’s the wrong objective. Never underestimate the value of cash and patience in achieving the real goal; superior returns over the complete cycle,” he explained. “Markets tell you what to do if you listen,” he said. “Near the highs, few opportunities exist to earn substantial returns, so you should take little risk. Near the lows, opportunities to earn attractive returns are abundant.” You should take a lot of risk. “This sounds simple because it is. It’s obvious. But obvious is not easy.”

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But Canada says no.

• UK Seeking ‘Canada Plus Plus Plus’ EU Trade Deal (BBG)

Britain wants a trade deal with the European Union that includes the best parts of the bloc’s agreements with Japan, Canada and South Korea, along with financial services, Brexit Secretary David Davis said, showing optimism a pact can be struck within a year. The chances of the U.K. leaving the EU without a deal, defaulting to World Trade Organization rules, have “dropped dramatically,’’ Davis said in a BBC TV interview on Sunday. Still, he signaled the painstaking agreement struck on Friday to end the first phase of Brexit negotiations isn’t binding, and that Britain’s exit payment of as much as 39 billion pounds ($52 billion) is contingent on reaching a free-trade agreement. Doing so, he said, “is not that complicated.”

“We start in full alignment: we start in complete convergence with the EU, so we then work it out from there,” Davis said on the Andrew Marr Show. “What we want is a bespoke outcome: We’ll probably start with the best of Canada, the best of Japan and the best of South Korea and then add to that the bits that are missing, which is services,” he said. “Canada plus plus plus would be one way of putting it.” The Brexit secretary’s bullishness belies the noise coming from his counterparts in the EU. It’s taken eight months of at times bitter haggling to make sufficient progress on what was supposed to be the easiest part of the talks – resolving Britain’s exit payment, its future border with Ireland, and the rights of EU and U.K. citizens living in each other’s territories.

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Don’t think I ever heard clapped-out before.

• Brexit’s Just A Distraction To The Real Problem: UK’s Clapped-Out Economy (G.)

As Brexiteers shout “forward” and remainers chant “ back”, the battle over the EU dominates British politics. Yet it obscures a more basic British problem. Our clapped-out economy, brilliant at consumption, poor at production, is becoming unviable. A “nation of shopkeepers” has become a nation of shoppers, dependent on debt. Deindustrialisation and misguided economic policies have reduced the former workshop of the world to a level where Britain can neither pay its way, nor afford the defence and public services an advanced society needs. Everything in which we once were leaders – ships, railways, TV, great bridges, nuclear plants, bicycles, textiles, clothing, even Kit Kats – we now import.

We consume more than we produce, leading to an annual balance of payments deficit rising above 6% of GDP, financed by borrowing and selling companies, property and citizenship to survive. The result is a sluggish economy (a growing proportion of which is owned by foreigners); low productivity (because the manufacturing sector has shrunk to one-tenth of GDP); and static pay, as every sector except finance cuts costs to survive. Being in or out of the EU has little relevance to this basic problem. The EU is a market, not a mutual support system. Instead of redistributing growth to succour laggards it punishes them, as it has Greece. It drains us and proscribes the techniques of nurture by state aid, protectionism and devaluation by which Germany and France grew. Its “aid” is just our own money back, with the EU’s heavy costs taken out.

Even worse, Germany’s huge surpluses mean that deficit countries like the UK, with our £60bn-plus trade deficit, are compounded by the single market. Yet coming out offers no solution either. It generates uncertainty and deters investment. Most of world trade is controlled by multinationals, and Britain would be more vulnerable to their ministrations. Tory Brexiteers aim at turning us, down and dirty, into a low-wage, deregulated, cost-cutting tax haven-on-Thames. Hardly acceptable to an electorate that has already endured decades of that. The only solution is to rebalance an economy excessively dependent on finance and services by widening the manufacturing and production base and making it competitive. Neither free trade nor the single market will do that.

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The EU is going to make this ugly. It’s the only thing they know how to do.

• Poland Risks Being the EU’s Rogue State (BBG)

Behind the noise of Brexit negotiations, the talk in the EU this year has been that there’s potentially a bigger problem in the east. And the prospect of another rupture looks to be increasing. Poland’s de facto leader, Jaroslaw Kaczynski, hand-picked his second prime minister in two years, opting last week for western-educated Finance Minister Mateusz Morawiecki as he seeks to boost the economy after revamping the judicial system. He is another Kaczynski acolyte who has backed the increasingly authoritarian Law & Justice party’s push to seize more control of the courts, a plan condemned by the European Parliament and European Commission The mood in Brussels is that EU institutions can no longer stand by and watch a country that’s the biggest net recipient of European aid thumb its nose without paying some sort of price. Few people are discussing Poland following Britain out of the bloc, but a protracted conflict is getting more likely.

