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Debt Rattle February 5 2025

Feb 052025
 
 February 5, 2025  Posted by at 11:06 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , , ,  123 Responses »


Pablo Picasso Girl with a Mandolin (Fanny Tellier) 1910

 

• US Will ‘Take Over’ Gaza – Trump (RT)
• Zelensky Says He’s Ready For Talks With Putin (RT)
• The Dynamic Duo Have the Dems on the Run (Green)
• Elon Musk Is ‘Special Government Employee,’ White House Confirms (ET)
• Audit USAID…Then Shut It Down! (Ron Paul)
• “Rank Insubordination”: Rubio Says USAID Full Of Rogue Employees (ZH)
• RFK Jr. Moves Closer To Becoming US Health Chief (RT)
• DOJ Seeks Information on FBI Employees Who Investigated Jan. 6 (ET)
• Dept. of Ed on the Chopping Block as Trump Readies Executive Order (Moran)
• House Panel Asks PBS, NPR Chiefs to Testify on Alleged ‘Biased Content’ (ET)
• NY AG Letitia James Defies Trump’s EO On “Gender Affirming Care” (AmG)
• 20,000 Government Workers Take Trump Buyout Offer As Mass Layoffs Loom (ZH)
• Trump Attack On The Deep State Spectacular And Almost Certainly Legal (Widburg)
• Biden Spent Billions Promoting Illegal Immigration – Musk (RT)
• Merkel To Blame For The Rise Of The AfD: Former Austrian Chancellor Kurz (RMX)
• UK Hoping To Buy Its Way Out Of Trump Tariffs (RT)
• El Salvador Abandons Bitcoin Legal Tender Experiment (RT)
• Trump’s Withdrawal From the Paris Agreement Won’t Hurt the Climate (RCW)

 

 

 

 

Benz Glenn

SEN. JOHN KENNEDY

Leavitt

Raskin

 

 

 

 

McCain

McCabe

80%

Vivek

 

 

“Ukraine is not losing, but the front is moving in the wrong direction”
Mark Rutte

 

 

 

 

Force 2 million people from their homeland and turn it into a playground for the rich. As Tacitus said: “they make a desert and call it peace”. Not Trump’s finest idea. “Jordan and Egypt should take them”. “But they don’t want to..” “Oh well, we’ll give them money”. “It’s not about money, it’s about homeland”.

• US Will ‘Take Over’ Gaza – Trump (RT)

US President Donald Trump has announced that the United States will assume control over the Gaza Strip, vowing to rebuild the war-torn enclave and create economic opportunities for its future residents. When asked whether US troops would be deployed to Gaza, Trump vowed to “do what is necessary.” Trump made the remarks on Tuesday following his meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the White House. The US president reiterated his view that Palestinians should be permanently resettled elsewhere, adding that the US would “take over” Gaza and lead efforts to clear the destruction left by 15 months of war between Israel and Hamas.“The US will take over the Gaza Strip. And we will do a job with it, too. We’ll own it and be responsible for dismantling all of the dangerous unexploded bombs and other weapons on the site,” Trump said, promising to “level the site and get rid of the destroyed buildings.”

Asked to clarify what exactly he meant by a “takeover,” the US leader said he envisions a “long-term ownership position” that would supposedly bring “great stability” to the entire Middle East. “Everybody I’ve spoken to loves the idea of the United States owning that piece of land, developing it, and creating thousands of jobs,” Trump claimed. Trump also said he is not ruling out deploying US troops to support his Gaza development plan. “We’ll do what is necessary. If it’s necessary, we’ll do that. We’re going to take over that place,” he said. Approximately 92% of homes in the Gaza Strip have been destroyed or severely damaged, and around 1.9 million people – more than 90% of Gaza’s population – have been displaced since the war broke out in October 2023, according to the UN. Trump, a former real estate mogul, has repeatedly referred to Gaza as a “demolition site” in recent weeks.

When asked who would populate Gaza once the US “takes over” and redevelops it, and whether the Palestinian people would be able to return, Trump responded: “I envision… the world’s people living there. I think the potential in the Gaza Strip is unbelievable. And I think the entire world, representatives from all over the world, will be there and they’ll live there… Palestinians also,” he said. “I don’t want to be a wise guy. But the Riviera of the Middle East – this could be so magnificent.”

Bibi

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Trump appears to do better at home than abroad. Gaza is a mess, and so is Kiev. Putin will not talk to Zelensky: “..when the current head of the regime – that’s the only way to call [Zelensky] today – signed this decree, he was a somewhat legitimate president. But now he can’t cancel it because he is illegitimate. That’s the trick, the catch, the trap..”

Trump also wants Ukraine to pay the US in rare earths. But those are all in the Lugansk and Donetsk areas, i.e. parts of Russia.

• Zelensky Says He’s Ready For Talks With Putin (RT)

Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky has expressed his willingness to negotiate with Russian President Vladimir Putin if it is the only way to bring the Ukraine conflict to an end. He made the remarks during an interview with British journalist Piers Morgan, with excerpts published on Tuesday. Asked if he is prepared to meet with the Russian president, Zelensky indicated that he is.“If that is the only setup in which we can bring peace to the citizens of Ukraine and not lose people, definitely we will go for this setup, for this meeting,” he said. “What is my attitude to him [Putin]? I will not be kind to him and I… consider him an enemy. And to be honest, I believe he considers me an enemy as well,” he said.

The remarks appear to reflect a shift in Zelensky’s stance. He has refused to negotiate with Putin in the past and even signed a decree banning any negotiations with Moscow, and Putin specifically. Last month, Zelensky said the ban applies to all Ukrainian officials except himself, while the original 2022 decree only stated that negotiations are “impossible” without specifying any individuals or entities prohibited from engaging in them. Last week, Putin reiterated Moscow’s position that Zelensky lacks the legitimacy to sign agreements, given that his presidential term expired in May 2024 and no constitutional mechanism exists to extend it. However, the Russian president said he is willing to send negotiators to talk to Zelensky if he is open to discussions.

“It’s possible to negotiate with anyone. However, due to his illegitimacy, [Zelensky] has no right to sign anything. If he wishes to participate in talks, I will deploy people who will conduct such negotiations,” Putin stated.The Ukrainian decree banning negotiations with Russia remains an obstacle to meaningful talks between Kiev and Moscow, Putin said. He pledged to deploy a team of legal experts to assess the authority of any Ukrainian negotiating team and determine whether they have the proper legal standing to sign an agreement. “If we start negotiations now, they will be illegitimate… Because when the current head of the regime – that’s the only way to call [Zelensky] today – signed this decree, he was a somewhat legitimate president. But now he can’t cancel it because he is illegitimate. That’s the trick, the catch, the trap,” Putin explained.

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“This is the one shot the American people have to defeat BUREAUcracy, rule of the bureaucrats, and restore DEMOcracy, rule of the people. We’re never going to get another chance like this.”

• The Dynamic Duo Have the Dems on the Run (Green)

“Get ’em skeered and keep the skeer on ’em,” was Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest’s timeless advice about combat. President Donald Trump is a Yankee and Elon Musk is an awkward super-genius immigrant but I swear those two have been reading up on their Confederate history. No, I’m not suggesting they’re going to “put y’all back in chains.” What do you think I am, a Democrat? [shudder] When your enemy is scared, don’t give him a moment to recover his wits. When he’s on the ground, don’t let him up. When he flees, pursue him. Because sometimes a simple win isn’t enough. Trump and Musk have the Democrats scared, and every indication is they mean to keep them scared. And Another Thing: I used to refer to Democrats as opponents. But after years of being treated like their enemy, it’s time to return the favor.

The panic set in over the weekend when Musk and his DOGE boys — more on them momentarily — showed up at the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) like they owned the place. Correction: they showed up like we, the taxpayers, own the place. Which we do, by the way. It’s just been a long time since our civil servants had a good reminder of the “servant” half of their positions. By Monday, they were desperately flailing.

“Congress must take action to restore the rule of law,” he whined. You just want to grab Schumer by the lapels and give him a good shake while reminding him, “You ARE in Congress, you ninny. Take it up with your coworkers, assuming they’ll listen to your pathetic excuse for a United States senator.” Musk responded to Schumer, “This is the one shot the American people have to defeat BUREAUcracy, rule of the bureaucrats, and restore DEMOcracy, rule of the people. We’re never going to get another chance like this.” And I’ve just got to know which 22-year-old know-nothing intern posted this face-palmer on behalf of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee yesterday.

It’s like the Dems are so all-in on their illegal alien invasion that they no longer know the difference between a naturalized citizen and a foreigner. There are a great many examples of waste with which I’ve already amused you these last few days but I think Stephen Miller summed up best what’s wrong with USAID.

THIS is what they’re panicked about losing. Not because anybody gives a damn about condoms for Gaza or establishing DEI in Serbian elementary schools, but because of the skim they’ll miss out on. Think of Democrats as mobsters who get their beaks wet on every transaction. Intelligencer’s Ed Kilgore collected his wits enough to very calmly shriek about “Trump and his underlings” doing things “that rely on exotic and dangerous theories of imperial presidential powers that Richard Nixon could have only dreamed of possessing.” Refusing to release grants (that were never explicitly authorized by Congress) to Deep State cronies is imperial, you see. Anyway, Kilgore’s genius #Resist plan goes thusly: There is a steadily increasing possibility that the Trump offensive could go so far and so fast that congressional Democrats are tempted essentially to go on strike when it comes to actions where they do actually have some leverage.

These include an upcoming effort to keep the federal government operating when the stopgap spending authority enacted in December runs out on March 14. So they’re going to stop us from shutting down wasteful government by shutting down even more wasteful government? Oh, please don’t throw me in that briar patch! More seriously, Kilgore writes that “the emerging idea may be for congressional Democrats to insist that before they provide a single vote that Republicans need, Elon Musk and Russell Vought (the OMB director nominee widely thought to be behind the funding freeze) must be put on a leash.”There are the chains again. It always comes down to those for Dems, doesn’t it?

Wait until the news sinks in that Trump is serious about radically downsizing the Department of Education. That’s another one of the Left’s Holiest of Holies that exists for the sacred purposes of funneling money to favored Democrat constituencies while indoctrinating children. It isn’t all fun and games, sadly. The Left doxxed at least one of the young computer geniuses Musk brought with him to OPM to untangle the spilled spaghetti mess of slush-fund spending at USAID and other agencies. There were two assassination attempts on Trump last year, so there’s no doubt in my mind the Left won’t happily trigger some other nut into taking a shot or two at one of Musk’s whiz kids. “In a mature society,” Robert Heinlein’s (literally) timeless character Lazarus Long observed, “’civil servant’ is semantically equal to ‘civil master.'” Well, I’m not feeling all that mature right now. How about you?

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“Special government employees are appointed for no more than 130 days.”

• Elon Musk Is ‘Special Government Employee,’ White House Confirms (ET)

The White House on Monday confirmed that Space X and Tesla founder and CEO Elon Musk is considered a “special government employee” under the Trump administration amid questions about his work with the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). Speaking to reporters at the White House, press secretary Karoline Leavitt confirmed Musk’s federal status and added, “I can also confirm that he has abided by all applicable federal laws.” Leavitt was also asked about Musk’s security clearance. She said she didn’t know but would check on it. The designation allows Musk, the world’s richest person, to work for the federal government and potentially avoid disclosure rules regarding possible conflicts of interest and finances that generally apply to other government staff.

Special government employees are appointed for no more than 130 days. President Donald Trump said that Musk “can’t do and won’t do anything without our approval, and we’ll give him the approval where appropriate; where not appropriate, we won’t.” “He reports in … but he does have a good natural instinct,” Trump told reporters at the White House on Monday. The Republican president also downplayed complaints about Musk’s alleged conflict of interests, saying, “Where we think there’s a conflict or there’s a problem, we won’t let him go near it, but he has some very good ideas.” One of the most significant steps was DOGE gaining access to the U.S. Treasury payment system, which is responsible for 1 billion payments per year totaling $5 trillion. It includes sensitive information involving bank accounts and Social Security payments.

It’s unclear what Musk wants to do with the payment system. He has said that he could trim $1 trillion from the federal deficit “just by addressing waste, fraud and abuse.” Democratic lawmakers have decried what they characterize as an unelected billionaire amassing too much power over the federal government. “That’s the biggest data hack ever in the world,” Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.) told reporters in Madison, Wisconsin. “I am outraged about it,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said on Capitol Hill, adding that Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent must revoke Musk’s access to the payment system. “We must halt this unlawful and dangerous power grab.” In a post on the Musk-owned social media platform X, Schumer said that DOGE isn’t “a real government agency” and lacks authority to make spending decisions or to shut down programs.

In response, Musk wrote on X on Tuesday morning that Schumer’s reaction is “hysterical” and that DOGE “is doing work that really matters.” He framed DOGE’s mission in existential terms. “This is the one shot the American people have to defeat BUREAUcracy, rule of the bureaucrats, and restore DEMOcracy, rule of the people,” Musk wrote. “We’re never going to get another chance like this.” Meanwhile, a group representing retirees and union workers sued Bessent and the U.S. Treasury Department on Monday in a bid to get them to stop sharing personal and financial information with DOGE.

“The scale of the intrusion into individuals’ privacy is massive and unprecedented,” the groups wrote in their complaint, filed in the District of Columbia federal court. Aside from the Treasury Department, Musk and Trump have set their sights on the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), with both saying that the organization has been led by radicals and needs to be dissolved. On Monday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio confirmed that he is now the acting director of USAID. He said the agency lacked accountability and that its staff did not follow orders.

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“..the “news” from Ukraine is being written by US government-backed media outlets and then picked up by US and other western media.”

• Audit USAID…Then Shut It Down! (Ron Paul)

As of this writing, when you attempt to access the US Agency for International Development (USAID) website or social media pages you are informed that, “This site can’t be reached.” The media reports that the new Trump Administration has not only frozen USAID activities but may be planning on bringing it back under control of the US State Department. Other reports, including statements by Elon Musk, suggest If true, the closing of USAID may be one of the most significant changes President Trump has made among many dramatic actions in his first couple of weeks in office. Many Americans may still have the idea that USAID is a government agency delivering relief at disaster sites overseas. They may still remember the bags of rice or grain with the USAID logo on them. But that is not USAID.

USAID is a key component of the US government’s “regime change” operations worldwide. USAID spends billions of dollars every year propping up “NGOs” overseas that function as shadow governments, eating away at elected governments that the US interventionists want to overthrow. Behind most US foreign policy disasters overseas you will see the fingerprints of USAID. From Ukraine to Georgia and far beyond, USAID is meddling in the internal affairs of foreign countries – something that would infuriate Americans if it was happening to us. When President Trump ordered a 90 day pause in USAID activities, we quickly learned just how pernicious the agency really is. The US media reported that Ukrainian press outlets were scrambling to keep their doors open when the US dollars stopped flowing. It is reported that 90 percent of the media outlets are funded by the US government!

This means that there is virtually no independent media in Ukraine, only fake news outlets willing to toe the US Administration’s propaganda line. Does anyone think these wholly US-funded “news” outlets would ever publish a story that the US government did not want published? This is plainly immoral, but it is also dangerous. Most US mainstream media stories about Ukraine have their origins in the “reporting” of the local media. From battlefield news to casualties to the state of the Ukrainian military, the “news” from Ukraine is being written by US government-backed media outlets and then picked up by US and other western media. It is a closed propaganda loop that not only propagandizes the US citizen but also feeds false information into US government outlets – such as Congress – that rely on mainstream US media reporting for their news on Ukraine.

No wonder so many in Washington continue to support this hopeless war! But USAID is not just in the business of disinformation. Elon Musk recently re-posted a New York Post article on X reporting that USAID funneled $53 million to EcoHealth Alliance to support gain-of-function research on coronaviruses at the Wuhan lab! Did USAID help fund COVID? Americans have a right to know. In natural catastrophes overseas Americans have shown themselves to be extremely generous. Private volunteer assistance organizations can more effectively assist victims of disasters worldwide. USAID needs a full and transparent audit. Americans deserve to know exactly what is being done in their name overseas. Then the agency needs to be shuttered completely, and its employees sent home. That would go a long way toward making America great again.

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“..their basic attitude is, ‘We don’t work for anyone, we work for ourselves, no agency of government can tell us what to do.”

• “Rank Insubordination”: Rubio Says USAID Full Of Rogue Employees (ZH)

Secretary of State Marco Rubio slammed the US Agency for International Development (USAID) for what he called “rank insubordination,” and is full of rogue employees who do whatever the hell they want. “Well, that was always the goal was to reform it, but now we have rank insubordination,” Rubio told Fox News, in comments just one day after President Trump announced that Rubio would serve as the acting head of USAID – which itself came after Elon Musk’s DOGE team descended upon the agency and revealed that “USAID is a ball of worms. There is no apple. And when there is no apple you just need to get rid of the whole thing. That’s why it’s got to go. It’s beyond repair.” According to Rubio, “Now we have basically an active effort — their basic attitude is, ‘We don’t work for anyone, we work for ourselves, no agency of government can tell us what to do.”

“So the president made me the acting administrator,” he added. “I’ve delegated that power to someone who is there full-time, and we’re going to go through the same process at USAID as we’re going through now at the State Department.” According to Rubio, USAID has lost its focus and abandoned the “national interest” – telling Fox: “They have basically evolved into an agency that believes that they’re not even a U.S. government agency, that they are out — they’re a global charity, that they take the taxpayer money, and they spend it as a global charity irrespective of whether it is in the national interest or not in the national interest.”

“One of the most common complaints you will get if you go to embassies around the world from State Department officials and ambassadors and the like is USAID is not only not cooperative — they undermine the work that we’re doing in that country, they are supporting programs that upset the host government for whom we’re trying to work with on a broader scale, and so forth,” Rubio added. On Monday, deep state crusaders Ilhan Omar (D-MN) and Jamie Raskin (D-MD) staged a dramatic protest outside the USAID headquarters, with Omar suggesting that Trump’s move to fold the agency into the State Department was “what the beginning of dictatorship looks like!” – and Raskin suggesting that Elon Musk had “illegally seized power over the financial payment systems of the United States Department of Treasury,” adding “Elon Musk, you didn’t create USAID,” and that Musk “doesn’t have the power to destroy it.”

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Tulsi, too, is one final round of votes away from being confirmed.

• RFK Jr. Moves Closer To Becoming US Health Chief (RT)

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has moved closer to becoming the US secretary of health and human services after the Senate Finance Committee voted 14-13 to approve his nomination, with all Republicans in favor and all Democrats opposed. Kennedy, 71, an environmental lawyer and well-known vaccine skeptic, faced rigorous questioning during his confirmation hearings. Republican Senator Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, a physician and chairman of the Senate Health Committee, had initially expressed reservations about Kennedy’s stance on vaccines. However, Cassidy ultimately voted in favor after receiving assurances from Kennedy and the administration of their “commitment to protecting the public health benefit of vaccination.”

Democrats, led by Senator Ron Wyden of Oregon, strongly opposed the nomination, citing concerns over Kennedy’s views. Wyden warned that Kennedy’s leadership could erode public trust in vaccines and public health initiatives. “Mr. Kennedy has given us no reason to believe he will be anything other than a rubber stamp for plans to cut Medicaid and rip health care away from the American people,” Wyden stated. The full Senate, where Republicans currently hold a majority, is expected to vote on Kennedy’s nomination in the coming days or next week. A simple majority is required for confirmation.

US President Donald Trump nominated Kennedy shortly after winning reelection in November last year. If confirmed, Kennedy will oversee a vast budget and key agencies, including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the National Institutes of Health (NIH), and other sub-agencies.Shortly before the committee’s vote, Trump endorsed his nominee in a post on Truth Social. “Twenty years ago, autism in children was 1 in 10,000. NOW IT’S 1 in 34. WOW! Something’s really wrong. We need BOBBY!!! Thank You! DJT,” the president wrote. Kennedy is the son of former US Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy and the nephew of President John F. Kennedy. He was a vocal critic of the Covid-19 response measures recommended by the World Health Organization, including the strict lockdowns and rapid rollout of vaccines.

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Zerohedge: “Update (1615ET): DOGE is at it again – kicking down the doors of FBI headquarters to obtain the names of roughly 5,000 agents who worked on Jan. 6 cases. This comes after the agency withheld specifics on those involved, such as their names. Officials working for Elon Musk’s DOGE were spotted by CNN entering FBI headquarters on Tuesday to collect the information.

• DOJ Seeks Information on FBI Employees Who Investigated Jan. 6 (ET)

The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) has asked for the names of thousands of FBI employees who worked on investigations into the Jan. 6, 2021, breach of the U.S. Capitol. Acting Deputy Attorney General Emil Bove in a Jan. 31 missive to Acting FBI Director Brian Driscoll directed the FBI to provide the names of all bureau personnel who investigated Jan. 6 and an unrelated terrorism case, Senate Democrats said in a Feb. 3 letter. Driscoll told FBI workers in a separate message to the FBI workforce that the request encompasses thousands of employees across the country, including himself, “who have supported these investigative efforts.” Bove warned that “additional personnel actions” could follow, Senate Judiciary Committee Ranking Member Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) said. [..] An FBI spokesperson confirmed that Bove has requested information about FBI personnel.

“The FBI is currently working to respond to a request for information from the Acting Deputy Attorney General about current and former FBI personnel assigned to certain investigations or prosecutions, including the events that occurred at or near the United States Capitol on January 6, 2021,” the spokesperson told The Epoch Times in an email. “The FBI will work within the law and policy to respond to official requests for information from the Department of Justice. To be clear, the FBI does not view anyone’s identification on one of these lists as an indicator of misconduct,” the bureau added. Ed Martin, interim U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, previously launched an investigation into why federal prosecutors brought a felony obstruction charge against hundreds of Jan. 6 defendants. Trump, after taking office, pardoned many people who had been charged over Jan. 6.

The new request for information comes after acting Department of Justice leadership terminated officials, including prosecutors involved in prosecuting Trump before he was elected, and six FBI executive assistant directors. “I do not believe the current leadership of the Justice Department can trust these FBI employees to assist in implementing the President’s agenda faithfully,” Bove stated in his letter to Driscoll, Senate Democrats said. Durbin and the other senators told Acting Attorney General James McHenry and Driscoll that the terminations, and reassignments that have also taken place, “deprive DOJ and the FBI of experienced, senior leadership and decades of experience fighting violent crime, espionage, and terrorism.” They asked for details about the actions.

Leaders of the Federal Bureau of Investigation Agents Association told members of Congress on Feb. 3 that the Department of Justice’s actions are threatening the jobs of thousands of FBI agents and “risk disrupting the bureau’s essential work.” “Any review of Special Agents should follow established disciplinary procedures that provide the necessary due process and transparency to our nation’s law enforcement officers,” the group said. McHenry and Driscoll are serving in acting positions as the Senate considers the nominations of Pam Bondi and Kash Patel to become, respectively, the attorney general and FBI director. Patel said during his confirmation hearing that he would not act against FBI employees solely due to their work on probes into Trump. “All FBI employees will be protected against political retribution,” he said. “I will not politicize that office,“ Bondi said during her confirmation hearing. ”I will not target people simply because of their political affiliation.”

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“Congress isn’t going to get rid of the Education Department. There simply aren’t the votes, as many Republicans have shown in the past that shuttering the Education Department is a bridge too far.”

• Dept. of Ed on the Chopping Block as Trump Readies Executive Order (Moran)

Donald Trump has ordered a plan to shutter the U.S. Department of Education and transfer its programs to the states, giving Congress a roadmap on how to accomplish that. This is a long-term project with no certainty of success. While the Education Department has many enemies, it also has many friends in both parties. With an FY 2025 budget of $82.5 billion, there’s plenty of cash to spread around. That $82.5 billion is in addition to the $276 billion spent to help K-12 students “catch up” after the pandemic. The government called that program “The Education Stabilization Fund.” The truth is, it didn’t stabilize anything. The National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) is often called “The Nation’s Report Card” because it’s administered to so many students.

The results from the 2024 NAEP test reveal the total failure of our Education Department. “The percentage of eighth graders who have ‘below basic’ reading skills according to NAEP was the largest it has been in the exam’s three-decade history — 33 percent,” reports the New York Times. “The percentage of fourth graders at “below basic” was the largest in 20 years, at 40 percent.” The teachers won’t take responsibility for that disaster. The Education Department isn’t either, despite creating programs they claimed would help kids “catch up.”

ABC News: “Closing down the department would be an extraordinary move that would help Trump inch closer to fulfilling the promise that he made for months on the campaign trail: dismantling it and sending education policy back to the states. But any executive action is likely to ask for a plan to shut down the department, but not an immediate directive to shut down the department, sources told ABC News. It’s also unclear how the next education secretary would handle plans to close the department and reallocate its functions. Trump’s education secretary choice Linda McMahon has not yet had a Senate confirmation hearing. A bill in the Senate to shutter the department would likely fail without a two-thirds majority vote.”

Without a semi-orderly transfer of responsibilities from federal to state agencies, chaos will ensue. That’s why the Trump administration will begin the process by moving carefully. The planned executive order would “shut down all functions of the agency that aren’t written explicitly into statute or move certain functions to other departments,” according to the Wall Street Journal.” “Fully abolishing the department would require an act of Congress, and lawmakers have for years shown little interest in doing so. Trump unsuccessfully tried to merge the education and labor departments in his first term. Last week, Rep. Thomas Massie (R., Ky.) introduced a bill to abolish the Education Department by the end of 2026. “Unelected bureaucrats in Washington, D.C., should not be in charge of our children’s intellectual and moral development,” Massie said. “States and local communities are best positioned to shape curricula that meet the needs of their students.”

I liken attempts to get rid of the Education Department to trying to get rid of Obamacare. Both of those huge entities have embedded themselves into every nook and cranny of American life. It’s not just a question of declaring them dead or repealed. Both Obamacare and federal education programs are a part of the DNA of many communities, and the chaos that would ensue by getting rid of either of those programs would cause enormous pain to some of the most vulnerable citizens. Congress isn’t going to get rid of the Education Department. There simply aren’t the votes, as many Republicans have shown in the past that shuttering the Education Department is a bridge too far. But if Trump and Elon Musk are able to shrink the Department of Education, curtailing many of its programs, the administration should consider it a victory.

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“Greene pointed to NPR’s refusal to cover the Hunter Biden laptop story because “we don’t want to waste the listeners’ and readers’ time on stories that are just pure distractions..”

• House Panel Asks PBS, NPR Chiefs to Testify on Alleged ‘Biased Content’ (ET)

The heads of the taxpayer-funded Public Broadcasting System (PBS) and National Public Radio (NPR) are being asked to testify at a congressional hearing on allegations of “blatantly ideological and partisan” coverage. In a Feb. 3 letter to PBS President and CEO Paula Kerger, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.), chairwoman of the House Oversight and Accountability Committee’s (HOAC) Subcommittee on Delivering on Government Efficiency (DOGE), cited as an example of such coverage PBS reporting that characterized a recent gesture by Elon Musk as a “Nazi salute.” Musk vigorously denied the allegation and Greene pointed to the Anti-Defamation League’s statement that said Musk “made an awkward gesture in a moment of enthusiasm, not a Nazi salute.”

Greene told Kerger that “this sort of bias betrays the principles of objective reporting and undermines public trust. As an organization that receives federal funds through its member stations, PBS should provide reporting that serves the entire public, not just a narrow slice of like-minded individuals and ideological interest groups.” In response, a PBS spokesman released a statement to The Epoch Times saying the outlet is “grateful to have bipartisan support in Congress, and our country. We’ve earned this support from decades of noncommercial and nonpartisan work in local communities: providing all Americans with content they trust.” The statement continued, saying PBS is committed to offering “a broad range of stories and programs that help citizens understand our past and shape our future; and helping children and families open up worlds of possibilities through educational programming.”

In a similar Feb. 3 letter to NPR President and Chief Executive Officer Katherine Maher, Greene pointed to NPR’s refusal to cover the Hunter Biden laptop story because “we don’t want to waste the listeners’ and readers’ time on stories that are just pure distractions” as evidence of unacceptable bias in federally funded news coverage. An NPR spokesman released the following statement to The Epoch Times concerning the hearing: “Since its inception, NPR has collaborated with local nonprofit public media organizations to fill critical needs for news and information in America’s communities. We constantly strive to hold ourselves to the highest standards of journalism. … We welcome the opportunity to discuss the critical role of public media in delivering impartial, fact-based news and reporting to the American public.”

Greene offered the two media executives two alternative dates in March for the hearing. A subcommittee spokesman told The Epoch Times the date has not been set. In addition to the Musk and Hunter Biden laptop incidents, Greene said the forthcoming hearing was prompted in great part by the publication in 2024 of an exposé by former NPR senior editor Uri Berliner. Berliner criticized the organization for “only serving a liberal leaning audience and for failing to properly report major news stories—including Hunter Biden’s laptop, COVID-19 origins, and the Russian collusion hoax,” Greene said in a separate statement announcing the hearing.

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“..pausing so-called “gender-affirming care” for gender-confused minors violates state law.”

• NY AG Letitia James Defies Trump’s EO On “Gender Affirming Care” (AmG)

In open defiance of President Trump’s January 28 executive order to “protect children from chemical and surgical mutilation,” New York Attorney General Letitia James on Monday warned hospitals that pausing so-called “gender-affirming care” for gender-confused minors violates state law.

Trump specified in his executive order that the term “child” or “children” referred to individuals under 19 years of age, and the phrase “chemical and surgical mutilation” meant “the use of puberty blockers, including GnRH agonists and other interventions, to delay the onset or progression of normally timed puberty in an individual who does not identify as his or her sex; the use of sex hormones, such as androgen blockers, estrogen, progesterone, or testosterone, to align an individual’s physical appearance with an identity that differs from his or her sex; and surgical procedures that attempt to transform an individual’s physical appearance to align with an identity that differs from his or her sex or that attempt to alter or remove an individual’s sexual organs to minimize or destroy their natural biological functions.”

The EO notes that the above procedures are often referred to as “gender affirming care.”“Countless children soon regret that they have been mutilated and begin to grasp the horrifying tragedy that they will never be able to conceive children of their own or nurture their children through breastfeeding,” the EO states. “Moreover, these vulnerable youths’ medical bills may rise throughout their lifetimes, as they are often trapped with lifelong medical complications, a losing war with their own bodies, and, tragically, sterilization.” The EO continues: “Accordingly, it is the policy of the United States that it will not fund, sponsor, promote, assist, or support the so-called “transition” of a child from one sex to another, and it will rigorously enforce all laws that prohibit or limit these destructive and life-altering procedures.”

James stated in a letter to health care providers and organizations that receive federal funds that denying such “care” to children in New York violates state laws that protect against discrimination based on sex and gender identity. “Regardless of the availability of federal funding, we write to further remind you of your obligations to comply with New York State laws,” the letter states. “Electing to refuse services to a class of individuals based on their protected status, such as withholding the availability of services from transgender individuals based on their gender identity or their diagnosis of gender dysphoria, while offering such services to cisgender individuals, is discrimination under New York law.”

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1%. Not the same as Twitter yet..

• 20,000 Government Workers Take Trump Buyout Offer As Mass Layoffs Loom (ZH)

Approximately 20,000 federal workers, or around 1% of the federal workforce, have accepted the Trump administration’s “buyout” offer before Thursday’s deadline, Axios reports, citing a senior administration official. The offer allows federal employees to stop working immediately and continue to be paid through Sept. 30. And with the door open for another 48 hours, the White House expects more to take the offer. “We expect more to come. If you see what’s happening at USAID, it’s just one piece of the puzzle,” said the official, referring to the federal agency which oversees foreign aid programs full of rogue employees that were funding all sorts of woke, anti-American projects around the world.

The buyout offer has faced heavy opposition from unions and other organizations, which argue that the offer is illegal, there’s no guarantee people will actually get paid (lol), and it’s something that Congress would need to authorize. The Trump admin rejects those assertions, and says it’s following through on its promise to restructure the federal government. Last week, the administration sent out a memo offering to pay all federal workers an 8-month severance through Sept. 30.The official further stated that the administration is still trying to implement a hiring freeze, which has proven more difficult than expected as some agencies continue to hire new workers. According to the report, the normal attrition rate within the federal workforce is around 6% per year, suggesting that some of those who have taken the buyout offer were planning to leave government service anyway.

According to the Washington Post, the assistant commissioner of a division of the General Services Administration told staff early this week that mass layoffs across the federal government are “likely” after the ‘buyout’ offer expires Thursday. “Please know that I empathize with the tough decisions you each are having to make,” wrote Erv Koehler, assistant commissioner of general supplies and services at GSA, in an email obtained by the Post. “Please focus on making the best decision for you and your particular situation.” According to Koehler’s email, GSA’s Federal Acquisition Service “is being asked” to cut its program by 50%, which reflects the agency’s goal to half the size of its staff.

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“President Trump has appointed DOGE and Elon Musk to act as his agents when it comes to reasserting executive control over government agencies. Agents acting within the scope of their assigned agency have the same authority as the principal.”

• Trump Attack On The Deep State Spectacular And Almost Certainly Legal (Widburg)

In the last few days, Donald Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency (“DOGE”) has effectively put an end to USAID, gelded the General Services Administration (GSA) tech division, the Office of Personnel Management (OPM), and the Treasury, and fired corrupt people in the FBI—and that’s just the short list. With the war on USAID, GSA, OPM, and the Treasury alone, DOGE is saving taxpayers at a rate of one billion per day. All of this has driven the Democrats into a frenzy as they insist that an elected president managing the government is a coup. Unfortunately for them (but not for us), they don’t have a legal leg to stand on.

President Kennedy founded USAID via Executive Order 10973 in November 1961: “Administration of Foreign Assistance and Related Functions.” It was meant to be a permanent clearing house that would work with the State Department to distribute money intended to help advance technology and financial competence in low-income countries. It reflected the fact that, in 1961, the U.S. was still the last country standing after WWII. The vision was to benefit America by fortifying poor countries against Soviet depredation. USAID has strayed far from that mandate. [..]Elon Musk revealed that the Treasury Department was cutting checks to terrorist organizations and known fraudsters. And, of course, Trump fired all the FBI agents involved in the war against those of Trump’s supporters who showed up at the Capitol on January 6. The Acting FBI Director fought back, which leads to the point of this article: It’s almost certain that none of these people has a legal leg to stand on, whether it comes to the way Trump has stopped the money flow or the firings.

First, Trump’s refusal to fund corrupt agencies: Since 1801, under the aegis of Thomas Jefferson, presidents have had a power known as impoundment. This means the president gets to decide how to spend—or not spend—money that Congress has allocated. In other words, the generation that ratified the Constitution believed that this was an appropriate exercise of executive power. However, in 1974, in yet another piece of Watergate fallout, Congress enacted the “Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act of 1974,” which says that the president must submit to Congress his plans not to spend money. Given the history of impoundment (the ratifying generation approved of it), it’s highly unlikely that this act is constitutional. The fact that no president has yet challenged it doesn’t change this reality.

Additionally, because Trump has a majority in Congress, if he were to submit his impoundment plan, the greater likelihood is that it would give him a pass. (RINOs would have a hard time explaining to voters why they want America to pay for “trans” comic books in Peru.) Second, Trump’s ability to fire employees: [..] In 1789, the First Congress debated whether the Constitution gives the president the unilateral power to remove Executive Branch officers. Ultimately, Congress simply said that when the president fires someone (a tacit acknowledgment that he has that unilateral power), a lower-level employee must take custody of records until a new officer is appointed. That debate has led the Supreme Court to hold several times that Congress has no direct role in firing officials. [..]

There was a fight over this power when Andrew Johnson attempted to fire an Executive Branch officer whom Lincoln had appointed, violating the Tenure of Office Act, and leading to Johnson’s impeachment. However, the Senate did not convict Johnson, and by 1887, Congress repealed any requirement that the Senate approve firings. When the 19th century ended, the president’s unilateral power to fire officers was unquestioned. This makes sense because if the Founders had wanted to extend the “advice and consent” power to firings, they could have done so. This standard continued through the 1920s. Things changed in the 1930s when an activist Supreme Court created a new standard, which has affected (or infected) the government to this day: It held that if Congress designates an agency as “independent,” Congress, not the president, has the power over dismissal, with the president as its agent.

This was the go-ahead to create a fourth branch of government that is neither legislative, executive, nor judicial, although, as we’ve repeatedly seen, these “independent” agencies all claim those powers. The big issue of our day is whether these “independent” agencies are constitutional—I say they’re not because they are not one of the three branches of government established under the Constitution. Thankfully, the Supreme Court has, of late, been pulling back from the 1930s template. Here’s another legal concept: “The greater includes the lesser.” In this case, it means that if the president has the power to fire officials, he has the power to fire lesser employees working under those officials.

And one last legal concept: President Trump has appointed DOGE and Elon Musk to act as his agents when it comes to reasserting executive control over government agencies. Agents acting within the scope of their assigned agency have the same authority as the principal. I’m confident that President Trump is acting entirely within the authority the Founding Fathers and ratifiers of our Constitution intended him to have. However, we know that these issues will end up before the Court and, perhaps, before Congress. I’m hopeful that, as President Trump and DOGE expose an escalating amount of government fraud, abuse, and waste, despite the escalating Democrat pushback, Congress and the Courts will understand that they will not have the American people at their backs if they strike down his legitimate use of constitutional power.

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“..billions of dollars were shifted from helping Americans in need to facilitating illegal immigration. Super messed up!”

• Biden Spent Billions Promoting Illegal Immigration – Musk (RT)

Elon Musk has accused the administration of former US President Joe Biden of redirecting billions of dollars in taxpayer funds away from assisting Americans in need and instead using them to support undocumented migrants. The entrepreneur is a close ally of current US President Donald Trump and leads the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), an organization responsible for reducing wasteful government spending. Musk has been vocal about the economic impact of illegal immigration, often criticizing government spending on social services for people in the country illegally. He has claimed that federal policies have incentivized unlawful border crossings while placing a significant financial burden on US citizens.

“Under the Biden administration, billions of dollars were shifted from helping Americans in need to facilitating illegal immigration. Super messed up!” Musk stated in a post on X on Tuesday. He previously estimated that illegal immigration cost US taxpayers over $150 billion in 2023 alone, citing data from the Federation for American Immigration Reform. This figure includes expenditures on healthcare, education, and law enforcement. The Biden administration had defended its approach to immigration, asserting that it was balancing border enforcement with humanitarian obligations. The previous administration claimed having expanded legal pathways for migrants while deporting those who failed to meet asylum requirements.

However, critics such as Musk and many Republican leaders maintain that Biden’s policies have weakened border security, incentivized illegal crossings, and strained government resources. Musk has shown a growing interest in political and social issues, particularly immigration. In 2023, he personally visited Eagle Pass, Texas, to witness the conditions at the US-Mexico border and spoke with officials about the challenges posed by the migrant surge. Since then, he has advocated for stronger border controls and policy reforms to curb illegal immigration.

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Staying in power for 16 years is far too long. You kill off the next generation of leadership.

• Merkel To Blame For The Rise Of The AfD: Former Austrian Chancellor Kurz (RMX)

Former Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz has openly blamed his former German counterpart Angela Merkel for the rise of right-wing populism in Germany, arguing that her 2015 open-border migration policy directly fueled the Alternative for Germany (AfD). Kurz stated that without Merkel’s migration stance, the AfD would never have gained the support it currently enjoys. Speaking to Bild, Kurz defended the asylum policies advocated by CDU leader Friedrich Merz, particularly his call to reject all illegal migrants at Germany’s borders. “I don’t just think that is correct, but it is absolutely necessary,” Kurz said. “If you look at how large parts of Europe — including Germany and Austria — have changed due to uncontrolled migration, it is obvious that this development is not good.”

Kurz, who was Austria’s foreign minister during the 2015 migrant crisis, emphasized that migration policies require not just words but concrete actions. He expressed hope that a policy shift in Germany would serve as a model for the rest of Europe. “In 2015, I saw firsthand how the Welkomkultur — or ‘welcome culture’ — triggered a negative domino effect, encouraging more migrants to come to Europe,” he explained. “When we shut down the Balkan route, other countries followed, and we saw a reversal of the migration wave. The same is possible today. If Germany takes the lead, other European nations will follow.”

Earlier this week, the CDU sought in the German parliament to implement a stricter immigration and asylum policy, legislation that could only pass with support from the Alternative for Germany (AfD). The move led to violent protests from left-wing activists at the CDU party headquarters in Berlin, but Kurz dismissed controversy surrounding the AfD’s support, arguing that leaders should focus on implementing the right policy irrespective of political alliances. “A politician should do what is right and not constantly worry about who supports or opposes it,” Kurz stated. “That is what leadership means.”

The Austrian politician criticized conservative politicians who shy away from necessary policies out of fear of aligning with right-wing populists on certain issues. “In Germany, there is a fear that a policy could be supported by the AfD,” he said. “But you cannot intentionally do something wrong just to avoid being on the same voting side as the AfD.” He pushed back against criticism that his own coalition with the right-wing FPÖ from 2017-2019 helped legitimize populist movements, emphasizing that he had won two elections against the FPÖ as leader of the Christian-democratic Austrian People’s Party (ÖVP), proving that the center-right can defeat right-wing populists by pursuing strong policies. “The right-wing parties are always strongest when conservative parties fail to implement their policies consistently,” Kurz warned.

After the left-wing parties took control of Austria, the FPÖ rallied to win last September’s elections as the largest party, and its leader Herbert Kickl is now in talks with the ÖVP to form a coalition. He is expected to become the FPÖ’s first-ever chancellor.Kurz argued that Merkel’s migration policies since 2015 were the main factor behind the AfD’s rise, saying: “Without the wrong migration policy since 2015, there would not be such a strong AfD in Germany. The failed migration policy is the guarantee that the AfD will continue to grow.” Kurz concluded with a stark warning to Germany’s political leadership, urging them to address citizens’ legitimate concerns about migration before they drive more voters to right-wing populist parties. “If you really want right-wing parties to grow without limits, then you should continue ignoring the legitimate concerns of a large part of the population,” Kurz said. “Otherwise, you will only push more people into the arms of these parties.”

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“..more liquefied natural gas (LNG) as well as F-35 fighter jets..”

• UK Hoping To Buy Its Way Out Of Trump Tariffs (RT)

The UK government is considering purchasing more liquefied natural gas (LNG) as well as F-35 fighter jets from the US in the hope of averting punitive tariffs on British goods, Politico has reported. Tariffs were a prominent tool in US President Donald Trump’s repertoire during his first term in office, with the Republican using the same tactics after returning to the White House last month. In an article on Tuesday, Politico quoted an anonymous former UK Energy Department figure as predicting that London and Washington could seal a deal that grants the US an even bigger share of the British market. According to the media outlet, American LNG currently accounts for 26% of the UK’s energy imports.

Former UK Energy Secretary and Chancellor of the Exchequer Kwasi Kwarteng told Politico that with dwindling North Sea offshore gas production, London would inevitably have to turn to foreign suppliers. “The US is the natural place to go,” the official said, adding that the “only other options are Qatar or Russia – and we’re not going to get it from there.” Citing an unnamed “defense industry figure,” the report claimed that the UK could also place more orders for US-made F-35 warplanes. The media outlet noted that the prospect of further purchases had been uncertain given London’s participation in the multinational Global Combat Air Program (GCAP) aimed at building a new fighter-jet. However, with Trump back in office, “everything [is] on the table,” another anonymous senior UK government figure told Politico.

Speaking to the BBC earlier this week, Trump claimed that while the “UK is out of line,” trade issues “can be worked out.” Last Saturday, Trump slapped 25% tariffs on imports from Mexico and Canada, and 10% tariffs on goods from China, suggesting that the European Union could soon face similar measures. On Tuesday, however, Trump placed the decisions on hold for a month after Canada and Mexico agreed to beef up security along their respective borders with the US. Trump argued that the agreements with both neighbors would help “stop the flow of fentanyl and illegal migrants into our country.”

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It’s not over. The IMF, in exchange for a $1.4 billion loan, insisted bitcoin acceptance should not be mandatory everywhere. We have questions.

• El Salvador Abandons Bitcoin Legal Tender Experiment (RT)

El Salvador’s Congress has approved a reform revoking Bitcoin’s status as legal tender, in a reversal of the country’s landmark 2021 decision, according to media reports. The amendments to its Bitcoin law come after a loan deal with the International Monetary Fund, which requires that the acceptance of the cryptocurrency be made voluntary in the country. In 2021, El Salvador became the first country to adopt cryptocurrency as legal tender, officially recognizing Bitcoin alongside the US dollar, which had been the nation’s primary currency for two decades. The legislative changes passed on January 30 removed Bitcoin’s mandatory acceptance in El Salvador, making its use entirely voluntary. The reform was approved with 55 votes in favor and two against.

The amendments reportedly come after nearly two years of pressure from the IMF, which urged the country to mitigate Bitcoin-related financial risks in exchange for a $1.4 billion loan, which was agreed to in December, to stabilize the country’s struggling economy. The IMF specifically pushed for Bitcoin acceptance to be voluntary in the private sector, according to Reuters. The move marks a significant policy reversal for El Salvador, as President Nayib Bukele championed Bitcoin’s legal tender status as a way to boost financial inclusion, particularly for the unbanked population.

However, recent surveys show that 92% of Salvadorans have refrained from using Bitcoin since its official adoption, highlighting public skepticism toward the digital currency, despite government efforts. Although Bitcoin has lost its legal tender status, the government has recently indicated that it will continue buying the cryptocurrency to add to its reserves. Last year, Bukele slammed the US dollar, claiming it is backed by nothing, and that the US economy is based on the “farce” of printing unlimited amounts of money. He went on to predict that Western civilization will collapse when this bubble “inevitably bursts.”

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“Talk is cheap. What matters is success. On that metric, the Trump administration is set to actually achieve what Paris Agreement signatories only write on paper.”

• Trump’s Withdrawal From the Paris Agreement Won’t Hurt the Climate (RCW)

President Donald Trump withdrew from the Paris Agreement. Cue the leftwing meltdown. Though everyone knew the withdrawal was coming, the left and the “international community” are still decrying America’s alleged abdication of leadership on climate. But toothless agreements window dressed with international summits and photo ops are not the same as leadership. The truth is America has led the world in reducing emissions for years not because of the Paris Agreement, but because innovation and the free market facilitate the deployment of cheaper and cleaner energy. Let’s review the record. In recent decades, America has achieved unprecedented — and unexpected — energy production thanks to fracking and horizontal drilling. Since the early 2000s when these twin technologies began to be deployed much more expansively, U.S. natural gas production has more than doubled.

By 2016, hydraulically fractured gas wells accessed through horizontal drilling accounted for nearly 70% of all oil and natural gas wells. While the left may clutch its pearls at the increased production of a fossil fuel like natural gas, this clean energy source has been a main driver of U.S. emissions reductions. Over the past 15 years when America has massively increased natural gas output, the U.S. reduced carbon emissions more than any other country. We can see this year by year. For example, from 2022 to 2023, America offset dirtier coal energy generation with natural gas. As coal declined by 121.9 terawatt hours of electric generation over that time, natural gas increased by 118.9 terawatt hours. At the same time, U.S. greenhouse gas emissions declined 1.9%. Notably, 80% of the U.S. carbon emissions reductions were driven by the electric power sector — precisely where natural gas has an outsized impact.

Notice what didn’t cause those emissions reductions? The Paris Agreement. The American energy sector — powered by innovation and good-old-fashioned free market economics — has been driving down carbon emissions cheaply and effectively before the Paris Agreement was a twinkle in climate activists’ eyes. And it will continue to reduce carbon emissions long after President Trump’s decision to withdraw. The Paris Agreement is far from the panacea some activists claim it is. It isn’t even a particularly effective tool to rally nations toward greater climate success. In the middle of the allegedly climate-conscious Biden administration, none of the world’s biggest emitters — America included — had reduced their emissions in accordance with the Paris goals. Apparently, the $1 trillion regulatory and subsidy regime erected by President Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act had little bang for the buck.

What Agreement supporters forget is that no number of high-profile international accords can make command-control tactics work — or instill other nations with the ambition to fulfill their empty promises. The Paris Agreement is the definition of bureaucratic failure, conflating meetings, busyness, and lofty goals as success. Its only achievement is to make climate ideologues and green jetsetters feel good about themselves as they fly to international conferences. It’s no wonder President Trump withdrew. Talk is cheap. What matters is success. On that metric, the Trump administration is set to actually achieve what Paris Agreement signatories only write on paper.

Trump entered office promising to deregulate the fossil fuel industry, increase permitting for natural gas extraction, approve the construction of energy facilities like natural gas export terminals, and re-establish American energy dominance. By leaning into America’s carbon advantage and exporting clean American energy abroad, he will boost the U.S. economy, supplant dirty energy from nations like Russia and Venezuela with a clean American alternative, and lower emissions both at home and abroad, all without the jaw-dropping price tag of the failed Biden-era green agenda. We should combine these steps with efforts to actually hold the biggest polluters accountable (which are being discussed by President Trump’s cabinet). This approach would be the antithesis of the Paris Accords’ America-last strategy.

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Netflix
https://twitter.com/i/status/1886570424105927139

 

 

Salesman

 

 

Babysit

 

 

Bond

 

 

88 pounds

 

 

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

 

 

 

 

 

Debt Rattle January 15 2025

Jan 152025
 
 January 15, 2025  Posted by at 10:19 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , ,  80 Responses »


Marcel Duchamp The chess game 1910

 

• America Is Winning – Biden (RT)
• Biden Trying To Spoil Everything Before Trump Arrives – Lavrov (RT)
• Ukraine Not Yet In Strong Enough Position For Negotiations: NATO Chief (ZH)
• Trump ‘Not Invested’ In Ukraine – Bloomberg (RT)
• UK Monitoring of Musk Online Reveals “Pathetic” Priorities (Curzon)
• California Governor Newsom Calls Musk A Liar (RT)
• TikTok Dismisses Bloomberg’s Report Of Potential Sale To Musk (ZH)
• Musk Hits Back At US Market Watchdog After Lawsuit (RT)
• LA Fires Worse Than Nuclear Strike – Trump (RT)
• The Real Heroes And Villains Of The California Wildfires (Tara Reade)
• DOJ Releases Jack Smith’s Report on Trump (ET)
• FBI Director Wray On Why He’s Resigning, Defends Search of Mar-a-Lago (ET)
• Special Prosecutor Cements Biden Family Corruption For History (JTN)
• I’m Gonna MAGA You, Baby (Pepe Escobar)
• Judge Threatens To Break UK Wall Of Secrecy In Assange Persecution (Cook)
• New Book Published Today – LONG LIVE NOVICHOK! (Helmer)

 

 

 

 

Trump Ad
https://twitter.com/i/status/1878992707286421868

Carr
https://twitter.com/i/status/1879154235830600004

Doocy

Hegseth
https://twitter.com/i/status/1879201147887706441

 

 

 

 

 

 

5 days before Inauguration Day, the news feels like a bunch of bits and snippets and loose ends. Guess there’s no other way. We’re getting ready.

 

 

Here’s why Biden lost the elections in a landslide. It’s because he’s winning. Or rather, he’s lost but America’s winning. Does that also mean that if he were winning, America would lose?

• America Is Winning – Biden (RT)

Outgoing US President Joe Biden has claimed that his four years of leadership have made America stronger and its enemies weaker. In remarks about the foreign policy achievements of his administration at the Department of State on Monday, Biden hailed his time in office as a boon to America’s global standing. “The United States is winning the worldwide competition compared to four years ago. America is stronger. Our alliances are stronger. Our adversaries and competitors are weaker. We have not gone to war to make these things happen,” he said. He described his handling of the Ukraine conflict as a success. Biden urged people to “think about” the fact that he “stood in the center of Kiev” since the tensions with Russia escalated into open hostilities. “I’m the only commander-in-chief to visit a war zone not controlled by US forces,” he said of his visit to Ukraine in February 2023.

“I had two jobs. One, to rally the world to defend Ukraine, and the other is to avoid war between two nuclear powers. We did both those things,” the US leader said. The remarks confirm that Washington was intentionally engaging in nuclear brinkmanship in Ukraine, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova has said, commenting on Biden’s speech. His administration “knew it was pushing the world towards the abyss and escalated the conflict nevertheless,” she said. Biden has claimed credit for undermining other rivals of the US, particularly Iran and Syria in the Middle East, while giving Israel credit for doing “plenty of damage to Iran and its proxies.” He also said the US was now in a stronger position to compete with China militarily and economically.

“On China’s current course, they will never surpass us. Period,” he declared. America has been forging new alliances all around the world, Biden said. Nations like Russia, China, Iran and North Korea have been growing closer together too, he acknowledged, but “that’s more out of weakness than out of strength,” according to Biden. The president also claimed credit for “not leaving a war in Afghanistan to his successor,” referring to the chaotic withdrawal of the US-led coalition from the nation in the early years of his term.

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“..Obama “banished 120 [Russian] diplomats from the US and arrested five sites of [Russian] diplomatic property” just three weeks before his successor’s inauguration.”

• Biden Trying To Spoil Everything Before Trump Arrives – Lavrov (RT)

The outgoing administration of US President Joe Biden is working hard to create problems for President-elect Donald Trump before he arrives at the White House, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has said. Lavrov made the statement during a press conference on Tuesday when asked about the sweeping new sanctions against the Russian energy industry, which Washington announced last week. The curbs target two major petroleum producers – Gazprom Neft and Surgutneftegaz – as well as their subsidiaries, including Naftna industrija Srbije (NIS), which handles deliveries of Russian oil to Serbia and neighboring European nations. Related insurance providers, as well as more than 30 oilfield service companies and over 180 vessels used to deliver Russian oil, have also been slapped with restrictions.

According to the foreign minister, the move made by the Biden administration simultaneously targets Serbia, Russia and Trump, who expressed a readiness to resume dialogue with Moscow in order to try to find a diplomatic solution to the Ukraine conflict. “The Democrats have such a manner in American politics to spoil the whole thing for the next administration before the end of their mandate,” he said. Lavrov reminded that the same thing had happened before Trump’s first term when outgoing Democratic President Barack Obama “banished 120 [Russian] diplomats from the US and arrested five sites of [Russian] diplomatic property” just three weeks before his successor’s inauguration.

“This whole case did not help Russian-American relations” back in 2017, he stressed. Regarding the Biden administration, the minister suggested that after not winning reelection “from the moral point of view, you should just wait before the inauguration [of Trump on January 20]; you should understand that your people want a different kind of policy.” “No, they are unwilling to do so. They want to spoil the whole thing,” he stressed.

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How about in ten years?

• Ukraine Not Yet In Strong Enough Position For Negotiations: NATO Chief (ZH)

The head of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization has just made an admission which surely won’t help Ukraine at the negotiating table in any potential future talks. The fresh words might also be by designed aimed at sabotaging expected Trump efforts to quickly end the war. NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte on Monday described that Ukraine is not yet in a strong position to begin peace talks, now with less than a week before President-elect Donald Trump enters the White House. “At this moment, clearly, Ukraine is not there,” Rutte told the European parliament’s foreign affairs and defense committees. “Because they cannot, at this moment, negotiate from a position of strength. And we have to do more to make sure, by changing the trajectory of the conflict, that they can get to the position of strength.”

He went on to say that the hope is to obtain security guarantees so that Ukraine can never be attacked by Russia again. He said that this involves mapping out Ukraine’s future relations with NATO. “But it’s too early now to exactly sketch out what that exactly will mean, also something we have to discuss with the incoming U.S. administration,” he stated. “But let’s hope that we will get to that point as soon as possible.” White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said last Friday that the latest energy sanctions placed on Russia were not intended to be a “bargaining chip” that can be taken off the table when Ukraine is ready to negotiate. “There’s no expectation right now that either side is ready to negotiate,” he stated, also emphasizing that timing is up to the Ukrainian government.

Another Biden official has been quoted as saying, “It’s entirely up to [the next administration] to determine whether, when, and on what terms they might lift any sanctions we put in place.” The Kremlin has described this as a “sanctions trap” left by the Biden administration to make things harder for Trump to negotiate and maneuver: “Of course, we are aware that the administration will try to leave the most difficult legacy possible in bilateral relations to Trump and his associates,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said ahead of the sanctions announcement. Biden officials have framed the sanctions as a long-term strategy. “We believe our actions are leaving a solid foundation upon which the next administration can build,” one official said, predicting the measures would cost Russia billions in monthly revenue and force “hard decisions” between sustaining its economy.

The Washington Post had also observed of the comments, “Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov, speaking before the widely anticipated sanctions were announced, said Friday that the Biden administration was trying to make things difficult for the incoming Trump team.” Continued defense and economic aid to the Ukraine has also been something that Europe and the Biden administration have long been trying to ‘Trump-proof’. So far, the president-elect has said he doesn’t immediately plan to cut or end aid, but this could be him telegraphing negotiations or an attempt to maintain leverage in this regard over the Russian side. As for the battlefield, there’s near universal consensus at this point that Russian forces are winning. Steady gains have persisted in the Donetsk region, while Ukraine tries to make life difficult for Russian leadership in Kursk region.

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“I just don’t think it’s realistic to say we’re going to expel every Russian from every inch of Ukrainian soil.”

• Trump ‘Not Invested’ In Ukraine – Bloomberg (RT)

US President-elect Donald Trump does not consider the Ukraine conflict a key priority for America’s national interests, according to Bloomberg, which cited several anonymous EU officials. The media outlet alleged on Tuesday that the Republican had given his European counterparts the “impression that he wasn’t strongly invested in Ukraine’s destiny or didn’t recognize a strategic significance of the war to US interests.” Nevertheless, the latest signals coming out of Trump’s team gave European governments grounds for cautious optimism, suggesting that the US president-elect would not push Ukraine into “premature negotiations with Russia,” the publication wrote, citing a “series of private talks” with his entourage. According to Bloomberg, Trump may continue supporting Ukraine to ensure it occupies a “position of strength before any talks take place.”

The incoming president is supposedly anxious to avoid a humiliating debacle in Ukraine like the chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan overseen by President Joe Biden in 2021. The article alleged that Trump is also wary that an outright Russian victory in Ukraine could embolden China to make more aggressive moves. Bloomberg also quoted Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, who said after her recent meeting with Trump at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida that she did not expect Washington to disengage from Kiev. Sources told the media outlet, however, that Trump’s unpredictability means that no one can reliably say what course of action he might take after assuming office on January 20. During an interview with Newsmax on Monday, Trump insisted that Russian President Vladimir Putin “wants to meet, and I’m going to meet very quickly.”

The Kremlin has responded positively to Trump’s declared intention to engage with Russia. However, it said the Ukraine conflict needed to be resolved in a way that addresses its core causes, including NATO’s eastward expansion. Speaking to ABC News on Sunday, incoming US National Security Advisor Michael Waltz stated: “I just don’t think it’s realistic to say we’re going to expel every Russian from every inch of Ukrainian soil.” “President Trump has acknowledged that reality, and I think it has been a huge step forward that the entire world is acknowledging that reality,” he added, suggesting that this realization could pave the way to ending the bloodshed. Shortly before the US election on November 5, Vice President-elect J.D. Vance similarly suggested that Kiev might have to cede some territory to Moscow in the end.

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“..the idea the taxpayer needs to fund a government unit to ‘monitor’ Elon Musk’s tweets is ridiculous” since “it costs nothing to open an account on X and once you’ve done that Elon’s tweets are completely unavoidable.”

• UK Monitoring of Musk Online Reveals “Pathetic” Priorities (Curzon)

The British establishment will not hold a national inquiry into gangs of mostly Pakistani men who raped girls across the UK, but it will expend its resources on monitoring tweets shared by Elon Musk. A government counter-extremism unit has been assessing the risk posed by Musk’s often outlandish claims, The Mirror has revealed. Last week, the Twitter/X boss labelled Labour’s Jess Phillips, the safeguarding minister, a “rape genocide apologist” after it emerged that she rejected a request for the government to commission a public inquiry into child sexual exploitation in Oldham, Greater Manchester, in October. The monitoring unit is part of the Homeland Security Group, which claims to focus on “the highest harm risks to the homeland, whether from terrorists, state actors, or cyber and economic criminals.”

However, it will now devote some of its time to Musk’s free-to-access ramblings, even while experts share concerns of the potential return of Islamic State terrorism. Reform MP Rupert Lowe said this “spying” is “pathetic,” given that there is to be “no inquiry into thousands of foreign rapists.” (Musk later shared Lowe’s post.) And even before news of the monitoring came to light, Allison Pearson—the journalist who was visited by the police in November over a year-old tweet—pointed to one hideous incident in the rape gang scandal to suggest that the PM “genuinely seems more outraged” about Musk’s posts “than he is about the 12-year-old who was driven at night to a Yorkshire wood where she was forced to give oral sex to at least 10 men … before being left alone in the dark.”

Priority concerns aside, Free Speech Union director Toby Young told europeanconservative.com that “the idea the taxpayer needs to fund a government unit to ‘monitor’ Elon Musk’s tweets is ridiculous” since “it costs nothing to open an account on X and once you’ve done that Elon’s tweets are completely unavoidable.” What, asked Young, is the government’s ‘report’ going to consist of? “A compendium of those tweets? You can see all of them by clicking on Elon’s avatar and it’s completely free.” What piece of world class detective work is this spy unit going to produce next? The revelation that the person responsible for these ‘dangerous’ tweets is a close friend of the President of the United States?

Meanwhile, fresh calls for an inquiry into the grooming gangs scandal continue to proliferate, including from survivors and, with potentially more influence, leading Labour figures. There is also talk of Starmer “appearing to soften his opposition to a new probe,” just days after he used a three-line whip to order Labour MPs to block one in Parliament—but skipped the vote himself. The Mirror’s report has since come under fire after a government spokesman “denied” that Musk was being monitored, although—as veteran press officer Gawain Towler pointed out —it is more likely that he was being snooped but no longer is “because of the Mirror scoop.”

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Newsom seems to claim there’s plenty water.

• California Governor Newsom Calls Musk A Liar (RT)

California Governor Gavin Newsom has lashed out at Tesla and SpaceX founder Elon Musk over his “lies” after the billionaire businessman blasted the state’s response to raging wildfires in Los Angeles. In a series of posts on X, Musk – a longtime critic of the Democrat politician – blamed the scale of damage in LA on “bad governance at a state and local level that resulted in a shortage of water” and retweeted a post calling on the governor to resign. Musk’s claim comes as LA mayor Karen Bass admitted that around 20% of the city’s fire hydrants ran dry last week, with Newsom calling for an independent investigation into the issue on Friday. Responding to Musk on Monday, however, Newsom posted a video clip showing the business mogul asking a firefighter if water availability was an issue.

The firefighter explained that there was water in “several reservoirs,” but the problem is that they are “flowing an amount of water that the system couldn’t bear,” which is why water trucks are being brought in to compensate as “mobile hydrants.” “(Musk) exposed by firefighters for his own lies,” Newsom wrote. According to former chief engineer at the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power Marty Adams, the scale of the wildfires has created a situation that is “just completely not part of any domestic water system design.” There needs to be “some new thinking about how systems are designed,” he told the New York Times. Wildfire and water expert Faith Kearns told National Geographic that the current situation “was like a worst-case scenario.” “But I think we should be planning for those worst-case scenarios…I do think this is where we’re headed,” she said.

Musk and Newsom have also sparred on X over the issue of looting amid reports that criminals were raiding areas where people had been forced to evacuate their homes. Newsom accused Musk of “encouraging looting by lying” after the tech CEO claimed that California Democrats had “decriminalized looting.” “It’s illegal – as it always has been,” Newsom wrote, adding that “bad actors will be arrested and prosecuted.” US President-elect Donald Trump has also taken aim at Newsom, with Trump accusing the governor of refusing to sign a “water restoration declaration” which Newsom said does not exist. Musk, a close Trump ally, has been appointed to co-lead the president-elect’s new Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) advisory board. The devastating LA wildfires have killed at least 24 people so far and displaced thousands more. Fierce winds are expected to pick up this week, making the blazes more difficult to control.

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“We can’t be expected to comment on pure fiction..”

• TikTok Dismisses Bloomberg’s Report Of Potential Sale To Musk (ZH)

Bloomberg is relying upon unnamed sources “familiar with the matter” as anchor sources in an overnight report about Elon Musk potentially acquiring the US operations of Chinese video-sharing platform TikTok. The company faces a Sunday deadline to find a US buyer or risk a ban. The report said: “Senior Chinese officials had already begun to debate contingency plans for TikTok as part of an expansive discussion on how to work with Donald Trump’s administration, one of which involves Musk, said the people, asking not to be identified revealing confidential discussions. Under one scenario that’s been discussed by the Chinese government, Musk’s X would take control of TikTok US and run the businesses together, the people said. With more than 170 million users in the US, TikTok could bolster X’s efforts to attract advertisers. Musk also founded a separate artificial intelligence company, xAI, that could benefit from the huge amounts of data generated from TikTok.”

Following Bloomberg’s report citing anonymous sources, a TikTok spokesperson told BBC News the whole story about China considering to sell the video-sharing platform to Musk as “pure fiction.” “We can’t be expected to comment on pure fiction,” the spokesperson told the British media outlet. BBC noted, “TikTok has repeatedly said that it will not sell its US operation.” On X, Musk responded with laughing emojis to Autism Capital’s video of angry white liberals melting down in a forest, referring to them as the potential response of TikTok’s audience if Musk bought the Chinese video-sharing platform.

https://twitter.com/i/status/1878970370335928670

In April of 2024, Musk wrote on X, “In my opinion, TikTok should not be banned in the USA, even though such a ban may benefit the 5yO› platform,” adding, “Doing so would be contrary to freedom of speech and expression. It is not what America stands for.” Bloomberg Intelligence analysts Mandeep Singh and Damian Reimertz recently estimated that TikTok’s US operations could be valued between $40 and $50 billion. Recall that Musk paid $44 billion for Twitter in 2022. President-elect Trump, who takes office next Monday, one day after TikTok’s deadline to sell or risk a ban, has sought to delay the ban on the video-sharing platform to allow time for negotiations. Trump has previously stated that he wants to “save” the app. Also, the Supreme Court is set to rule on the constitutionality of a law that would ban the platform from the US if the TikTok’s owner ByteDance does not find a buyer by Sunday.

https://twitter.com/i/status/1878985530588750049

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“The action by the agency “is an admission… that they cannot bring an actual case”..

• Musk Hits Back At US Market Watchdog After Lawsuit (RT)

SpaceX and Tesla CEO Elon Musk has labeled the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) “a totally broken organization” after it filed a lawsuit against him, linked to his purchase of Twitter (later re-branded as X). The SEC, which is tasked with enforcing laws against market manipulation, sued Musk in a federal court in Washington on Tuesday, claiming that he had failed to disclose his ownership of more than 5% of Twitter stock in a timely fashion in early 2022, several months before buying the social media platform. The agency alleged that this allowed the tech billionaire to “underpay by at least $150 million for shares he purchased after his beneficial ownership report was due.”

On Wednesday, the tycoon responded to a post on X by an account under the name Satoshi Nakamoto – a reference to the unidentified creator of Bitcoin – who expressed surprise that “the SEC is suing Elon Musk for buying Twitter at ‘artificially low prices’ even though he bought it for $44 billion and industry analysts said it was worth more like $30 billion.” The Securities and Exchange Commission is “a totally broken organization,” Musk, who has been tapped by US President-elect Donald Trump to head DOGE, a special advisory body tasked with identifying government inefficiency, wrote. “They spend their time on sh*t like this when there are so many actual crimes that go unpunished,” he said.

Musk’s lawyer, Alex Spiro, insisted that his client has “done nothing wrong” and called the SEC’s lawsuit a “sham.” The action by the agency “is an admission… that they cannot bring an actual case” against the billionaire, he said in a statement. The SEC’s “multi-year campaign of harassment” targeting Musk resulted “in the filing of a single-count ticky tack complaint… for an alleged administrative failure to file a single form – an offense that, even if proven, carries a nominal penalty,” Spiro stressed. The head of the Securities and Exchange Commission, Gary Gensler, has said that he will step down from his post on January 20 when Trump is inaugurated. Last month, the president-elect nominated Paul Atkins, a cryptocurrency advocate and CEO of the Patomak Partners consultancy firm, to become the new chair of the SEC.

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Sounds crazy. Until, like him, you see the aerial footage.

• LA Fires Worse Than Nuclear Strike – Trump (RT)

US President-elect Donald Trump has compared the devastation of the Los Angeles wildfires to a nuclear attack, warning that the death toll may rise in the coming days. He criticized California’s leadership, particularly Governor Gavin Newsom, suggesting that mismanagement has exacerbated the crisis. The wildfires that began last week in southern California have claimed at least 24 lives, burned more than 40,000 acres, and destroyed over 12,000 structures, leveling entire neighborhoods. Los Angeles Sheriff Robert Luna has reported 16 deaths from the Eaton fire and eight from the Palisades fire, with 16 individuals still missing. Authorities expect the death toll to rise as search teams with cadaver-sniffing dogs continue to comb through the rubble.


Aerial view of homes destroyed in wildfires in Pacific Palisades, California © Getty Images / Mario Tama

In an interview with Newsmax, Trump predicted that rescuers would find “many more dead” and expressed bewilderment at the scale of destruction. “I believe it’s greater damage than if they got hit by a nuclear weapon. I’ve never seen anything like it. Vast miles and miles of houses just burned to a crisp. There’s nothing standing,” Trump told the outlet. He added that he had seen “very guarded pictures” of the destruction, claiming that the catastrophe is “far worse than you even see on television, if that’s believable.” The president-elect went on to blame the Californian leadership for the scale of the tragedy, insisting that the crisis could have been prevented if water from Canada was allowed to flow to the state and its forests were properly maintained. Trump specifically accused California Governor Newsom of prioritizing environmental policies over human lives and called for his resignation.

Trump is considering paying a personal visit to southern California to survey the damage caused by the fires, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing people familiar with his plans. In his interview with Newsmax, the president-elect also expressed interest in taking part in the rebuilding of the area, stating that “we’re gonna do things with Los Angeles. You know, I’m already putting my developer cap on.” Newsom has declared a state of emergency in the affected areas and has called on federal agencies for additional support in dealing with the fires. Outgoing President Joe Biden has also approved a Major Disaster Declaration, which enables federal resources to be directed toward response and recovery operations. According to the latest estimates by the AccuWeather forecasting service, the wildfires have caused losses of between $250 billion and $275 billion, accounting for property destruction, firefighting expenses, and economic disruption.

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” While Southern California’s fires have exposed the resilience of its residents and the bravery of its first responders, they have also laid bare the failures of leadership.”

• The Real Heroes And Villains Of The California Wildfires (Tara Reade)

The catastrophic wildfires raging across Southern California have brought widespread devastation, but also incredible stories of heroism. As human and animal rescues showcase the bravery of citizens and the resilience of communities, questions arise about the roles of California Governor Gavin Newsom and Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass in wildfire prevention and response. The Palisades and Eaton fires have ravaged over 27,000 acres combined, destroying more than 10,000 structures, displacing over 180,000 people, and claiming at least 42 lives, according to updated reports. These numbers highlight the immense human and environmental toll. However, amidst the chaos, tales of heroism have emerged.

In Pacific Palisades, 83-year-old Parkinson’s patient Aaron Samson narrowly escaped the flames thanks to the quick thinking and bravery of his son-in-law and neighbors. In Altadena, volunteers and emergency responders evacuated 90 elderly residents from a senior care facility, saving lives as the flames closed in. Animals have also been gravely impacted. In Altadena, residents risked their own safety to rescue horses, with dramatic footage showing people running through embers with the animals. Veterinarian Annie Harvilicz transformed her clinic into a sanctuary for over 40 displaced pets, demonstrating selflessness and dedication.

While these acts of bravery unfolded, critics point to systemic failures at the leadership level. Governor Gavin Newsom and Mayor Karen Bass have faced mounting criticism for decisions that may have exacerbated the wildfire crisis. In 2020, Governor Newsom reduced the state’s wildfire prevention budget by $150 million, and reports revealed that actual fire prevention efforts were significantly below publicly stated targets. Mayor Bass has also come under scrutiny for a $17.6 million budget cut to the Los Angeles Fire Department (LAFD), impacting the department’s emergency response capabilities. During the fires, Mayor Bass was on a diplomatic trip to Ghana as part of a Biden delegation, sparking public outrage over her absence despite days of warnings about unprecedented winds increasing fire risk.

Accountability and allegations. Critics argue that a combination of budget cuts, resource mismanagement, and misleading public statements about wildfire preparedness could amount to gross negligence. Advocacy groups have called for investigations into whether these leaders violated their duty to protect the public. Some legal experts suggest that proven negligence could lead to lawsuits or even criminal charges. Additionally, speculation about potential “land grabs” following the destruction of valuable property has fueled public mistrust. Some residents have accused officials of using the crisis to advance agendas favoring developers and special interests.

Insurance crisis. The crisis has been compounded by insurance companies dropping fire coverage for residents in high-risk areas. Months before the fires, many Los Angeles homeowners received notices that their fire insurance policies were being canceled or not renewed. Insurers cited the increasing frequency and severity of wildfires as reasons for deeming many areas uninsurable. In the mid-1990s I worked for a California Stare Senator, another Willie Brown protegee like Newsom. Fraudulent practices with fire and earthquake insurance were a problem back then, and they are worse now, having been left unchecked. The insurance groups have lobbied both political parties very hard to not hold them accountable for fraudulent practices. And they succeeded.

Without fire coverage, families face the prospect of financial ruin, unable to rebuild their homes and communities. This has left thousands of Californians vulnerable to not only the immediate dangers of the flames but also long-term economic hardship. The Palisades and Eaton fires will eventually be contained, but the damage to communities may be irreversible due to restrictive rebuilding permits and the lack of insurance options. Residents and advocacy groups are demanding accountability from state and local officials, though skepticism remains about whether meaningful investigations will occur.

I was in my late teens and early twenties when I lived around many of the iconic places which are now on fire or gone. Generations of families lived in some of these communities and it is heartbreaking to see the direct result of mismanaged fire policies, with millions in funding, having been squandered by corrupt officials. Los Angeles, once a beautiful dream for many, has now become a hellscape of ruin. Governor Gavin Newsom’s rumored ambitions for higher office, including a potential presidential bid, have drawn attention to his track record. Critics warn that his leadership during California’s wildfire crises reveals systemic corruption and mismanagement, which could have broader implications if he ascends to national leadership. While Southern California’s fires have exposed the resilience of its residents and the bravery of its first responders, they have also laid bare the failures of leadership that allowed this devastation to occur.

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When impotence doubles down.

• DOJ Releases Jack Smith’s Report on Trump (ET)

U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) officials have released part of former special counsel Jack Smith’s report about President-elect Donald Trump. Part one of Smith’s report was made public early on Jan. 14 (1am), after U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon allowed its release. In the report, Smith – who recently resigned – said that he believes the evidence against Trump was strong enough to yield a conviction, even though the DOJ dropped its prosecutions of the president-elect. “As alleged in the original and superseding indictments, substantial evidence demonstrates that Mr. Trump then engaged in an unprecedented criminal effort to overturn the legitimate results of the election in order to retain power,” Smith wrote. An indictment against Trump charged him with multiple federal crimes, including conspiring to obstruct the certification of the 2020 presidential election.

After the charges were brought, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that presidents are immune from prosecution for official conduct. Smith’s team subsequently reanalyzed the evidence it had gathered. “Given the Supreme Court’s ruling, the Office reevaluated the evidence and assessed whether Mr. Trump’s non-immune conduct—either his private conduct as a candidate or official conduct for which the Office could rebut the presumption of immunity—violated federal law,” Smith wrote in the newly released report. “The Office concluded that it did. After doing so, the Office sought, and a new grand jury issued, a superseding indictment with identical charges but based only on conduct that was not immune because it was either unofficial or any presumptive immunity could be rebutted.” Part two of the report is being kept back, at least for now, as Trump’s co-defendants in the case fight its release on grounds such as Smith being found to be unconstitutionally appointed.

Smith said in the report that Trump sought to defraud the United States and obstruct the certification of electoral votes in part by conspiring with others to send alternate slates of electors to Washington. After Trump won the 2024 election, consistent with the DOJ’s interpretation that the U.S. Constitution prohibits prosecution of a sitting president, the DOJ dropped the charges against Trump. “The Department’s view that the Constitution prohibits the continued indictment and prosecution of a President is categorical and does not turn on the gravity of the crimes charged, the strength of the Government’s proof, or the merits of the prosecution, which the Office stands fully behind,” Smith said in the report. “Indeed, but for Mr. Trump’s election and imminent return to the Presidency, the Office assessed that the admissible evidence was sufficient to obtain and sustain a conviction at trial.”

Trump’s lawyers said in a recent letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland that the DOJ’s actions represented a “complete exoneration” of their client. Trump wrote on his Truth Social website early Tuesday that Smith “was unable to successfully prosecute the Political Opponent of his ‘boss’ … so he ends up writing yet another ’Report.’” “THE VOTERS HAVE SPOKEN!!!” Trump added later. Smith, who was appointed by Garland, said in the report that the decision to prosecute Trump was solely his and refuted any allegations to the contrary. “Nobody within the Department of Justice ever sought to interfere with, or improperly influence, my prosecutorial decision making. The regulations under which I was appointed provided you with the authority to countermand my decisions, 28 C.F.R. § 600.7, but you did not do so,” Smith said.

“Nor did you, the Deputy Attorney General, or members of your staff ever attempt to improperly influence my decision as to whether to bring charges against Mr. Trump. And to all who know me well, the claim from Mr. Trump that my decisions as a prosecutor were influenced or directed by the Biden administration or other political actors is, in a word, laughable.” Smith also defended prosecuting Trump, arguing that doing so served federal interests, including the interest in applying the law equally with regards to the breach of the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. “There is a substantial federal interest in ensuring the evenhanded administration of the law with respect to accountability for the events of January 6, 2021, and the Office determined that interest would not be satisfied absent Mr. Trump’s prosecution for his role,” Smith said.

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I believe every word he says.

• FBI Director Wray On Why He’s Resigning, Defends Search of Mar-a-Lago (ET)

FBI Director Christopher Wray on Sunday explained why he is stepping down as head of the law enforcement bureau as President-elect Donald Trump prepares to take office in one week. “My decision to retire from the FBI, I have to tell you, it was one of the hardest decisions I’ve ever had to make,” Wray told CBS’s “60 Minutes” in what is likely his last interview as FBI chief. “I care deeply, deeply about the FBI, about our mission, and in particular, about our people. However, he said, the “president-elect had made clear that he intended to make a change and the law is that that is something he’s able to do for any reason or no reason at all.” In December 2024, Wray announced he would be leaving his post at the end of President Joe Biden’s term amid comments made by Trump signaling he would replace him. Trump has since named Kash Patel, a former intelligence official, to be in charge of the FBI, a position that needs Senate confirmation.

Trump in his first term nominated Wray to lead the FBI in 2017 for a 10-year term ending in 2027. However, the president-elect has often expressed his displeasure with the federal law enforcement bureau, particularly after its agents searched his Mar-a-Lago residence in Florida in August 2022 for classified documents. Trump was later charged by special counsel Jack Smith for what prosecutors say was the illegal retention of classified materials and for obstructing attempts to get them back. Last month, Smith opted to drop an appeal of a federal judge’s earlier order that had dissolved the case, and late last week, Smith resigned as special counsel. When Wray announced last month that he would leave, Trump responded in a Truth Social post that it is a “great day for America” because, according to him, “it will end the Weaponization of” the Department of Justice.

“I just don’t know what happened to him. We will now restore the Rule of Law for all Americans,” Trump wrote. The president-elect then praised Patel, saying he would be “committed” to bringing “law, order, and justice” to the United States. In Sunday’s interview with “60 Minutes,” Wray elaborated on why he would leave the law enforcement bureau. “My conclusion was that the thing that was best for the Bureau was to try to do this in an orderly way, to not thrust the FBI deeper into the fray,” he said before praising FBI officials and agents. “They tackle the job with a level of rigor and tenacity and professionalism and objectivity that I think is unparalleled, and I will tell you, it’s been the honor of a lifetime to serve with them,” he said of the agents. Regarding the Mar-a-Lago search, Wray backed his agents’ decision, saying it is the FBI’s responsibility to “follow the facts wherever they lead, no matter who likes it.”

He also said that searching Trump’s Palm Beach property and resort was seen as a last resort. “And when we learn that information, classified material, is not being properly stored, we have a duty to act. And I can tell you that in investigations like this one, a search warrant is not and here was not anybody’s first choice,” he told the outlet. When he was asked about Patel and other Cabinet nominees, Wray said he would not weigh in on Trump’s selections. “Facts and the law drive investigations, not politics or partisan preferences,” he said, referring to the FBI. Aside from speaking on his tenure as FBI director, Wray again warned that the greatest threat that the United States faces is the Chinese communist regime as state-backed malign actors have repeatedly targeted and hacked into U.S. infrastructure and companies.

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Pardon Joe! He will need it!

• Special Prosecutor Cements Biden Family Corruption For History (JTN)

An epic political scandal derailed for years from the public attention it deserved by false Democrat and news media claims of “conspiracy theories” and “Russian misinformation” came to an abrupt and harsh conclusion Monday. And that repudiation was delivered by an unlikely source: the prosecutor who originally tried to give Hunter Biden a sweetheart deal that would have spared the first son prison time. Special Counsel David Weiss’ report was not a manifesto of new disclosures dug up by the FBI or a grand jury. It barely filled 27 pages and failed to answer several questions submitted by Congress, and thus it was blasted by lawmakers for being “incomplete.”

But in simple terms it affirmed for history some simple conclusions: 1.) Hunter Biden broke the law. 2.) The Biden family engaged in a political grift that sucked millions from foreign interests by trading on its powerful name. And 3.) the family patriarch, Joe Biden, misled the public by suggesting his family was a victim of politics that warranted a pardon that erased his son’s dual convictions in tax and gun cases. “The Constitution provides the President with broad authority to grant reprieves and pardons for offenses against the United States, but nowhere does the Constitution give the President the authority to rewrite history,” Weiss wrote in one of several poignant repudiations of the sitting president.

Rep. Harriet Hageman, R-Wyoming, a member of the House Judiciary Committee that investigated a large part of the Biden scandal, told Just the News on Monday evening that Weiss’ report left much to be still investigated by Congress, including the potential national security implications of Joe Biden’s decisions for countries where his son collected millions. “To what extent has our national security been compromised because of the activities and actions of Hunter Biden?” she asked during an appearance on the Just the News, No Noise television show. “I constantly have to question the position that this administration has taken with regard to China, what we’re seeing with the with the drones on the East Coast and even in Wyoming, the Chinese spy balloon that was allowed to traverse the entirety of the entire United States, the situation in Ukraine, with spending another $500 million there in the last week that he is in office.

“All of these are countries that had contact with and were paying Hunter Biden massive amounts of money, and that’s why this is an important issue for the American people, because we cannot allow family members of elected officials to be able to sell our country to the highest bidder of foreign countries,” she added. House Oversight and Accountability Committee Chairman James Comer, R-Ky., who led an impeachment inquiry of Joe Biden, said the report was “incomplete” but that its most important contribution was to confirm for history that the Biden family engaged in corruption and tried to cover it up as his committee had shown. “Joe Biden will be remembered for using his last few weeks in office to shield his son from the law and protect himself. The president’s legacy is the same as his family’s business dealings: corrupt,” he said.

Most of Weiss’ grievances dealt with Joe Biden’s attacks on the FBI and IRS agents and federal prosecutors who brought charges against his son, a proverbial defense of institutions by a career prosecutor who eventually was appointed U.S. Attorney by President Donald Trump, then special counsel by Biden Attorney General Merrick Garland. “Politicians who attack the decisions of career prosecutors as politically motivated when they disagree with the outcome of a case undermine the public’s confidence in our criminal justice system,” he wrote. “The President’s statements unfairly impugn the integrity not only of Department of Justice personnel, but all of the public servants making these difficult decisions in good faith.”

Weiss himself faced questions about the judgement of his staff after his team tried to give Hunter Biden a prison-sparing deal that was scuttled by a federal judge only when two IRS whistleblowers, Gary Shapley and Joseph Ziegler, came forward to Congress with evidence of political interference in the case. Weiss then doubled back and sought more serious cases against Hunter Biden after the embarrassment, securing a jury conviction in his home state of Delaware on gun charges and a guilty plea on sweeping tax charges in California.

The dual convictions placed the first son in jeopardy of facing prison time, but President Biden intervened before sentencing and issued a pardon in December that he earlier had vowed to avoid. His office’s wobbly performance left just one final unknown: How would the special prosecutor define Hunter Biden’s conduct for history in the final report. The first few paragraphs gave a succinct answer. “I prosecuted the two cases against Mr. Biden because he broke the law,” Weiss wrote in a passage that refuted years of claims by the family and its defenders that Joe Biden’s son had done nothing wrong. “Eight judges across numerous courts have rejected claims that they were the result of selective or vindictive motives,” he added for emphasis.