Concerns about the shift in Poland triggered calls to limit access to EU funds for countries disrespecting the democratic rule of law. At a ministerial meeting on Nov. 15 in Brussels, the issue was raised during a discussion about the 2021-2028 budget by countries including Germany, France and the Nordic states, according to two EU officials with knowledge of the matter. Poland’s refusal to take in mainly Muslim refugees was referred last week to the European Court of Justice along with Hungary and the Czech Republic. “There is a growing feeling in Brussels that solidarity cannot be a one-way street, and that it becomes difficult to justify the 10 billion-euro per year net transfers for a country that is increasingly at odds with the bloc’s values,” said Bruno Dethomas, a senior policy adviser at GPLUS consultancy in Brussels and a former EU ambassador to Poland. “It is high time the EU reacted, or it risks losing its soul.”

Poles are accustomed to their government stirring up nationalist fervor with blistering attacks on the EU while welcoming the policies of U.S. President Donald Trump. It’s railed against taking in Muslim refugees, claimed the country has been enslaved and snapped at criticism of its power grab this year. But even by Kaczynski’s standards, his speech on Nov. 10 to mark Independence Day pulled no punches. It’s up to Poles to show “the sick Europe of today the path back to health, to fundamental values, to true freedom and to the strengthening of our civilization based on Christianity,” he said.

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How confident are you in this audit?

• Pentagon To Undergo First Ever Audit (ZH)

After decades of waste, overpayments, trillions of missing or improperly accounted for dollars, and most recently losing track of 44,000 US soldiers, the Pentagon is about to undergo its first audit in history conducted by 2,400 auditors from independent public accounting firms to conduct reviews across the Army, Navy, Air Force and more – followed by annual audits going forward. The announcement follows a May commitment by Pentagon comptroller David Norquist, who previously served as the CFO at the Department of Homeland Security when the agency performed its audit. “Starting an audit is a matter of driving change inside a bureaucracy that may resist it,” Norquist told members of the Armed Services Committee at the time when pressed over whether or not he could get the job done at the DHS.

According to the DoD release: “The audit is massive. It will examine every aspect of the department from personnel to real property to weapons to supplies to bases. Some 2,400 auditors will fan out across the department to conduct it, Pentagon officials said. “It is important that the Congress and the American people have confidence in DoD’s management of every taxpayer dollar,” Norquist said. -defense.gov”. The Pentagon is no stranger to criticism over serious waste and purposefully sloppy accounting. A DoD Inspector General’s report from 2016 – which appears to be unavailable on the DoD website (but fortunately WAS archived)- found that in 2015 alone a staggering $6.5 trillion in funds was unaccounted for out of the Army’s budget, with $2.8 trillion in “wrongful adjustments” occurring in just one quarter.

In 2015, the Pentagon denied trying to shelve a study detailing $125 billion in waste created by a bloated employee counts for noncombat related work such as human resources, finance, health care management and property management. The report concluded that $125 billion could be saved by making those operations more efficient. On September 10th, 2001, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld announced that “According to some estimates we cannot track $2.3 trillion in transactions,” after a Pentagon whistleblower set off a probe. A day later, the September 11th attacks happened and the accounting scandal was quickly forgotten.

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Dickens was a big spender how had little.

• ‘A Christmas Carol’, Money, Debt, and Success (MW)

Karl Marx was so broke in 1859 he couldn’t afford the postage stamps to mail off his new manuscript, leading the philosopher to lament, “I don’t suppose anyone has ever written about ‘money’ when so short the stuff.” He was probably right about that. However, the most famous book about money written by someone strapped for cash wasn’t “Das Kapital” or “The Communist Manifesto.” It was “A Christmas Carol.” Charles Dickens suffered not only a personal-finance crisis but a creative one, as well, in the fall of 1843, when, in a sort of literary Hail Mary pass, he committed to writing a Christmas book in an impossible six weeks. And, in a plot twist as improbable as anything he himself could have come up with, this gambit actually worked: “A Christmas Carol” became one of the best-selling and most widely adapted books of all time, a work that shaped the very meaning of the holiday itself, and singlehandedly wiped out the goose market — more on that later.

This remarkable tale, recounted in Les Standiford’s biography, “The Man Who Invented Christmas,” and just turned into a highly entertaining new movie of the same name starring Dan Stevens and Christopher Plummer, holds financial lessons for everyone, especially those of us who’ve been tormented by the ghosts of bills past due and deadlines soon to come. Dickens was in debt: to begin with. There is no doubt whatever about that. Sales of his two most recent novels were so disappointing that his publishers cut his pay. Meanwhile, the 31-year-old author and social-justice warrior had just moved into a larger, and much more expensive, home to accommodate the birth of his fifth child (like Marx, his pecuniary troubles stemmed somewhat from the age-old failure to live within one’s means).