Weiss then proceeded to describe the scheme that led to the charges: Hunter Biden traded on his politically powerful family name to collect millions from foreigners seeking influence, performed little work, then failed to pay taxes on some of the income. Some of that money came from Burisma Holdings, the Ukrainian energy firm deemed corrupt by the State Department that prompted the scandal back in 2019 in a series of columns written by this author in The Hill newspaper. “Mr. Biden made this money by using his last name and connections to secure lucrative business opportunities, such as a board seat at a Ukrainian industrial conglomerate, Burisma Holdings Limited, and a joint venture with individuals associated with a Chinese energy conglomerate,” the prosecutor wrote. Weiss added for emphasis: “He negotiated and executed contracts and agreements that paid him millions of dollars for limited work.”

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“Trump 2.0 is gearing up to be an extended exercise in the capacity to hurt The Other. Any Other. Hostile takeovers – and blood on the tracks. That’s how we “negotiate”.

• I’m Gonna MAGA You, Baby (Pepe Escobar)

It’s the greatest show on earth – unleashing a double bill of New Paradigm and Manifest Destiny on crack. We are the greatest. We will rock you – in every sense. We will crush you. We will take whatever we want because we can. And if you wanna walk away from the U.S. dollar, we will destroy you. BRICS, we’re coming to get ya. Trump 2.0 – a mix of professional wrestling and MMA played in a giant planetary cage – is in da house starting next Monday. Trump 2.0 aims to be on the driving seat on the global financial system; on control of the world’s oil trade and LNG supply; and on strategic media platforms. Trump 2.0 is gearing up to be an extended exercise in the capacity to hurt The Other. Any Other. Hostile takeovers – and blood on the tracks. That’s how we “negotiate”.

Under Trump 2.0, global tech infrastructure must run on U.S. software, not just on the profit front but also on the spy front. AI data chips must be American only. AI data centers must be controlled by America only. “Free trade” and “globalization”? That’s for losers. Welcome to neo-imperial, techno-feudal mercantilism – powered by U.S. tech supremacy. Trump’s National Security Advisor Mike Waltz has named a few of the targets ahead: Greenland; Canada; assorted cartels; the Arctic; the Gulf of “America”; oil and gas; rare earth minerals. All in the name of strengthening “national security”. A key plank: total control of the “Western Hemisphere”. Monroe Doctrine 2.0 – actually the Donroe Doctrine. America First, Last and Always.

Well, let’s delve a bit on pesky material imperatives. The Empire of Chaos faces a humongous debt, owed to usual suspect loan sharks, that may only be – partially – repaid by selected export surpluses. That would imply re-industrialization – a long, costly affair – and securing smooth military supply chains. Where the resource base will be for this Sisyphean task? Washington simply cannot rely on Chinese exports and rare earths. The chessboard needs to be rejigged – with trade and tech unified under U.S. unilateral, monopoly control. Plan A, so far, was to simultaneously confront Russia and China: the two top BRICS, and key vectors of Eurasia integration. China’s strategy, since the start of the millennium, has been to trade resources for infrastructure, developing Global South markets as China itself keeps developing.

Russia’s strategy has been to help nations recover their sovereignty; actually helping nations to help themselves on the sustainable development front. Plan A against the concerted geoeconomic and geostrategic strategies of the Russia-China strategic partnership miserably failed. What has been attempted by the ghastly, exiting U.S. administration generated serial, massive blowbacks. So it’s time for Plan B: Looting the allies. They are already dominated chihuahuas anyway. The – exploitation – show must go on. And there are plenty of chihuahuas available to be exploited. Canada has loads of fresh water plus oil and mining wealth. The Canadian business class in fact has always dreamed of deep integration with the Empire of Chaos. Trump 2.0 and his team have been careful not to name names. When it comes to the Arctic as a crucial, evolving battlefield, there may be a vague allusion to the Northwest Passage.

But never a mention of what really matters; the Northern Sea Route – the Russian denomination; the Chinese call it the Arctic Silk Road. That’s one of the key connectivity corridors of the future. The Northern Sea Route encompasses at least 15% of the world’s unexplored oil and 30% of the world’s unexplored natural gas. Greenland is smack in the middle of this New Great Game – capable of supplying years of uranium, as much oil as Alaska (bought from Russia in 1867), plus rare earths – not to mention providing useful real state for missile defense and offense. Washington has been trying to grab Greenland from Denmark since 1946. There’s a deal with Copenhagen in place guaranteeing military control – mostly naval. Now Greenland is being revamped as the ideal U.S. entry point into the Arctic Great Game against Russia.

At the St. Petersburg forum last June, I had the privilege to follow an exceptional round table on the Northern Sea Route: that’s an integral part of Russia’s 21st century development project, focused on commercial navigation – “We need more icebreakers!” – and bound to surpass Suez and Gibraltar in the near future. Slightly over 50,000 Greenland residents – which already enjoy autonomy, especially vis a vis the EU – would more than accept a full Danish exit; Copenhagen actually abandoned them since 1951. Greenlanders will love to profit from vast U.S. investments. Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov went straight to the point: “The first step is to listen to the Greenlanders” – comparing it to how Russia listened to the residents of Crimea, Donbass and Novorossiya vis a vis Kiev.

What Trump 2.0 actually wants from Greenland is crystal clear: total militarization; privileged access to rare earths; and commercially excluding Russia and Chinese companies. Chinese military expert Yu Chun noted that “soon, the long-desired ‘golden waterway’ of the Arctic Ocean is expected to open, allowing ships to traverse the Pacific Ocean and sail along the northern coasts of North America and Eurasia into the Atlantic Ocean.” As the Northern Sea Route is “a key element of Sino-Russian cooperation”, it’s inevitable that the U.S.’s “strategic vision is to prevent the establishment of a ‘golden waterway’ between China, Russia, and Europe by controlling Greenland.”

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It’s Starmer again..

• Judge Threatens To Break UK Wall Of Secrecy In Assange Persecution (Cook)

Judge Foss, sitting at the London First-Tier Tribunal, has ruled that the Crown Prosecution Service must explain how it came to destroy key files that would have shed light on why it pursued Assange for 14 years. The CPS appears to have done so in breach of its own procedures. Assange was finally released from Belmarsh high-security prison last year in a plea deal after Washington had spent years seeking his extradition for publishing documents revealing US and UK war crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan. The CPS files relate to lengthy correspondence between the UK and Sweden over a preliminary investigation into rape allegations in Sweden that predate the US extradition case. A few CPS emails from that time were not destroyed and have been released under Freedom of Information rules. They show that it was the UK authorities pushing reluctant Swedish prosecutors to pursue the case against Assange.

Eventually, Swedish prosecutors dropped the case after running it into the ground. In other words, the few documents that have come to light show that it was the CPS — led at that time by Keir Starmer, later knighted and now Britain’s prime minister — that waged what appears to have been a campaign of political persecution against Assange, rather than one based on proper legal considerations. It is not just Britain concealing documents relating to Assange. The US, Swedish and Australian authorities have also put up what Stefania Maurizi, an Italian journalist who has been doggedly pursuing the FoI requests, has called “a wall of darkness”. There are good grounds for believing that all four governments have co-ordinated their moves to cover up what would amount to legal abuses in the Assange case.

Starmer headed the CPS when many highly suspect decisions regarding Assange were made. If the documents truly have been destroyed, it will be difficult, if not impossible, to ever know how directly he was involved in those decisions. Extraordinarily, and conveniently for both the UK and Sweden, it emerged during legal hearings in early 2023 that prosecutors in Stockholm claim to have destroyed the very same correspondence deleted by the CPS.

The new ruling by Judge Foss will require the CPS to explain how and why it destroyed the documents, and provide them unless it can demonstrate that there is no way they can ever be retrieved. Failure to do so by 21 February will be treated as contempt of court. The UK and the US have similarly sought to stonewall separate FoI requests from Maurizi concerning their lengthy correspondence while Washington sought to extradite Assange on “espionage” charges for revealing their war crimes. The British judiciary approved locking Assange up for years while the extradition case dragged on, despite United Nations legal experts ruling that Assange was being “arbitrarily detained” and the UN’s expert on torture, Nils Melzer, finding that Assange was being subjected to prolonged psychological torture that posed a threat to his life.

Read more …

Never ending.

• New Book Published Today – LONG LIVE NOVICHOK! (Helmer)

From the beginning, the Russian Embassy in London issued formal requests for consular access to the Skripals and protest notes when this was denied by the Foreign Office. In reply to British stonewalling on access and propagandizing the allegations against the Russian government, the Embassy issued a detailed summary of every action Russian officials had taken and the statements they made. The one option the Embassy in London did not take was to engage British lawyers to obtain a hearing and an order of habeas corpus in the High Court to compel the appearance of the Skripals to testify for themselves. This option was obvious to the Embassy and lawyers in London between March 21, 2018, when the Home Office went to the court for legal authority to allow blood testing of the Skripals, and April 9, when Salisbury District Hospital announced that Yulia Skripal had been released; and then on May 18 when Sergei Skripal was also discharged from hospital.

During this period it was reported that Yulia was able to telephone her cousin Viktoria in Russia. Years later, as Chapters 67, 71, and 73 reveal, it became clear in retrospect that Yulia had recovered consciousness in hospital much earlier than the hospital allowed to be known, and that doctors had then forcibly sedated her. At the time the Russian Embassy was announcing it “questioned the authenticity” of the statements issued by the London police and media on Yulia’s behalf. The Embassy was right; it was not believed. It is possible the Embassy did attempt to engage barristers to go to court for a habeas corpus hearing for the Skripals, but learned that no one would take the case. At the time I made an independent request for this engagement to the well-known human rights barristers in London; the outcome was that none agreed to represent the Skripals. The refusals were point-blank – no one would give a reason.

British officials anticipated that an effort might succeed in forcing a High Court hearing, however. So, on May 24, 2018, a one minute fifty-five second speech by Yulia Skripal was presented on video in which she spoke from a script and appeared to sign a statement. Referring to “offers of assistance from the Russian Embassy,” she claimed “at the moment I do not wish to avail myself of their services.” Skripal’s Russian text spoke of “help” from the Russian Embassy: “now I don’t want and [I am] not ready to use it.” “Obviously, Yulia was reading a pre-written text,” the Russian Embassy responded publicly. “[This] was a translation from English and had been initially written by a native English-speaker…With all respect for Yulia’s privacy and security, this video does not discharge the UK authorities from their obligations under Consular Conventions.”

At first, Putin seemed unprepared on the facts of the case – the Russian facts – and unprepared for the British government’s propaganda blitz. The president cannot have been unprepared. On March 15, 2018, the Kremlin revealed that at a Security Council meeting on that day Putin was briefed by the Foreign and Defense Ministers and the intelligence chiefs. “While talking about international affairs,” the official communiqué said, “the Council members held an in-depth discussion on Russia-UK relations against the backdrop of Sergei Skripal’s case. They expressed grave concern over the destructive and provocative position of the British side.”

The line which Putin and his advisers decided at that meeting they planned to follow in public was revealed by Putin three days later at a press conference. He tried to feign ignorance himself, and then dissimulated on the weapon, the motive, and the opportunity. “Regarding the tragedy you have mentioned,” Putin told reporters, “I learned about it from the media. The first thing that comes to mind is that, had it been a warfare agent, the victims would have died immediately. It is an obvious fact which must be taken into account. This is first.”

“The second is that Russia does not have such chemical agents. We destroyed all our chemical weapons, and international observers monitored the destruction process. Moreover, we were the first to do this, unlike some of our partners who promised to destroy their chemical weapons but have not done so to this day, regrettably. Therefore, we are ready for cooperation, as we said immediately. We are ready to take part in any investigations necessary, provided the other side wants this too. We do not see their interest so far, but we have not removed the possibility of cooperation on this matter from the agenda.” “As for the overall situation, I believe that any reasonable person can see that this is total nonsense. It is unthinkable that anyone on Russia would do such a thing ahead of the presidential election and the FIFA World Cup. Absolutely unthinkable. However, we are ready for cooperation despite the above things. We are ready to discuss any issues and to deal with any problems.”

Read more …

 

 

 

 

Badger

 

 

Peacock
https://twitter.com/i/status/1879213811472941088

 

 

Shark

 

 

Sound

 

 

San Carlo

 

 

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Debt Rattle December 21 2024

Dec 212024
 
 December 21, 2024  Posted by at 10:41 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , ,  56 Responses »


René Magritte L’éternité 1935

 

• Shutdown Odds Tumble As House Passes Latest GOP Spending Package (ZH)
• US Democrats Want Government Shutdown To Strip Trump Of Leverage – Vance (RT)
• Advisers Had to Babysit “Diminished” Biden From the Very First Day (Sp.)
• “He has Good Days and Bad Days” (Turley)
• Musk Far More ‘Influential’ Than Trump Online – WaPo (RT)
• Trump’s Economic Plans (Jim Rickards)
• Trump Wins—and the Censorship Begins (AmG)
• Yet Another Christmas Carol (James Howard Kunstler)
• The FBI Deserves Kash Patel (John Kiriakou)
• West Has Pumped Over $300 Billion Into Ukraine – Orban
• Kiev’s Western Backers Wary About Training Soldiers Close To Front – Media (RT)
• EU Deletes ‘Ukraine Must Win’ Mantra (RT)
• Could European Peacekeepers Really be Deployed to Ukraine? (Sp.)
• Putin’s Q&A and the Forever Wars Riddle (Pepe Escobar)
• The Russian Line On Syria (Helmer)

 

 

 

 

Watters

Elon severance

MuskTrump

MuskTurley

 

 

 

 

Through this whole circus, I get the impression that what really counts is the words used to phrase the bill. You need words that allow both sides to declare victory, no matter what the bill actually says.

• Shutdown Odds Tumble As House Passes Latest GOP Spending Package (ZH)

Update: With the support of Democrats, the House just passed Speaker Johnson’s latest spending package bill. Lawmakers voted 366 to 34 to approve the proposal, well above the two-thirds threshold needed under special fast-track procedures. One lawmaker voted present. It now heads to the Senate, while the White House said in a statement that President Biden won’t stand in the way. “President Biden supports moving this legislation forward and ensuring that the vital services the government provides for hardworking Americans—from issuing Social Security checks to processing benefits for veterans—can continue as well as to grant assistance for communities that were impacted by devastating hurricanes,” White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said in a statement. Polymarket’s odds of a government shutdown are tumbling.

As the Epoch Times notes further, moments after the House of Representatives passed a new package to keep the federal government funded through March 14, House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) and other congressional lawmakers discussed the process that brought the bill over the finish line. “In bipartisan fashion, with an overwhelming majority of votes, we passed the American Relief Act of 2025,” Johnson said, adding that funding the government through March 2025 was “a big priority for us.” The House Speaker described the package as “America First” legislation that allows his GOP coalition to deliver the nation a “sea change in Washington” after Inauguration Day next month. “President Trump will return to D.C. and to the White House, and we will have Republican control of the Senate and the House,” Johnson said.

“Things are going to be very different around here.” House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) took credit for the bill passing Friday evening. “House Democrats have successfully funded the government at levels requested by President [Joe] Biden in order to meet the needs of the American people in terms of their health, safety, and economic well-being,” Jeffries told reporters after the vote. “We have successfully advanced the needs of everyday Americans, but there are still things to be worked on, and we look forward to that fight in the new year.”

The package also included requested disaster relief funds after an active hurricane season that included multiple destructive storms in multiple states throughout the southeast. Rep. Buddy Carter (R-Ga.), was relieved that portion was included in the final package. “Thank God we got disaster,” Carter told The Epoch Times. Regarding the debt ceiling consideration, Rep. Tom Emmer (R-Minn.) said that the public would have to wait and see what would “be done early in the next administration.” President-elect Donald Trump suggested he was pleased with the outcome of the vote, Rep. Rich McCormick (R-Ga.) told The Epoch Times.

Read more …

Things move fast, but it’s still useful to see what is said before the finish line.

• US Democrats Want Government Shutdown To Strip Trump Of Leverage – Vance (RT)

US Vice President-elect J.D. Vance has blasted the Democrats for rejecting a spending plan supported by Donald Trump, claiming they are trying to prevent the incoming president from “negotiating leverage” in the first year of his new term in the White House. The current federal funding is due to expire at midnight on Friday, leaving the government on the brink of a shutdown. The Democrats on Thursday rejected the new spending plan, known as a continuing resolution (CR). Thirty-eight Republicans also voted against it. The bill failed by a vote of 174-235. “The Democrats just voted to shut down the government even though we had a clean CR because they didn’t want to give the president negotiating leverage during the first year of his new term,” Vance told reporters straight after the vote.

On Wednesday, US President-elect Trump dismissed a previous bipartisan funding deal, which had been struck to prevent a shutdown just days before the Christmas break. Republicans balked at the proposed package, claiming it was bloated and full of Democratic policy priorities. Tech billionaire Elon Musk slammed the measure in dozens of posts on X, describing it as “criminal.” Instead, Trump urged lawmakers to pass a new package that included an extension of government funding until March and a two-year suspension of the debt limit into January 2027, adding trillions more to the federal government’s $36 trillion debt. The Trump-backed bill failed just hours after it was assembled, with Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson pledging to come up with another solution before government funding lapses at midnight on Friday.

Republicans have voiced opposition to increases in government spending, while Democrats voted against the bill because they argued the extra borrowing would be used to pass tax cuts for the wealthy. “They’ve asked for a shutdown and I think that’s exactly what they’re going to get,” Vance claimed. If lawmakers fail to approve a spending bill or extend the deadline, the US government will begin a partial shutdown that would affect millions of federal employees and the services they provide. While essential services such as border protection, in-hospital medical care, law enforcement and air-traffic control continue to operate, the shutdown would affect a vast number of operations, from court proceedings to travel and food safety inspections. Federal workers could go without pay, expecting they would be paid back in full once the government reopens. The last US government shutdown took place in December 2018 and January 2019 during Trump’s first White House term and was the longest in the country’s history.

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“..all US presidents have gatekeepers, the walls around Biden “were higher and the controls greater.”

• Advisers Had to Babysit “Diminished” Biden From the Very First Day (Sp.)

Joe Biden, the oldest president in US history, has repeatedly been criticized for his cognitive decline and a tendency to fall. Outgoing US President Joe Biden’s entourage has covered up the extent of his mental decline since he entered office in 2021, the Wall Street Journal reported in its bombshell investigation. The newspaper cited numerous unnamed Democratic lawmakers, donors, and presidential aides as saying that despite the fact that all US presidents have gatekeepers, the walls around Biden “were higher and the controls greater.” “There were limits over who Biden spoke with, limits on what they said to him, and limits around the sources of information he consumed,” the sources argued. “They body him to such a high degree,” one insider claimed, adding that there has been more “hand-holding” as compared to other presidents.

Biden’s “tightknit inner circle of advisers” also worked out a strategy to prevent POTUS from making gaffes or missteps that could tarnish his image, according to the sources. The advisers did their best to keep Biden’s meeting short as his public interactions became more scripted. The strategy, however, collapsed during Biden’s June 27 debate with Donald Trump, which saw the former being unable to complete his thoughts. US media reported at the time that the disastrous debate became an eye-opener and a turning point in discussions of Biden’s mental state and his suitability to serve as the next president. The 82-year-old finally dropped out of the presidential race and endorsed Kamala Harris as his replacement in late July.

VDH

Doocy
https://twitter.com/i/status/1870109006779359467

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The Dems and their media play dangerous games.

“Suddenly, everyone is shocked to learn that Biden was mentally diminished..”

• “He has Good Days and Bad Days” (Turley)

In an explosive exposé, the Wall Street Journal has revealed how the mental decline of President Joe Biden was pronounced from the start of his term. However, cabinet members and other Democrats lied to the public about his declining levels of acuity and engagement. That effort succeeded largely with the help of an alliance with the media, which showed little interest in whether the President was actually running the government. After President Joe Biden’s disastrous debate performance, the solid wall of media and staff shielding his declining mental state collapsed. Even after Special Counsel Robert Hur declined criminal charges against Biden due to his diminished state, Democratic pundits and the press covered for him, claiming that he was sharp and effective. With the debate, the public was able to see what many in the media and the White House had been hiding for years.

After interviewing roughly 50 insiders, the Journal found evidence of a knowing effort to hide Biden’s mental state. For many, Biden’s refusal to leave his home for much of the 2020 campaign was evidence of the insecurity of staff about his ability to engage with reporters. It only got worse during the term as staff virtually tackled anyone trying to ask him a question. Biden was routinely shuffled off stage after reading briefly from a teleprompter. Behind the scenes, cabinet members reportedly stopped asking for meetings with Biden after staff conveyed that such requests were not welcomed. He held far fewer cabinet meetings and was often considered “down” for any discussions. That included a period during the calamity of the Afghan withdrawal.

One official is quoted as admitting on one occasion in 2021 that Biden “has good days and bad days, and today was a bad day so we’re going to address this tomorrow.” That was just after he was elected. Yet, Biden was kept within the protective cocoon of media that did not press the issue and was infamous for ignoring scandals while asking Biden about his choice of ice cream on a given day. Now, some media outlets are re-positioning on the issue as they prepare to resume hard questioning and investigations in the new Trump Administration . . . after a four-year hiatus. Suddenly, everyone is shocked to learn that Biden was mentally diminished and blaming nameless staff for misleading them.

One exception this week was Chris Cillizza, who served as CNN’s editor-at-large before leaving the network in 2022. On YouTube, Cillizza stated, “As a reporter, I have a confession to make” and admitted “I should have pushed harder earlier for more information about Joe Biden’s mental and physical well-being and any signs of decline.” Now, everyone likes a redemptive sinner and I give Cillizza credit for admitting his own failure to pursue the story despite many critics objecting for years over the lack of such inquiries. However, Cillizza only confessed to failing to pursue the story due to a fear of being accused of “age shaming” Biden. The suggestion is that identity politics chilled journalism, not the overwhelming media support for the President and countervailing opposition to Trump.

The “age shaming” excuse is difficult to square with the failure to pursue an array of other scandals during the term from influence peddling to policy debacles. Nevertheless, Cillizza was remarkably frank that he was only able to push on the story after leaving CNN: “I didn’t really push on it, if I’m being honest. Now, once I left CNN and once it became a little bit more clear to me about Biden’s age, I think I did write pretty regularly and talk pretty regularly about how I wasn’t sure that this guy was up to it. And then obviously, after the June 27 debate, everybody, including me, was writing and talking about it.”

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X is most influential. That’s where Musk is. Trump, on Truth Social, has far less reach. They are very aware of this, and use it to their advantage.

Trying to drive a wedge between them is a fool’s game.

• Musk Far More ‘Influential’ Than Trump Online – WaPo (RT)

Messages that Elon Musk posts on X, the platform he purchased for $44 billion in 2022, have received far more viewership than those of any other politically-involved users, including President-elect Donald Trump, the Washington Post reported this week. The newspaper, which generally favors the Democratic Party, has tracked engagements since July, the month when the billionaire endorsed Trump for president. It said it has been monitoring posts hourly for 48 hours after publication to assess the “influence” that X users have on their audience. According to its analysis, Musk’s messages have received a total of 133 billion views during the monitoring period, which is 15 times more than Trump’s posts on the platform and more than 16 times more than the combined reach of all accounts belonging to members of the incoming Congress.

In short, the entrepreneur “eclipses” all others in terms of influence, the Post suggested. Trump was suspended from Twitter in the wake of the January 6, 2021 Capitol Hill riot, before Musk bought the company and changed its name to X. The president-elect has since moved the bulk of his political messaging to his own platform, Truth Social. Musk reinstated Trump’s X account after purchasing the microblogging network. WaPo has suggested that Trump’s presence elsewhere doesn’t significantly affect its analysis. He has “only 8.4 million followers there compared to his 96 million on X,” it said. Critics of Trump have been sounding the alarm over what they perceive as the undue influence that Musk has on the Republican politician and the future policies of his administration.

The billionaire has been closely involved with the transition process and has publicly weighed in on electoral politics with his online commentary on appointments. Nancy Pelosi, the former House speaker and a key figure in the Democratic establishment, described Trump as the billionaire’s “puppet” on Thursday, while reacting to the failure of Congress to pass a stop-gap funding bill this week. Musk has led the online charge against the 1,547-page proposal, released on Tuesday, branding it “criminal,” “outrageous,” “unconscionable,” and ultimately “one of the worst bills ever written.” Democratic lawmakers opposed an alternative bill pitched by Trump. Friday is the deadline for allocating more money to keep the federal government running.

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“..nominal growth is higher than the nominal deficit and the debt-to-GDP ratio is declining. That’s the key to sustainability.”

• Trump’s Economic Plans (Jim Rickards)

Trump will begin his first 100 days with an emphasis on his economic plans. His core economic team is already announced including Russell Vought as Director of the Office of Management and Budget, Jamieson Greer as U.S. Trade Representative, Kevin Hassett as Director of the National Economic Council, Scott Bessent as U.S. Treasury Secretary, and Howard Lutnick as Secretary of Commerce. Hassett and Bessent will form the core of this team with Greer taking the lead on tariffs and Vought taking the lead on budget deficits and fiscal policy. Trump’s economic policy will be built around what are called the Three Arrows. That’s a name adopted by the new Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent. He took the name from the Three Arrows policy of Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, who announced them in 2012. Abe’s arrows were monetary easing, fiscal stimulus and structural reforms to make Japan more competitive. Bessent’s arrows are different, but the basic idea of using government to help grow the economy in productive ways is the same.

Bessent’s plan is also called the “3–3–3” plan for reasons that are made clear below. Bessent’s first arrow is to achieve 3% annual real growth in the U.S. economy. This may not sound like much, but it is. From 2009 to 2019 (basically the period from the end of the last financial crisis to the beginning of COVID), the U.S. grew at a rate of only 2.2% per year. Economists estimate that the potential growth of a mature developed economy such as the U.S. is about 3.2%. That gap between 3.2% potential growth and 2.2% actual growth means trillions of dollars of lost wealth over time. From 1983 to 1986 during the Reagan years, the economy actually did grow at just over 5% per year. Real growth during that three-year stretch was 16%. (Although this followed the severe recession of 1981-1982.

Growth higher than potential is possible when labor and industrial slack from a prior recession is available). So, Bessent’s goal of 3% real growth is realistic given potential performance, past performance, and recent lagging growth. The emphasis here is on “real” growth. This means growth without taking into account any inflation. If real growth is 3% and inflation is 2%, then nominal growth will be 5% (3% real + 2% inflation = 5% nominal). Everyday Americans are properly focused on real growth because they don’t want to see their wage gains eaten up by inflation. Still, nominal growth is important when considering debt service since debt is nominal — you owe what you owe whether the real value is preserved or not. Bessent’s second arrow is to keep annual deficits below 3% of GDP. When discussing debt, we are dealing with nominal amounts rather than real amounts. For example, if U.S. GDP is projected at $28 trillion for a given fiscal year, then the deficit for that year cannot exceed $840 billion under Bessent’s plan.

Note that this does not involve “paying off the national debt” or even running a small surplus. A deficit of $840 billion is huge. But the limitation of 3% of GDP is highly significant in terms of making the debt sustainable and maintaining confidence in the U.S. dollar and U.S. Treasury securities. Before deciding that this is an easy target, it’s helpful to know that the U.S. deficit for fiscal year 2024 is $1.83 trillion. The deficit in fiscal year 2023 was $1.69 trillion. In short, Bessent’s goal of an $840 billion deficit represents a 54% reduction in the deficit from 2024 levels and a 50% reduction from 2023 levels. That’s a huge reduction in the deficit in one fiscal year. Not all of this deficit reduction would have to come from spending cuts, although some of it could, especially if Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy identify enough government waste through their new Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).

It’s likely that Musk and Ramaswamy will easily identify wasteful spending. The hard part is getting it to stop. The other way to cut the deficit is to grow the economy in such a way that government revenues grow with it. This does not mean tax rate increases. It does mean tax revenue increases from current or even reduced tax rates. One ace-in-the-hole for Trump and Bessent will be tariffs. Those are not part of the Internal Revenue Code, but they do generate government revenues. The U.S. began tariffs in 1790, but the Internal Revenue Code did not come into being until 1913. For 123 years, the U.S. government-funded itself mostly with tariffs, excise taxes, and borrowing without the benefit of income taxes.

The U.S. currently imports over $3.5 trillion of goods per year. If only half were subject to tariffs of 10%, that would generate $175 billion of new revenue, which goes a long way to reaching Bessent’s deficit reduction goals. Now the genius of the Three Arrows plan becomes clear. If nominal GDP growth is 5% (3% real + 2% inflation), and nominal deficits are kept to 3% of GDP, that means nominal growth is higher than the nominal deficit and the debt-to-GDP ratio is declining. That’s the key to sustainability.

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“..the alphabet news outlets, which provided Kamala Harris with “78 percent positive coverage, while these same networks have pummeled former President Donald Trump with 85 percent negative coverage..”

• Trump Wins—and the Censorship Begins (AmG)

As was proven during the 2024 election cycle, we are well beyond the scope of mere bias in the legacy media. Given the shrinking audience influence coupled with massively declining income from severe loss of cable subscriptions and advertising revenue, American media outlets have chosen a different course: straight-up propaganda intended for consumption by a niche audience, half of which don’t know they’re being lied to and the other half not caring. Broadcasting has been replaced with “wish casting.” How else can we explain the completely lopsided coverage from the alphabet news outlets, which provided Kamala Harris with “78 percent positive coverage, while these same networks have pummeled former President Donald Trump with 85 percent negative coverage?” And it was even more biased on CNN and MSNBC.

Major media outlets broadcast opinion-centric journalism that push narratives, ranging from “extinction-grade climate crisis” pronouncements to the “existential threat to democracy” dangers of a second Donald Trump presidency. There are no “two sides” reporting here; it is commentary passed off as “journalism” that wraps news stories around pre-packaged and carefully circulated talking points that favor the establishment bureaucracy and big-moneyed interests over American citizens. Simultaneously, Trump is a threat to democracy and will jail or even execute his opponents, is in service to Vladimir Putin, and will wreck the economy with his extremist MAGA agenda that is tied directly to Project 2025.

Trump will launch World War III, he’ll outlaw homosexuality and transgenderism, and he’ll cancel all future elections and become dictator for life. It will be the end of America, and a vote for Kamala Harris will be our “new way forward.” The American legacy media always had a tenuous relationship with its viewers and readers, losing its credibility every time the public finds that what is reported turns out to be completely untrue. Exhausted from the lies of omission and outright fabrications, the legacy media found itself without much of an audience and surprisingly little influence on the 2024 presidential election. But a ridiculous narrative is shaping up, one plainly untrue on its face, that the reason for Trump’s victory was not inflation, illegal immigration, or the economy, or that Harris-Walz was an outrageously insulting offering by the Democrats.

No, the reason Trump sailed to victory was “the massive influence of right-wing media.” Let that last statement sink in for a moment. That’s right, you can blame One America News, X, Newsmax, Fox News (still considered “right-wing” by many, especially on the left), assorted podcasts, and especially Joe Rogan, for putting Trump back into the White House. And the legacy media, who provided hideously lopsided coverage against Trump for years and conducted the presidential and vice-presidential debates in a grossly biased fashion, whines that their massive investment in Kamala Harris was thwarted by a relatively tiny segment of alternative media and citizen journalism. You have delusional, far-left, Democrat operatives like Julie Roginsky being taken to the woodshed by Scott Jennings, saying that the media and social media, especially, are now controlled by conservatives

[..] Need more evidence? Watch compressed election night coverage on ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, and, worst of all, MSNBC to see how optimism at 8 PM EST morphed to concern by midnight and outright despair around 3 AM when Trump declared victory. Both left-leaning cable channels, CNN and MSNBC, didn’t call the race until shortly after 5 AM on Wednesday. The Associated Press, the New York Times, CBS, and ABC all called the race around 5:30 AM. This was hours after the result was no longer in doubt. Well, it actually was. But it’s not because of the outsized influence of conservative media; it was because of the decimated influence of the legacy media. Most Americans no longer need solid evidence to conclude that they are being lied to by legacy outlets; thus, they turn to alternative media for truthful content and credible opinion.

This obvious shift in content consumption should be solid proof that the left can no longer control, frame, or even influence public opinion. The growth of alternative media and Elon Musk’s refusal to censor conservative thoughts and opinions on X/Twitter have loosened the multi-generational grip legacy media has had over journalism and have brought new voices into the mix, offering a mere balance in information. But the American Left cannot tolerate informational balance.

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“The nation appears to be having a kind of moment involving a gross, naked emperor and a bunch of people noticing this isn’t a nudist-friendly zone.” — Jeff Childers

• Yet Another Christmas Carol (James Howard Kunstler)

Hitler was dead, to begin with. As dead as ein Türnagel. At least no one had heard him squawk since the Russkies cracked bottles of Dunkelbrau at the Brandenburg Gate, April, 1945. Nobody ever called Joe Biden “Hitler,” but around his gloomy place-of-business, known as the “White House, they sometimes called him “Joe Biden,” with a titter and a smirk, as they called “a lid” on his bewildered day and stuffed him into the nearest broom closet. “Joe Biden” was a mere babe in pram when old Adolf bid farewell to his smoldering Reich. But, eight decades later, after being jammed into the Oval Office by his chauffeur, one Barack Obama, the grasping, scraping, flinty, clutching, covetous old bird, sometimes known as “the Big Guy,” from whom no match had ever struck the fire of an original idea, or a good idea, or even a sound, workable idea, shuffled to his bed-chamber in the lonely compartment known as the White House “residence” on Christmas eve.

“Humbug!” he maundered to himself as he struggled aboard the cold presidential bed, absent lately of the doctor who once claimed to be his wedded wife. “Humbug,” was the new flavor that Ben and Jerry had concocted just for the holiday, a “green” ice-cream featuring pureed mealworms and cocoa bean husks for a satisfyingly punitive crunch. Was Dr. Jill dead, too, now, old “JB” wondered, like his old pals Senator Byrd, and feisty Strom Thurmond and other members of “the firm?” (Or was she in the arms of that scoundrel, Emhoff?) “Humbug,” he mumbled as he fell off into a cruel, blank slumber. He awakened — he knew not how many minutes longer — to a snorting noise, as of pigs rooting in a forest, followed by a thin, sonorous wailing that might have been the revenant of some once-mighty bombast in the Nuremburg Zeppelinfeld.

And then resolved out of a mist the very figure of Hitler, his once-smart, gray Führeruniform tattered and threadbare, and the whole of his body wreathed in rotting sausages, the reek of which might have driven a rank of the stoutest, blondest SS leutnants to their knees in abject surrender. “What do you want of me?” Scrooge cried, but this ghost of Hitler only wailed again and beckoned with gnarled finger. Suddenly, “Joe Biden” seemed to be flying out in the night air across a great swamp, and then north over the Beltway, to Scranton, Pennsylvania. The scene: a slagheap behind the Lackawanna Iron and Steel Company, 1949. “JB” is a boy again — oh, to be a boy, with loose joints and a clear mind! — playing with his chums, Bob McGee and Sonny Donahoe. They are reenacting the last days of World War Two.

“I’ll be Ike,” says Bob, always a leader whom “Joe” liked to please. “Sonny, you be Omar Bradley. And “Joey,” you can be Hitler.” “Joey” loved playing Hitler: a few minutes of fulminating histrionics! Then, his hand mimicking a Walther P-38 with the muzzle pointed behind the ear, and the plosive pow! And then, writhing upon the heap of cinders acting out the Führer’s last moments. “You were so good at it!” the ghost wailed. “What happened to you?” “I wish I knew. Everything’s a blur now. But tell me, spirit: was I a good you?” “One of the best!” the ghost of Hitler moaned and dissolved into vapor.

“Joe Biden” wakes again in his bedchamber. It is flooded with bright light and trappings of the holiday: a tree festooned with what appear to be gleaming glass ornaments shaped like dildoes. And before it, enrobed in scarlet and muskrat fur, the cheerful figure of Senator-elect Adam Schiff, grinning from ear to ear, with a wreath of holly about his lightbulb-shaped head. The light is blinding. “What are you doing here?” the president asks. “And remind me what your name is, if it’s not too much to ask. “I am the ghost of Christmas Present,” Mr. Schiff intones, as though dispensing yet another rumor of Russian collusion. “Come, take my hand.”

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Kiriakou appears to suggest that Patel would go after people who have immunity. He won’t.

• The FBI Deserves Kash Patel (John Kiriakou)

On the surface of things, Kash Patel is the kind of person most of us would want to keep out of government. A MAGA true believer, and Donald Trump’s choice to head the F.B.I., he’s the tip of the spear of Trump’s apparent effort to use the courts to go after his perceived enemies in the media and on Capitol Hill. The mainstream Democratic-oriented press is apoplectic about the appointment. The Christian Science Monitor said it most clearly when it wrote that, “Democrats invoke (the notorious late F.B.I. Director J. Edgar Hoover) as they warn about Mr. Patel, suggesting he will target political enemies. Republicans, though, compare Hoover’s tenure to what they say is a modern ‘deep state” resisting and harassing Mr. Trump.” That’s the bottom line. Democrats compare him to Hoover while Republicans argue that he’s the anti-Hoover.

I’m here to argue that Kash Patel is exactly what Americans need right now at the F.B.I. We need somebody with the guts and the political authority to burn the F.B.I. down, at least figuratively. First, I’m under no illusions that Kash Patel is a good guy. According to former Fox News host Bill O’Reilly, Patel is “salivating” at the opportunity to investigate and, apparently, charge former Rep. Liz Cheney with some sort of crime because of her work on the Jan. 6 Committee. This is not only wrong, it also ignores the fact that Cheney had congressional immunity for her work because she was serving in an official capacity for the committee. Nothing will come of any investigation.

The press also has opined that Patel will target police officers who arrested protestors at the Jan. 6 riots at the Capitol for investigation. Again, the police have qualified immunity, and nothing will come of the idea. He has also called for the prosecution of a wide range of political figures, including President Joe Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, and outgoing F.B.I. Director Christopher Wray. Again, they have immunity, and nothing will come of Patel’s rhetoric.

[..] The bureau also investigated candidate Trump and participated in the Russiagate fiasco in Operation Hurricane Crossfire. I’ve had my own negative experience with the F.B.I. In 2009, the bureau secretly opened a criminal case against me in response to my having blown the whistle on the C.I.A.’s torture program. In the end, I was charged with five felonies, including three counts of espionage. I hadn’t committed espionage, of course, and those charges were dropped, but not until I had declared bankruptcy.

To make the case go away, I pleaded guilty to a lesser charge and served 23 months in a federal prison. I had been facing 45 years. In the intervening years, three F.B.I. agents have reached out to me to apologize for their role in the case, saying that it was political in nature and that they were ordered to target me. That’s the F.B.I. That’s what it does. And that is why we need Kash Patel at the helm of the F.B.I. right now. We need somebody who is willing to tear this organization down to its bare studs. The F.B.I. is a criminal organization. It should be dealt with like a criminal organization. There should be a price to pay for its crimes against the American people.

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And what’s the return on that investment?

“This “enormous” amount of money could have been given to Europeans to make people’s lives much better..”

• West Has Pumped Over $300 Billion Into Ukraine – Orban

The US and the EU have provided over $300 billion in financial aid and military assistance to Kiev since the escalation of the Ukraine conflict in 2022, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has said. Such a huge amount of money “could have done wonders” had it been spent to improve the lives of people within the EU, he said in an interview with Kossuth radio on Friday. Orban highlighted the evolving military situation, noting that “the balance of power on the frontlines is shifting day by day” in Russia’s favor. He also pointed to the political changes expected in the US when Donald Trump returns to the White House next month. The developments call for leaders in EU capitals to embrace a more pragmatic approach to ensuring stability and economic resilience within the bloc, Orban believes.

However, the prime minister argued that Brussels remains out of touch with global realities, pointing to a recent European Parliament decision to continue sending substantial funds to Kiev – a move he described as a clear example of misplaced priorities. “During the negotiation with the Americans, I received the figure that Europe and America together have spent €310 billion so far. Those are huge numbers!” the Hungarian prime minister stressed. He argued that the hundreds of billions of euros already spent to fund the conflict could have been used to bolster European infrastructure, to develop countries in the Western Balkans to the level of the EU, or beef up military capabilities. This “enormous” amount of money could have been given to Europeans to make people’s lives much better, the Hungarian leader concluded.

Russia has repeatedly warned that no amount of Western aid will stop its troops from achieving the goals of the military operation or change the ultimate outcome of the conflict. By backing Kiev, they only prolong the conflict, Moscow has argued. Earlier this month, Orban proposed a Christmas ceasefire between Ukraine and Russia, describing it as a last-ditch attempt to mediate a diplomatic resolution of the conflict. He floated the idea to Kiev and Moscow, as well as to Trump, who he personally met at his residence in Florida. The Kremlin spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov said that Moscow “fully supports Orban’s efforts aimed at finding a peaceful settlement and resolving humanitarian issues related to the exchange of prisoners.” However, Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky rejected Budapest’s offer.

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Sitting ducks.

• Kiev’s Western Backers Wary About Training Soldiers Close To Front – Media (RT)

Western officials are concerned about British plans to potentially resume the training of Kiev’s troops inside Ukraine, The Times reported on Friday, citing sources familiar with the matter. The UK is among the nations that have trained the Ukrainian military on their soil. Valery Zaluzhny, Kiev’s former top general who has been appointed ambassador to London, toured a boot camp in southern England last month to tell these recruits that they should not be afraid to die for their country. This week, British Defense Secretary John Healey said the UK could send military personnel to Ukraine. Such a move would help the Ukrainians “motivate and mobilize more recruits,” he suggested during a visit to Kiev. “The closer to the front, the more efficient the training is,” a Western official told The Times, discussing the merits and drawbacks of such a deployment.

“But it’s fair to say the Russians would target any kind of Western assistance inside Ukraine.” The UK had sent several dozen instructors into Ukraine in January 2022 to teach Kiev’s forces how to operate British-donated anti-tank missiles, the report added. They were pulled out shortly before direct hostilities with Russia broke out the following month. Yavorov military base in Western Ukraine, where the training took place, was hit by Russian long-range missiles within weeks, in March 2022. The Ukrainian military is struggling to replenish manpower, despite a major overhaul of its mobilization system this year, which introduced harsher punishments for draft avoidance and lowered the conscription age to 25 years. Mandatory conscription makes recruits prone to desertion, according to the media.

Kiev’s Western backers claim that moving their training programs closer to the front would bolster the confidence of Ukrainian citizens that they would be properly trained and equipped before being sent into combat. The Times claimed that Tony Radakin, the chief of the defense staff, overruled Army chief Patrick Sanders, when he was pushing in September 2023 for the UK to train Ukrainian troops inside the country. Russia considers foreign fighters in Ukraine fair military targets. It claims that some Western service members are secretly on the ground, preparing the launches of donated long-range missiles, including Britain’s Storm Shadows. This makes the donors de facto participants in the fighting, Russian officials have said. Moscow has condemned the conflict as a Western proxy war against Russia, in which Ukrainians are used as ‘cannon fodder’.

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Replaced by “Russia must not prevail”.

• EU Deletes ‘Ukraine Must Win’ Mantra (RT)

The European Union has reportedly dialed back its stance on the Ukraine conflict, replacing the phrase “Ukraine must win this war” with “Russia must not prevail” in a European Council statement on new sanctions against Russia, first released on Monday. The revision apparently came after questions from Politico about its alignment with Brussels’ latest diplomatic messaging. An EU official said the original statement was a mistake, according to Politico’s Brussels Playbook newsletter. A separate statement released by the European Council on Thursday also used the phrase “Russia must not prevail” when discussing the Ukraine conflict. Council President Antonio Costa, who had a joint press conference with Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky the same day, stated that “international law must prevail.”

Politico’s Eddy Wax said the change in EU messaging highlights a broader shift in the West, as US President-elect Donald Trump intends to seek a swift end to the hostilities upon taking office in late January. Some senior figures in the EU, including the bloc’s top diplomat, Kaja Kallas, have continued to insist that “Ukraine will win” in their public statements. However, there is a growing acknowledgement in Brussels that it cannot prop up Kiev without Washington’s backing, the Politico report suggested. “The EU’s strategy appears to be flattering Trump, wishfully projecting onto him, and turning a blind eye to some of his more alarming statements,” the outlet said.

Kiev, meanwhile, has not toned down its rhetoric on the conflict. On Thursday, both Zelensky and his chief of staff, Andrey Yermak, publicly insulted Russian President Vladimir Putin following his annual marathon Q&A event earlier in the day. Former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, who serves as deputy chair of the national Security Council, suggested on Friday that Kiev was trying to derail Trump’s peace efforts by antagonizing Moscow further. Zelensky is “showing the middle finger” to the incoming American leader, Medvedev claimed.

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Only if Russia gives permission. Which means no weapons.

• Could European Peacekeepers Really be Deployed to Ukraine? (Sp.)

Few European countries would risk sending their soldiers to Ukraine as part of some kind of a peacekeeping force, former Swedish military officer and politician Mikael Valtersson told Sputnik. He outlined two potential scenarios of peacekeeper deployment in the Ukrainian conflict zone, with the basis for both being “a ceasefire along the current front lines and no Ukrainian NATO membership in the foreseeable future.” The first scenario involves an international peacekeeping force comprised of troops from countries or regions unaffiliated with the participants of the Ukrainian conflict, such as “Türkiye, India, Latin America, Africa, ASEAN and maybe European countries like Hungary and Slovakia.”

The second scenario, where EU troops would be sent as peacekeepers, would likely result in Russia perceiving it as a breach of any ceasefire and would restart the fighting “long before the Western forces reached the front lines.” As a result, Europe would be left with a conflict “involving several European countries, but without the backing of NATO or the US,” so it is small wonder that, as Valtersson put it, “it would be impossible to get unity within Europe about such a mission.”

“Instead, the fighting probably will continue during 2025, without US support, until Ukraine realises that they must accept the situation on the ground. But then the conditions might be even more severe for Ukraine,” Valtersson mused. “They lost a great opportunity to get a good deal during the Istanbul negotiations and risk gambling away even more now.” “A much more plausible scenario for European military involvement on the ground in Ukraine is that some of the more hawkish nations send support units and ‘instructors’ to Ukraine,” Valtersson warned. These European troops would become prime targets for Russia, he added, without actually having “much impact” on the outcome of the conflict.

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“Christianity was born in Damascus (remember St. Paul) – not in Jerusalem. When Putin went to Damascus, he was on an Orthodox Christian pilgrimage: coming from the Third Rome (Moscow) to pay his respects to the precursor of the first Rome, the cradle of Christianity.”

• Putin’s Q&A and the Forever Wars Riddle (Pepe Escobar)

He spoke for four and a half hours, virtually non-stop, reviewing the results of 2024, mastering all the facts. His Direct Line received over 2 million questions, from Russia and around the world. And he had to crown the performance with a flourish, in an “I did it, my way” vein: “I believe that not only did I simply save [Russia], we moved away from the edge of the abyss.” The record would confirm it, compared to the appalling state of the Russia he inherited when first elected president in March 2000. President Putin’s end of the year Q&A contains enough substance to be unpacked for weeks, if not months. Let’s focus here on our current geopolitical crossroads: the Forever Wars in West Asia and Ukraine, two vectors of the standard imperial drive, now united in an Omni-War. Putin stated that, “we have come to Syria in order to prevent a terrorists’ enclave (…) In general, our goal has been achieved.”

Whether Syria remains “terrorist free” remains to be seen: the new, “inclusive”, rebranded as woke Emir of Damascus, al-Jolani, a Saudi national, is a certified Salafi-jihadi still with a $10 million American bounty on his head. The “enclave” now encompasses most of former Syrian sovereign territory, otherwise illegally occupied by jihadi gangs and Zionist lebensraum practitioners. It’s important to remember that Russia first intervened in Syria in 2015 not so much to keep access to the warm waters of the Eastern Mediterranean: but mostly to protect holy Christian Orthodox sites in Damascus. Christianity was born in Damascus (remember St. Paul) – not in Jerusalem. When Putin went to Damascus, he was on an Orthodox Christian pilgrimage: coming from the Third Rome (Moscow) to pay his respects to the precursor of the first Rome, the cradle of Christianity.

On the larger Levantine geopolitical picture, Putin is correct. The CIA invented Operation Timber Sycamore way back in 2012 to train and weaponize “moderate rebels” to overthrow Assad – spending over $1 billion a year: the most extensive CIA covert op since the jihad in Afghanistan in the 1980s. The UK, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Jordan were Sycamore partners. Over the final years, the Pentagon jumped in to “prepare” Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), the “soft” ISIS splinter group. Ultimately it was nearly 14 years of toxic US sanctions and relentless siege warfare that led to the final act, complete with Ukrainian drone instructors, mountains of Qatari cash and the Turk-assembled crypto-al Qaeda infantry (no more than 350 fighters, according to Putin himself). Now it’s a matter of adapting. Putin said that, “we have established relations with all those that control the situation on the ground (…)

Most countries expect the Russian bases to remain (…) Our interests should coincide, a question that requires painstaking examination.” He also reminded everyone that politics is the art of compromise – and Russia’s strategic priority is to keep the bases in Tartus and Hmeimim. Putin brushed aside the notion that Russia has been weakened by Assad’s downfall in Syria, quoting Mark Twain: “Rumors about my death have been greatly exaggerated.” Instead, he practically proposed that the Russian bases could provide humanitarian aid: one can imagine the population of a deeply polarized, fragmented Syria arguing with the Salafi-jihadis to get their share. Were that to happen, Russia would be in direct aid competition with the collective West. The EU, via its new, deranged Estonian ultra-Russophobic foreign policy chief, has already ordered that there will be no sanctions relief if the Russian bases stay.

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“If earlier, let’s say, the same Iranian friends asked [us] to help them move their units into the territory of Syria, now they asked us to withdraw them from there.”

• The Russian Line On Syria (Helmer)

Quoting Mark Twain, President Vladimir Putin has made his first public statement on Syria during his Direct Line broadcast on Thursday. “Whoever wants to imagine Russia weakened…I want to recall the famous man and writer, who once said: ‘The reports of my death are greatly exaggerated.’” During four and a half hours of question-and-answer, Putin responded to questions on the Syrian conflict from a US and later a Turkish reporter. He said the future of the Russian bases at Khmeimim and Tartus is undecided. “The vast majority of [Syrian groups] tell us that they would want our military bases to remain in Syria. I don’t know — we should think about it, because we have to decide for ourselves how we relate to the political forces that are now in control and will control the situation in this country in the future. Our interests ought to coincide. If we stay there, then we have to do something in the interests of the country where we are.

”Putin endorsed the Turkish military movements into Syria over the Israeli ones. “Israel is also solving security issues for itself…We hope that Israel someday will leave the territory of Syria, but right now it is bringing in there additional troops. I think there are already thousands of troops. And I have such an impression, that they are not only not going to leave, but they are going to reinforce there…Turkey needs to ensure its security somehow. We understand that all. This is not for today’s meeting, so as not to waste time.” To Keir Simmons of NBC, Putin said: “You and those who, I repeat, pay your wages, want to present everything that happens in Syria like some kind of failure, the defeat of Russia…We came to Syria ten years ago so that it would not become a terrorist enclave like the fact we observed in some other countries, say, in Afghanistan.

In general, we have achieved our goals… And even those groups that fought against the Assad regime, with government troops, also undergo internal changes. No wonder today many European countries and the United States want to establish a relationship with them. If they are terrorist organizations, what are you doing there? So, they’ve changed, have they? This means that to a certain extent, the [Russian] goal has been achieved. “Furthermore, we did not have ground troops in Syria. They just weren’t there. There are our two bases — air and naval. The ground component consisted of the armed forces of Syria itself and some, as we all know — there is no secret here – the so-called pro-Iranian combat formations. In our time we even took out of there [Russian] special forces. We didn’t just fight there.

“What has been happening there? When armed opposition groups approached Aleppo, Aleppo was protected by about thirty thousand people. 350 militants entered the city. Government forces, and with them the so-called pro-Iranian units, retreated without a fight, blew up their positions, and left. And also with some small exceptions, where there were some clashes, that was what happened throughout Syria. If earlier, let’s say, the same Iranian friends asked [us] to help them move their units into the territory of Syria, now they asked us to withdraw them from there. We took out four thousand Iranian fighters from the Khmeimim base to Teheran. Part of the so-called pro-Iranian units went without a fight to Lebanon, some to Iraq.

“Today the situation in the Syrian Arab Republic is not easy, of course. We very much hope that there will be peace, tranquility. We support relations with all the groups that control the situation there, with all countries of the region. The vast majority of them tell us that they would want our military bases to remain in Syria. I don’t know — we should think about it, because we have to decide for ourselves how we relate to the political forces that are now in control and will control the situation in this country in the future. Our interests ought to coincide. If we stay there, then we have to do something in the interests of the country where we are.

“What will be our interests there? What can we do for them? This is a question that is waiting for painstaking research on both sides. Already now we can do something, including using these bases – we have already offered it to our partners, including those located in Syria, and neighboring countries. [We] offered the use of, say, the Khmeimim airbase to deliver humanitarian aid in Syria. And this is accepted with understanding and desire to organize this work together. The same applies to the naval base in Tartus. Therefore, whoever wants to imagine Russia weakened, since you are an American, I want to recall the famous man and writer [Mark Twain], who once said: ‘The reports of my death are greatly exaggerated.’”

Later in the broadcast, Putin was asked a question by Ali Jura of the Turkish state news agency Anadolu: “Mr. President, Israel violates international rights by killing tens of thousands of people, including children in Palestine and Lebanon. Israel now takes advantage of the situation in the region to occupy Syria and violates its sovereignty. How do you comment on the actions of Israel? Did you have a conversation with President Erdogan about the region as a whole? Thank you.”

Read more …

 

 

 

 

Brian Cox

 

 

Gervais

 

 

Pesticides

 

 

Wind
https://twitter.com/i/status/1870062259013071095

 

 

Shelter toys
https://twitter.com/i/status/1870094847211700470

 

 

Vibes
https://twitter.com/i/status/1870187674583060962

 

 

Husky

 

 

Bump
https://twitter.com/i/status/1870169812581974133

 

 

 

 

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

 

 

 

 

 

Debt Rattle December 4 2024

Dec 042024
 
 December 4, 2024  Posted by at 10:05 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , , ,  66 Responses »


Johannes Vermeer The geographer 1668-69

 

• FBI Agents Back Kash Patel As Next Director: ‘He’s the right fix’ (JTN)
• The Government Gangsters (Glenn Beck)
• Tucker Carlson Claims US Embassy Has Muted Zelensky (RT)
• Trump Offers Canada Chance To Join US (RT)
• Joe Biden Cloaks His Legacy in Infamy With the Hunter Biden Pardon (Turley)
• In Pardoning His Own Son, Biden Argues That US Justice Sucks (Marsden)
• “Trump-Proofing” California Could Be a Costly Option for Californians (Turley)
• Ukraine Will Reject Any Alternative To NATO Membership – Foreign Ministry (RT)
• Kiev Should ‘Disregard Everything And Everyone’, Become Nuclear Power – MP (RT)
• Georgia: A Second Front for Putin (Paul Craig Roberts)
• The Second Front Has Been Activated In Syria (Sonja van den Ende)
• EU Reports Dramatic Fall In Birth Rate (RT)
• EU Has Weakened ‘A Lot’ Amid Ukraine Conflict – Hungarian FM (RT)
• The End Of Fake News? MSNBC Hits New Low In Ratings (ZH)
• Ryanair CEO O’Leary: Germany Is Run By ‘Idiots’ (RMX)
• Fani Full Release Ordered After Fulton DA Sat On RICO Records (ZH)
• House Oversight Report Supports Lab-Leak Theory for COVID-19 Origin (ET)
• The Skripals Are As Good As Dead – The Judge Has Buried Them (Helmer)

 

 

 

 

YMCA

Article III

In a blanket pardon, you lose the 5th

Georgia
https://twitter.com/i/status/1863938810196955257

Gaetz

Benz


https://twitter.com/i/status/1864152269153063050

Biden AI

 

 

 

 

“..an influential retired bureau supervisor says a large number of agents support Kash Patel for the job..”

• FBI Agents Back Kash Patel As Next Director: ‘He’s the right fix’ (JTN)

As Democrats try to stymie President-elect Donald Trump’s pick for FBI Director, an influential retired bureau supervisor says a large number of agents support Kash Patel for the job because of his national security experience and his vision to replace the law enforcement agency’s leadership who allowed politics to usurp crime fighting. “This guy is completely and 100% qualified to run that organization. He’s what’s needed today. He’s the right fix,” retired FBI Supervisory Special Agent Jeff Danik told Just the News in a wide-ranging interview Monday. While Democrats and news media critics have suggested that Patel was selected to be a loyalist seeking revenge on Trump foes, Danik noted Patel’s extensive career experience, which includes stints as a federal public defender, federal prosecutor, counterterrorism director at the National Security Council, senior counsel to the House Intelligence Committee and chief of staff to both the Defense Secretary and the Director of National Intelligence.

“He has the correct balance, in my view, having been there for almost 30 years,” Danik said of Patel. “He has the correct balance of prosecutor, which is what we do. We feed the prosecution tube. Defense attorney, so the other side of that coin. Intelligence, the intelligence agencies, which is a key element to the FBI’s either success or failure. “And then also, I think this is personal, that he’s been a victim himself of the system,” Danik said. “And the combination of those things uniquely qualifies him beyond his, you know, substantial accomplishments.” Those accomplishments, Just the News confirmed, include two major government awards for Patel’s work on national security during the Obama administration.

The recognitions included a 2017 Assistant Attorney General’s award of excellence for Patel’s prosecution of 12 Al-Shabab terrorists who killed 72 and injured dozens more with suicide bombings targeting sports fans watching a 2010 FIFA World Cup soccer match at two locations in Kampala, the capital of Uganda. They also include a Central Intelligence Agency Award for Human Intelligence Gathering for his work combating terrorism in East Africa. Patel mentioned both awards in a lawsuit he filed against a news media organization back in 2019 and they were confirmed by government officials who spoke to Just the News.Danik’s full-throated endorsement of Patel is significant, since he is a popular figure in the FBI retiree community as an accomplished bureau supervisor in the Miami area known to help and counsel agents currently on the job.

“I talk to agents all the time. I’m constantly involved with helping them, counseling them through tough times, or helping on the job or just after retirement,” Danik said during an interview on the John Solomon Reports podcast. “And there’s a large group that are highly, highly supportive of him, of the President-elect, and are willing to help with whatever jobs or tasks are involved in getting behind the scenes.” “When somebody new comes into into an organization, even if they’re somewhat familiar with it, there’s a lot of complexity involved with these federal bureaucracies. They have really established lots of different little machine gunner nests that need to be known about before you go in,” he added. Danik was explicitly supportive of Patel’s oft-stated strategy of “cleaning house” in the upper echelons of the FBI, saying that is where cases involving Hillary Clinton, Donald Trump and others have been politicized to the detriment of the nation.

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X thread.

• The Government Gangsters (Glenn Beck)

Trumps FBI Director Kash Patel knew the Deep State’s plan to remove Joe Biden and pardon Hunter to hide their crimes. Garland and Wray should have been impeached. Fauci, the CIA and the Media lied about the origins of Covid. Wray has the Epstein files. He says the FBI can be fixed by shutting down the Hoover building immediately and opening it up the next day as a Museum of the Deep State letting everyone walk the halls for free and leaving it open 365 days a year. He says twenty people can run the FBI, the other seven thousand agents that are sitting in that building should be chasing criminals around America, not distorting statistics about January 6th so Christopher Wray can go to Congress and lie and say domestic violent terrorism is on the rise.

He encourages the arrest and prosecution of Hunter Biden over the crime of prostitution for calling a Hooker, which is prosecutable in almost every jurisdiction in America and he also says Joe Biden can be prosecuted for receiving money overseas, ill gotten gains, which is illegal. There are bigger crimes involving Ukraine and other matters, but these are simple and fast crimes to prosecute. The investigation into the Hunter Biden Laptop was shutdown by the FBI and the Department of Justice with the help of the media, proving this was a coordinated Deep State effort. He says the Obama-Clinton Administration has been running the White House for years, not Joe Biden. The Deep State is evil, vindictive and very smart.

He names the Top Five Deep State Operatives in America which are General Mark Milley of the U.S. Department of Defense, Mark T. Esper former Secretary of Defense, William Barr former U.S. Attorney General of the Department of Justice, Christopher Wray current FBI Director and Merrick Garland the current Attorney General of the Department of Justice. He says the Deep State will be shattered under the second Trump Administration, but it will be a monster fight. He read the entire secret JFK files and the secret seven pages of the 9/11 report, he says he has seen it all and will recommend to President Trump to release all the files to the American people including the Epstein files. He refers to the Deep State Operatives as Government Gangsters that will be brought to justice.

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“..Carlson published a video on X in which he previewed the upcoming release of an interview with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov..”

• Tucker Carlson Claims US Embassy Has Muted Zelensky (RT)

American journalist Tucker Carlson has said the US government has been blocking his attempts to organize an interview with Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky for more than a year. On Wednesday, Carlson published a video on X in which he previewed the upcoming release of an interview with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov. The journalist said the conversation with Russia’s top diplomat was aimed at providing a perspective on how close Washington and Moscow could be to a direct clash, after the administration of outgoing US President Joe Biden granted Ukraine permission to fire American-made long-range weapons deep into Russian territory.

In the same clip, filmed on Manezhnaya Square in the heart of Moscow, the former Fox News host revealed that “we have also tried for over a year to get an interview with Zelensky, the president of Ukraine.” According to Carlson, his team “have attacked that from a bunch of different angles. We have spoken to a lot of different people around him, had dinner with them. We have been in talks continuously.” “And those efforts have been thwarted by the US government. The American Embassy in Kiev, which our tax dollars pay for, told the Zelensky government: No, you may not do the interview. You can talk to CNN. You cannot talk to us,” Carlson said.

In June, the journalist said he had agreed an interview with the Ukrainian leader. However, Zelensky’s press-secretary, Sergey Nikiforov, swiftly rejected the claim, saying that “Tucker Carlson should check his sources in the FSB (Russia’s Federal Security Service) more carefully.” Zelensky “has a completely different schedule, and Tucker Carlson is not on it,” Nikiforov stressed. Carlson’s latest trip to Moscow is his second since the escalation between Russia and Ukraine in early 2022. In February, he interviewed Russian President Vladimir Putin, with the recording of their two-hour conversation getting 14 million views on YouTube and 185 million views on X in the first three days after its release.

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Western Canada would be interested. But not the east. Though Québec…

• Trump Offers Canada Chance To Join US (RT)

US President-elect Donald Trump has suggested that Canada should become the 51st US state unless it manages to halt the flow of illegal migrants and drugs across its border with the US, Fox News reported on Monday, citing sources. According to the report, the incoming US leader made the remarks last Friday during a dinner with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. Earlier last week, Trump threatened to place 25% tariffs on goods coming from both Canada and Mexico upon inauguration in retaliation for illegal immigration, as well as the “crime and drugs,” coming to the US across the borders with the two countries. Trudeau called Trump shortly thereafter to attempt to dissuade the incoming US president from going ahead with the proposed hike, and on Friday arrived at Trump’s estate at Mar-a-Lago to continue discussions.

According to people reportedly present at Friday’s dinner who heard Trump’s discussion with Trudeau, the US president-elect repeated his earlier claim that Canada had failed its neighbor by allowing drugs and illegal immigrants from over 70 different countries to enter the US. He also reportedly chided Canada for the US trade deficit with it, which he estimated at around $100 billion. Trudeau reportedly told Trump that such punishing tariffs would destroy the Canadian economy. Trump was said to have replied with a tongue-in-cheek suggestion that Canada could avoid this by becoming the 51st US state, with Trudeau as governor. He later expounded on the idea, saying that Canada could even be divided into two states, one conservative and one liberal. The remark was reportedly received with nervous laughter from Trudeau and other dinner attendants, while Trump once again emphasized that he plans to carry out his threat as soon as he returns to the White House on January 20.

After the dinner, Trudeau told reporters he had “an excellent conversation” with Trump, without revealing its details. Trump later called his meeting with Trudeau “productive” and noted that the Canadian prime minister had “made a commitment” to work with the new US administration on Trump’s key points of concern. He did not mention his previous tariff hike threat again. Many US imports from both Canada and Mexico are currently exempted from tariffs because of the USMCA trade agreement that Trump enacted during his first term. Experts have warned that it is not clear how Trump could implement the proposed tariff hikes without violating that deal. Many economists have also warned that tariff hikes could backfire on the US economy by causing a spike in domestic prices, and also lead to retaliatory actions by targeted countries that could spark a trade war.

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“Even among past scandals in the abuse of the pardon power, Biden has done lasting damage not just to his legacy but his office.”

• Joe Biden Cloaks His Legacy in Infamy With the Hunter Biden Pardon (Turley)

President Joe Biden’s decision to use his presidential powers to pardon his own son will be a decision that lives in infamy in presidential politics. It is not just that the President used his constitutional powers to benefit his family. It is because the action culminates years of lying to the public about his knowledge and intentions in the influence-peddling scandal surrounding his family. Even among past scandals in the abuse of the pardon power, Biden has done lasting damage not just to his legacy but his office. Despite its noble origins and purpose, the pardon power historically has not been a pristine power used by past presidents. As I have previously written, it was used to benefit the political cronies of past presidents. President Warren Harding was even accused of selling pardons, including to mob enforcer Ignacio Lupo, known as “Lupo the Wolf.” Former president William Clinton waited for the final days of his presidency to pardon his own brother as well as a major democratic donor.

In 2023, I wrote that Biden might follow this same pattern and pardon his son as a lame-duck president. The column suggested that Biden might withdraw as a candidate for office and then take the action as a father: “The pardon-and-apology approach might appeal to Biden not only as an effort to convert vice into virtue but to justify his withdrawal from the election as a selfless act.” In the 2020 election and throughout his presidential term, Biden repeatedly lied to the American public with an ease and impunity that shocked even many political veterans in Washington. He was repeatedly asked if he knew about Hunter’s foreign dealings, including millions in alleged deals with Russians, Ukrainians, Chinese, and other clients. President Biden lied and denied such knowledge. As I detailed in my testimony in the Biden impeachment hearing, he had repeated discussions of these dealings. He is even on tape discussing news stories on the dealings.

President Biden was also repeatedly asked if he met any of his son’s clients. He repeatedly lied. We have pictures and records of dinners and meetings with these clients. Hunter Biden was expressly thanked for his arranging such access to his father. Few reporters pressed Biden on the corruption scandal, but they were often met not only with denials but angry retorts from the president. When Fox reporter Peter Doocy raised it, the President steamed “Yes, yes, yes. God love you, man — you’re a one-horse pony, I tell you.” When CBS’s Bo Erickson broke ranks and raised the scandal and drew a rebuke from Biden “I know you’d ask it. I have no response, it’s another smear campaign, right up your alley, those are the questions you always ask.” The President continued to lie throughout the election, the presidential debates, and his term. Then, the press repeatedly asked him whether he would pardon his son. The President was now running for reelection and again lied.

He and the White House said over and over again that no such pardon would occur and was not being contemplated. That was also a lie. NBC is reporting that, while issuing these denials last June, there were discussions about the pardon. The pardon power was written in absolute terms, and a president can even, in my view, pardon himself. However, what is constitutional is not necessarily ethical or right. This is one of the most disgraceful pardons even in the checkered history of presidential pardons. President Biden has lied to cover up a corruption scandal that reportedly brought his family millions in raw influence peddling. His portrayal of his son as a victim stands in sharp contrast to the sense of immunity and power conveyed by Hunter in his dealings. There were diamonds as gifts, lavish expense accounts, and a sports car, in addition to massive payments that Hunter claimed were “loans.”

There are messages where Hunter belies the President’s portrayal of a political witch hunt, including messages like the one to a Chinese businessman openly threatening the displeasure of Joe Biden if money is not sent to them immediately. In the WhatsApp message, Hunter stated: “I am sitting here with my father, and we would like to understand why the commitment made has not been fulfilled. Tell the director that I would like to resolve this now before it gets out of hand, and now means tonight. And, Z, if I get a call or text from anyone involved in this other than you, Zhang, or the Chairman, I will make certain that between the man sitting next to me and every person he knows and my ability to forever hold a grudge that you will regret not following my direction. I am sitting here waiting for the call with my father.” The President has now pardoned Hunter for his convicted felonies and any crimes he may have committed from “Jan. 1, 2014, to Dec. 1, 2024.” It is all now being buried under a sweeping immunity deal and a pack of presidential lies.

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“Too bad that time’s up for you to actually do anything about this kind of systemic selective prosecutorial bullying, beyond serving your own family’s interests.”

• In Pardoning His Own Son, Biden Argues That US Justice Sucks (Marsden)

One of the big bonuses of being US president is that you can pardon any federal crimes you want on the way out the door. It’s a chance to help out family, friends, donors, or curry favor with potential future business associates in your post-White House career. US President Joe Biden just handed one out to his own son, Hunter Biden, who was facing up to 25 years prison in a firearms case and 17 years for a tax case. That length of sentence would make it seem that Hunter was accused of waving a gun around or firing it off in the vicinity of someone, but that’s hardly even the case. Instead, he was convicted of lying on his paperwork when applying for one. One of the questions asks whether you’ve smoked pot or done any other drugs “unlawfully.” No way, Hunter said. But unfortunately for him, a quick Google image search reveals spades of images of him with a crack pipe hanging from his mouth. Whoops.

In the tax case, he was convicted of three felony offenses and six misdemeanor offenses, according to his dad’s Justice Department statement, having “spent millions of dollars on an extravagant lifestyle rather than paying his tax bills.” And when he was finally made to pay up, having blanked out on paying for four tax years, he indulged in some creative accounting in inventing some business deductions. Enter Joe in the role of the parent who shows up at the school principal’s office to explain why his kid is such a screwup and can’t get his homework done on time for the tax man. “Those who were late paying their taxes because of serious addictions, but paid them back subsequently with interest and penalties, are typically given non-criminal resolutions. It is clear that Hunter was treated differently,” Biden wrote in a statement. Sounds like Hunter’s serious addiction in this case was not paying taxes, just like every other American facing similar charges.

Everyone’s addicted to something. Maybe some other Americans were too busy double-fisting Ding Dongs or Twinkies to cater to the tax man? Or working on their gains at the gym? Or on a Netflix bender? Where’s their pardon? I’m sure Americans will be thrilled to learn that the president figures that indulging in some nose candy constitutes a free pass from any serious consequences of messing up your taxes – or just ignoring their existence altogether. Tax man knocking at the door? Just answer while smoking a giant blunt and tell him to bugger off. What about the gun stuff, though? Joe has an answer for that, too. “Without aggravating factors like use in a crime, multiple purchases, or buying a weapon as a straw purchaser, people are almost never brought to trial on felony charges solely for how they filled out a gun form,” he wrote.

Yeah okay, and most drivers who speed aren’t hauled up on speeding charges. Not because they aren’t doing it, but because there isn’t a cop sitting in the back of each one of their cars waiting for them to go over the limit and give them a ticket. Biden is literally saying that Hunter has been “treated differently” simply because he’s Biden’s son. Is he seriously blowing the whistle on his own Justice Department, and American justice, in general, with accusations of political prosecutions? Sure sounds like it. Too bad that, as president, he wasn’t actually in any position to actually do anything about it, huh? How about the tax man targeting Donald Trump’s returns? Is that not political, too, Joe? What about all the other felony charges that seemed designed to derail his return to the presidency? “For the first time in American history a former president that is a convicted felon is now seeking the office of the presidency,” Biden said earlier his year. “But as disturbing as that is, more damaging is the all-out assault Donald Trump is making on the American system of justice.”

Are we talking about the same system of justice that sucks so much that you had to correct its errors so your kid could avoid becoming someone’s Alcatraz amigo? “It says a lot about the United States that we work relentlessly to free Americans who are unjustly held around the world,” Biden said amid a prisoner swap with Russia this summer. How much work has Biden done – beyond his own kid’s case – to ensure that people who mess up on government paperwork in the US aren’t facing prison terms that rival those of genocide perpetrators? “The charges in his cases came about only after several of my political opponents in Congress instigated them to attack me and oppose my election,” Biden said. Sounds like a real problem. Too bad that time’s up for you to actually do anything about this kind of systemic selective prosecutorial bullying, beyond serving your own family’s interests.

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“Californian voters surprised many Democrats this election with almost 40% voting for President-elect Trump over California’s own Vice President Kamala Harris..”

• “Trump-Proofing” California Could Be a Costly Option for Californians (Turley)

California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) is widely known to be angling to be the next Democratic presidential nominee after the implosion of Vice President Kamala Harris. This week, Newsom positioned not just his campaign but also his state as part of the “resistance” for the next four years against the Trump Administration. Newsom pushed a special session to secure a $25 million war chest to take the Trump Administration to court, even before the inauguration and release of policies by the incoming administration. I wrote earlier about how the loss of both houses, as well as the White House, will mean that lawfare and obstructive efforts will shift to the states. Newsom is moving to out-position governors (and potential primary opponents) like Govs. Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania and Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan.

Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker moved first in a chest-pounding press conference that he would stop the incoming administration from trying to remove undocumented persons, declaring, “You come for my people, you come through me.” New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy (D) added that he will “fight to the death” against Trump’s agenda. Newsom has upped the ante by demanding millions to pre-fund litigation against the new administration. With a massive budget debt burden, Newsom has continued to pile on new debt for politically popular initiatives. I cannot recall any state pre-positioning funds for the sole purpose of litigating against any incoming administration. The most obvious area of disagreement is the effort to ramp up the enforcement of immigration laws and to carry out deportations.

While polls show that the public overwhelmingly supports such enforcement, including deportations, California is seeking to take the lead in court actions designed to slow or frustrate such efforts. It could prove costly, not just in litigation expenditures. The Trump Administration could seek to withhold federal funding from states and cities obstructing enforcement efforts. In the meantime, sanctuary cities are continuing to face rising costs associated with rising populations of undocumented migrants. For example, as we previously discussed, Denver Mayor Mike Johnson (D) declared that he was preparing the Mile-High City for its “Tiananmen Square moment” to fight the federal government in any attempt to deport unlawful migrants. Johnson warned that he would have not only Denver police “stationed at the county line to keep [ICE] out” but also “50,000 Denverites.” He later walked back the comments while repeating that the city is positioning itself to be part of the resistance.

Now the Common Sense Institute (CSI), a non-partisan research organization estimated that eight percent of the city’s 2025 budget of $4.4 billion is now dedicated to housing and services for undocumented persons. If true, that amounts to $356 million or $7,900 per migrant. California has led other states in offering a wide array of benefits to undocumented persons. Notably, Californian voters surprised many Democrats this election with almost 40% voting for President-elect Trump over California’s own Vice President Kamala Harris.

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“Russian President Vladimir Putin has said Kiev’s NATO ambitions were the key reason behind the current conflict.”

• Ukraine Will Reject Any Alternative To NATO Membership – Foreign Ministry (RT)

Ukraine will not accept any kind of security guarantees as a substitute for NATO membership, according to a Foreign Ministry statement published on Tuesday. In the document issued ahead of the NATO foreign ministers’ meeting in Brussels this week, Kiev blasted the 1994 Budapest Memorandum, under which Ukraine gave up its Soviet-era nuclear arsenal for security guarantees from Russia and the West. The Foreign Ministry called the pact a “monument to short-sightedness in strategic security decision-making,” and urged its Western backers to issue it an invitation to the US-led military bloc during the meeting in Brussels. “Having the bitter experience of the Budapest Memorandum behind us, we will not settle for any alternatives, surrogates, or substitutes for Ukraine’s full membership in NATO,” the ministry said in a statement, marking this week’s 30th anniversary of the memorandum’s signing.

The criticism comes amid recent Russian advances and the upcoming return of US President-elect Donald Trump to the White House in January, which has raised uncertainty over US support as Kiev fears it could be forced to the negotiating table. “We are convinced that the only real security guarantee for Ukraine, as well as a deterrent factor for further Russian aggression against Ukraine and other states, is only Ukraine’s full membership in NATO,” the statement said. Ukraine was left with around 1,700 nuclear warheads after the collapse of the Soviet Union. While this stockpile technically made Ukraine the world’s third-largest nuclear power, the weapons themselves remained under the operational control of Russia, and were surrendered under the 1994 Budapest Memorandum. This agreement involved the US, UK, and Russia providing security assurances to Kiev in return for the removal of the weapons.

While Ukraine has never controlled nuclear weapons, in 2022, Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky expressed regret about his country agreeing to relinquish them, suggesting that Kiev has “every right” to reverse the decision. Earlier this year, Zelensky said Ukraine could protect itself by becoming either a nuclear state or a member of NATO. He later backtracked, saying Kiev does not have any alternative “except NATO.” NATO, however, is “highly unlikely” to heed Kiev’s call for a membership invitation during this week’s meeting, Reuters reported, citing diplomats, saying it would take weeks or even months to reach a consensus from the bloc’s 32 members for the decision. Ukraine made NATO membership a strategic goal in 2019. This was a red line for Moscow, which has for years expressed concerns about the bloc’s creeping expansion towards its borders. Russian President Vladimir Putin has said Kiev’s NATO ambitions were the key reason behind the current conflict.

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Forget it. Think Oreshnik.

• Kiev Should ‘Disregard Everything And Everyone’, Become Nuclear Power – MP (RT)

Ukraine must become a nuclear power to protect itself no matter the consequences, an opposition MP said on Tuesday. Becoming a member of NATO, which the current government hopes will happen, is not enough, Aleksey Goncharenko has argued. This week marks the 30th anniversary of the signing of the Budapest Memorandum, which comprises three nearly-identical multilateral agreements with former parts of the USSR that had nuclear weapons stationed on their territories at the time the Soviet Union dissolved in 1991. Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Ukraine agreed to denuclearize in exchange for security assurances by Russia, the US, and UK. The Ukrainian Foreign Ministry issued a statement on Tuesday to complain that the document has not applied to Kiev since the US-backed armed coup of 2014.

The anniversary, it said, is a good time to extend to Ukraine a formal invitation to NATO, it claimed. ”NATO is a good thing. But NATO will not defend us. Nuclear weapons would,” Goncharenko wrote in response on social media. “So we should disregard everything and everyone and make the bomb. Then we’ll figure things out.” The MP also rebuked Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky for missing the opportunity to get a “normal peace treaty” with Russia and NATO membership before the 2023 ‘counteroffensive’. He belongs to the party of former President Pyotr Poroshenko, who lost to Zelensky in the 2019 presidential election. The Budapest Memorandum with Ukraine should serve as a reminder to Western leaders that the “development of European security architecture at the expense of Ukrainian interests rather than in alignment with them is doomed to fail,” the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry said in the statement.

The country “will not accept any alternative, imitation, or substitute for a NATO membership with full rights,” it added. In recent statements, Zelensky has been sending mixed messages on NATO membership, suggesting that Kiev would be willing to accept accession of only the territories currently under its control, or accession of all claimed territories without protection under Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty. Kiev claims that Ukraine was the third-largest nuclear power after Russia and the US, before agreeing to give up the weapons. The Ukrainian government has denied having a secret nuclearization plan, after German media claimed last month that it does.

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The EU’s foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas took the side of the 34%, whom she declared to be the “Georgian people,” not the 54% who won the election.”

• Georgia: A Second Front for Putin (Paul Craig Roberts)

President Putin faces the possibility of a second Ukraine, a second war front that could result from Washington’s success in staging a coup d’etat in Georgia with a color revolution. Riots ongoing since the “Russian party” defeated the “Western party” by 54% to 34% have convinced the Prime Minister of Georgia that the West is in the process of launching a color revolution to overthrow, as was done in Ukraine, the democratically elected government. Putin is silent and consequently could find himself fighting on two fronts. Then the West will open a third front. This is what Putin can expect from consistently presenting himself as a non-interventionist unless Russia is attacked. Russia, certainly the most powerful military entity on earth, carries no weight in Western councils. Georgia, the country, became a part of Russia in early 1800. In 1917 Georgia became one of the provinces of the Soviet Union.

The country became independent in 1991 when the collapse of the Soviet Union gave Washington the opportunity to break up the Soviet Union. Georgia, Ukraine, Belarus, and the Central Asian provinces were turned into independent countries. In 2003 Washington engineered the “Rose Revolution” in Georgia, which put a pro-Western government in office. In 2008 Washington sent its US trained and equipped Georgian army into South Ossetia, a disputed province that did not agree to leave Russia with Georgia. As Russian peacekeepers were killed in the Georgian invasion of South Ossetia, Putin sent in the Russian Army which quickly destroyed the American trained Georgian Army and conquered Georgia in five days, which is what should have happened in Ukraine. Failing to realize that Washington would continue to try to turn Georgia into a front against Russia, Putin turned Georgia loose and took his army home.

Putin, a true believer in non-interference even when it is at Russia’s expense, left Georgia to be subverted by Washington. Putin did not require that Georgia shut down Washington’s NGOs operating in the country or that Georgia subordinate itself in any way to Russia. Consequently, Washington got a French-born woman installed as president of Georgia, and Washington’s propaganda and NGOs have convinced 34% of Georgians to prefer alignment with the West than with Russia. It is part of Washington’s intent to surround Russia with missile bases. Washington’s EU puppet has threatened to impose sanctions on the democratically elected Georgian government for failure to void the election and put in office a pro-West government. The EU’s foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas took the side of the 34%, whom she declared to be the “Georgian people,” not the 54% who won the election.

She promised that the EU would punish those who won and that sanctions against Georgia was one of the options for dealing with the Georgian people’s refusal to comply with EU rule. Last Saturday the US State Department spokesman announced Washington’s suspension of its strategic partnership with Georgia, thus setting up Georgia for overthrow. The Georgian President supports Washington’s NGO protesters and said the parliamentary elections are illegitimate. There is no indication that the Russian government realizes that the overthrow of the pro-Russian government means trouble for Russia. Fyodor Lukyanov, chairman of the Presidium of the Council on Foreign and Defense Policy, writes nonsensically about the attempt at “color revolution” as if it is merely an internal affair for Georgia.

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“..Uyghur jihadists in Syria pose an overlooked yet significant regional and international security problem..”

• The Second Front Has Been Activated In Syria (Sonja van den Ende)

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who will go down in history as the most corrupt leader of the most extreme radical settler regime ever seen in the “promised land” called Israel, has negotiated a supposed ceasefire with Hezbollah, which will last for 60 days. Shortly after the ceasefire in Lebanon came into effect, and after Israeli Netanyahu warned Syrian President Bashar al-Assad that he was “playing with fire”, a new front was opened from Idlib to Aleppo. The terrorist group called Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) launched an attack on Aleppo from their last enclave in Idlib. HTS and other factions called the al-Fatah al-Mubin group, just another small terrorist organization affiliated with HTS, advanced in the western countryside of Aleppo and took control of strategic points in the villages of Qubtan al-Jabal and Sheikh Aqil.

According to sources and Syrian media, around 50 people were killed, including terrorists, Syrian Arab Army (SAA) soldiers and an SAA soldier who was taken back to Idlib as booty. Who is HTS? If you believe Western sources, they are a Sunni Islamist political and armed organization involved in the Syrian civil war. It was formed on January 28, 2017, as a merger between Jaysh al-Ahrar, Jabhat Fatah al-Sham, Ansar al-Din Front, Jaysh al-Sunna, Liwa al-Haq and Nour al-Din al-Zenki Movement. Syrian and Iraqi people call the organization Daesh, which means “the one who crushes”. The West sometimes gave it another name, ISIS or Islamic State. Also, the so-called Syrian civil war is a proxy war of the West to get the oil and gas out of Syria (and Iraq). This is well known among Syrians, who see their oil being stolen by the U.S., initially by their proxies Daesh, but now more directly with the help of the U.S. military.

The main goal of the U.S. is to replace Russian allies with those of the U.S., usurping Assad’s power with radical jihadists, aligned in the past mainly with Saudi Arabia and Qatar, so that the U.S. could build a pipeline through Syria to Europe. The evidence is clear that U.S. President Barack Obama, against advice and warnings from his top military officers, pursued a policy to protect the fundamentalist Sunni organization Al Qaeda in Syria. Proof that the U.S. (and its Western client states) under the Obama administration sponsored terrorists in Syria and Iraq is in the form of the last mentioned group, the Nour al-Din al-Zenki Movement. Obama had to admit before the entire Western press that Nour al-Din al-Zenki, who beheaded an eleven-year-old Palestinian boy in cold blood in front of rolling cameras, was indeed a terrorist group.