On top of all this, his relatives, including his chronically deadbeat dad, kept hitting him up for money. His father, who later inspired the beloved character Wilkins Micawber in “David Copperfield,” was so hopeless with money that Dickens rented his parents a cottage far out in the country, where he hoped it would be harder for them to overspend. For Dickens this was all kind of galling because he had been working so hard and he didn’t have much to show for it,” said Declan Kiely, curator of a terrific ongoing exhibit on Dickens at the Morgan Library in New York. When Scrooge berates his cheerful nephew Fred, “What’s Christmas time to you but a time for paying bills without money; a time for finding yourself a year older, but not an hour richer?” that could just as well have been Dickens ranting.

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How inevitable is this?

• Mass Starvation Is Humanity’s Fate (Monbiot)

[..] to keep pace with food demand, farmers in south Asia expect to use between 80 and 200% more water by the year 2050. Where will it come from? The next constraint is temperature. One study suggests that, all else being equal, with each degree celsius of warming the global yield of rice drops by 3%, wheat by 6% and maize by 7%. These predictions could be optimistic. Research published in the journal Agricultural & Environmental Letters finds that 4C of warming in the US corn belt could reduce maize yields by between 84 and 100%. The reason is that high temperatures at night disrupt the pollination process. But this describes just one component of the likely pollination crisis. Insectageddon, caused by the global deployment of scarcely tested pesticides, will account for the rest. Already, in some parts of the world, workers are now pollinating plants by hand. But that’s viable only for the most expensive crops.

[..] Because they tend to use more labour, grow a wider range of crops and work the land more carefully, small farmers, as a rule, grow more food per hectare than large ones. In the poorer regions of the world, people with fewer than five hectares own 30% of the farmland but produce 70% of the food. Since 2000, an area of fertile ground roughly twice the size of the UK has been seized by land grabbers and consolidated into large farms, generally growing crops for export rather than the food needed by the poor. While these multiple disasters unfold on land, the seas are being sieved of everything but plastic. Despite a massive increase in effort (bigger boats, bigger engines, more gear), the worldwide fish catch is declining by roughly 1% a year, as populations collapse. The global land grab is mirrored by a global sea grab: small fishers are displaced by big corporations, exporting fish to those who need it less but pay more.

About 3 billion people depend to a large extent on fish and shellfish protein. Where will it come from? All this would be hard enough. But as people’s incomes increase, their diet tends to shift from plant protein to animal protein. World meat production has quadrupled in 50 years, but global average consumption is still only half that of the UK – where we eat roughly our bodyweight in meat every year – and just over a third of the US level. Because of the way we eat, the UK’s farmland footprint (the land required to meet our demand) is 2.4 times the size of its agricultural area. If everyone aspires to this diet, how exactly do we accommodate it? The profligacy of livestock farming is astonishing. Already, 36% of the calories grown in the form of grain and pulses – and 53% of the protein – are used to feed farm animals. Two-thirds of this food is lost in conversion from plant to animal. A graph produced last week by Our World in Data suggests that, on average, you need 0.01m2 of land to produce a gram of protein from beans or peas, but 1m2 to produce it from beef cattle or sheep: a 100-fold difference.

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Monsanto is the no.1 risk to our food. Presented as our savior.

• Monsanto Offers Cash To US Farmers Who Use Controversial Chemical (R.)

Monsanto will give cash back to U.S. farmers who buy a weed killer that has been linked to widespread crop damage, offering an incentive to apply its product even as regulators in several U.S. states weigh restrictions on its use. The incentive to use XtendiMax with VaporGrip, a herbicide based on a chemical known as dicamba, could refund farmers over half the sticker price of the product in 2018 if they spray it on soybeans Monsanto engineered to resist the weed killer, according to company data. The United States faced an agricultural crisis this year caused by new formulations of dicamba-based herbicides, which farmers and weed experts say harmed crops because they evaporated and drifted away from where they were sprayed. Monsanto says XtendiMax is safe when properly applied.

The company is banking on the chemical and soybean seeds engineered to resist it, called Xtend, to dominate soybean production in the United States, the world’s second-largest exporter. BASF SE and DowDuPont also sell versions of dicamba-based herbicides. Monsanto’s cash-back offer comes as federal and state regulators are requiring training for farmers who plan to spray dicamba in 2018 and limiting when it can be used. Weed specialists say the restrictions make the chemical more costly and inconvenient to apply, but Monsanto’s incentive could help convince farmers to use it anyway.

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