But so were all the others who the U.S. kept on sponsoring with weapons and money (as did Europe and the entire West). Later, they all merged with Daesh (ISIS). In 2016, during the liberation of Aleppo by the Syrian Arab Army, fighters from other terrorist groups (all fighting under the banner of Daesh but fighting among themselves) captured and killed members of the Zenki movement. Many of those who survived were later granted asylum in Europe (particularly Germany) along with other terrorists. But to this day, Europe is in denial and calls them rebels, while the evidence of gang violence happening in the cities of Europe is clear. Some say because of President Assad’s humane offer, they chose to be exiled to the enclave of Idlib, where a concentration of jihadists (after 2016) is now located.

The biggest Daesh group there has become HTS, and almost all groups are affiliated with them. Also, there are remaining Uyghurs, many of whom are in Idlib. This group is extremely violent, and they know they can’t go back to China. According to one report, Uyghur jihadist fighters in Syria have served as a force multiplier for insurgents there. Uyghur fighters gained ground in Idlib, the only Syrian province that still has a large local and foreign jihadist presence. Uyghur jihadists in Syria pose an overlooked yet significant regional and international security problem. They are likely to become a greater threat if fighting in Idlib winds down and the province is not decisively captured by a strong state or non-state actor hostile to jihadist groups.”

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Here’s the plan: “The negative natural change (more deaths than births) was outnumbered by the positive net migration..”

• EU Reports Dramatic Fall In Birth Rate (RT)

The number of babies born in the EU fell to a record low last year, according to the latest data from the bloc’s statistical office (Eurostat). Despite this, the total population has been on the rise due to mass immigration. Births across the EU’s 27 member states stood at 3,665,000 in 2023 – a decline of 5.5% year-on-year, as per Eurostat’s figures. Birth rates have been falling steadily across the EU since 2008. The number of births last year was the lowest in the EU countries since comparable data was first collected in 1961, and the annual decline is the largest on record, the Financial Times (FT) reports. The sharpest drops in births over the past decade have been recorded in Italy, Spain, Greece, Poland, Finland, and the Baltic states.

Demographic experts polled by the FT believe the longstanding trend of Europeans having fewer babies may have been exacerbated by concerns over economic and political tensions on the international level, the worst surge in inflation in a generation, climate change, and the Covid-19 pandemic. According to a recent report, the Total Fertility Rate has halved from 3.3 children per woman in 1960 to 1.5 in 2022 in the 38 countries that are members of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), which include 22 EU member states plus Australia, Canada, Japan, South Korea, and others. According to Eurostat, all EU regions have fertility rates below the replacement level of 2.1 live births per woman.

Nevertheless, the population of the EU has been on the rise over the past decade, with the exception of the pandemic year of 2021. The most notable jump was recorded in 2023, according to Eurostat figures. “The negative natural change (more deaths than births) was outnumbered by the positive net migration,” the agency said in a release in July. Eurostat attributed the population growth to increased migration after the pandemic and the influx of immigrants from Ukraine who received temporary protection status in the EU.

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“When I sit on the meetings of the Foreign Affairs Council with other foreign ministers and listen to some, I’m so sad, that such kind of extreme pro-war positions are present..”

• EU Has Weakened ‘A Lot’ Amid Ukraine Conflict – Hungarian FM (RT)

The EU approach to the Ukraine conflict has ultimately weakened the bloc “a lot,” Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto has said, branding the decision to blindly follow Washington’s polices a “big mistake.” The top diplomat made the remarks while speaking exclusively to RT’s Saskia Taylor in an interview on Monday. Comparisons between EU and US aid to Ukraine by the bloc’s leaders are a “very bad and harmful approach from the European perspective,” Szijjarto said. While the US is hardly affected by the enduring hostility between Moscow and Kiev, the conflict has taken a heavy toll on the EU, according to the minister. “There is destruction taking place in Europe, and the European economy is faced with the impacts and the consequences of this war. So therefore, following the US policies without any kind of criticism, that’s a big mistake and I do believe that the strategy the European Union has been following in the recent 1000 days is a failed one,” Szijjarto said.

The EU has “weakened a lot” during the conflict, and the approach taken by the bloc has proven to be a wrong one, the diplomat stated. I do believe that instead of globalizing the conflict, the right strategy would have been to localize it and to do everything in order to resolve it, to make peace, instead of pouring oil on the fire, which has been the case. “There are many extremely pro-war politicians in Europe. When I sit on the meetings of the Foreign Affairs Council with other foreign ministers and listen to some, I’m so sad, that such kind of extreme pro-war positions are present,” Szijjarto stated. Hungary itself has taken a different approach, remaining “the only country in Europe or European Union which has not delivered weapons to Ukraine,” he noted. “We are the only country in NATO, almost the only one, which speaks openly about the red lines which must be kept seriously. And we are the ones who speak openly about our assessment that NATO is a defense alliance and not an attack,” Szijjarto added.

The foreign minister also touched upon the situation in Georgia, which has been gripped by unrest over the past few days after Georgian Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze announced that he would freeze accession talks with the EU until 2028. The protests have been openly backed by the EU, with the stance taken by the bloc’s leadership hardly surprising given that Hungary has been “under attack for the last 15 years,” Szijjarto suggested. “My problem is that this is very [common] in Europe. In the case, if it is not the liberals to win an election, the democratic nature of the whole country and the whole political system is being questioned immediately. If it is liberals to win, everything’s fine. If it’s patriots to win, if it is conservatives to win, if it is right-wing to win, the nature of democracy is immediately questioned. And this is totally unacceptable,” he said.

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“During the week of Nov. 6, MSNBC averaged just 38,000 viewers among adults 25-54..

• The End Of Fake News? MSNBC Hits New Low In Ratings (ZH)

The leftist “news” channel MSNBC is facing a ratings crisis, with some of its advertiser-coveted viewership dropping to a two-decade low, according to Nielsen data reviewed by Fox News. During the week of Nov. 6, MSNBC averaged just 38,000 viewers among adults 25-54, its lowest-rated non-holiday weekday since July 19, 2004. As reported by Fox News, this demographic is widely prized by advertisers and is crucial for network revenue. Low viewership impacted shows like The 11th Hour with Stephanie Ruhle and Jose Diaz Balart Reports, both of which saw their smallest audiences ever. Other shows—including Chris Jansing Reports, Deadline: White House and Katy Tur Reports—saw their worst days ever among the demos. Several shows lost over 50% of their 25-54 audience.

Among those shows are The 11th Hour with Stephanie Ruhle, All In with Chris Hayes, Chris Jansing Reports, Inside with Jen Psaki, The Rachel Maddow Show and Joy Reid’s ReidOut. This slump couldn’t have come at a worse time, as MSNBC’s parent company, Comcast, announced cuts to cable channels, excluding NBC News and Bravo TV. CNN reports that MSNBC will be moved into “SpinCo,” a publicly traded cable programming company. Tech mogul Elon Musk has hinted at purchasing MSNBC, while journalist Jack Posobiec says he’s recruiting investors to take control of the left-wing network.

Podcast host Joe Rogan joked about replacing Rachel Maddow if Musk buys MSNBC: “I will wear the same outfit and glasses, and I will tell the same lies.”Along with viewership and Comcast scandals, MSNBC is under the scrutiny of its viewers after Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski met with Donald Trump, despite having previously compared him to dictators. Al Sharpton faces ethical scrutiny after his nonprofit quietly took a $500,000 donation from the Harris campaign ahead of his interview with Vice President Kamala Harris. MSNBC conceded that Sharpton blindsided them with the donation. “MSNBC was unaware of the donations made to the National Action Network,” an MSNBC spokesperson told the Washington Free Beacon.

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“Hamburg will see its flights cut by 60 percent, BER by 20 percent and Cologne/Bonn by 10 percent.”

• Ryanair CEO O’Leary: Germany Is Run By ‘Idiots’ (RMX)

In an interview for the industry magazine “Airliners,” Ryanair CEO Michael O’Leary attacked German politicians, calling them “a government of idiots,” criticizing in particular the Greens, whom he accused of “stupid solutions,” reports DoRceczy. He was also skeptical about the future government of the Federal Republic of Germany. “I don’t think the next government of Germany will be any better,” he said. Ryanair’s boss described the German aviation market as one of the worst in Europe, calling Berlin’s BER airport “dysfunctional,” adding that the airport could only function as “a regional airport at best.”

According to him, high fees of over €50 per passenger are a key reason why the German aviation industry is only slowly recovering from the coronavirus pandemic. This is why Ryanair has already reduced its German capacity from 16 million to 13.5 million seats. The fleet of 300 aircraft will be moved to more attractive markets, with the location “determined strictly on the basis of expected profits,” he said. Ryanair will be withdrawing completely from Dortmund, Dresden, and Halle/Leipzig airports by March 2025, while Hamburg will see its flights cut by 60 percent, BER by 20 percent and Cologne/Bonn by 10 percent. “Further cuts could come next year with the summer flight schedule, as Ryanair increasingly favors lower-cost destinations outside Germany,” DW reports.

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“Defendant is ORDERED to provide Plaintiff with copies of all responsive records that are not legally exempted or excepted from disclosure..”

• Fani Full Release Ordered After Fulton DA Sat On RICO Records (ZH)

Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis has been ordered by a local judge to release all communications between her office, Special Counsel Jack Smith’s office, and the January 6th Committee regarding her RICO case against President Donald Trump and his allies, after she was found to have violated federal law by withholding them. “The Court also hereby ORDERS Defendant to conduct a diligent search of her records for responsive materials within five business days of the entry of this Order. Within that same five day period, Defendant is ORDERED to provide Plaintiff with copies of all responsive records that are not legally exempted or excepted from disclosure,” reads a Tuesday order. If Willis can’t find them, she is mandated to follow court-ordered procedures to “provide an explanation why such correspondence does not exist.”

Willis, who had been served on March 11, 2024 in the suite involving conservative watchdog Judicial Watch, failed to respond by an April 10 deadline. After later claiming she ‘misunderstood’ the court’s directive, she then said that the document release would jeopardize her RICO case. [..] As the Epoch Times notes further… “In mid-2023, Willis told a local radio station that she was not coordinating in any way with Smith’s office in investigations and cases brought against former President Donald Trump. Smith had charged Trump, now the president-elect, with both classified documents-related and 2020 election-related charges in two different jurisdictions, while Willis brought charges against him and more than a dozen others for alleged election-related crimes in Fulton County.

“I don’t know what Jack Smith is doing and Jack Smith doesn’t know what I’m doing,” Willis said in July of that year. “In all honesty, if Jack Smith was standing next to me, I’m not sure I would know who he was. My guess is he probably can’t pronounce my name correctly.” Since then, however, she has made no comments about Smith’s investigation. Smith, meanwhile, has never commented on Willis’s case against Trump. Smith in November filed court papers confirming he would be dropping his election case against Trump and would stop the appeals process in his classified documents case. During his 2024 presidential campaign, Trump said he would terminate Smith as special counsel upon taking office.

A letter sent by Willis’s office on Dec. 17, 2021, to the House Jan. 6 committee had “requested access to any Select Committee records relevant to her investigation into President Trump’s actions to challenge the 2020 presidential election, including ‘recordings and transcripts of witness interviews and depositions, electronic and print records of communications, and records of travel,’” House Judiciary Republicans said in a report released last year relating to an investigation they launched into Willis. Willis has been critical of House Republicans’ investigation into her office and the Trump case, accusing House Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) of trying to interfere in the case at one point. “Jim Jordan has, time after time after time, attacked my office with no legitimate purpose,” she told MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow in May. “Anyone who knows Jim Jordan’s history knows that he only has the purpose of trying to interfere in a criminal investigation.”

In a letter issued to Republicans in 2023, Willis said Republicans are trying to “obstruct a Georgia criminal proceeding and to advance outrageous partisan misrepresentations.” Her case against Trump has stalled in recent months after one of the president-elect’s co-defendants submitted a court filing earlier this year claiming Willis and then-special prosecutor Nathan Wade were engaged in a romantic relationship. The pair confirmed they were in a relationship but denied any wrongdoing. A judge overseeing the case issued an order in March allowing Willis to remain on the case if Wade resigned, which he did hours later. Trump and several of his co-defendants appealed the decision to the Georgia Court of Appeals earlier this year, where the case is still pending.”

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“By nearly all measures of science, if there was evidence of a natural origin it would have already surfaced..”

• House Oversight Report Supports Lab-Leak Theory for COVID-19 Origin (ET)

A Republican-led oversight subcommittee has concluded that the COVID-19 virus likely originated from a laboratory in Wuhan, China, following a two-year investigation into the pandemic. The House Oversight Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic released a 520-page report on Dec. 2, detailing the findings of the subcommittee’s investigation. The report found that the U.S. National Institutes of Health funded gain-of-function research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV), and that EcoHealth Alliance Inc. used U.S. taxpayer dollars to facilitate this research at the lab. It also found that the Chinese communist regime, agencies within the U.S. government, and some members of the international scientific community sought to cover up facts concerning the origins of the pandemic.

The committee said that COVID-19 possesses biological characteristics not found in nature and that data indicates that all COVID-19 cases stemmed from a single introduction into humans, unlike previous pandemics, where there were more spillover events. “By nearly all measures of science, if there was evidence of a natural origin it would have already surfaced,” the oversight subcommittee said in a statement. The report said that the Wuhan Institute of Virology has a history of conducting “gain-of-function” research under low biosafety precautions. Several researchers from the Wuhan Institute of Virology fell sick with a COVID-like virus months before the first case of the outbreak was allegedly detected at a wet market, according to the report.

The report said that in January 2021, the U.S. State Department published an unclassified fact sheet that stated: “The U.S. government has reason to believe that several researchers inside the WIV became sick in autumn 2019, before the first identified case of the outbreak, with symptoms consistent with both COVID-19 and common seasonal illness.” Citing the fact sheet, the report stated that the Wuhan Institute of Virology “has a published record of conducting ‘gain-of-function’ research to engineer chimeric viruses.” The report said the June 2023 ODNI assessment supported this conclusion and went further, stating, “Scientists at the WIV have created chimeras, or combinations of SARS-like coronaviruses through genetic engineering, attempted to clone other unrelated viruses, and used reverse genetic cloning techniques on SARS-like coronaviruses.”

The June 2023 ODNI Assessment said that some of the “WIV’s genetic engineering projects on coronaviruses involved techniques that could make it difficult to detect intentional changes.” Among those interviewed during the panel’s investigation was Anthony Fauci, former director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), who stepped down from his role in December 2022. The report stated that Fauci had “prompted” a research study titled “The Proximal Origin of SARS-CoV-2”—which dismissed the idea that the virus was laboratory constructed—to “disprove” the lab leak theory. Fauci testified at a June hearing that he did not suppress the lab leak theory and did not view it as inherently a conspiracy theory but said that “some distortions on that particular subject are,” according to the report.

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“Hughes’s expression of his gratitude to everyone associated with the Novichok narrative except for the Skripals means he is burying them..”

• The Skripals Are As Good As Dead – The Judge Has Buried Them (Helmer)

After Yulia Skripal has testified through her doctor that she was attacked with a poison spray in a restaurant minutes before she and her father, Sergei Skripal, collapsed on March 4, 2018, the British Government hearings on what happened have attempted to suppress her evidence. Yesterday, December 2, the hearings ended with a statement by Jack Holborn, a lawyer paid by the Home Office to say he represents the Skripals, and to claim they agree to the suppression of their own evidence. “Sergei and Yulia Skripal are grateful to this Inquiry for its work,” Holborn said. “Thank you.” Page 158 The retired judge who has directed the hearings, Anthony Hughes (titled Lord Hughes of Ombersley), let slip in his closing statement that he understands the Skripals are dead or incommunicado in prison because he omitted to thank them for their participation. “

I am grateful,” Hughes said, “to all the Core Participants and chiefly, of course, to those most closely connected to the events, namely Dawn Sturgess’ family, who have coped, if I may say so, admirably with what must have been at times extremely difficult evidence to listen to.” Only the Skripals were closer to the events than the Sturgess family or the ambulance crews, police, intelligence agents, doctors, and government officials who have been called to testify on their oaths. But Hughes ruled on September 23 that the Skripals were not allowed to testify either in the open hearing room, behind closed doors, or by remote internet link. Hughes’s expression of his gratitude to everyone associated with the Novichok narrative except for the Skripals means he is burying them.

Holborn has been seconding Andrew Deakin KC, a lawyer also paid by the Home Office to represent the Skripals. Neither of them has asked questions of any witness nor made submissions throughout the eight weeks of the Dawn Sturgess Inquiry hearings. Deakin’s opening statement on October 14 lasted 88 seconds. “Both Sergei and Yulia Skripal,” Deakin said, “would like to express their sorrow at the death of Dawn Sturgess and to offer their deepest sympathies to her family and loved ones. Sergei and Yulia Skripal also express their sympathy to those who were injured in the course of this incident. Finally, Sergei and Yulia would like to express their profound gratitude to the emergency workers, police and hospital staff who risked their lives to help them. Sergei and Yulia keenly await the outcome of this Inquiry. They look forward to better understanding the circumstances of the Salisbury attack, to considering the Inquiry’s conclusions as to who was responsible for that attack and to being able to move on with their lives.” Page 156-57. Deakin did not appear again.

In open testimony at the Inquiry it has been revealed that Yulia Skripal’s doctor at the Salisbury District Hospital, Stephen Cockroft, discovered she had recovered consciousness on March 8, four days after the attack. The police evidence to the Inquiry is that Skripal then communicated by eye signals to Cockroft that she remembered being sprayed, not at home but at Zizzi’s Restaurant where she and her father had been lunching just before they collapsed. The senior police source for this evidence was Keith Asman; he is the chief of forensics for the Counter Terrorism Policing (CTPSE) group which in the investigation of the Novichok affair has combined the Metropolitan and regional police forces with the Secret Intelligence Service (MI6) and the Security Service (MI5). In his witness statement, Asman repeated what another police officer, code-named VN104, had recorded from Dr Cockroft. The evidence of Detective Inspector (DI) VN104, identified as the deputy head of the Metropolitan Police investigating Novichok, was not called into open or closed testimony by Hughes.

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Frens
https://twitter.com/i/status/1863534908569981204

 

 

Slide
https://twitter.com/i/status/1863660969118822457

 

 

Bonedigger

 

 

Kestrel

 

 

Seal

 

 

Dunkin

 

 

Chihuahua
https://twitter.com/i/status/1863677018270994682

 

 

Save the bees

 

 

 

 

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

 

 

 

 

 

Debt Rattle December 1 2024

Dec 012024
 
 December 1, 2024  Posted by at 9:40 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , ,  47 Responses »


Caravaggio Adoration of the Shepherds 1609

 

• Trump Nominates Kash Patel For FBI Director (ZH)
• Pam Bondi To Visit Capitol Hill Next Week, Joining Musk, Ramaswamy (JTN)
• A Top Priority for DOGE: Decentralizing the Federal Government (AmG)
• Schedule F – Trump’s Plan A for Emptying the Swamp (Donner)
• Mexico, Canada Cozy Up To Trump Amid Tariff Threats, China Goes It Alone (JTN)
• Trump Threatens BRICS (RT)
• Democrat Mayors Say They Will Use Police To Obstruct Trump’s Deportations (ZH)
• CNN Contributor Scott Jennings Joins Los Angeles Times Editorial Board (JTN)
• Mass Desertions Crippling Ukrainian Army – AP (RT)
• Russia and China Are Rewiring Greek Mythology (Pepe Escobar)
• Elon, Are You Musk or Mask? (Pacini)
• European Elites Are Destroying Europe – Again (SCF)
• ‘I Won’t Claim That Milan Is A Safe City’ – Mayor (RMX)
• Joe Rogan: ‘Greatest Media Psy-Op In History’ Was Waged Against Trump (NYP)

 

 

 

 

Alex Jones

Border patrol
https://twitter.com/i/status/1862978593497718833

Trump academy
https://twitter.com/i/status/1862997542725644733

Comer

Sachs
https://twitter.com/i/status/1862934557332304075

 

 

A big threat to many. Epstein list, DIddy list, Russia Russia Russia, etc etc.

• Trump Nominates Kash Patel For FBI Director (ZH)

After weeks of speculation, President-elect Donald Trump announced on Saturday that he’s picked Kash Patel to replace Christopher Wray as the head of the FBI. Patel has been a longtime critic of the bureau who has called for shutting down the agency’s Washington headquarters, cleaning house when it comes to top leadership, and bringing the nation’s law enforcement agencies “to heel.” According to a Saturday post to Truth Social, Trump called Patel a “brilliant lawyer, investigator, and “America First” fighter who has spent his career exposing corruption, defending Justice, and protecting the American People.” “He played a pivotal role in uncovering the Russia, Russia, Russia Hoax, standing as an advocate for truth, accountability, and the Constitution,” Trump continued.

“Patel has been open about what kind of changes he’d pursue if given the chance. His various proposals include reducing the FBI’s footprint in Washington and “dramatically” limiting its authority. He hopes to curb the power of the Justice Department’s Civil Division and jettison a Pentagon office that produces classified assessments of long-term trends and risks, arguing it is just a tool of the “deep state.” Patel has said he also intends to aggressively hunt down government officials who leak information to reporters, and change the law to make it easier to sue journalists. During an interview with Steve Bannon in December, Patel said he and others “will go out and find the conspirators not just in government but in the media.” -AP

Patel has served as both a federal prosecutor and a public defender, and filled a number of administrative roles at the tail end of Trump’s first term, including on the National Security Council and in the Pentagon. And in a sign this is a good move – in 2021 when Trump floated Patel for deputy director of the CIA or the FBI, former AG William Barr said that would happen “over my dead body.” Former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe said that no part of the FBI would be “safe” with Patel in a leadership position.

In response, Patel told the Washington Post: “Those calling me a danger, let’s just ask them for a proof, a piece of evidence that actually shows I’ve committed any constitutional violations or any ethical quandaries, and I’d love to hear their response to this.” Current FBI Director Christopher Wray will now either have to resign or be fired, assuming Patel makes it through Senate confirmation. And as noted above, Patel has vowed to investigate and possibly prosecute regime-puppet journalists. “Yes, we’re going to come after the people in the media who lied about American citizens, who helped Joe Biden rig presidential elections — we’re going to come after you,” Patel said last year. “Whether it’s criminally or civilly, we’ll figure that out.”

https://twitter.com/i/status/1863016245328756913

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Bondi must be confirmed by the Senate, Musk and Ramaswamy don’t.

• Pam Bondi To Visit Capitol Hill Next Week, Joining Musk, Ramaswamy (JTN)

Attorney General-nominee Pam Bondi will travel to Capitol Hill next week to meet with Senate Republicans as a start to her confirmation process. The presidential transition team for GOP President-elect Donald Trump confirmed Bondi’s visit Friday with The Washington Examiner. She will join Trump appointees Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy, who are expected to meet with Republican lawmakers in the House and Senate. Trump nominated Bondi, a former Florida GOP attorney general, after former Florida Republican Rep. Matt Gaetz withdrew his name from consideration last week. Trump appointed Musk and Ramaswamy to head his new Department of Government Efficiency. They are expected on Capitol Hill, in Washington, D.C., on Thursday. Their appointments do not require Senate confirmation.

Bondi is expected to meet Monday with Iowa GOP Sen. Chuck Grassley, who will be the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee during the upcoming congressional session, also according to The Examiner. The Judiciary committee will hold the confirmation hearings for Bondi. “Attorney General Nominee Bondi is looking forward to the confirmation process and answering any questions senators might have,” Trump’s presidential transition spokesman Alex Pfeiffer told the news outlet. “Attorney General Nominee Bondi’s life has been dedicated to keeping Americans safe. She looks forward to continuing that work at the Department of Justice.” GOP House Speaker Mike Johnson said Wednesday the meetings with entrepreneurs Musk and Ramaswamy will focus on “major reform ideas to achieve regulatory rescissions, administrative reductions, and cost savings—& revive the principle of limited government.”

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“..nearly 90% of federal government office space in Washington is vacant because most federal workers began working from home during the COVID pandemic and never returned to their offices.”

• A Top Priority for DOGE: Decentralizing the Federal Government (AmG)

One of the best ideas I heard from Donald Trump for his second term is to move as many as 100,000 federal employees to “new locations outside the Washington Swamp” to places “filled with patriots who love America.” This initiative will save tax dollars and help depoliticize federal agencies. There also are important security and fairness reasons to relocate these agencies across the United States. I speak from experience. In the early 1990s, the late Senator Robert Byrd (D-West Virginia) drafted legislation to move thousands of CIA employees to West Virginia. Byrd proposed closing 21 CIA offices in Washington, DC, and its Virginia and Maryland suburbs and moving them to large campuses in Jefferson County, West Virginia. My wife and I were CIA employees at the time, and we were thrilled about the potential move of our office out of the DC area.

We were unable to afford a house without a lengthy commute on our federal salaries because the large presence of federal workers and contractors had driven housing prices through the roof. (Five of the seven wealthiest U.S. counties are in the DC suburbs.) We also disliked the liberal culture and high taxes of the DC area. Unfortunately, the Washington establishment, including many well-paid senior CIA officers and contractors, blocked Senator Byrd’s attempt to relocate CIA offices to West Virginia. As a result, when my wife could no longer work full-time because of the disability of one of our children, we ended up buying a house 50 miles from DC with a roundtrip commute of 2.5 to 3 hours per day. Moving federal agencies out of the DC area to areas with affordable housing and reasonable commutes are two good reasons why the Trump administration should decentralize the federal government.

The current practice of locating these agencies within a few miles of the White House and Congress reflects a bygone era before telephones, email, and video conferences. Most federal employees rarely interact with members of Congress and the White House and can do their jobs more efficiently and economically in more affordable and less congested areas of the country. There’s also the issue of fairness. DC, Maryland, and Virginia receive huge tax revenues from federal employees’ salaries and retirement checks. They also benefit from large federal expenditures like the DC Metro, DC airports, free federal museums, etc. Since technological advances have made it unnecessary for these agencies to be located near our nation’s capital, it is time to share the wealth of federal agencies by spreading them across the United States. There is no reason why this government spending and jobs should continue to be concentrated in one part of the country.

Many of these moves would make these agencies more effective and accountable to the American people. For example, relocating the Agriculture Department headquarters to a farming state would move the agency closer to the Americans it was created to serve. Agriculture employees could interact with farmers and ranchers on a daily basis. The Agriculture Department could also hire many employees who actually live on farms and ranches. The same would be true for moving the headquarters of the Transportation Department to Detroit or the Interior Department to Utah or Wyoming. Other possibilities: move the Department of Health and Human Services to North Carolina’s Research Triangle, move the FBI headquarters to the Redstone Arsenal in Huntsville, Alabama, move the Energy Department headquarters to the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, and move the Environmental Protection Agency headquarters to Florida.

Large portions of the Pentagon, CIA, State Department, Department of Homeland Security, IRS, and other agencies should also be moved to locations across the U.S. There are two other crucial reasons for decentralizing U.S. government agencies away from the Washington, DC area. The most important is security. Given growing threats from nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons; drones; and violent demonstrations by radical groups, keeping large numbers of federal agencies and employees in the Washington, DC, area is a significant and avoidable threat to national security and the continuity of government. Spreading federal agencies across the United States would make it harder for a U.S. adversary to deal a devastating blow to the federal government with a single attack. Decentralizing federal agencies also would help depoliticize them and fight the so-called “deep state.”

The resistance by federal employees to the president’s constitutional authority as the head of the federal government is driven by a self-serving Washington, DC, culture consisting of entrenched employees, former employees, federal contractors, think tanks, and the mainstream media. Many of these employees do little work and are extremely hard to fire. Even worse, nearly 90% of federal government office space in Washington is vacant because most federal workers began working from home during the COVID pandemic and never returned to their offices.

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“Everyday Americans have complained about federal bureaucratic hegemony for as long as we can remember, but now they will finally have a president in place with specific plans to do something about it.”

• Schedule F – Trump’s Plan A for Emptying the Swamp (Donner)

Ever since Election Day, much talk has focused on President-elect Donald Trump’s appointments – in record time – of his Cabinet, advisors, and agency directors. This new administration is a diverse mix, but they all have one thing in common: The returning president sees them as loyal to him and his outsized agenda. But what about all the other, more entrenched denizens of DC? Enter Schedule F – Trump’s bold plan to “drain the Swamp.” Washington is abuzz with the extraordinary diversity of beliefs among the new designees. This is far from typical for incoming presidents, who ordinarily populate their administrations with political veterans in lockstep with their ideology.

But after assembling a largely forgettable team upon his arrival in DC as a novice in 2017, the road-tested 47th president has broken the mold, as is his wont, by selecting Republicans and Democrats, hawks and doves, neoconservatives and populists, corporatists and unionists, insiders and outsiders. Trump’s most famously ambitious objective, however, is to drain and ultimately empty the DC swamp of its unelected, unaccountable, and obstructionist bureaucrats who can thwart the will of the president, as they did so often during his first administration. The arrogance of these supercilious apparatchiks is due to the iron-clad protections they enjoy as civil servants. They cannot be fired no matter their behavior, except in the rarest of circumstances. Presidents come and go, they tell themselves, but we will outlast them all and can act accordingly.

You may recall the so-called “all-of-government” approach to the DEI agenda during the current administration, where the goal of equity must be embraced and adopted not only in social planning and policies but across all agencies and cabinet departments. Well, the incoming president will employ that same broad, sweeping approach to weeding out the most unproductive and recalcitrant employees among the federal government’s 2.2 million-strong civilian workforce. And while DOGE – the newly formed non-governmental Department of Government Efficiency to be headed by Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy – has been the talk of Washington, it faces severe limits in its attempts to affect systemic reform. No less than 60% of the government’s $6.8 trillion budget is “non-discretionary” and largely untouchable because it is devoted to Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and interest on the exploding national debt, now more than $36 trillion. Another 13% is devoted to defense, which Trump has pledged to increase. Thus, Musk’s stated goal of cutting $2 trillion in unnecessary federal spending will be extremely difficult, if not impossible, to achieve.

However, taking an axe to the bloated budget ultimately figures to have less permanent impact than Trump’s audacious plans to alter the federal government’s modus operandi and its entrenched culture. The linchpin for his game-changing reforms is reinstating the innocuous-sounding Schedule F, instituted by Trump in the waning days of his first term but immediately reversed by Joe Biden upon taking office. It will empower massive changes in the bureaucracy, re-classifying thousands of careerists as political appointees. It refers to a section of the Civil Service Reform Act of 1978, exempting some federal employees from civil service protections, specifically those “whose position has been determined to be of a confidential, policy-determining, policy-making or policy-advocating character.” Under Trump’s plan, the number of such employees would jump from roughly 4,000 to about 50,000, signaling a sea change in the way Washington does business.

The outgoing Biden administration, deeply fearful of Trump’s bold plans to upend the DC establishment, is working overtime to “Trump-proof” (as much as possible) the federal government, hoping to minimize the damage to its familiar and comfortable way of life. The danger inherent in Schedule F is the likelihood that the next Democratic president could use the same expanded executive control over the bureaucracy to reverse course from Trump and bring in committed progressives who could do even more damage than the present embedded bureaucrats. So, to make these plans stick beyond Trump’s next term, his administration might attempt to move one or more executive agencies out of Washington. This would wrench thousands of civil servants out of their comfort zone, likely leading to a significant number of resignations by those accustomed to life inside the DC beltway.

Despite setting a risky precedent that could backfire on Republicans in the years ahead, Trump is focused on the here and now, believing the addition of Schedule F will force permanent structural change on what has effectively become a fourth branch of government, namely, the administrative state. Everyday Americans have complained about federal bureaucratic hegemony for as long as we can remember, but now they will finally have a president in place with specific plans to do something about it.

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“On January 20th [..] I will sign all necessary documents to charge Mexico and Canada a 25% Tariff on ALL products coming into the United States, and its ridiculous Open Borders..”

• Mexico, Canada Cozy Up To Trump Amid Tariff Threats, China Goes It Alone (JTN)

The United States’ neighbors seem eager to avoid a major trade-and-tariff standoff with Washington as Donald Trump returns to the White House, but Beijing is readying for round two after trading blows with the Republican president during his first administration. Though Trump has long expressed support for tariffs, he set off an international firestorm this week with his Day One plans to shake up trade relations with key economic partners. “On January 20th, as one of my many first Executive Orders, I will sign all necessary documents to charge Mexico and Canada a 25% Tariff on ALL products coming into the United States, and its ridiculous Open Borders,” Trump announced this week. Trump overthrew Republican free trade orthodoxy during the 2016 primary, criticizing foreign trade practices for which he blamed the outsourcing of American jobs. [..]

Mexico
While there appears to be some disagreement between Trump and his Mexican counterpart over the state of their negotiations, both have deemed their recent talks as productive and indicated that they were prepared to work closely with one another. Despite Trump’s support for strict immigration and tariff policies during his first term, he generally enjoyed a strong relationship with former Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador. Current Mexican leader Claudia Sheinbaum, however, initially expressed skepticism about Trump’s tariffs plans and suggested they would lead to a direct trade war. “One tariff would be followed by another in response, and so on until we put at risk common businesses,” she said earlier this week. But the pair spoke privately within days and both suggested there was room for discussion.

Trump posted Thursday on Truth Social: “Just had a wonderful conversation with the new President of Mexico, Claudia Sheinbaum Pardo. She has agreed to stop Migration through Mexico, and into the United States, effectively closing our Southern Border. We also talked about what can be done to stop the massive drug inflow into the United States, and also, U.S. consumption of these drugs. It was a very productive conversation!” Sheinbaum disputed that she had made any material commitments but that the pair had discussed immigration and drug trafficking and that tariffs had come up in that context. “It was a good conversation and we are going to keep having conversations,” she said. “Mexico’s stance is not to close borders, but to build bridges between governments and their peoples.”

Canada
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau on Friday night unexpectedly flew to Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort home in Florida to talk with him, amid the tariff threat. On Tuesday, Trudeau quickly called Trump after the tariff post to discuss his plans. Trudeau’s government has faced abysmal polling numbers amid widespread economic discontent and frustration over his immigration policies. Some surveys have suggested his Liberal Party faces an electoral wipeout when voters go to the polls and a trade war with the United States could see its prospects fade even further. “We obviously talked about laying out the facts, talking about how the intense and effective connections between our two countries flow back and forth,” Trudeau said Tuesday.

Though not typically viewed as a major factor in the United States’ immigration surge, Canada shares with America the largest undefended border in the world. Ottawa’s own lax immigration policies have contributed, moreover, not just to Trudeau’s low polling numbers, but the security situation for the U.S. During fiscal 2024, U.S. Customs and Border Protection reported a record 198,929 encounters with and apprehensions of illegal border crossers along the Canadian frontier. Among those apprehended were individuals from 97 different countries. Though border security is a significant factor in Washington’s relationship with Ottawa, Canada’s economy is not without some industrial weight of its own and Trump’s primary concern with tariffs seems to be foreign imports.[..]

China
While Canada and Mexico appear at least willing to engage with Trump on his trade and border initiatives, China, the main object of Trump’s ire, is evidently adopting a more bellicose approach to the Republican’s return. “Imposing arbitrary tariffs on trading partners will not solve America’s own problems,” Chinese Commerce Ministry spokesperson He Yadong told reporters. China is already subject to some import tariffs, as Trump’s trade policy pivot carried over to the Biden administration to a degree. In announcing the tariffs this week, Trump further singled out Beijing for additional scrutiny if it did not crack down on the export of fentanyl and other drugs. “Until such time as they stop, we will be charging China an additional 10% Tariff, above any additional Tariffs, on all of their many products coming into the United States of America,” Trump declared, observing that his move followed failed discussions with China to convince them to crack down.

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Trying to save the dollar. Too late.

• Trump Threatens BRICS (RT)

The BRICS nations will be hit with 100% tariffs on their goods if they try to introduce a reserve currency to rival the dollar, US President-elect Donald Trump has warned. Trump has repeatedly threatened to use tariffs to achieve his geopolitical goals. ”The idea that the BRICS Countries are trying to move away from the Dollar while we stand by and watch is OVER,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform on Saturday. Trump went on to say that he would ask the BRICS nations to promise not to create a common currency, “nor back any other currency to replace the mighty US dollar,” or they will face 100% tariffs. ”They can go find another ‘sucker!’” he continued. “There is no chance that the BRICS will replace the US Dollar in International Trade, and any Country that tries should wave goodbye to America.”

BRICS previously comprised Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa, and was expanded in January to include Egypt, Iran, Ethiopia, and the United Arab Emirates. Around 30 other nations have expressed interest in joining the group of emerging economies. Russia, which currently holds the group’s rotating presidency, floated the idea of introducing a BRICS currency in 2022. Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva echoed Moscow’s proposal last year, arguing that having the option of trading in another reserve currency would reduce the BRICS countries’ “vulnerability” to fluctuations in the dollar’s exchange rate.

BRICS leaders stopped short of announcing plans for such a currency at their summit in the Russian city of Kazan last month. Instead, the group pledged to set up a cross-border payment system to function alongside the Western SWIFT network, and to increase their use of local currencies in international trade. ”Cooperation within BRICS is not directed against anyone or anything – neither against the dollar nor against other currencies,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov stated in October. “It pursues the main goal of ensuring the interests of those countries that participate in this format.”

Using local currencies to settle bilateral trade bills “helps to keep economic development free from politics,” Russian President Vladimir Putin said at the time. Trump has vowed to use tariffs to settle US trade deficits, force offshore manufacturers to return, and achieve a range of geopolitical goals. In addition to proposing a blanket tariff of 20% on all incoming goods, Trump has threatened Canada and Mexico with additional 25% tariffs if they fail to reduce the flow of migrants and drugs into the US. Trump also declared this week that “we will be charging China an additional 10% tariff, above any additional tariffs,” until Beijing “follows through” on punishing the producers and smugglers of fentanyl, a powerful synthetic opioid.

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Homan: “But, look, me and the Denver mayor, we agree on one thing. He’s willing to go to jail, I’m willing to put him in jail.”

• Democrat Mayors Say They Will Use Police To Obstruct Trump’s Deportations (ZH)

There are only two issues that Democrats might care more about than the national legalization of abortion: Blocking the passage of voter ID laws, and, blocking the mass deportation of illegal immigrants. The reason should be relatively obvious – Keeping the border open and illegal immigrants flowing into the US is the key to election victory for progressives in the long run. If leftists are going to exterminate millions of future voters in the womb, then their only other option to fill ballot boxes is to import people from the third world and give them as much free stuff as possible so they’re sure to vote blue. Democrats have been pushing for a sweeping amnesty for illegals for years. If they had won the 2024 election by a comfortable margin it’s a certainty that an amnesty would be at the top of their priority list.

The open border policies and sanctuary actions of the political left are in direct violation of US immigration law, but Democrats act as if these laws are a suggestion rather than the rule. Without federal enforcement squarely in their corner blue cities and states only have one option left – Pretend they have the moral high ground and drum up as much civil unrest as possible. This might work in deep blue sanctuary cities, but the Trump Administration won the election in a landslide which included the popular vote. The majority of Americans want deportations and these cities do not have significant national backing. Despite this fact, some Democrat mayors are threatening to utilize local police forces to obstruct Trump’s mass deportation efforts. Denver Mayor Mike Johnston claims the deportation of illegals is “unconstitutional” and he initially threatened to use local law enforcement to block federal agencies from entering the city to carry out migrant arrests.

He ultimately walked these comments back, but only to a point, saying he’s ‘willing to go to jail’ to prevent deportations. For leftists the standard procedure is to wait and see how effectively they can use activist groups as a shield and then they change their rhetoric accordingly. If they can get the mob to show up on the doorsteps of DHS and ICE officials like they did with Supreme Court judges in 2023 then they may feel emboldened to escalate. Johnston seemed to tone down his chest puffing theatrics after incoming Border Czar Tom Homan gave him a reality check. “You are absolutely breaking the law. All he has to do is look at Arizona v. U.S. and he would see he’s breaking the law, Homan said flatly. “But, look, me and the Denver mayor, we agree on one thing. He’s willing to go to jail, I’m willing to put him in jail.”

Democrats don’t have the testicular fortitude to go into any fight alone, but the deportation debate is within their favorite wheelhouse, which is “resistance against the man”. For the past four years progressives have had the support of every government institution, almost every corporation and every NGO in the US and abroad, yet, they still tried to pretend they were the underdog fighting a rebellion against an oppressor. Now they truly are the underdog and they will certainly try to play to that image using the deportation drama as a background. The Mayor of Tuscon, Regina Romero, has also threatened the use of local police to obstruct deportation arrests. Her messaging is once again centered on the claim that deportations of illegals are a violation of higher moral standards. The law and the will of the voters must therefore take a back seat to the superior virtues of the progressive ideology.

It should be noted that members of the violent Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua have been intercepted in Denver County and in Cochise County just east of Tuscon. They are specifically organizing in sanctuary cities with lax immigration standards, and they often recruit from illegal migrant shelters already in these areas. Multiple blue cites have stated publicly that they intend to refuse help to immigration agents during deportations. This includes the catch and release of violent criminals in order to prevent their arrest by ICE. In other words, Democrats would rather see rapists and murders back on the streets than hand them over to Trump. The thought process here seems utterly insane, but again, it makes perfect sense when one realizes how much time and energy Democrats have invested in their amnesty model. Without a massive third world voting block bought off with US tax dollars, it’s unlikely that progressives will win another election for a very long time.

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There goes their final bit of credibility.

• CNN Contributor Scott Jennings Joins Los Angeles Times Editorial Board (JTN)

Conservative CNN commentator Scott Jennings confirmed Fridayt that he is joining the editorial board of the Los Angeles Times, after the owner’s paper said he intended to hire more conservative voices. LA Times owner Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong earlier this month said he was hoping to balance out the editorial section of his newspaper by hiring more Republicans, and floated Jennings as one of the voices he wanted to bring on board. Soon-Shiong previously noted that the editorial boards of newspapers are responsible for what stories are assigned, which can be skewed based on the editor’s personal biases. Jennings praised Soon-Siong for his “important and groundbreaking” mission in returning neutrality and balance to the iconic newspaper, and said he has contributed to the paper over the past few years.

“I’ve written columns for the paper over the last few years and was honored to do so under such a storied and important masthead,” Jennings posted on X. “I love newspapers and believe in strong journalism and strong opinion pages that represent a wide array of views. I approach my commentary jobs by starting with the truth and then providing my honest opinion based on my conservative values and experience.” Jennings was a standout during this election cycle as a paid contributor on the CNN cable news network, frequently the lone conservative among more liberal counterparts in spirited panel discussions on politics. Jennings said that the shakeup at the newspaper, the largest daily in liberal-leaning California, followed management’s decision to withhold an endorsement in the presidential election – a big step in fixing the problems facing legacy media.

“Roughly half (or more) of the country often feels like legacy media doesn’t care what it thinks and has little interest in fairly representing its views and values,” Jennings said. “I plan to represent those Americans who believe they are often ignored or even ridiculed in legacy media and applaud Dr Soon-Shiong’s move to bring balance to the editorial board.” Other news outlets, including the Washington Post, have also tried to bring neutrality and balance back to their publications. Washington Post owner Jeff Bezos highlighted the public’s distrust in the news media in an op-ed last month. “Now more than ever the world needs a credible, trusted, independent voice, and where better for that voice to originate than the capital city of the most important country in the world?” Bezos wrote. “To win this fight, we will have to exercise new muscles. Some changes will be a return to the past, and some will be new inventions … None of this will be easy, but it will be worth it.”

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When’s the revolt?

• Mass Desertions Crippling Ukrainian Army – AP (RT)

Mass desertion is “starving” the Ukrainian Army and “crippling” Kiev’s battleplans, as troops flee in their tens of thousands, the Associated Press reported on Friday, citing two soldiers who went AWOL, as well as lawyers and a dozen officials, most of whom spoke on condition of anonymity. “We have already squeezed the maximum out of our people,” an officer with the 72nd Brigade told the American news agency, explaining why the problem became so acute. The Prosecutor General’s office lists more than 100,000 soldiers who have been charged over desertion, nearly half of whom quit this year alone, but the actual number is likely significantly higher, AP said. It may be as high as 200,000, one MP told the agency. In some cases, entire units have fled their frontline positions, it was told.

“If there’s no end term [to military service], it turns into a prison – it becomes psychologically hard to find reasons to defend this country,” said one of the deserters, who was named by AP. He was charged shortly after being interviewed. Earlier this year, Kiev adopted sweeping military service reform, hoping it would bolster the rate of mandatory conscription. The US is now reportedly pushing the Ukrainian government to lower the minimum draft age to 18, down from 25. Conscription is being brutally enforced by officers and their civilian helpers. One such official said handling his targets is like “dealing with a cornered rat,” The Telegraph newspaper reported earlier this week. Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky signed a bill into law this week, which waives criminal responsibility for first-time deserters if they volunteer to go back and fight.

In July 2023, Russian President Vladimir Putin warned that a shortage of manpower was the biggest problem facing the Ukrainian military, after a failed “counteroffensive” conducted against Russia earlier that year. “Ukrainian units have suffered huge losses in their suicidal attacks. Tens of thousands of casualties,” he said during a Russian Security Council meeting. “Despite constant raids, the never-ending waves of total mobilization in Ukrainian cities and villages, the current regime is finding that sending reinforcements to the front line becomes increasingly difficult,” he added. “The country’s mobilization reserve is being depleted.” Zelensky has been consistently blaming a shortage of Western-donated weapons for Ukrainian setbacks on the battlefield. Meanwhile Russian officials have accused him of waging a war “to the last Ukrainian” on behalf of the US.

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“As far as the production of relevant missile systems and relevant equipment is concerned, Russia has 10 times more of them than the combined output of all NATO countries..”

• Russia and China Are Rewiring Greek Mythology (Pepe Escobar)

Oh, the wonders chips from dishwashers are able to unleash. How come Zeus, King of the Gods, could not have foreseen it? Especially when his divine intuition was aware that in the future his thunderbolts would be replicated in Russia via Oreshnik – a seemingly harmless hazelnut tree. Mythology prefigures post-everything reality. Now let’s go back to Newton for a bit. Based on his formulas, a one meter long uranium projectile flying at very high speed is capable of perforating 6 meters of hard rock (to the sound of Deep Purple’s Highway Star?) A warhead traveling at 1,200 meters per second is capable of perforating 46 meters of concrete. Now imagine impact velocity greater than the speed of sound; the impact depth, of course, is exponentially fiercer. Impact shock, at very high velocity, turns whatever is ahead into gas. A – kinetic – shock wave pops up as deep as 50 meters, swarming the deep underground and crushing, destroying – actually imploding – everything in its wake.

That’s what happened deep underground at the Yuzhmash plant in Dnepropetrovsk – as Oreshnik was conceived by improving these physical principles. And Russia only used blanks for this first Oreshnik test – instead of warheads. Satisfaction guaranteed or your money back. Now cut to Russia and Kazakhstan’s Presidents Vladimir Putin and Kassym-Jomart Tokayev deepening their strategic partnership face to face in Astana – including a renewed drive for strengthening cooperation within the CSTO. Additionally, Kazakhstan was officially invited to become a BRICS partner. Putin answered quite a few press questions on Oreshnik and the wider NATO proxy war. But arguably what was most intriguing was his speech at a restricted attendance meeting of the CSTO Collective Security Council. Some of it deserves to be quoted at length – not least because of the President quipping about “customer satisfaction”:

“The Russian Iskander missile system and its modifications represent the Russian analogue of all three ATACMS missile modifications. The warhead weight in TNT equivalent is about the same, but Iskander has a longer range. The new U.S.-made PrSM missile is not superior to its Russian counterparts in any specification. The Storm Shadow air-launched missile, the French SCALP, and the German Taurus have a warhead weighing between 450 and 480 kilogrammes in TNT equivalent and a range of 500 to 650 kilometres. The German Taurus missile has a 650- kilometre range. The Kh-101 air-launched missile is the Russian analogue of these systems which is comparable in terms of power warhead, but significantly exceeds each of the European-made systems in terms of range. The new U.S.-made PrSM missiles, as I mentioned earlier, as well as the JASSM, are inferior to their Russian counterparts in terms of technical specifications.

“Without a doubt, we are aware of the number of the relevant weapons systems that are in service of our potential adversaries. We know how many of them are kept in storage facilities. We know their exact location, how many weapons have been supplied to Ukraine, and how many more are planned to be supplied. As far as the production of relevant missile systems and relevant equipment is concerned, Russia has 10 times more of them than the combined output of all NATO countries. Next year, we will increase the production by another 25 to 30 percent. We can see that the Kiev regime ringleaders are begging their masters for military equipment of a different kind. Let no one forget about the Kalibr, Kinzhal and Zirkon hypersonic missile systems, which are unmatched around the world in terms of their technical specifications. Their production is also being ramped up and is going at full speed. More such products may show up shortly on our menu of the products of this class, if I may put it that way. As they say, customer satisfaction is guaranteed.”

Putin compared an Oreshnik strike with the impact from a collision with a meteorite: “We know from history what meteorites fell where, and what the consequences were. Sometimes it was enough to form entire lakes.” Even as he stressed that “publicity is inappropriate when dealing with new weapons”. That was exactly the case with Oreshnik: “We waited until the moment when we conducted the test and, in fact, saw a result. And then we made an announcement.” That sets the context for what Mikhail Kovalchuk, the actual creator of these seemingly innocent hazelnuts, the post-everything replica of the thunderbolts of Zeus, told Izvestia on the sidelines of the IV Congress of Young Scientists in the federal territory of Sirius. Kovalchuk is the president of the Kurchatov Institute National Research Center. Essentially, he remarked how “the materials that Russia has that can withstand ultra-high temperatures made it possible to create the Oreshnik system and will make it possible to create other types of hypersonic weapons.”

The whole planet may be asking how did Russia manage to overtake everyone else: “Because we are one of the five world leaders (…) We have created hypersonic weapons in a short period of time. And these are materials that used to work at 1,500 degrees, then at 1,800, and these at 2,000, and we did it, while others did not.” And there’s more: Kovalchuk said, “other materials that can withstand high temperatures will make it possible to create even more advanced weapons. The next step should be materials that can withstand 2,500-3,000 degrees.” That would make possible, for instance, missiles flying at very low altitudes at Mach 15 or even Mach 20 creating even more utterly devastating impact – including plasma shock – than the already tested Oreshnik. Putin, for his part, also said – almost casually – that the Ministry of Defense is currently “picking targets” for more strikes by Oreshnik, including Ukrainian “decision making centers”, industrial production sites and military facilities. Is NATO listening? Obviously not.

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“X has been elected as the preferred political communication space, becoming the common square in which to share and find information, but also a laboratory for sociological analysis of political mutations.”

• Elon, Are You Musk or Mask? (Pacini)

Let’s not focus on cars, which are a small percentage of Musk’s industries: what is of interest is technological research, which is also favoured by the saturation of market sectors. We have also seen examples of this in the SMO in the Ukraine, when photos and videos of the Tesla Tank Cybertruck used in conflict zones surfaced, and even Ramzan Kadyrov, the leader of Chechnya, has his own, apparently remotely disabled from Tesla HQ. There are strategic geometries that are redefined through the cover of a well-fed collective imagination. It sometimes happens that the most precious and delicate things are hidden… by putting them out in the open for all to see, but no one notices. Musk’s transhumanist aims are neither a secret nor new. He is the man who made brain chips, human-machine connections, humanoid robots, etc. ‘pop’. If previously these topics were for a few insiders or enthusiasts, with Musk they have become a media product to be consumed.

On 30 January 2024, Musk announced the first Neuralink brain implant on a human being. The American billionaire then added another post, writing: ‘Neuralink’s first product is called TELEPATIA. It will allow you to control your phone or computer and, through them, almost any device, simply by thinking. The initial users will be those who have lost the use of their limbs. Imagine if Stephen Hawking could communicate faster than a typist. That is the goal’. The next step is to make these chips communicate with artificial intelligence. And here we are in the era of transhumanism. As Stephen Hawking himself wrote, ‘Artificial intelligence could develop a will of its own. And it will be extremely good at achieving its goals. If these are not aligned with ours, we will be in trouble. You’re probably not an ant-hater who stomps on these insects out of malice, but if you’re in charge of a hydroelectric project and there’s an ant hill in the region that you have to flood, it’s going to end badly for the ants.

Let’s try not to put humanity in the position of ants. AI could either be the best thing that ever happened to humanity, or the worst. Far from demonising AI tout court, what is interesting to understand is the broad scope of this type of research and its political as well as strategic effect. Projects like this completely redefine the criteria of democracy, of political participation of free will, of the definition of being human or not. You don’t put a man like Musk in government by pure chance. Beyond the ‘pro-life’ electoral proclamations, so to speak, made by Trump, one has to wonder what a man who is pro-life is doing inside the entourage of the new American president. They will get over it, or not, the ‘right-wing’ voters from the Catholic world, especially on the East Coast, who have faced numerous battles on bioethics and bio-law, not only on the issues of gender, abortion and euthanasia, but also on experimental medical research, of which Musk is a passionate philanthropist.

It is probable to believe that the research carried out by his laboratories will not stop in the face of some protest. Michael Foucault’s Lectures on Biopolitics come to mind, when in the Paris years he predicted that the introduction of total control over the living body would not necessarily take place by force, but would pass through the subtle ploy of gradual approval by citizens, who would come to legitimise and even justify any ethical violation, without realising it, in the name of ‘science’. Let’s face it: Trump, with business, has a way with it.

Getting Musk on the electoral victory bandwagon was a real businessman’s move. In one fell swoop, and probably with an agreement that had already been made beforehand, Trump has guaranteed himself control of a good slice of strategic sectors that are undergoing a strong development phase. Especially when it comes to the domains of cyberspace and outer space, Musk is an undisputed leader. And, as such, in September 2023 he transferred part of the control of Starlink to the Pentagon, a move that became crucial for the success of some of the attacks by Ukraine in the Donbass during the SMO. The same Musk who a few months earlier, in early 2023, had offered himself as a mediator for the conflict, even inviting the Pentagon to foot the bill for the satellite internet terminals he had donated to Kiev.

Musk is the man who has taken social networking to a more refined level of hybrid warfare, surpassing Mark Zuckerberg in style and numbers. The purchase of Twitter, renamed X, worth a whopping $45 billion, became a so-called ‘free’ social network, changing the rules of the community, with less censorship of content. This aspect proved to be a winning move. X has been elected as the preferred political communication space, becoming the common square in which to share and find information, but also a laboratory for sociological analysis of political mutations.

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“These charlatan leaders are shameless in their Russophobia and surrogacy for U.S.-led Western imperialism – even to the point of killing their own people..”

• European Elites Are Destroying Europe – Again (SCF)

Instead of pushing for a diplomatic solution to the worst conflict on the European continent since World War Two, European political elites are slavishly going along with Washington’s criminal proxy war against Russia, which is in danger of spiraling into a nuclear Armageddon. This week the buffoonish former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson openly admitted that the conflict in Ukraine was a proxy war against Russia. But that didn’t give Johnson pause for thought or shame. He urged the Europeans to send more weapons to Ukraine. Nor did his crass candidness elicit any outcry or condemnation. Johnson, the imbecile, was, in effect, confirming what Russia has been warning is the essence of the conflict in Ukraine – a U.S.-led war using Ukrainian cannon fodder.

Then, we had the chief of Britain’s intelligence agency MI6, “Sir” Richard Moore, holding forth to an audience in Paris that Russia’s Putin was causing “staggeringly reckless sabotage” across Europe. The British spymaster claimed that Russia was threatening the continent with nuclear weapons to weaken NATO support for Ukraine. He omitted the glaring fact that the U.S., Britain, and France have dramatically escalated the conflict by supplying a NeoNazi regime in Ukraine with long-range missiles to strike Russia. Meanwhile, the governments in Germany and Nordic countries are issuing dire public warnings for people to “get ready for war” by building bomb shelters in their homes and stocking up on non-perishable foods. You could hardly make this insanity up except in the dystopian novels of George Orwell. The continent is being led by the nose to disaster by politicians and corporate-controlled media who have lost their minds.

They long ago lost any self-respect or independence and are simply acting as the most pathetic surrogates for U.S.-led imperialism. Even without the ultimate catastrophe of war, Europe has been brought to ruination by elitist politicians who have unquestioningly followed the American agenda of trying to strategically defeat Russia through a proxy war. Central to this U.S. strategic objective is vanquishing decades of mutually beneficial energy trade between Europe and Russia. The sanctions imposed on the Nord Stream gas pipelines by Trump during his first administration, followed by the blowing up of the pipes by the Biden administration in September 2022, are testimony to that bigger picture. None of the European governments or their news media properly investigated that huge crime of state-sponsored terrorism. The proxy war and sanctions on Russian energy that the European leaders happily went along with have caused the European economies to implode.

Critical commentators talk about the deindustrialization of Europe. Even the Financial Times, in a recent in-depth report on Germany’s “broken economy”, sounded aghast at “the most pronounced downturn in Germany’s postwar history.” The report surveys auto, chemical and engineering sectors crucial to the German economy and cites “high energy costs” as the detrimental factor. However, the Western media, even in supposed “in-depth reports” like the Financial Times, are careful not to spell out the obvious cause of Europe’s economic collapse: the U.S.-led proxy war in Ukraine and the consequent damage in Europe’s relations with Russia. Media reports deplore a “jobs massacre” in Germany’s industrial giants like Volkswagen and Thyssenkrupp without explaining the cause as if the calamity is somehow random misfortune. As if that is not bad enough, the incoming Trump administration is lining up heavy tariffs on exports from Europe as well as China, Canada, and Mexico. That will be a coup de grâce for the European economies delivered by its American ally.

Europe is in this appalling predicament – facing economic ruin amid a potential military conflagration – all because it has been misled by people like Ursula von der Leyen, Josep Borrell, France’s Macron, Germany’s Scholz (and Angela Merkel before him), and Netherlands former premier Mark Rutte, who is now the gung-ho head of NATO calling for more European weapons to Ukraine. Many others can be named from the Nordic countries, Poland, and the Baltic states. Rather fittingly, the European elitist political class has a long and vile history of Russophobia, going back to collaboration with Nazi Germany in its genocidal aggression against the Soviet Union. The tragedy of Europe is not something mysterious or ill-fated. It is the direct result of elitist rulers who have assiduously conducted policies that harm European citizens. These charlatan leaders are shameless in their Russophobia and surrogacy for U.S.-led Western imperialism – even to the point of killing their own people through economic devastation or worse – world war.

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Not sure urban planning is the main issue. Being overrun is.

• ‘I Won’t Claim That Milan Is A Safe City’ – Mayor (RMX)

Italian Interior Minister Matteo Piantedosi has announced the deployment of 600 additional police officers to Milan, citing concerns over integration challenges and rising crime rates, particularly in areas with significant immigrant populations. The announcement follows recent unrest in the Corvetto district, where a 19-year-old Egyptian resident, Ramy Elgaml, died in a road accident after a police chase, sparking mass protests by the considerable immigrant population. During a meeting on security with Milan’s prefect Claudio Sgaraglia and Police Chief Vittorio Pisani, Piantedosi confirmed that the reinforcements, planned before the Corvetto unrest, will enhance territorial control and improve public safety.

He offered damning statistics on the disproportionate involvement immigrants have in committing crime, noting that 65 percent of all offenses in the city are committed by foreign nationals despite representing 20 percent of all residents. “These figures highlight integration challenges that must be addressed to reduce marginalization and its consequences,” Piantedosi stated. He denied comparisons to the recent Parisian suburban riots, calling them “very exaggerated,” but acknowledged that the Corvetto unrest signals issues requiring attention. The Italian minister criticized the reliance on issuing residence permits as a solution to integration issues, pointing out the need for more comprehensive measures. He highlighted efforts already underway, noting over 40 high-impact operations and 162 arrests in Corvetto this year, but accepted that much more needed to be done.

“The second-most important city in Italy after Rome deserves all the attention it can get,” he added. Milan’s left-wing mayor Beppe Sala echoed the need for investments in public housing and community centers to foster integration and accepted that the Italian city can no longer be considered a safe place to live. “I won’t claim Milan is a safe city, but it is making an effort to address challenges faced by all international cities,” he said. Sala claimed that migrant crime was a result of shortcomings in creating spaces for young immigrants to engage positively within their communities, linking the lack of such centers to increased alienation in the suburbs.

With over 60,000 public housing units out of Milan’s 800,000 apartments, Sala described the distribution as “disproportionate,” emphasizing the importance of equitable urban planning. Italy’s Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini, whose League party first made its name in the northern Italian city and the surrounding area, remarked on the meeting in a post on X. “Minister Piantedosi’s data are crystal clear. Yet for the left, it is a non-problem, they seek justifications to the point of falsifying reality,” he wrote. “Woe to anyone who criticizes the dogma of indiscriminate reception at all costs, woe to anyone who criticizes environments in which foreign crime thrives in our cities, woe to anyone who wants to harshly apply the law to intervene in an increasingly unsustainable situation,” he quipped.

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Rogan has put the media world upside down. He has become the topic that they talk about. Last week it was RT, now the New York Post and Just the News, both on the same day.

• Joe Rogan: ‘Greatest Media Psy-Op In History’ Was Waged Against Trump (NYP)

Joe Rogan argued that the establishment media that once was friendly to President-elect Donald Trump has since been engaged in a years-long “psy-op” to convince Americans he is dangerous. “The Joe Rogan Experience” is one of the world’s most popular podcasts, and Rogan is seen as having been one of the key players in the 2024 election, for interviewing Trump and then endorsing his bid for the presidency in the 11th hour. The podcaster has since mocked the media for losing their credibility with voters and alienating lifelong liberals like himself. On Thursday’s episode, with comedians Shane Gillis, Mark Normand, and Ari Shaffir, Rogan recalled how friendly people in entertainment and the media once were to Trump, playing clips from his 2012 appearance on “The View” where he was cheered, as well as when he went on Oprah in and she asked him about running for president.

Since then, “The View” has become a frequent source for apocalyptic takes about Trump, and Oprah shredded him while campaigning with Vice President Kamala Harris. Rogan argued that the abrupt shift in tone toward Trump has been shocking in retrospect, “What we saw is the greatest media psy-op in history.” The podcast host continued to hammer legacy media. “What you’re seeing with Trump, regardless of his flaws, is a massive concentrated psy-op,” Rogan said. “They’ve distorted who he is to the point where most people think that way. Most people think that way. They’ve had narratives.” “What is a psy-op? I keep hearing that,” Normand said.

“Psychological operation,” Rogan explained. “Where they’ve decided to distort people’s perceptions of things.” Shaffir replied that older liberals are shocked to hear that former President Obama oversaw more deportations than Trump. “They go, ‘That doesn’t make sense.’ And you go, ‘Right, focus on what’s giving you the reality of the world,’” he said. Rogan then turned to his producer, Jamie, and asked him to show a “wild” quote from former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton from 2008 where she was “saying some wild MAGA-type s—” about “illegal immigrants.” Clinton could be heard in the recording declaring, “I think we got to have tough conditions. Tell people to come out of the shadows. If they’ve committed a crime, deport them, no questions asked.” “She’s a Republican,” Shaffir joked.

In the recording, Clinton continued, “If they’ve been working and are law-abiding, we should say, ‘Here are the conditions for you staying. You have to pay a stiff fine because you came here illegally. You have to pay back taxes and you have to try to learn English. And you have to wait in line.’” The guests expressed their shock at Clinton’s past comments. “’You have to wait in line,’ And everybody’s cheering,” Rogan said. “2008. Hillary Clinton was more MAGA than Trump. But how about that? More MAGA than Trump. It’s all a f—ing illusion. It’s all a f—ing illusion. All of them, when convenient, have said the exact same things.” Rogan argued that this election shows that the tide has turned, however. “They had control of the media up until now. This election was the first time they didn’t really have control of the media anymore,” Rogan argued. When asked why this is, the podcaster replied, “Because of us, because of podcasts. Because of social media, because of X.”

Read more …

 

 

 

 

Fenbendazole
https://twitter.com/i/status/1862727748189401143

 

 

Urso

 

 

Vaccine
https://twitter.com/i/status/1862616283738501504

 

 

Lynx

 

 

Dive

 

 

 

 

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

 

 

 

 

 

Debt Rattle September 27 2024

Sep 272024
 
 September 27, 2024  Posted by at 8:50 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , ,  59 Responses »


Pablo Picasso The bathers 1918

 

• Ukraine ‘Is Gone’ – Trump (RT)
• Trump Agrees To Meet Zelensky (RT)
• Trump Pushes Narrative That Iran Is Trying to Kill Him (Antiwar)
• US Doesn’t Want Ukraine In NATO – Erdogan (RT)
• Biden Behind Nord Stream Sabotage – Russia’s Top MP (RT)
• NATO Outlines Plans In Event Of War With Russia (RT)
• Biden Drains Remaining Ukraine Aid Funds (RT)
• US Congress ‘Happy to Be Lied to’ in Service of American Imperialism (Sp.)
• Moderator for VP Debate Tied to Donations for ‘Lincoln Project’ (HUSA)
• Former CDC Director Robert Redfield Praises “Make America Healthy Again” (ZH)
• The Assault on America’s Defining Principles (Turley)
• What Happens if We Hold College and Nobody Comes? (Turley)
• Taxes and Tariffs and Trade: Trump’s Plan To Bolster The Economy (JTN)
• FBI Claims it Doesn’t Have DNC’s Jan. 6 Pipe Bomb Footage (HUSA)
• Appeals Court Seems Skeptical of New York Civil Fraud Suit Against Trump (ET)
• FBI Specialist Urges Americans to Prepare For Hardship (MN)
• Boeing Machinists on Strike Have a Historic Opportunity (Sawant)

 

 

 

 

Trump ad

 

 

Melania

 

 

Holistically


https://twitter.com/i/status/1839095068537532889

Bidenomics

 

 

Rogan Chamath

 

 

Eric Adams
https://twitter.com/i/status/1839436032888221900

 

 

Bug
https://twitter.com/i/status/1839019582985744422

 

 

RFK food

 

 

Loverboy

 

 

Ballots
https://twitter.com/i/status/1838887620253728832

 

 

USB stick

 

 

 

 

“Millions and millions of people, including all of these great soldiers, they’re dead. Those gorgeous buildings with golden towers are demolished and lying broken on their side. Ukraine is gone. It’s not Ukraine anymore. You can never replace those cities and towns.”

• Ukraine ‘Is Gone’ – Trump (RT)

Former US President Donald Trump has hammered Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky for refusing to negotiate with Russia, arguing that the country is now “obliterated” while Kiev is reduced to sending “young children and old men” to the front lines amid its conflict with Moscow. Zelensky is currently visiting the US to attend the UN General Assembly in New York and pitch his so-called ‘victory plan’ to key figures in President Joe Biden’s administration. Republican lawmakers, however, have condemned Zelensky for publicly criticizing Trump and his running mate, J.D. Vance. He incited further ire among Republicans when he appeared at an event at a munitions plant organized by Pennsylvania Governor Joshua Shapiro, a key ally of Trump’s Democratic opponent, Vice President Kamala Harris.

At a rally in North Carolina on Thursday, Trump accused Zelensky of “making little nasty aspersions” toward him, before turning to the Ukrainian leader’s handling of the conflict with Russia. “The country is absolutely obliterated,” he declared. “Millions and millions of people, including all of these great soldiers, they’re dead. Those gorgeous buildings with golden towers are demolished and lying broken on their side. Ukraine is gone. It’s not Ukraine anymore. You can never replace those cities and towns.” “And Biden and Kamala allowed this to happen by feeding Zelensky money and munitions like no country has ever seen before,” he continued. “But now Ukraine is running out of soldiers. They’re using young children and old men because their soldiers are dying.”

While the Ukrainian military does not publish casualty figures, the Russian Defense Ministry has estimated Kiev’s losses at around half a million men. Ukraine’s manpower shortage has been well documented by Western media outlets, and the country’s top general acknowledged earlier this month that recruits are often sent to fight after as little as six weeks’ training. Trump argued that Biden and Harris could have “easily” struck a deal with Russia to prevent the conflict from ever starting. Instead, through “a lot of bad statements and stupid statements,” Biden “egged it on.” “And we continue to give billions of dollars to a man who refuses to make a deal,” Trump said, referring to Zelensky. “Any deal, even the worst deal, would have been better than what we have right now.”

Russia and Ukraine reportedly agreed to a peace deal during talks in Istanbul in 2022. The agreement would have involved Ukraine declaring military neutrality, limiting its armed forces, and vowing not to discriminate against ethnic Russians. In return, Moscow would have joined other leading powers in offering Ukraine security guarantees. However, Zelensky withdrew from the talks at the last moment. According to Ukrainian negotiator David Arakhamia, former US Under Secretary of State Victoria Nuland, and several Ukrainian media reports, the US and UK were instrumental in convincing Zelensky to abandon negotiations. Trump maintains that he would settle the conflict “in 24 hours” if elected president this November. Zelensky, however, has stated that the former president “doesn’t really know how to stop the war,” while Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has said that he doesn’t “think there is a magic wand” that can stop the fighting overnight.

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“Any deal, even the worst deal, would have been better than what we have right now.”

• Trump Agrees To Meet Zelensky (RT)

US Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump has announced he will meet with Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky on Friday in New York. Zelensky has met with President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris, who is the Democrats’ candidate for the presidency in the November election. He has also sought a meeting with Trump. “I will be meeting with him tomorrow morning at around 9:45 at Trump Tower,” the former and possibly future US president announced at a press conference in New York City on Thursday afternoon. Earlier in the day, Trump had posted a message from Ukraine’s deputy ambassador to the US, relaying Zelensky’s request for a meeting, to his TruthSocial platform. “Dear Donald, I hope you’re doing well. I recall our recent phone call – it was really good,” Zelensky wrote. “All of us in Ukraine want to end this war with a just peace. And we know that without America this is impossible to achieve.

That’s why we have to strive to understand each other and remain in close contact.” “You know I always speak with great respect about everything connected to you, and that’s how it should be,” the Ukrainian actor-turned-politician wrote, adding that he would “really like for our meeting to take place.” The request came after Trump criticized the “little nasty aspersions” Zelensky had made about him and his running mate, Ohio Senator JD Vance, in an interview published last Sunday. At a campaign rally in North Carolina, Trump described Ukraine as “absolutely obliterated” and accused Biden and Harris of “feeding Zelensky money and munitions like no country has ever seen before.” “We continue to give billions of dollars to a man who refuses to make a deal,” Trump said, referring to Zelensky. “Any deal, even the worst deal, would have been better than what we have right now.”

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Not a very high level of credibility. Who feeds him this? Warmongers?!

• Trump Pushes Narrative That Iran Is Trying to Kill Him (Antiwar)

On Wednesday, former President Donald Trump pushed a narrative being spread by US intelligence officials that Iran is trying to kill him even though there’s no evidence of Iranian involvement in either attempt on his life. Trump’s campaign said they were briefed on the alleged Iranian threat by officials from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, which is led by Avril Haines. “Big threats on my life by Iran. The entire US Military is watching and waiting. Moves were already made by Iran that didn’t work out, but they will try again,” Trump wrote on X after the briefing. “Not a good situation for anyone. I am surrounded by more men, guns, and weapons than I have ever seen before.” The claim that Iran is plotting to kill Trump was first made by a CNN report back in July, following the assassination attempt by Thomas Matthew Crooks, who was shot and killed by the Secret Service.

The report acknowledged there was no evidence Crooks was linked to Iran, which was reaffirmed on Tuesday by intelligence officials speaking to The New York Times, who stressed there was no Iran connection to the July shooting. The Times report also said there was no evidence that Iran was connected in any way to Ryan Routh, who was arrested on September 15 and recently charged with attempting to assassinate Trump. Routh is a staunch supporter of the Ukraine proxy war and traveled to the country to help recruit fighters for the Ukrainian foreign legion. Despite the lack of evidence, Trump suggested at a campaign event on Wednesday that Iran might have been involved in the two assassination attempts. “As you know, there have been two assassination attempts on my life that we know of, and they may or may not involve – but possibly do – Iran,” he said at an event in North Carolina.

“If I were the president, I would inform the threatening country, in this case Iran, that if you do anything to harm this person, we are going to blow your largest cities and the country itself to smithereens,” Trump added. The claims about Iran come amid soaring tensions in the Middle East as Israel has dramatically escalated its bombing campaign in Lebanon, a situation that could potentially turn into a full-blown war between the US and Iran. But Iran’s actions over the past year have shown they’re not interested in war with the US. For example, when Iran launched a reprisal attack on Israel in response to the bombing of the Iranian consulate in Syria, Iranian officials said they warned the US 72 hours in advance. The US denied the claim, but Turkey and Jordan confirmed they were given notice, which would have gotten back to the US. Iran and the US also engaged in indirect negotiations in Oman to avoid escalation.

Iran’s new president, Masoud Peseshkian, has also taken an extremely diplomatic tone toward the US since coming into office and wants direct negotiations with Washington. “We are not hostile towards the US. They should end their hostility towards us by showing their goodwill in practice,” Pezeshkian said last week. “We are brothers with the Americans as well.” Members of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) occasionally vow they will take revenge for Trump’s assassination of Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani, who headed the IRGC’s Quds Force. But in response to recent allegations, Iran has said Trump should be punished for the killing in a court of law. “These accusations are unsubstantiated and malicious,” Iran’s mission to the UN said in response to the CNN report in July. “From the perspective of the Islamic Republic of Iran, Trump is a criminal who must be prosecuted and punished in a court of law for ordering the assassination of General Soleimani. Iran has chosen the legal path to bring him to justice.”

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“..the US, first and foremost, does not want to see Ukraine as a NATO member. And many NATO countries do not want Ukraine to be a member-state.”

• US Doesn’t Want Ukraine In NATO – Erdogan (RT)

The US is the main opponent of Ukraine joining NATO, although many other countries in the bloc are also against Kiev’s potential membership, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has said. While Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky’s so-called ‘victory plan’ stresses NATO accession, Erdogan told NBC News on Wednesday that “the US, first and foremost, does not want to see Ukraine as a NATO member. And many NATO countries do not want Ukraine to be a member-state.” Zelensky is currently in the US, where is he promoting the plan and is scheduled to meet with President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris in Washington on Thursday. “These are not questions to be rushed,” he added. “And when making our minds, when we are taking our decisions, we always take into consideration the stance of other NATO member states, we discuss those possible questions around the table and make the final decision accordingly,” Erdogan stated.

When asked directly if Ankara would accept Ukraine in NATO, Erdogan replied that “we are going to follow the developments, the deliberations, and reach a final decision accordingly. These are not decisions to be rushed in an excited way.” He also spoke about Türkiye’s ties with Russia, describing them as “multidimensional, political, economic, cultural, defense industry related. There are many dimensions, dimensions there and our solidarity, our interaction, has been going on and economically every day, these relations are expanding.” A unanimous decision by all members is required to expand NATO. Finland and Sweden, who became the latest nations to join the bloc in 2023 and 2024 respectively, had to overcome strong initial opposition from Türkiye, which accused them of harboring members of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), considered a terrorist group by Ankara.

A senior US State Department official told AP on Tuesday that the political element of Zelensky’s ‘victory plan’ focuses on how to assure the Ukrainian population that they will be welcomed into Western institutions such as the EU and NATO, assuming they continue to fight Russia or if a negotiated settlement with Moscow is achieved. NATO declared at a 2008 summit in Bucharest that Ukraine, along with another former Soviet Republic, Georgia, would join the US-led bloc at some stage. After the conflict between Russia and Ukraine broke out, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg and other officials repeatedly claimed that Kiev was on track to becoming a member, but never announced a specific timeline for accession. Moscow, which views NATO as hostile and vigorously opposes its eastward expansion, highlighted Kiev’s aspirations of joining the bloc as among the main reasons for launching its military operation against Ukraine in February 2022.

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Yet another narrative (retelling) pops up: “..a privately-funded operation masterminded by a now-disgraced Ukrainian intelligence officer..”

• Biden Behind Nord Stream Sabotage – Russia’s Top MP (RT)

US President Joe Biden “was behind” the sabotage of the Nord Stream pipelines, and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz helped him tank his country’s economy in the aftermath, Vyacheslav Volodin, the head of the Russian State Duma, has claimed. The senior legislator commented on Thursday on the second anniversary of the explosions, which disabled the undersea connectors built to deliver Russian natural gas directly to Germany, noting the failure of European investigators to name the culprit. There have been accounts in the media suggesting possible scenarios, “which were occasionally laughable,” he said. “Washington and Biden personally were behind the Nord Stream bombing. His interest was to cut Western Europe off from cheap Russian gas and force it to buy it from America at a price three times higher,” he said.

The German economy took a hit and is now in recession due to a loss of competitiveness, Volodin added, “which means that the people of Germany were punished instead of Washington, as Biden and Scholz took money out of their pockets.” “You cannot pin this one on some ‘pro-Ukrainian group’ and civilian divers,” Volodin stressed. On Tuesday, the German news outlet Der Spiegel published its latest retelling of the events of September 2022. It mostly repeats the story that a privately-funded operation masterminded by a now-disgraced Ukrainian intelligence officer conducted the sabotage with the blessing of former General Valery Zaluzhny. The Western press has been repeating similar versions of this story for months. Spiegel claimed to have identified the divers, saying that most were civilians, but the group was led by a commando.

The operation was first contemplated years before the outbreak of hostilities between Russia and Ukraine in February 2022, it stated. Pulitzer Prize-winning US investigative journalist Seymour Hersh alleged that Biden had ordered the sabotage of Nord Stream in a February 2023 article. He said US military divers had secretly planted explosives to destroy the pipelines at a significant depth, using a NATO exercise in the Baltic Sea as a cover. The White House has denied the accusations, but Russian officials have called the story plausible. Prior to the destruction of Nord Stream 1 and 2, senior US officials, including Biden, had issued threats to destroy the Russian-German pipelines.

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They’re trying to sell a story: “..a large number of frontline casualties without the capability to airlift them for treatment..”

• NATO Outlines Plans In Event Of War With Russia (RT)

NATO would have to deal with a large number of frontline casualties without the capability to airlift them for treatment in the event of a major war with Russia, its logistics chief has said. Lieutenant-General Alexander Sollfrank, the head of NATO’s Joint Support and Enabling Command (JSEC), outlined the difficulties that troops would face in an interview with Reuters on Wednesday. “The challenge will be to swiftly ensure high-quality care for, in the worst case, a great number of wounded,” Sollfrank said. The environment of a hypothetical conflict with Russia would be completely different from what the US and its allies faced in Afghanistan and Iraq, he added. Unlike insurgents in the Middle East, Russia has the military capability to threaten NATO aircraft, Sollfrank noted, predicting that medical evacuations would have to be conducted on the ground.

“For planning reasons, all options to take a great number of wounded to medical installations need to be considered, which includes trains but potentially also buses,” the NATO official said. Ukraine is currently using hospital trains to evacuate injured troops from the front line, as reported by CNN earlier this month. The NATO logistics command, which is based in the southern German town of Ulm, recently staged an exercise based on coordinating medical evacuations, Reuters said. JSEC contingency plans would require a legal foundation for issues such as the expedited transportation of narcotics across national borders, Sollfrank said. He also called for a ‘military medical Schengen’ – similarly to how the bloc needs a ‘military Schengen’ to rapidly deploy troops and weapons to the eastern flank, according to the official.

The US and its allies have claimed that Russia may be planning to attack NATO, and that the West can delay or prevent that outcome by arming Ukraine. The bloc has been expanding in Europe for decades, in violation of assurances given before Moscow agreed to German reunification in 1990. The Russian government has cited NATO’s approach to its borders and the bloc’s intention to add Kiev to its ranks as key causes of the Ukraine conflict. Officials in Moscow have denied having any aggressive intentions toward NATO, which they consider a hostile force that must be deterred.

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“The mechanisms allow payments to arms manufacturers and permit weapons to be drawn directly from American military stockpiles..”

• Biden Drains Remaining Ukraine Aid Funds (RT)

US President Joe Biden announced nearly $8 billion in military aid to Ukraine on Thursday, releasing the remaining funding authorized by Congress. Lawmakers recently declined to extend the availability of certain funds beyond next week’s deadline. The funding includes $2.4 billion under the Pentagon’s Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative and $5.5 billion under the Presidential Drawdown Authority (PDA). The mechanisms allow payments to arms manufacturers and permit weapons to be drawn directly from American military stockpiles. The latter sum was set to expire at the end of this month, which marks the end of the fiscal year in the US. The White House had hoped that the US Congress would allow the PDA money to be spent at a later point. However, legislation passed on Wednesday did not include any such clause, reportedly following resistance from Republicans skeptical of the continued bankrolling of Kiev.

Biden announced the decision on military aid during a meeting with Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky, who is in the US to promote his ‘victory plan’ in the conflict with Russia. Zelensky has said he wanted the US president to be the first to see the proposal as it heavily relies on American aid. According to the Wall Street Journal, US officials have previewed the plan but found it “unimpressive.” The US president said Kiev will receive an additional Patriot surface-to-air system, more munitions and drones, as well as a new capability, the AGM-154 Joint Standoff Weapon (JSOW). The glide bomb has a range of up to 130km when dropped from a high-flying aircraft. Some supporters of Kiev’s cause have criticized the 11th-hour drawdown of funds by Biden. Senator Roger Wicker, a Republican from Missouri, claimed it was “typical of this administration to wait until the last possible moment to announce full use of the PDA.”

Zelensky’s visit also triggered complaints from members of the GOP, after he criticized the Republican presidential ticket and visited an ammunition factory in the battleground state of Pennsylvania, without a single Republican official present. Senior party members have accused the Ukrainian leader of campaigning for the Democrats. They also alleged that the Biden administration facilitated potential meddling in the 2024 presidential election by organizing Zelensky’s Pennsylvania visit and spending taxpayer money on it.

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“..most of Congress was very happy to be lied to and would have denounced Blinken for the truth.”

• US Congress ‘Happy to Be Lied to’ in Service of American Imperialism (Sp.)

Secretary of State Antony Blinken is facing calls to resign after a damning report suggested he willfully misled Congress to keep US military aid flowing to Israel. Analysis by the investigative reporting nonprofit ProPublica revealed that Blinken defied the findings of multiple government bodies that concluded Israel was deliberately blocking humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip. Blinken ignored the advice of multiple officials with the State Department and US Agency for International Development (USAID), testifying before lawmakers that Tel Aviv was not interfering with the flow of aid. US law forbids the provision of military equipment to any country obstructing American humanitarian assistance. Journalists Dan Lazare and Robert Fantina joined Sputnik’s The Critical Hour program Wednesday to discuss the scandal, which has led the director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations to call on Blinken to resign.

“This is business as usual,” said Fantina. “The United States doesn’t respect international law and doesn’t respect its own laws if those laws somehow get in the way of its quest for power and profits. So the fact that Blinken lied to Congress, blatantly lied – and this wasn’t something that was inconsequential, this caused the starvation, the continued starvation and the slaughter of innocent people.” “We’ve said before that the United States is enabling this genocide by continuing to arm Israel and by increasing its arms shipments to Israel,” he continued. “So the fact that Blinken is lying should really surprise no one. Other international organizations that aren’t affiliated with any nation have said repeatedly for months that Israel is blocking humanitarian aid. And yet the United States denies this, or at least Blinken did.”

The human rights organization Amnesty International affirmed Israel was stemming the flow of humanitarian assistance earlier this year, characterizing Tel Aviv’s actions as a “tightening” of its “16-year-long suffocating blockade” of Gaza. Israel has tightly controlled the amount of food and other basic necessities allowed to enter the Palestinian territory since June 2007, when it decided to dismantle its settlements in the Gaza Strip. However, Israel has exerted control over the strip of land, which is considered sovereign Palestinian territory under international law, since 1967, when it seized land intended to form the basis of a Palestinian state in the region. The US has served as the country’s strongest backer in the decades since, with Israel becoming the United States’ largest cumulative recipient of foreign aid. Observers claim the US backs the country as a crucial beachhead in a geopolitically vital region where Israel serves as a proxy for US interests against Iran and other adversaries.

“Israel is engaged in a brutal war, which is now spreading dramatically and it will continue doing so,” said Lazare, claiming Israel is inarguably using the flow of humanitarian aid as an instrument of war. “It’s all irrelevant. I mean, war is the cessation of law, and, therefore, calling on warmakers to obey the law strikes me as kind of contradictory.” “If you’re acting on behalf of the [US] government or any kind of imperialism, you are free to lie to Congress at will, the laws against lying to Congress only apply to those which the empire sees as a threat,” posited host Garland Nixon. “Congress does not mind being lied to if it thinks it benefits the empire,” Lazare agreed. “In general there are lies Congress likes and lies Congress doesn’t like. And, therefore, it’s Congress’ power of decision, power to decide which lies are okay and which lies are not. And generally the okay ones are those that further America’s imperial ambitions.” Sam Perlo-Freeman, a researcher with the group Campaign Against Arms Trade, agreed, claiming simply, “most of Congress was very happy to be lied to and would have denounced Blinken for the truth.”

Read more …

“..it quickly became clear that some of its members were growing increasingly unhinged with Trump Derangement Syndrome.”

• Moderator for VP Debate Tied to Donations for ‘Lincoln Project’ (HUSA)

The husband of one of the two moderators in next week’s CBS News debate featuring vice presidential candidates J.D. Vance and Tim Walz appears to have made two donations of $250 apiece to the controversial Lincoln Project during the 2020 election. Records from the Federal Election Commission show that Ali “Yado” Yakub, the husband of Face the Nation host Margaret Brennan, contributed on July 2 and Sept. 26 of that year to the anti-Trump super-PAC. Voting records confirmed that the address listed was the residence of Yakub, who was registered as a Republican, and Brennan, who was registered as an independent.Many have observed that registration offers no indication about political preference, with Democrats during the recent primary—in which President Joe Biden ran largely uncontested—frequently changing their party identification to vote against Trump.

Yakub also made contributions to ActBlue in 2019, including two that were earmarked for the primary campaign of future Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg. Headline USA reached out to both Brennan and Yakub by phone and email but received no response. The Lincoln Project—founded by high-profile NeverTrump ex-Republicans Rick Wilson, George T. Conway III, Steve Schmidt, Reed Galen, John Weaver and Jennifer Horn—initially appeared to be a sort of principled response by members of the GOP establishment to Trump’s takeover of the party. However, it quickly became clear that some of its members were growing increasingly unhinged with Trump Derangement Syndrome.

The group lost all credibility when, in January 2021, allegations emerged that co-founder John Weaver had engaged in sexual impropriety with young, male staffers and had allegedly solicited boys as young as 14. The bombshell led to an exodus of the group’s more influential figures, such as former John McCain campaign chief Steve Schmidt, who had become a registered Democrat the month prior. Only two of its charter members—Rick Wilson and Reed Galen—are currently associated with the group, which has grown more radical and outlandish, notoriously engaging in a stunt in which it staged a fake neo-Nazi rally and attempted to blame Trump supporters.

It also has run ads pushing blatant disinformation, such as attempting to suggest that Trump would monitor and arrest people for attempting to obtain an abortion. Trump has repeatedly emphasized that the issue is now at the state level and will remain so if he is re-elected, while noting that he personally favors exceptions for abortions in a set of specific, narrowly tailored circumstances. Moreover, the Lincoln Project has sought to falsely tie Trump to the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025, which he has repeatedly disavowed and denied any association with. The project launched in April 2023, well before Trump was the presumptive nominee, and was designed as a series of policy proposals for use by whichever candidate prevailed.

Read more …

“Maybe it was a warning sign when big pharma and the feds pushed Ozempic as the ‘wonder shot’ to end the obesity crisis..”

• Former CDC Director Robert Redfield Praises “Make America Healthy Again” (ZH)

Former CDC Director Robert Redfield, who served during the Trump administration, wrote an editorial in Newsweek praising President Trump’s decision to join forces with Robert Kennedy Jr. to “make America healthy again.” “We know chronic disease is more than 75 percent of the country’s $4 trillion annual health care expenditure. Unfortunately, we have become a sick nation. We’re paying too much for chronic disease, and this must change. It’s time to make America healthy again,” Redfield wrote in the op-ed published on Tuesday. After more than four decades in public health, Redfield believes the former president “chose the right man [RFK Jr.] for the job” to combat the processed foods industrial complex, which has ignited an obesity crisis across the Heartland.

“For instance, obesity in American children has increased dramatically since John F. Kennedy’s presidency, from around 4 percent in the 1960s to almost 20 percent in 2024,” he said, adding, “The causes of childhood obesity are complex, but a primary origin is clearly the modern American diet of highly processed foods.” He explained the causes for this obesity crisis are primarily due to “special interest and corporate influences on our federal agencies.” Redfield pointed out that “Kennedy is right” about the corporate capture problem of federal agencies.

Kennedy is right: All three of the principal health agencies suffer from agency capture. A large portion of the FDA’s budget is provided by pharmaceutical companies. NIH is cozy with biomedical and pharmaceutical companies and its scientists are allowed to collect royalties on drugs NIH licenses to pharma. And as the former director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), I know the agency can be influenced by special interest groups. Redfield acknowledges that agency capture is a serious issue, highlighting that federal agencies responsible for regulating food and medicine are possibly compromised by the food industrial complex and big pharma. Maybe it was a warning sign when big pharma and the feds pushed Ozempic as the ‘wonder shot’ to end the obesity crisis instead of promoting exercise and safe, clean food.

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Enemies of the Constitution. They will end the country.

“..an explosion of books and articles laying out a new vision of “democracy” unconstrained by constitutional limits on majority power..”

• The Assault on America’s Defining Principles (Turley)

Kamala Harris declared in Tuesday’s debate that a vote for her is a vote “to end the approach that is about attacking the foundations of our democracy ’cause you don’t like the outcome.” She was alluding to the 2021 Capitol riot, but she and her party are also attacking the foundations of our democracy: the Supreme Court and the freedom of speech. Several candidates for the 2020 presidential nomination, including Ms. Harris, said they were open to the idea of packing the court by expanding the number of seats. Mr. Biden opposed the idea, but a week after he exited the 2024 presidential race, he announced a “bold plan” to “reform” the high court. It would pack the court via term limits and also impose a “binding code of conduct,” aimed at conservative justices. Ms. Harris quickly endorsed the proposal in a statement, citing a “clear crisis of confidence” in the court owing to “decision after decision overturning long-standing precedent.”

She might as well have added “because you don’t like the outcome.” Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D., R.I.) has already introduced ethics and term-limits legislation and said Ms. Harris’s campaign has told him “that your bills are precisely aligned with what we are talking about.” The attacks on the court are part of a growing counterconstitutional movement that began in higher education and seems recently to have reached a critical mass in the media and politics. The past few months have seen an explosion of books and articles laying out a new vision of “democracy” unconstrained by constitutional limits on majority power. Erwin Chemerinsky, dean of the UC Berkeley law school, is author of “No Democracy Lasts Forever: How the Constitution Threatens the United States,” published last month. In a 2021 Los Angeles Times op-ed, he described conservative justices as “partisan hacks.”

In the New York Times, book critic Jennifer Szalai scoffs at what she calls “Constitution worship.” She writes: “Americans have long assumed that the Constitution could save us; a growing chorus now wonders whether we need to be saved from it.” She frets that by limiting the power of the majority, the Constitution “can end up fostering the widespread cynicism that helps authoritarianism grow.” In a 2022 New York Times op-ed, “The Constitution Is Broken and Should Not Be Reclaimed,” law professors Ryan D. Doerfler of Harvard and Samuel Moyn of Yale called for liberals to “reclaim America from constitutionalism.” Others have railed against individual rights. In my new book on free speech, I discuss this movement against what many professors deride as “rights talk.” Barbara McQuade of the University of Michigan Law School has called free speech America’s “Achilles’ heel.”

In another Times op-ed, “The First Amendment Is Out of Control,” Columbia law professor Tim Wu, a former Biden White House aide, asserts that free speech “now mostly protects corporate interests” and threatens “essential jobs of the state, such as protecting national security and the safety and privacy of its citizens.” George Washington University Law’s Mary Ann Franks complains that the First Amendment (and also the Second) is too “aggressively individualistic” and endangers “domestic tranquility” and “general welfare.” Mainstream Democrats are listening to radical voices. “How much does the current structure benefit us?” Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D., N.Y.) said in 2021, explaining her support for a court-packing bill.

“I don’t think it does.” Kelley Robinson, president of the Human Rights Campaign, said at the Democratic National Committee’s “LGBTQ+ Kickoff” that “we’ve got to reimagine” democracy “in a way that is more revolutionary than . . . that little piece of paper.” Both AOC and Ms. Robinson later spoke to the convention itself. The Nation’s Elie Mystal calls the Constitution “trash” and urges the abolition of the U.S. Senate. Rosa Brooks of Georgetown Law School complains that Americans are “slaves” to the Constitution.

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“..many departments have purged their ranks of Republicans, conservatives, and libertarians.”

• What Happens if We Hold College and Nobody Comes? (Turley)

In the 1930s, Bertolt Brecht asked “What if they gave a war and nobody came?” As someone who has been a teacher for over 30 years, I find myself increasingly asking the same question as trust and enrollments fall in higher education. Trust in higher education is plummeting to record lows. According to recent polling, there has been a record drop in trust in higher education since just 2015. Not surprisingly, given the growing viewpoint intolerance on our campuses, the largest drops are among Republicans and Independents. There has been a precipitous decline in enrollments across the country as universities worry about covering their costs without raising already high tuition rates. From 2010 to 2021, enrollments fell from roughly 18.1 million students to about 15.4 million. There are various contributors to the drop from falling birthrates to poor economic times.

However, there is also an increasing view of higher education as an academic echo chamber for far left agendas. For many, there is little appeal in going to campuses where you are expected to self-censor and professors reject your values as part of their lesson plans. That fear is magnified by surveys showing that many departments have purged their ranks of Republicans, conservatives, and libertarians. In my new book “The Indispensable Right: Free Speech in an Age of Rage,” I discuss the intolerance in higher education and surveys showing that many departments no longer have a single Republican as faculties replicate their own views and values. One survey (based on self-reporting) found that only nine percent of law professors identified as conservative. Some anti-free speech advocates are actually citing higher education as a model for social media in showing how “unlikeable voices” have been eliminated.

Many of those “unlikeable” people are now going elsewhere as schools focus on degrees in activism and denouncing math, statistics, the classics, and even meritocracy as examples of white privilege. Schools offering classic education are experiencing rising enrollments, but the growing crisis has not changed the bias in hiring and teaching. Despite repeated losses in courts, universities and colleges continue to deny free speech and diversity of thought. The fact is that this academic echo chamber may be killing educational institutions, but the intolerance still works to the advantage of faculty who can control publications, speaking opportunities, and advancement with like-minded ideologues. We have seen the same perverse incentive in the media where media outlets are seeing plummeting readers and revenue.

Journalism schools and editors now maintain that reporters should reject objectivity and neutrality as touchstones of journalism. It does not matter that this advocacy journalism is killing the profession. Reporters and editors continue to saw at the limb upon which they sit due to the same advantage for academics. For reporters, converting newsrooms into echo chambers gives them more security, advancement, and opportunities. Recently, the new Washington Post publisher and CEO William Lewis was brought into the paper to right the ship. He told the staff “let’s not sugarcoat it…We are losing large amounts of money. Your audience has halved in recent years. People are not reading your stuff. Right. I can’t sugarcoat it anymore.” The response from reporters was to call for owner Jeff Bezos to fire Lewis and others seeking to change the culture.

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“I will give you the lowest taxes, the lowest energy costs, the lowest regulatory burden and free access to the best and biggest market on the planet, but only if you make your product here in America.”

• Taxes and Tariffs and Trade: Trump’s Plan To Bolster The Economy (JTN)

In a bid to build a broader coalition, former President Donald Trump has outlined a vision of tax cuts, import tariffs, and “reciprocal trade” to preserve and restore American industries. Since coming down the escalator of Trump Tower in 2015, the Republican standard bearer has espoused unconventional trade policies and dragged much of the GOP kicking and screaming toward protectionism. His tenure saw the U.S. renegotiate trade agreements with its neighbors, resulting in the United States, Mexico, Canada Agreement (USMCA), while also waging a trade war with China seeking to curb some of Beijing’s abuses. His signature tax plan, the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, saw the doubling of the standard deduction and the reduction of the corporate tax rate to 21%. As he has sought to contrast himself with Harris, Trump has highlighted both elements of his economic plan and doubled down on the tax cuts and tariffs approach.

“So, as your president, here is the deal that I will be offering to every major company and manufacturer on Earth,” he said at a Tuesday event in Savannah, Ga. “I will give you the lowest taxes, the lowest energy costs, the lowest regulatory burden and free access to the best and biggest market on the planet, but only if you make your product here in America.” “It all goes away if you don’t make your product here and hire American workers for the job,” he warned. His message, so far, appears to have resonated with working class voters, notably the traditionally Democratic-leaning union workers. After internal polling showed that its members decidedly favored Trump over Vice President Kamala Harris, the International Brotherhood of Teamsters declined to endorse a candidate, marking the first time in decades that the union had not backed a Democrat for president.

In recent weeks, Trump has unveiled a litany of tax relief proposals, most of which involve either simplifying the system or eliminating taxation on certain sources of income entirely. Speaking at a New York rally last week, Trump vowed to restore state-and-local-tax (SALT) deductions for federal tax returns in an about-face after signing the TCJA, which imposed a $10,000 cap on SALT deductions. “I will cut taxes for families, small businesses and workers, including restoring the SALT deduction, saving thousands of dollars for residents of New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and other high cost states,” he said. Earlier this month, he pledged to eliminate all taxes on overtime work as well, saying “[t]he people who work overtime are among the hardest working citizens in our country … It’s time for the working man and woman to finally catch a break.”

Trump has also promised to end taxation on Social Security benefits, a proposal that has drawn broad support from the public across most age brackets, according to recent polling. Among the most notable of his campaign pitches, however, has been a pledge to eliminate taxes on tips, which he announced at a June rally in Nevada in a bid to win over service workers in the critical battleground. Separate from pledging further tax cuts, he has also made the TCJA a central fixture of his campaign. Many of the act’s cuts are set to expire next year and he has begun to focus on the adverse impacts for taxpayers of permitting those cuts to sunset.

Using information from the Tax Foundation, the Trump campaign this month launched a website, dubbed kamalataxincrease.com, breaking down the average cost to tax-paying families by state. The site estimates that a Harris-proposed tax plan would cost families an average of $2,580.57 in additional taxes per year. The TCJA lowered the corporate tax rate to 21%, but Trump vowed to go further in his Tuesday speech, promising a “manufacturing Renaissance” through a “15% Made in America tax rate.” “We’re cutting the business tax from 21% to 15% which makes us the most competitive tax anywhere on the planet, but only for those who make their product in the USA. See, that’s an incentive,” he said. “[P]eople are going to be pouring in. Companies are going to be pouring in.”

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They’re trying to run out the clock. “Massie then called for answers on the matter before Election Day.”

• FBI Claims it Doesn’t Have DNC’s Jan. 6 Pipe Bomb Footage (HUSA)

The FBI has claimed that it doesn’t have the Democratic National Committee headquarters’ security footage from the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol Hill uprising—footage that would presumably show the discovery of a pipe bomb that was allegedly planted outside the DNC the night before. The FBI’s admission was revealed in a Friday letter from Homeland Security Inspector General Joseph Cuffari to Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky. In that letter, Cuffari said he asked the FBI to review the DNC security videos from Jan. 6—but was told that the bureau doesn’t have that footage. “On March 18, 2022, the FBI informed DHS OIG that it did not have any video footage from January 6, 2021,” Cuffari told Massie.

https://twitter.com/i/status/1838980352901079550

The letter to Massie was revealed Tuesday, the same day Revolver News published a report suggesting that the DNC pipe bomb footage was tampered with. Revolver reported that an unnamed DHS-OIG official viewed the DNC footage, and said that the footage clearly shows the pipe bomber planting a device on the evening of Jan. 5—something that the footage released by the FBI to the public doesn’t show. Revolver also reported that the DHS-OIG official had to go to the DNC to view the footage—raising questions about why the FBI doesn’t have video of one of the most significant crimes from the whole Jan. 6 fiasco. “We can only conclude that either the FBI is lying and did have footage, or they’re telling the truth and for some reason deleted the footage,” Revolver wrote on Tuesday. Meanwhile, Vice President Kamala Harris continues to be tight-lipped on the subject, despite the fact that her motorcade drove past the DNC pipe bomb on Jan. 6.

Harris left the Capitol at 11:21 a.m. arrived to the DNC at 11:25 a.m., but the nearby pipe bomb wasn’t discovered until 1:07 p.m. by a plainclothes Capitol Police officer. Some J6 researchers argue that Harris’s silence on the issue suggests that the U.S. government is engaging in a coverup with the pipe bomb case—perhaps because a government asset planted the bombs, or for some other unknown reason. On Tuesday, Massie raised that possibility again. “It’s almost as if they don’t want to know. Can you rule out that there were any confidential human sources involved in the whole pipe bomb thing?” Massie asked DOJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz. Horowitz said he didn’t “recall” whether any government assets were involved, but he’d have to go back and refresh his memory. Massie then called for answers on the matter before Election Day.

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“Mar-a-Lago is worth $18-26 million”. That alone closes the case.

• Appeals Court Seems Skeptical of New York Civil Fraud Suit Against Trump (ET)

Appeals judges in New York fielded multiple questions to the New York Attorney General’s Office on Sept. 26 indicating that they were skeptical of its application of an anti-fraud law to former President Donald Trump’s business practices. The questions came during oral arguments over Trump’s claims that the state Supreme Court erred in handling the civil fraud case, which resulted in a $489 million penalty for the former president. Trump’s attorney in the case, D. John Sauer, told a five-judge panel in the court’s appellate division that the judge and prosecutors flouted time limits on the claims involved. He noted that Attorney General Letitia James’s office pressed an overly broad interpretation of legally punishable fraud and that, regardless, the former president hadn’t committed fraud in his dealings with banks and others. Some of the judges questioned whether the state was acting within the bounds of its authority or had a legitimate interest in bringing the suit.

Justice David Friedman pressed New York Deputy Solicitor General Judith Vale on whether there was any precedent for the attorney general suing over transactions involving sophisticated parties where neither “lost any money. “Every case that you cite involves damage to consumers, damage to the marketplace. … We don’t have anything like that here,” Friedman said. Vale argued that “there was absolutely a public impact and a public interest here.” “There are at least four different public harms from the kind of misconduct here,” she said. Vale also said that “when risk is injected into the market, that does hurt the counterparties and it does hurt the market as a whole.” Justice Peter Moulton asked, “How do we draw a line, or at least [put up] some guardrails to know when the AG is operating well within her broad, admittedly broad sphere of 63(12)?”

Moulton was referring to New York Executive Law 63(12), which is the statute James used in suing Trump. The statute allows the attorney general to apply for court intervention when “any person shall engage in repeated fraudulent or illegal acts or otherwise demonstrate persistent fraud or illegality in the carrying on, conducting or transaction of business.” Part of Sauer’s argument was that the attorney general’s conception of fraud was too loose and noted that no one was victimized by Trump’s conduct. At one point, he told the court that under existing precedent, “there has to be a capacity or tendency to deceive, or atmosphere conducive to fraud.” “And what we’ve pointed out is that you have a situation where there were no victims, no complaints,” he said, also saying that Trump’s business partners did their due diligence.

Presiding Justice Dianne Renwick was skeptical that the statute required some kind of harm in order to prove fraudulent activity. She read the relevant portion of the statute and told Vale: “I don’t read harm or threat of harm in that, but the other side is saying that that is to be read into this statute. “Are there any cases where the language harm or threat to harm limits the scope of the attorney general?” Vale said that there weren’t “as to liability and not in cases like this where what the attorney general is seeking injunctive relief and disgorgement.”

Trump is currently facing a disgorgement of $489 million with interest accruing by the day. During oral arguments, Vale encountered multiple questions about the appropriateness of the disgorgement. Moulton told Vale that the disgorgement amount was “troubling.” “How do you tether the amount that was assessed by [the] Supreme Court to the harm that was caused here, where the parties left these transactions happy about how things went down?” he asked. Vale responded that “disgorgement looks at taking the gain away from the wrongdoer.” Although the amount was high, she said that “there was a lot of fraud … and illegality.”

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Posted the video yesterday. Here’s some backgroud added in.

• FBI Specialist Urges Americans to Prepare For Hardship (MN)

A former FBI specialist who was persecuted for questioning January 6 said during a hearing with lawmakers on Capitol Hill that Americans should stock up on food and prepare for hardship. Marcus Allen, a former FBI staff operations specialist, told the Judiciary Subcommittee on Weaponization of the Federal Government that he was deliberately targeted by higher ups for asking why there were so many federal informants in the crowd at the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot. “The FBI questioned my allegiance to the United States, suspended my security clearance, suspended my pay and refused to allow me to obtain outside employment or even accept charity,” Allen testified The feds came down hard on Allen after he sent an email on September 21st, 2021 which his supervisors claimed contained hyperlinks to “extremist propaganda” from “questionable sources”.

Department of Justice Inspector General Michael Horowitz, who testified alongside Allen, is investigating the FBI’s security clearance and adjudication process, including the targeting of “political conservatives who were seen as loyal to Trump or resistant to COVID-19 vaccine mandates.” “There are no words strong enough to describe the impact the FBI’s lies about me have had on me and my family,” said Allen during an emotional statement. “The stress has taken a toll on our health and our children have suffered, traumatized by the thought of our door getting kicked in or Dad not coming home.” Allen added even more ominously: “This is a warning, to the American people I say.. I personally have no confidence the FBI will reign in its own conduct.” However, it was Allen’s final comments that raised many eyebrows.

The former FBI staffer urged Americans to use their right to vote despite any doubts they may have about election integrity. “My other recommendations are in the natural order,” Allen continued, “Arm yourself and know how to defend yourself, make three to four friends in your neighborhood and promise to come to each other’s mutual aid in times of hardship.” “And during the great depression, people stocked up their pantry, so I think that’s a good practice especially in our economic times, and make sure you have three to four months of food,” he added. Allen also urged Americans to pray and read the bible regularly.

https://twitter.com/i/status/1838976194433405052

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Boeing can’t afford any of this.

• Boeing Machinists on Strike Have a Historic Opportunity (Sawant)

In a potentially game-changing move, 33,000 Boeing machinists in the Pacific Northwest, unionized with IAM District 751, are on strike after rejecting the company’s initial insulting contract offer. A stunning 96 percent of the rank and file voted to go on strike, marking a sea change for the fight of working people at Boeing. For decades, Boeing’s executives and wealthy shareholders have, with the active help from Democrats and Republicans in Washington state and Washington D.C., enforced a decades-long brutal regime that has thrown both workers and safety standards under the bus in favor of short-term profit maximization for themselves. The strike offers an opening for the company’s workers to win historic gains and begin rebuilding a fighting union with a militant, active rank-and-file membership.

Like workers everywhere, Boeing machinists are fighting for decent wages and benefits in the face of the sky-high cost of living. The workers are demanding a 40 percent wage increase, which is the bare minimum they need given the ground they have lost in past sell-out contracts from the bosses, combined with historic inflation levels and high living costs in the region. They are angry at Boeing’s shell games, including the attempt to take away their annual employee bonuses (called “AMPP”), which they were promised in return for being forced to accept higher healthcare costs in a past contract. They are also demanding an end to the intolerable regime of mandatory overtime, which is running rampant at Boeing, denying workers the right to a life outside of work. The machinists are also fighting for a restoration of defined benefit pension, and full and retroactive reinstatement of pension for all workers.

The initial contract offer from the Boeing bosses came nowhere close to meeting these demands. What Boeing touted as a 25 percent raise over four years in the contract offer is, in reality, much less. When coupled with the cost of living and the removal of the annual AMPP bonus, the proposed raises don’t even make up for recent and future inflation, much less the severe blows from past contracts. The offer also fails to restore workers’ pensions.Since the strike began, Boeing has been forced to release a second contract offer, which includes a 30 percent pay increase over the next 4 years, up from 25 percent in the last offer. The strike has also forced Boeing to back down from their attempt to take away workers’ annual bonuses. But this new offer is still far less than what workers have been demanding and what they need, and workers immediately responded both on the picket line and in social media with their strong opposition to this totally inadequate offer, saying they must continue the strike.

The union leadership has now come out with a statement that says as much also, and which condemns the disgraceful way in which Boeing has attempted to undemocratically circumvent the union with this offer. Because of this, they are rejecting this new offer outright.In the Seattle area, a job at Boeing used to be highly sought after — it was a path to decent wages and benefits and relative stability. A common phrase among workers was “If it ain’t Boeing, I ain’t going.” With the attacks over the last 15 years, many new Boeing workers are instead being paid less than the Seattle minimum wage, and the company has had higher and higher turnover. These attacks on the workforce have gone hand-in-hand with the corporation’s major struggles in recent years with safety and quality control.

The strike comes in the wake of the machinists being sold out in a spectacularly shameful deal made over a decade ago in November 2013 by Boeing executives and shareholders with the Democratic Party-dominated Washington State Legislature, and Democratic Governor, Jay Inslee. The defined benefit pension plan, won by the unionized machinists in previous decades, was eliminated in one fell swoop. A defined benefit plan, which is currently accessible only to a small proportion of the workforce in the private sector and which was won through labor struggle, is a plan that guarantees retired workers a decent income for life. This was replaced by Boeing with a far weaker 401(K) retirement system that leaves workers at the mercy of the ups and downs of the stock market. This dramatically undermines annual retirement income, as well as shifting the risk away from the executives and major shareholders of big corporations like Boeing onto the backs of working people.

The Democratic Party justified this historic attack on both the Boeing machinists and working people statewide by claiming that it was necessary to save jobs. Boeing executives had carried out public extortion, threatening to take away the final assembly of the 777X aircraft out of Washington state, which would eliminate an estimated 10,000 union jobs. State and local Democrats from across the region insisted that the machinists accept the contract, and scandalously told them that if they didn’t, they would be responsible for not only the loss of their own jobs, but also the broader economic repercussions if Boeing were to move future production out of state.

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Shots

 

 

Hurricane


https://twitter.com/i/status/1839079306586386738

 

 

Not impresssed
https://twitter.com/i/status/1839397581476257900

 

 

Jaguar

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Debt Rattle September 25 2024

Sep 252024
 
 September 25, 2024  Posted by at 8:26 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , , ,  43 Responses »


Pablo Picasso Harlequin and woman with necklace 1917

 

• America Must Get Out of Ukraine – Trump (RT)
• Zelensky ‘Greatest Salesman In History’ – Trump (RT)
• America The Unready (Paul Craig Roberts)
• ‘Peace’ Has Become A Swear Word – Hungarian FM (RT)
• Trump: DOJ, FBI ‘Mishandling, Downplaying’ Second Assassination Attempt (JTN)
• Trump’s Protection To Be Enhanced – NBC (RT)
• Trump Urged Use Of Troops To Protect Capitol On Jan. 6, But Was Rebuffed (JTN)
• Zelensky Leaving Ukrainians to Die for BlackRock, Deep State (Miles)
• Russia Wins Ukraine Conflict Despite ‘Best’ US, NATO Weapons – Ron Paul (Sp.)
• ‘Israel Dying From One Thousand Cuts’ (Manley)
• Thirst For Money Enriches Oligarchs, But Bankrupts Europe (SCF)
• European Union Morphs Into NATO’s Financial War Machine (SCF)
• America In Collapse Plays World Leader (Pacini)
• Non-Citizens Added To States’ Voter Rolls Through DMV (JTN)
• Not Just Springfield, Haitians Being Flown To Small Towns Nationwide (Blankley)
• EVs “Up To Twice As Expensive” To Run As Regular Gas Cars In The UK (ZH)

 

 

 

 

Poll

 

 

Unrealized Gains Tax

 

 

RFK diabetes

 

 

2020

 

 

Trump states

 

 

O’Leary

 

 

John Paulson

 

 

Endorsed

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

“I think that we’re stuck in that war unless I’m president. I’ll get it done. I’ll negotiate; I’ll get us out. We gotta get out..”

• America Must Get Out of Ukraine – Trump (RT)

The United States needs a clear exit strategy for the conflict in Ukraine, former President Donald Trump told a campaign rally, insisting that neither current US leader Joe Biden nor his Democratic rival Kamala Harris has any such plan. “Biden and Kamala got us into this war in Ukraine, and now they can’t get us out. They can’t get us out,” Trump told the crowd in Savannah, Georgia, on Tuesday, reiterating his promise to end the conflict as soon as he is reelected. “I think that we’re stuck in that war unless I’m president. I’ll get it done. I’ll negotiate; I’ll get us out. We gotta get out. Biden says, ‘We will not leave until we win,’” Trump argued. “What happens if the Russians win? That’s what they do – they fight wars. As someone told me the other day, they beat Hitler; they beat Napoleon. That’s what they do. They fight. And it’s not pleasant,” Trump said.

At another campaign rally on Monday, the Republican claimed that Zelensky wants his rival to win “so badly” because, as long as Democrats remain in power, the Ukrainian leader walks away with $60 billion every time he comes to the US. Zelensky is currently in the US, where he is expected to meet with President Joe Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris, and members of Congress to present them with his “victory plan,” which, rather than involving talks, revolves around somehow forcing Moscow into submission. Ukrainian officials also claimed that Zelensky had planned to see Trump; however, a Trump campaign official told AP that no such meeting has been scheduled yet.

During Zelensky’s stay, the US intends to announce another $375 million batch of military aid to Ukraine, AP reported on Tuesday evening citing anonymous sources in Washington. The package would include missiles for HIMARS launchers, cluster bombs for Ukrainian fighter jets and other ammunition, which will come out of the US military stockpiles. By the Pentagon’s account, the US has provided Ukraine over $56 billion in direct military aid since February 2022. In April, the US approved a $61 billion military aid package for Kiev after months of opposition by some Republicans. Ukrainian officials are concerned that Trump could cut the steady flow of US military aid.

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“He wants [Harris] to win this election so badly, but I would do differently – I will work out peace..”

• Zelensky ‘Greatest Salesman In History’ – Trump (RT)

Vladimir Zelensky wants Kamala Harris to win the election “so badly,” former US President Donald Trump told a campaign rally in Pennsylvania on Tuesday. The comment comes after the Ukrainian leader cast doubt on the Republican candidate’s claims that he could promptly end the Russia-Ukraine conflict. Trump has insisted that he would tell Russian President Vladimir Putin and Zelensky to “make a deal” to end the hostilities. “I think Zelensky is the greatest salesman in history. Every time he comes into the country, he walks away with $60 billion,” Trump told his supporters. In April, the US approved a $61 billion military aid package for Kiev after months of opposition by some Republicans. Ukrainian officials are reportedly concerned that Trump could cut US military aid. “He wants [Harris] to win this election so badly, but I would do differently – I will work out peace,” Trump added.

Zelensky called Trump’s claims into question in an interview published in The New Yorker magazine on Sunday. “My feeling is that Trump doesn’t really know how to stop the war, even if he might think he knows how. With this war, oftentimes, the deeper you look at it the less you understand,” he said. The Ukrainian leader is currently in the US, where he is expected to meet with President Joe Biden, members of Congress, Kamala Harris and Donald Trump, to present them with his ‘victory plan.’ While the details of it are not clear, Zelensky told ABC News that his plan is aimed at “the strengthening of Ukraine” and its army to “push [Russian President Vladimir] Putin to stop the war.” The end of the conflict between Moscow and Kiev could be closer than one might think, according to Zelensky. “That is why we are asking our friends, our allies, to strengthen us. It is very important,” he added. Trump has said that he will “probably” meet Zelensky during his visit but no date has been scheduled.

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PCR never contemplates the option that Putin didn’t think Russia was ready for a bigger battle.

• America The Unready (Paul Craig Roberts)

Andrei Martyanov, an emigre from Russia, writes books about military strategy and America’s lack of one. He does his best to make us aware that if we are to find ourselves at war with Russia, we need better strategic thinking than we have. His latest book, America’s Final War, published by Clarity Press, tells us that the West is unprepared for the conflict the West is fomenting with Russia. Martyanov is contemptuous of American military thinking and the American echo chamber that passes for thought. Consequently, the establishment will ignore him and continue on its mistaken path. Martyanov uses Washington’s response to Russia’s Special Military Operation in Donbas to illustrate his point. Much of the book is his defense of his view of the conflict. Martyanov was the leading dissident to the view of Western pundits that Russia would be defeated and Ukraine would be victorious. The West’s propagandistic response to the conflict contributed to the West’s misunderstanding.

Believing its own misrepresentation of the conflict, the West continued to convince itself that just a little more Western intervention would turn the tide. Add this weapons system. Then this one. Then F-15s, and at the present time the Western idiots are deciding whether the US and NATO will launch long-range missiles into Russia from Ukraine. Such a desperate measure, which Putin said would mean the US and NATO are at war with Russia, is a powerful indication that Ukraine is defeated, just as Martyanov said would be the case. Martyanov is protective of Putin. I think because Putin did not invade Ukraine and immediately overthrow the neo-Nazi Regime Washington has established there. Instead he limited Russian arms to clearing Ukrainian forces out of Donbas, a former Russian territory that Soviet leaders attached to Ukraine. Putin has accepted numerous insults and provocations without expanding the war beyond his Special Military Operation. It is Putin, not the West, who has resisted the expansion of a limited conflict into a wider war.

I join Martyanov in admiring Putin for his concern with the life of humanity. Where I depart from Martyanov and Putin is that I regard Russia’s victory in Ukraine as tactical, not strategic. It is in strategy that Martyanov sees Russia’s advantage. Putin’s strategy was to avoid wider war by limiting the conflict to clearing Donbas, a Russian area of Ukraine, of Ukraine forces that were killing Russian people. I appreciate the good will in Putin’s decision, but he misread his adversary, and his decision was a strategic error of potentially immense consequences. To keep the US/NATO from becoming ever more involved in the conflict and, thus, ever widening the conflict, Putin needed to quickly prevail. He could not do this without attacking Kiev, preventing the government from continuing the fight, and sealing Ukraine’s borders with the West.

Thus, Putin’s Special Military Operation guaranteed increasing Western involvement, more casualties, and a wider war which, if Washington joins the European and British decision to fire missiles into Russia, brings us World War III. This is a total failure of strategic thinking on Russia’s part. How do we explain this? I think that Martyanov is correct that Russia has a war strategy whereas the West has bluster and delusion. But why didn’t strategy come into play in Ukraine? How did Putin convince himself that he was going to keep Ukraine out of NATO simply by evicting Ukrainian forces from Donbas? One possible answer is that Putin did not realize who the enemy was. It was not the puppet in Kiev. The enemy was in Washington, London, Berlin, Paris. Did Putin only see the enemy in Donbas? Did he not know that he was at war with the US and NATO?

The neoconservative doctrine that the principle goal of US foreign policy is the prevention of the rise of any country that can serve as a constraint on American unilateralism is perhaps too absurd for the Russians to take seriously. This policy declaration is known as the Wolfowitz Doctrine. It has been in effect since 1991 when the Soviet Union collapsed, which removed constraint on US unilateralism. In public statements Putin shows awareness that Washington expects Russia, China, and Iran to accommodate themselves to Washington’s “rules based order.” Washington’s rules, of course. This is not subject to discussion and negotiation. It is a requirement. Not realizing the implications of this requirement is the mistake of the Russian, Chinese, and Iranian governments.

Putin
https://twitter.com/i/status/1838272642702348615

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“Diplomacy should provide the tools for international policy-making, which should be based on dialogue… We must cease attempts to discredit those arguing for peace..”

• ‘Peace’ Has Become A Swear Word – Hungarian FM (RT)

It is wrong that “peace” has become a curse word in international politics, Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto has insisted. The fighting between Russia and Ukraine and the conflict in the Middle East are at risk of escalating and could “undermine global security at any moment,” Szijjarto said in his speech at the Summit of the Future at UN headquarters in New York on Monday. Humanity could be faced with two “sad” scenarios if tensions keep mounting: the outbreak of the Third World War or the world being divided into blocs again, he warned. The question now is whether such outcomes could be avoided and “whether the global pro-peace majority can ensure that the word ‘peace’ is not used as a swear word in international politics,” the foreign minister stressed.

“European politicians usually argue in favor of diplomacy and peaceful solutions to certain wars if they are far away from Europe, but nowadays, unfortunately, a war is going on in Europe, and those who argue in favor of peace are immediately stigmatized, attacked and criticized,” he said. According to Szijjarto, those who are calling for a diplomatic solution to the Ukrainian crisis are being “branded [Russian President Vladimir] Putin’s puppets and Russian spies, even as Europe is itself adding fuel to the conflict.” The international political system must undergo a fundamental change for the current problems to be resolved, and the UN has “a major role” to play in this, he argued.

“Diplomacy should provide the tools for international policy-making, which should be based on dialogue… We must cease attempts to discredit those arguing for peace,” he stressed. Unlike most EU member states, Hungary has refused to supply weapons to Ukraine during the conflict with Russia, criticized the bloc’s sanctions against Moscow, and consistently called for a diplomatic solution to the crisis. In July, after Budapest had assumed the European Council’s half-year rotating presidency, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban embarked on a ‘peace mission’ in an attempt to settle the conflict between Moscow and Kiev. He visited Ukraine, Russia and China, as well as met with Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump in the US.

His plan reportedly includes making concessions to Russia regarding NATO expansion in Europe, which Moscow has listed as one of the key reasons for launching its military operation in February 2022. However, Orban’s initiative faced harsh criticism in Brussels, with the bloc’s foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell, insisting that the Hungarian PM was “not representing the EU in any form” and European Council President Charles Michel labeling the peace mission “a problem” and saying that it was “not acceptable.”

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They have enhanced the charges now.

• Trump: DOJ, FBI ‘Mishandling, Downplaying’ Second Assassination Attempt (JTN)

Former President Donald Trump on Monday issued a scathing statement against the FBI and Department of Justice, accusing them of “mishandling and downplaying” the second assassination attempt against him. Trump became the subject of an apparent assassination attempt in mid-September while golfing at his Palm Beach course. During that incident, the Secret Service engaged with an armed suspect after an agent noticed the barrel of an AK-47 protruding from the bushes where he was hiding. The suspect fled and authorities subsequently arrested Ryan Wesley Routh, 58, in connection with the incident. Routh currently faces gun charges for possessing a firearm while a felon and possessing a firearm with an obliterated serial number. “The Kamala Harris/Joe Biden Department of Justice and FBI are mishandling and downplaying the second assassination attempt on my life since July,” Trump said.

“The charges brought against the maniac assassin are a slap on the wrist. It’s no wonder, since the DOJ and FBI have been coming after me nonstop with Weaponized Lawfare since I announced my first Historic Campaign for the Presidency.” Trump further accused the DOJ and FBI of a “conflict of interest” and insisted the agencies were obsessed with “getting Trump.” He then insisted that state authorities would bring a more rigorous prosecution. “If the DOJ and FBI cannot do their job honestly and without bias, and hold the aspiring assassin responsible to the full extent of the Law, Governor Ron DeSantis and the State of Florida have already agreed to take the lead on the investigation and prosecution,” he added. “Florida charges would be much more serious than the ones the FBI has announced. The TRUTH would be followed, wherever it leads.”

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First, ‘only a sitting president gets max protection’, then ‘he already has the same protection’, and now even ‘that protection has to be enhanced’.

• Trump’s Protection To Be Enhanced – NBC (RT)

Security around former US President Donald Trump will be heightened in light of the recent assassination attempts on the Republican presidential nominee, NBC News reported on Monday citing a Secret Service official. Trump was targeted during a rally in Pennsylvania in July, when a lone gunman managed to fire several shots at the former president, grazing his ear, killing one audience member and injuring another two. Earlier this month, another would-be assassin, 58-year-old Ryan Wesley Routh, was arrested by the Secret Service after being spotted near a Trump-owned golf course in Florida apparently trying to take a shot at the former president. The would-be assassin was found with a Soviet-made rifle and a backpack full of armor plates.

“Given recent events, the Secret Service is taking a heightened posture in its protection of the former president,” an agency official told NBC News. According to the outlet, the new security measures have already been put in place and could be seen on Monday when Trump got off his plane in Pennsylvania with a Secret Service agent following closely behind him. Last week, the US House of Representatives also passed a bill to boost Secret Service protections for all presidential nominees, including Trump, Vice President Kamala Harris, and their running mates.

Specifically, the new bill requires that the Secret Service apply “the same standards for determining the number of agents required to protect presidents, vice presidents, and major presidential and vice presidential candidates.” “We as a federal government have a responsibility to ensure the safety and the well-being of these candidates. One of them is going to be president, and the election should be decided by voters at the ballot box — not by an assassin’s bullet,” Congressman Mike Lawler, who introduced the legislation, told reporters on Friday. “If the argument by the Secret Service is that they don’t have enough resources or they don’t have enough manpower, then that needs to be addressed immediately,” he said.

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“..civilian leadership at the Pentagon admittedly openly they would not comply with Trump’s wishes..”

“..President Trump banter that you all are familiar with, and in no way, shape, or form did I interpret that as an order or direction..”

• Trump Urged Use Of Troops To Protect Capitol On Jan. 6, But Was Rebuffed (JTN)

Then-President Donald Trump gave clear instructions to Pentagon brass days before the Jan. 6 riots to “do whatever it takes” to keep the U.S. Capitol safe, including deploying National Guard or active-duty troops, but top officials did not comply because of political concerns, according to transcripts of bombshell interviews conducted by the Defense Department’s chief watchdog that shine new light on government disfunction ahead of the historic tragedy. Gen. Mark Milley, the former chairman of the Joints Chief of Staff, confirmed to the Pentagon inspector general three years ago that during a Jan. 3, 2021, Oval Office meeting Trump pre-approved the use of National Guard or active duty troops to keep peace in the nation’s capital on the day Congress was to certify the results of the 2020 election. Milley’s interviews were among several key to transcripts obtained by House Administration Oversight Subcommittee Chairman Barry Loudermilk, R-Ga., and shared with Just the News.

“The President just says, ‘Hey look at this. It’s going to be a large amount of protesters come in here on the 6th, and make sure that you have sufficient National Guard or Soldiers to make sure it’s a safe event,’” Milley told the inspector general in one of two interviews he did in spring 2021 during a probe of the Pentagon’s response to Jan. 6. Milley said then-Acting Defense Secretary Christopher Miller, himself a former general, assured Trump there was an adequate safety plan for Pentagon assistance to Washington, D.C. “Miller responds by saying, ‘Hey, we’ve got a plan, and we’ve got it covered.’ And that’s about it,” Milley recalled. Milley confirmed a second time during the interviews that Trump was clear in his wishes. “It was just what I just described, which was, ‘Hey, I don’t care if you use Guard, or soldiers, active-duty soldiers, do whatever you have to do. Just make sure it’s safe,” the general told the IG.

The transcripts of Milley’s April 8, 2021, and April 16, 2021, interviews confirm reporting by Just the News two years ago that Trump wanted troops to keep the capital city safe. But other transcripts gathered by Loudermilk during his subcommittee’s ongoing probe of Jan. 6 security failures show civilian leadership at the Pentagon admittedly openly they would not comply with Trump’s wishes, with some saying they did not like the optics of armed soldiers or Guardsmen roaming the Capitol with weapons during what was supposed to be a peaceful transition of power.

[..] ex-Defense Secretary Miller told Congress that Trump gave a specific number of troops he wanted to see made available for security ahead of Jan. 6. “The President commented that they were going to need 10,000 troops the following day…I interpreted it as a bit of presidential banter or President Trump banter that you all are familiar with, and in no way, shape, or form did I interpret that as an order or direction,” Miller testified. But Milley, the former Joint Chiefs chairman, said he did not recall that number ever being uttered in the meetings with Trump. “There was no discussion of 10,000 troops,” the retired four-star general said.

The transcripts also provide some hints that top Pentagon officials personally disliked the 45th president. For instance, former Acting Secretary Miller at one point compared the former president to Cuba’s most infamous communist leader, the late Fidel Castro. “Everyone was like, ‘Did you listen to the President’s speech?’ I’m like, ‘The guy speaks for 90 minutes, it’s like Castro or something. No. I’ve got work to do,” Miller told the IG at one point.

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“Zelensky… could have stopped this war before it started..” [..] “That’s why he has to continue this rhetoric, to stay in power.”

• Zelensky Leaving Ukrainians to Die for BlackRock, Deep State (Miles)

While politicians wage a propaganda war to ensure continued funding for the Western proxy conflict against Russia, average Ukrainians are left to suffer for the sake of powerful outside interests, according to one whistleblower and former diplomat. Analyst Andrii Telizhenko, who previously served in Ukraine’s government but fled the country after facing opposition to his anti-war beliefs, joined Sputnik’s The Final Countdown program Monday, lamenting the fate of hundreds of thousands of young Ukrainian men and women who have sacrificed their lives for the intractable US-backed conflict. The former government official said Kiev has lost 970,000 troops since 2022, confirming previous analysis that has placed the number of Ukrainian deaths during the conflict at close to one million. “Zelensky… could have stopped this war before it started,” said Telizhenko of the controversial figure, whose constitutional mandate as president of Ukraine ended in May. “That’s why he has to continue this rhetoric, to stay in power.”

“He can’t [negotiate] because he’s owned by the West, by Washington, by London, by BlackRock, by the military industrial complex, so they’re not gonna let him do that,” he continued. “They are making money out of this war and getting everything they can out of Ukraine and out of the resources that Ukraine has. So he has no other possibility. He could have stopped it as soon as he became the president in 2019.” “He could have [granted] Donbass… autonomy without losing hundreds of thousands of lives,” the former diplomat noted, faulting Zelensky for not following through on a peace plan reached with Russia in Istanbul or implementing the Minsk Accords after campaigning on the issue in 2019. Ukraine’s Western allies have intervened multiple times to prevent Ukraine from reaching a peaceful resolution to its differences with Russia, most recently when the Zelensky regime took part in talks with Moscow after the launch of its special military operation.

The United States intervened to put an end to at least two separate rounds of peace negotiations, according to testimony from former Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett and revelations about the role played by former UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson. Neoconservative elements in Washington have long sought to respond to the perceived threat of Russian military and diplomatic power, but the interests of large Western financial institutions in seeing the proxy war continue have received less attention. The US investment firm BlackRock and Delaware-based bank JP Morgan have launched a massive fund for public and private interests to invest in Ukraine’s reconstruction, it was announced earlier this year. It has been estimated that some half a trillion dollars could be sought to help the country rebuild. BlackRock CEO Larry Fink has emerged as one of the Democratic Party’s most prominent supporters, working behind the scenes with a number of wealthy donors to help Democrats craft campaign strategy as the party ultimately chose to replace President Joe Biden on the presidential ticket.

The investment firm was subjected to significant criticism from Republican presidential candidates during the party’s primary earlier this year; BlackRock has publicly supported progressive-leaning environmental, social, and governance (ESG) corporate principles and has made Democratic Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) the largest recipient of its campaign contributions. “Zelensky is… destroying his own country, leaving people to die for BlackRock, for Washington, for London – and Lindsey Graham confirmed it,” Telizhenko claimed, referring to the hawkish senator’s unyielding support for the proxy conflict. “Ukraine has trillions of dollars… worth of resources. That’s why we’re fighting this war. This is why Zelensky has to continue this war.

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“The US government’s “obsession” with Ukraine is going to “get us all killed..”

• Russia Wins Ukraine Conflict Despite ‘Best’ US, NATO Weapons – Ron Paul (Sp.)

Russia’s special military operation in Ukraine is succeeding despite the regime in Kiev receiving billions of dollars in weapons from the United States and other NATO allies, former US Congressman Ron Paul said on Monday. “The fact is that Russia is winning the war despite hundreds of billions of dollars and the best weapons systems from the US and NATO countries. Each new shipment of increasingly sophisticated weapons does not produce battlefield victories for Ukraine. It only produces more dead Ukrainian soldiers and more profits for the weapons manufacturers,” Paul said in a column for the Ron Paul Institute for Peace and Prosperity.

The world narrowly avoided nuclear destruction last week due to the Biden administration reportedly denying Ukraine’s request to strike deep inside Russian territory, Paul said. However, previous requests by Ukraine have been initially denied then granted later, Paul added. The US government’s “obsession” with Ukraine is going to “get us all killed,” Paul said. US arms manufacturers are the driving force behind the country’s interventionist foreign policy, Paul said. It is “madness” to risk the future of the US for wars that have nothing to do with the country and serve no national interest, Paul said. The statement applies to both the conflict in Ukraine and conflicts in the Middle East, according to Paul.

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“Now what the Hezbollah are sending in are just rockets. They haven’t really put into effect their high precision missiles that they have yet.”

• ‘Israel Dying From One Thousand Cuts’ (Manley)

Israel and Hezbollah have now entered a stage in their nearly year-long conflict that reports say is verging on a full-out war. Citing Israel’s military, The Wall Street Journal reported on Sunday that “dozens of warplanes” struck southern Lebanon on Saturday night into Sunday morning. In response to attacks on Lebanon’s communication devices, Hezbollah targeted Israel’s Rafael Advanced Defense Systems which is one of the developers of its Iron Dome air-defense system over the weekend. Hezbollah also said that they targeted Israel’s Ramat David Airbase near Haifa.Michael Maloof, a former senior security policy analyst with the Office of the Secretary of Defense, joined Sputnik’s The Final Countdown on Monday to discuss the increasing hostility between Israel and Hezbollah.

“[Displacing people is a] major problem for the Israeli government. That’s why they’ve now decided to put Gaza aside and start extending northward because they need to try to reopen that northern part. Because you got increasingly disgruntled population of Israelis, many of whom are saying they’re never going to return. Now, the Israeli government’s got to find room for them and new placement,” Maloof explained. “They have to pay for it and it’s draining the Israeli economy.” A week ago, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s security cabinet made the decision to initiate the return of residents to the north of Israel an “official war goal”, BBC reported. About 60,000 people were evacuated from the area due to the conflict between Hezbollah and Israel as the conflict in the Gaza Strip nears its one-year anniversary.

During a military parade in Tehran on Saturday which commemorated the Iran-Iraq War of 1980-1988, Iran revealed a new solid-fueled ballistic missile dubbed the Jihad (Holy War). The missile has a reported range of up to 1,000 km and was designed by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ aerospace division, Sputnik reported on Saturday. “[Iran is] going to have to respond sooner than later because Hezbollah is, I should say Lebanon, not just Hezbollah, but Lebanon is now being attacked with missiles, soon to be with ground forces. That’s from reports that I’m getting there. There are troops coming up from Gaza as well as tanks being rolled into the northern parts to enter southern Lebanon,” the analyst explained.

“So, this is getting [riskier] by the day. It isn’t just, as I said, a tit-for-tat. Now it’s escalating on a daily basis, and that portends something very serious,” the expert said. “…this [conflict] could extend because I also see we’re going to have the Iraqi Shia and the, potentially, the Iranians and the Yemenis coming in on this,” he added. “Now what the Hezbollah are sending in are just rockets. They haven’t really put into effect their high precision missiles that they have yet. And, they may be doing some around the Haifa area. I understand that Haifa has been hit pretty much, but all news about that has been blacked out.”

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“By continuously and incessantly sending weapons, the German company has managed to escape a serious financial crisis..”

• Thirst For Money Enriches Oligarchs, But Bankrupts Europe (SCF)

There are many reasons why Europe wants to prolong the war in Ukraine. Irrational liberal ideology and commitment to the project of a unipolar global order are undoubtedly the most important reasons. However, business and private profit cannot be ignored. According to many recent reports, there has been a huge increase in the profits of military-industrial companies in a number of Western countries, which explains the thirst for war of the pro-Ukrainian oligarchies. One of the most notorious cases of this war profiteering is taking place in Germany. The military giant Rheinmettall is seeing its profits growing amid a wave of systematic support for the Kiev regime. By continuously and incessantly sending weapons, the German company has managed to escape a serious financial crisis and now has a chance to once again rank among the world’s leading defense companies.

Rheinmettal ‘s business was in a bad way. The company was on the verge of abandoning the military sector to focus on civilian production, since most of its profits were coming from the production of automobile parts. However, Germany’s participation in military assistance programs led the corporation to revitalize its production of weapons and ammunition, once again becoming a global giant in the sector. Armored vehicles, tanks, ammunition, artillery pieces and air defense systems are some of the products in Rheinmettal’s current industrial catalog. After making adventures into industrial base projects on the Polish-Ukrainian border, the company is now working on opening a new factory in Saxony, where it expects to produce more than one hundred thousand artillery shells per year. Obviously, the German state is interested in these profits.

Recently, an action plan by the German government was announced to use part of the profits of Rheinmettal for reindustrialization projects – which seem more necessary now than ever, since Germany has been the country most affected by the anti-Russian madness. It only remains to be seen how this reindustrialization will be possible without Russian gas and cheap energy. In short, Germany believes it is profiting from the war. But this calculation is wrong – as well as dangerous and irresponsible. The profits do not go to the German people, but to a small number of defense oligarchs who employ an absolute minority of German society. Furthermore, the real economic revival is minimal, since the constant demand for weapons requires a systematic production routine that hinders any research project in technological innovation. In other words, Rheinmetall – as well as the entire Western military-industrial complex – is doomed to continually produce the same type of equipment according to its current samples, without any relevant innovation.

Industry without innovation has little chance of long-term success. Western weapons, which have already proven to be largely unsuitable for the Ukrainian battlefield, are likely to become increasingly obsolete, and there will be no capacity for technological renewal, since, thanks to anti-Russian sanctions, the precarious European society is reaching a pre-industrial stage of development. And, still on the subject of sanctions, it is important to emphasize that increased spending on the military industry could be a ticking time bomb for a country without reliable sources of cheap energy. After the blockade of Russian gas, Germany has been experiencing a period of profound energy instability, depending on unusual alternative sources to meet its needs – such as burning wood or buying American gas at exorbitant prices. This scenario is completely inconsistent with a situation of economic development and stability.

Germany will discover an old lesson in economics: the private profits of the oligarchies do not reflect a real situation of economic development and social well-being. Without solving the problems generated by sanctions – which obstruct technological innovation – and without relieving the pressure on the systematic production of weapons, not even constant demand will be able to save Germany and the whole of Europe from a deep crisis. Despite the profits, aid to Ukraine remains an obstacle to European economic progress, pleasing only transnational oligarchies.

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The arms industry loves the Baltics.

• European Union Morphs Into NATO’s Financial War Machine (SCF)

Two key posts – in foreign and defense policy – reveal the militarist and anti-Russia direction of the European Union. Ursula Von der Leyen, the president of the European Commission – which works as the executive branch of the European Union – announced her new team of commissioners for the next five years. Taking over as foreign affairs minister for the 27-nation bloc is Kaja Kallas who is a staunch Russophobe and vigorous supporter of Ukraine. Kallas has called for more EU and NATO military funding for Ukraine to “defeat Russia” and the break up of the Russian Federation. The former Estonian prime minister has led the movement to destroy Soviet Red Army monuments across the Baltic states. (This is while her investor husband continues to profit from doing business with Russia.)

Working closely alongside Kallas will be another rabid Russophobe, the former Lithuanian prime minister Andrius Kubilius, who is taking up a newly created EU post as defense commissioner. The creation of that post is an alarming sign of how the EU bloc has transitioned from a trade and political union to a military organization. But what’s even more alarming is the assigning of such an anti-Russia hawk as Kubilius to oversee military policy. At a time when relations between the EU and Russia have become so fraught with tensions, the European bloc is giving politicians from hostile Baltic states a driving seat to push relations even further towards conflict. Indeed, the first announcement Kubilius made as the prospective new defense commissioner was that the European Union would likely be at war with Russia in the next six to eight years. That assessment is shared by Kaja Kallas.

Kubilius said the sole focus during his tenure is ramping up military spending by the EU nations to boost NATO and aid Ukraine. He said that he will be working closely with foreign policy chief Kallas to tap funds. What this means is that the European Union is moving towards making it mandatory for national budgets to allocate more to military procurement. That’s a breakthrough for all the worst reasons. Kubilius is reportedly aiming for a budget of €500 billion over the next five years to be spent on the military by the EU. That increase would represent about half of the projected EU total budget. His comments indicate the purpose of the massive redirection of finances – to boost NATO. Kubilius noted that “the European Union has instruments to get larger financing, which NATO doesn’t.”

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“..the masses have been fed an education that has resulted in a general impoverishment, a sudden lowering of skills and irreparable cultural damage..”

• America In Collapse Plays World Leader (Pacini)

American officials have sacrificed national security for decades in pursuit of national superiority. Further arms supplies to Ukraine will not guarantee victory for Kiev, but will only lead to escalation. This is not in the interest of the U.S., which should first and foremost take care of its own population. Some might ask the American political leadership – of whatever faction it is – whether they have realised that the U.S. is no longer the boss of the world. If the answer is no, an extensive update dossier would be needed, to be delivered very quickly to the desk of the president on duty. There is no more time. We repeat: there is no more time. The United States is in the midst of a political crisis afflicting the entire West (which happens to be directly influenced by the USA) and has not yet managed to resolve it.

This poses a major disadvantage internationally, because all around there is a world that is moving forward, in a multipolar key, with a large number of governments and peoples who no longer want to remain under the heel of the invader and who are rebelling, some through markets, some through partnerships, some through revolutions. In all of this, the U.S. is in the midst of a social crisis that mirrors the unprecedented political one. The demise of the West, as Oswald Spengler put it, is louder than people think. Nobody cares about Americans any more, because there are basically no politicians who have America at heart any more, while they rather have their own interests at heart. This process of separation of governance-representation-people is one of the most delicate points of a transition phase that will lead the whole of humanity to have to rethink the political processes through which societies organise themselves.

The problem is that the U.S. is still an imperialist political system with tentacles all over the world, and the dollar has been the main currency dominating the planet for almost a century, so the consequences of this debacle will be equally unprecedented. The final metastasis of a sick society cannot be avoided. The American generational problem is very much reflected in the country’s foreign policy: while it is true that there is a masterful consistency with the long-term planning that was established at the beginning of the 20th century, it is equally true that things have not gone as strategists and analysts expected. Reality must now be reckoned with. The U.S. has a very exclusive, lobbying, elitist education system linked to a few power groups, whose dependence on the ‘matrices’ of London and Tel Aviv makes the success of candidates complex. Many are called but few are elected, to paraphrase the well-known gospel verse.

Instead, the masses have been fed an education that has resulted in a general impoverishment, a sudden lowering of skills and irreparable cultural damage, starting a process that is self-perpetuating through its own successes (which are actually failures). Who will think about Americans in the future? Not even the current election candidates have managed to find the minimum number of successors. While the belligerent rhetoric continues, the U.S. is being destabilised by an unprecedented illegal immigration, settling social protests with violence or a few doses of new cheap psychotropic drugs, producing some new mass entertainment to keep the protest within tolerable limits. Perhaps nobody really cares what will happen in the ‘New World’ across the Atlantic Ocean. Or perhaps they care enough to let the murderer die his own death.

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“We have hundreds where they actually mark on the form, ‘hello, not a citizen,’ and they still get registered to vote..”

• Non-Citizens Added To States’ Voter Rolls Through DMV (JTN)

Non-citizens have been added to several states’ voter rolls largely through motor vehicle departments, sometimes even after they have explained that they are not U.S. citizens. States have been discovering non-citizens on their voter rolls over the years, with many being added through the “motor voter” process at motor vehicle departments that began with the National Voter Registration Act of 1993 (NVRA). If non-citizens are seeking to become naturalized citizens, then being illegally registered to vote can prevent that from occurring. An election integrity group has examined states’ voter rolls for years, finding many non-citizens who are illegally registered to vote across the country. J. Christian Adams, president of the Public Interest Legal Foundation (PILF), said on a Just the News special report with The Association of Mature American Citizens to be aired Tuesday that non-citizens had been registered to vote in Pennsylvania for decades.

“Pennsylvania had been registering non-citizens, by admission – this wasn’t some conspiracy on the internet – and they admitted they had been registering non-citizens for 20 years at PennDOT, and it was a glitch, they called it,” Adams said. “So we use the National Voter Registration Act to go in to try to get the records of how bad the problem was, the records of how they fixed the problem, or allegedly fixed it, and they’ve been stonewalling us for about seven years.” He explained that PILF had oral arguments earlier this month before “the Third Circuit Federal Court of Appeals in Philadelphia, defending our win. Hopefully, eventually, Pennsylvania coughs up the records.” In 2017, Pennsylvania Secretary of State Al Schmidt, a Republican who was a Philadelphia city commissioner at the time, told a Pennsylvania Senate committee that there were over 100,000 matches of voter registration records to state driver’s license numbers with Immigration and Naturalization Service indicators.

The matches don’t mean that all of those people were registered to vote, but Schmidt argued: “We’re not talking about an insignificant number here. We’re talking about a potentially very significant number of thousands and tens of thousands.” The Pennsylvania Department of State announced in September 2017 that records indicated 1,160 non-citizens since 1972 had requested their voter registrations be canceled. Meanwhile, in California, PILF filed a federal lawsuit in February against the Alameda County Registrar of Voters for allegedly violating the NVRA by not disclosing records of foreign nationals registering to vote and voting for more than 20 years. Non-citizens have been placed on voter rolls through motor vehicle departments by lying about their citizenship, Adams also noted. “[W]e’ve collected over the years of the data on how non-citizens get in, and it’s largely by not telling the truth in the motor voter process. And it includes people here on green cards, people here legally,” Adams added.

“Most of the people who get registered to vote, according to the data we’ve collected, are actual, legal residents, like 90% of them, 95%. And so they get sucked into the system, through motor voter, through DMV, and they get registered to vote that way, and it’s a big problem,” he continued. However, sometimes, non-citizens still get on states’ voter rolls despite explaining their citizenship status. “People get registered to vote when they tell, on their voter registration form, the election officials, that they are not a citizen,” Adams said. “We have hundreds where they actually mark on the form, ‘hello, not a citizen,’ and they still get registered to vote,” he explained.

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“The TPS (Temporary Permanent Status) program “came from the White House and is a Homeland Security policy..”

• Not Just Springfield, Haitians Being Flown To Small Towns Nationwide (Blankley)

Haitians are not just arriving in Springfield, Ohio, but also in small rural towns nationwide as a result of several Biden-Harris administration policies. Since fiscal 2021, more than 485,000 Haitian illegal border crossers, a record, have been reported by U.S. Customs and Border Protection. The overwhelming majority were reported this fiscal year, nearly 216,000, compared to 48,727 in fiscal 2021. Since fiscal 2021 through August, the majority have been apprehended at the southwest border of nearly 262,000, followed by nearly 221,000 nationwide and nearly 2,300 at the northern border, according to the data. Additionally, since July, 205,000 Haitians have been released through the CHNV parole program, according to CBP data. Of the more than 765,000 illegal foreign nationals released into the country through the CBP One app, the top nationality is Haitian.

Through these programs, U.S. Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas also extended Temporary Permanent Status to them and granted work authorization. All of these programs are illegal, state attorneys general who’ve sued to stop them, argue. U.S. House Republicans also cited them as among the many illegal actions Mayorkas caused them to impeach him. Mayorkas has since only expanded the programs and extended TPS. When responding to the Haitian influx, local officials claim Haitians are there to work and are contributing to society despite claims by residents to the contrary. The city of Springfield claims a “surge in our population over the last several years, primarily due to an influx of legal immigrants,” suggesting that Springfield “is an appealing place for many reasons including lower cost of living and available work.”

Springfield Mayor Bob Rue has said “my hands are tied in many ways” about the influx of Haitians, pointing to a designation they were given by the Biden-Harris administration. The TPS program “came from the White House and is a Homeland Security policy,” he said at a recent city commission meeting. Springfield residents have argued the overwhelming majority of Haitians are enrolling in welfare and not working; have caused increased crime and there aren’t enough police to deal with it; and residents are being killed by Haitian drivers. Rue has expressed concerns about the dangerous driving conditions, saying, “I have almost been hit myself.”

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“..rapid chargers cost 24.1p per mile, while slower chargers cost 16.4p per mile. This is roughly double the cost of a diesel car at 12.5p per mile, with petrol cars costing 14.5p per mile.”

• EVs “Up To Twice As Expensive” To Run As Regular Gas Cars In The UK (ZH)

As if the EV boom needed another nail its in coffin, the UK has now produced figures showing that driving and electric vehicle is “up to twice as expensive” as driving a regular gas powered car. Data from the app ZapMap has confirmed that operating an electric vehicle (EV) can cost over 24p per mile, compared to 12.5p per mile for a diesel vehicle, according to Yahoo Finance and The Telegraph. And charging an EV at a rapid or ultra-rapid roadside station can reach up to 80p per kilowatt hour. According to calculations by The Times, a typical electric car travels 3.3 miles per kWh, making rapid chargers cost 24.1p per mile, while slower chargers cost 16.4p per mile. This is roughly double the cost of a diesel car at 12.5p per mile, with petrol cars costing 14.5p per mile.

A round trip from London to Penzance would cost £148 using rapid chargers, compared to £77 for diesel and £89 for petrol. Charging at home is much cheaper, costing less than a third of rapid chargers. ZapMap noted a 5% rise in rapid charger prices over the past year, despite a 30% drop in electricity wholesale prices and falling oil prices, the report says. The Yahoo report says that even drivers using slower public chargers, which can fully recharge a vehicle in about 30 minutes, pay more per mile than petrol or diesel users. The number of rapid and ultra-rapid charging stations in Britain has risen by 40%, now exceeding 12,500. However, electric car sales have slowed, making up 17.2% of new registrations in 2024, down from 18.7% in late 2022. Currently, rapid chargers cost EV drivers 24.1p per mile, while slower chargers cost 16.4p per mile.

Read more …

 

 

 

 

Meloni

 

 

Shepherd

 

 

Diabetes

 

 

Bees

 

 

Tiny house dragon

 

 

Cats

 

 

Kitty

 

 

Evzones

 

 

Ali

 

 

 

 

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

 

 

 

 

 

Debt Rattle August 23 2024

Aug 232024
 
 August 23, 2024  Posted by at 9:08 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , ,  76 Responses »


Salvador Dali Spain 1936-38

 

• Russian Residency Law Helps Westerners Escape Posthuman Globalist Madness (Sp.)
• ‘Muslim Women for Harris’ Disbands After DNC Controversy (RT)
• Trump Says He Was Queen Elizabeth II’s ‘Favorite President’ – Daily Mail (RT)
• New York AG Asks Appeals Court to Uphold Trump $454 Million Judgment (ET)
• Secret Service Agents Placed on Leave After Trump Assassination Attempt (RCP)
• Judge Rules RFK Jr. Can Sue Biden Admin Over Censorship (ZH)
• Tucker Carlson, Trump Jr. Pushed Kennedy to Endorse Donald Trump (Sp.)
• Ukraine Tried To Attack Russian Nuclear Plant – Putin (RT)
• Czech President Sounds Like An International Terrorist – Moscow (RT)
• Moscow Charges CNN Journalist With Illegal Border Crossing (RT)
• Nord Stream Ecocide & Fall of Germany ‘Engineered by Western Powers’ (Miles)
• FBI Promises Continued Crackdown on US Journalists, Dissidents (SP.)

 

 

 

 

What’s that glass for again?

 

 

Gouge

 

 

2025
https://twitter.com/i/status/1826513047201944040

 

 

Russell Crowe

 

 

Bill
https://twitter.com/i/status/1826445094905675913

 

 

Trump SNL 2015

 

 

Oprah

 

 

Von Trump


https://twitter.com/i/status/1826346571400970330

 

 

 

 

“..a “satanic new wave” of ideas which are “very popular among the Western elite, but absolutely disgusting to the rest of humanity.”

• Russian Residency Law Helps Westerners Escape Posthuman Globalist Madness (Sp.)

Russia has rejected globalism and now serves as a safe haven for Westerners who are feeling oppressed by neoliberal destructive ideas in their homeland, US journalist Timothy Kirby told Sputnik. President Vladimir Putin signed a decree on August 19 providing foreigners who share Russia’s spiritual and moral values, and who seek to escape the West’s destructive neoliberal ideals, with a temporary residence permit in Russia. “The law provides Westerners something that they’ve sought for a long time – the opportunity to move to Russia,” Timothy Kirby, an American-born journalist and radio host, told Sputnik. Earlier, Western foreigners couldn’t immigrate to Russia without a legal basis, but now “the door has finally started to open,” he added. Under the new law, the temporary residence permit would be granted outside the quota approved by the Russian government, and without the need for confirmation of the applicants’ knowledge of the Russian language, Russian history, and basic laws.

However, they would have to submit a written statement, stating reasons for moving, to their local Russian diplomatic mission or consular office. In addition, Putin has instructed the Russian Foreign Ministry to draw up a list of states imposing destructive neoliberal values. “In a lot of ways, Russia is the country that is leading the fight against some of the absolute madness that comes from the West,” Kirby added, referring in particular, to the absurd idea that “gender” is some sort of social construct that has nothing to do with one’s sex assigned at birth. Another Western theory says that patriarchy is designed to “repress women for some reason, even though women aren’t particularly repressed,” he continued. Kirby emigrated from the US to Russia in 2006 and calls himself “an advocate for life in Russia” for those who oppose a “satanic new wave” of ideas which are “very popular among the Western elite, but absolutely disgusting to the rest of humanity.”

“Russia and the Russian people are facing the challenges of the 21st century; a lot of intellectuals would basically call it the era of postmodernism,” Kirby said. “The average person in Russia, whether they understand it or not, rejects this. Russians have chosen to remain human, to keep going with society, to reject globalism, to reject some sort of post-human and post-modern bizarre future. And that’s a good thing… And God bless Russia for it.” Conservative Westerners have been relocating to Russia for quite a while. Speaking to Sputnik last year, Father Joseph Gleason, an American-born Orthodox priest, had expressed hopes that moving to Russia could be simplified for family-oriented, hard-working Christian immigrants. Gleason moved to Russia with his wife and eight children in 2017 to escape the Western aggressive neoliberal agenda. Since then, he has been assisting other conservatives to settle in the country.

“Now, in America, there are cases of people losing their jobs, not being able to find a new job, being denied an education, and not being able to get into a university – simply because they’re opposed to homosexual behavior, and because they’re opposed to this lie of homosexual marriage, or because they’re opposed to transgenderism,” Gleason told Sputnik in August 2023. Earlier this month, Irina Volk, the official representative of the Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs, announced that another American Christian family is seeking shelter in Russia. Leo and Chantelle Hare and their three children decided to move to Russia as traditional, moral and family values are increasingly under attack in the US. In the future, the Hares plan to obtain Russian citizenship. The couple understands that the level of education and security is higher in Russia, and that the state protects traditional values and provides support to large families, stated Volk while speaking to the press.

Read more …

Didn’t see much on Kamala’s speech last night. It’ll come.

Note: what are the odds they have a bet going behind the curtain, that they can elect even the least competent person president?

• ‘Muslim Women for Harris’ Disbands After DNC Controversy (RT)

The campaigning group Muslim Women for Harris has disbanded following reports that pro-Palestine speakers were denied a platform at the Democratic National Convention (DNC) in Chicago. Pro-Palestinian activists and allied groups have been demanding that US Vice President Kamala Harris commit to cutting military aid to Israel and push more urgently for a ceasefire in Gaza. They had planned to voice their position at the DNC, which wrapped up on Thursday. “We cannot in good conscience continue Muslim Women for Harris-Walz, in light of this new information from the Uncommitted movement, that VP Harris’ team declined their request to have a Palestinian American speaker take the stage at the DNC,” the group wrote in a statement on Instagram. “We pray that the DNC and VP Harris team makes the right decision before this convention is over. For the sake of each of us,” it added.

Earlier on Thursday, Abbas Alawieh, one of the leaders of the Uncommitted National Movement, said Democrats had refused to allow Palestinian-Americans to speak at the DNC. “We think that’s unacceptable. We think that this is the party where we shouldn’t be silencing people’s voices,” he said in a video posted on X (formerly Twitter). Speaking to Al Jazeera, Alawieh argued that “the Palestinian speaker situation is a mistake on the party’s end.” He and other activists launched a sit-in outside the convention venue to protest the decision. According to the Washington Post, the Democratic leadership was concerned that a pro-Palestinian speech would “threaten the unity” displayed at the convention. No specific reason was given for the denial, however, the newspaper said.

During her DNC speech on Thursday night, Harris said that the White House was “working around the clock” to secure the release of the remaining Israeli hostages held by Hamas and to reach a “ceasefire deal.” At the same time, the Democratic presidential candidate reaffirmed that she “will always ensure Israel has the ability to defend itself.” Harris became the Democratic candidate after US President Joe Biden quit the race last month. She will face Republican nominee Donald Trump on Election Day in November.

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Ha ha ha! He knows how to get them going. “..the Queen “said it to friends of mine that ‘President Trump was my favorite president.’”

Why couldn’t she have liked him? She spent her whole life without any real human contact. Wouldn’t she have longed for that? And here’s someone who acts natural with her, and who holds the job perhaps closest to hers: president of America.

• Trump Says He Was Queen Elizabeth II’s ‘Favorite President’ – Daily Mail (RT)

Former US President Donald Trump has insisted that he was in Queen Elizabeth II’s good graces following claims to the contrary in a new biography of the late monarch. In an interview with the Daily Mail on Wednesday, the Republican firebrand dismissed Craig Brown – the author of ‘A Voyage Around the Queen’ – as a “sleazebag” who is “looking for some publicity for a book that probably is phony.” Trump met the late monarch twice during his term in office. The first time was in 2018 when she received him and his wife informally for tea. The following year, the then-US head of state was greeted with a full state banquet. Observers at the time claimed that Trump had violated royal protocol on several occasions. The Daily Mail quoted the 78-year-old as insisting that the Queen “said it to friends of mine that ‘President Trump was my favorite president.’”

The former president went on to characterize his relationship with the late British monarch as “great” and “unbelievable.” “She liked me and I liked her,” he claimed, recounting how they had “spent hours together at a state dinner.” According to Trump, the author of the biography had intentionally smeared him with “totally false” allegations in a bid to promote his work. The book suggests that Queen Elizabeth II found Trump “very rude,” and told another guest that she had “particularly disliked” the way he looked over her shoulder, as if in search of someone more interesting. ‘A Voyage Around the Queen’ also describes how the monarch supposedly believed Trump “must have some sort of arrangement” with his wife Melania, “or else why would she have remained married to him?”

In July 2018, Trump, along with the first lady, had tea with Elizabeth II at Windsor Castle toward the end of his UK trip. He later described the monarch as a “fantastic woman… smart and sharp [with] so much energy.” However, observers were quick to point out several instances in which Trump had apparently broken etiquette. First, he failed to greet the Queen properly, omitting to bow. Melania, too, failed to perform the customary “small curtsy.” While not strictly obligatory, these are considered good manners and implicitly expected of officials visiting the royal family. Later during the meeting, Trump walked ahead of the Queen and turned his back to her while inspecting the royal guard – both gestures were viewed as impolite.

Read more …

Hard to believe that this pops up again. Then again, how many days to the election? Remember, this (also) seeks to defend Engoron’s claim that Mar-a-Lago is worth $18-26 million.

Letitia James and Arthur Engoron pay no price and run no risk here. They can run the system against Trump till the cows come home. And they will still get paid.

• New York AG Asks Appeals Court to Uphold Trump $454 Million Judgment (ET)

New York Attorney General Letitia James’s office asked an appeals court on Wednesday to uphold the $454 million civil fraud judgment against former President Donald Trump from earlier this year. In a 168-page submission, state attorneys said there is “overwhelming evidence” supporting Manhattan Supreme Court Judge Arthur Engoran’s Feb. 16 decision finding that Trump misrepresented his wealth to insurers, banks, and other entities to build his real estate empire. Trump appealed that ruling in July. Among other things, he and his attorneys argue that the judge, who they say “struggled to understand basic banking concepts” before handing down the penalty, made an erroneous decision. State attorneys, responding in their submission to the First Department of the State Supreme Court’s Appellate Division on Wednesday, said that Trump’s appeal is filled with “meritless legal arguments.”

They say his appeal disregards substantial evidence from the bench trial that demonstrated “fraud and illegality on an immense scale.” “Supreme Court’s liability determinations are supported by overwhelming evidence that, in each Statement, defendants used a variety of deceptive strategies to vastly misrepresent the values of Mr. Trump’s assets,” Assistant Solicitor General Daniel S. Magy wrote, referring to annual statements they said misrepresented Trump’s wealth. Magy said that Trump, along with his company and top executives, engaged in deceptive practices to maintain loans worth more than $500 million and illicitly gained more than $360 million in profits. “On appeal, defendants tellingly ignore almost all their deceptions. Instead, they primarily argue that [the New York State Office of the Attorney General] failed to prove that defendants’ counterparties relied on the misrepresentations to their financial detriment,” Magy added.

“But it is well-established that neither reliance nor victims’ losses—which are elements of common-law fraud—is required for fraud or illegality claims where, as here, [state attorneys] seeks disgorgement and injunctive relief rather than damages or restitution.” In his July appeal, Trump’s attorneys objected to the legal mechanics of James’s lawsuit, arguing that it used a statute—meant to protect consumers from being ripped off—“in a way never seen before.” Trump and his attorneys argued that there were “no victims and no losses.” They contended that the case should never have gone to trial, the statute of limitations barred some allegations, and the state shouldn’t be policing private business transactions. They also argued that the ruling is a disaster for the New York economy, as it gives the attorney general’s office “limitless power to target anyone.”

State attorneys, defending the statute of limitations, argued that the law empowers the attorney general to act against fraudulent business conduct, regardless of whether it directly “targets consumers, small businesses, large corporations, or other individuals or entities.” They also rejected Trump’s claims that the case should never have gone to trial and that the state should not interfere in private business transactions. The Appellate Division has scheduled the appeal’s oral arguments for Sept. 26. A ruling is expected about a month later, shortly before the end of Trump’s presidential campaign. The outcome of the appeal could see the court uphold, modify, or overturn Engoron’s ruling. The $485 million sum continues to accrue interest while the appeals process plays out. Trump has paid a $175 million bond to halt collection while he appeals. Should the ruling be upheld, Trump and his sons will be liable for the full sum.

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“..I’m talking about a big group of former agents [who] are on fire about what happened here – they are horrified about what’s going on with this agency.”

But it’s already forgotten… No media.

• Secret Service Agents Placed on Leave After Trump Assassination Attempt (RCP)

Three weeks ago, Acting Secret Service Director Ronald Rowe angrily pushed back on senators’ calls to immediately fire or discipline key agents directly responsible for the security failures that led to the assassination attempt against former President Trump at last month’s campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania. Since that time, Secret Service leaders have placed several members of the Pittsburgh Field Office on administrative leave, according to three sources in the Secret Service community. (Administrative leave occurs when a federal employee temporarily leaves their position and work duties – either because of a misconduct investigation or medical or mental health issue. These employees usually still receive pay and benefits, but those decisions are left to the discretion of agency leadership.) While these members of the Pittsburgh Field Office were placed on leave, a different set of agents, several assigned to Trump’s permanent protective detail, are still on the job providing Trump protection, the sources say.

They remain operational even though they too were deeply involved in devising the Butler rally’s security plan. The differing treatment of the two teams is spurring internal dissension and speculation that the Pittsburgh office could bear the brunt of the serious security failures that day, even though there’s plenty of blame to go around. During a joint Senate committee meeting July 30, Rowe said he couldn’t understand or defend why the roof where shooter Thomas Crooks fired from wasn’t better secured. He said the Secret Service is investigating whether any employees broke the rules or didn’t follow established protocol to protect obvious vulnerabilities. If so, he said they would be held accountable through the agency’s disciplinary process and face punishment, including termination.

Yet, Rowe and other senior officials back in Washington headquarters should share the blame, these sources argue. The agency’s top brass were almost certainly involved in declining at least some of the security assets requested for the Butler rally despite a heightened threat level brought on by a specific Iranian assassination plot against Trump. Former Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle resigned in late July amid bipartisan outrage over her lack of transparency about the rally security failures. But critics in Congress and the Secret Service community are calling for more accountability in the wake of the worst security failure since President Ronald Reagan was shot in 1981.

Dan Bongino, a popular conservative personality who spent 11 years in the Secret Service, has blasted his former agency’s “apocalyptic security failure” and called for a full house-cleaning of the upper leadership ranks in its Washington headquarters. Rowe, he said, is just as bad, if not worse than Cheatle because he was her hand-picked deputy and played a key role in her management decisions. “My Secret Service colleagues I worked with, where nothing like this ever happened at our advances, are horrified at Ron Rowe, ashamed at what this agency has become,” he said in on his podcast the day after Rowe testified before the Senate. “… I’m not talking about a small cadre of them. I’m talking about a big group of former agents [who] are on fire about what happened here – they are horrified about what’s going on with this agency.”

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“..Kennedy would be censored by the action of one Government Defendant in response to another.”

• Judge Rules RFK Jr. Can Sue Biden Admin Over Censorship (ZH)

A federal judge on Tuesday ruled that Robert F. Kennedy Jr. can continue to pursue his lawsuit against the Biden administration over censorship at the direction of the government. The decision comes after a June ruling by the Supreme Court, which established who can sue the Biden administration for violating their First Amendment rights when government officials pressured social media companies to suppress free speech did not have standing to sue. According to District Court Judge Terry Doughty, Kennedy meets the standard set by the Supreme Court because there is “ample evidence” to show he was censored at the direction of government actors, and is at “substantial risk” that the censorship will continue, the Daily Caller reports.

Under the Supreme Court’s Murthy v. Missouri ruling, Doughty explained that “a court must make specific findings that a particular defendant pressured a particular platform to censor a particular topic before the platform suppressed a particular plaintiff’s speech on that topic.”

Kennedy was named by one of the “Disinformation Dozen” – and was specifically targeted by the government over what they alleged was COVID-19 misinformation, Doughty noted in his ruling – adding that there is “not much dispute” that Kennedy, and his organization – Children’s Health Defense, “were specifically targeted by the White House, the Office of Surgeon General, and CISA [Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency].” “The Court finds that there is further risk for future risk injury here because Kennedy is a 2024 presidential candidate,” wrote Doughty. “For example, if, hypothetically, the FBI saw a piece of information related to the 2024 presidential election posted by the Kennedy campaign on social media that it deemed to be ‘misinformation,’ then it reached out to CISA, who worked closely with the EIP, who then removed the posts, Kennedy would be censored by the action of one Government Defendant in response to another.”

“Doughty granted Kennedy an injunction in February blocking multiple federal agencies from coercing or significantly encouraging platforms to suppress protected speech, which he put on hold pending the Supreme Court’s ruling. In response to the government’s appeal, the Fifth Circuit in July sent the case back to the district court to rule on the plaintiffs’ standing.” -Daily Caller. According to New Civil Liberties Alliance litigation counsel Jenin Younes, “It is gratifying that Judge Doughty found RFK, Jr. and Children’s Health Defense have standing, even under the draconian requirements the Supreme Court developed in Murthy,” adding “We are assessing next steps for the Murthy plaintiffs in light of Judge Doughty’s opinion, which will also assist us in crafting discovery requests to ensure we can demonstrate standing going forward.”

Read more …

He did it a few hours ago.

• Tucker Carlson, Trump Jr. Pushed Kennedy to Endorse Donald Trump (Sp.)

Independent US presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. was pushed to support Republican nominee Donald Trump by people including journalist Tucker Carlson and the former president’s son Donald Trump Jr., NBC News reported, citing two sources familiar with the matter. Kennedy has not yet endorsed Trump, although he is scheduled to address the nation about his “path forward” on Friday, after running mate Nicole Shanahan said the campaign is considering dropping out and supporting Trump. Carlson, Trump Jr., and business executive Omeed Malik have been privately working to persuade Kennedy to end his campaign and endorse Trump instead, the report said on Wednesday. Kennedy is set to announce the suspension of his campaign on Friday and back Trump, the report said. However, talks are still ongoing, the report added.Kennedy endorsing Trump would not come as a surprise to Democrats, Harris campaign communications chief Michael Tyler told Sputnik on Thursday.

RFK

Read more …

Note that none of Ukraine’s backers speaks out.

• Ukraine Tried To Attack Russian Nuclear Plant – Putin (RT)

Ukrainian forces have attempted to strike Russia’s Kursk Nuclear Power Plant (NPP), President Vladimir Putin has said during a cabinet meeting. Kiev sent thousands of troops into Russia’s Kursk Region earlier this month, attempting to reach the town of Kurchatov, where the nuclear facility is located. Moscow has declared the incursion an act of terrorism and has deployed additional troops to repel the invaders. “Last night, the enemy attempted to strike the atomic power plant,” Putin said at a cabinet meeting on Thursday afternoon. “The International Atomic Energy Agency [IAEA] has been informed. They promised to come themselves and send specialists to assess the situation. I hope they actually do so.” The IAEA already has observers working at the Zaporozhye NPP, Europe’s largest such facility. The mission was deployed in the summer of 2023, as Ukrainian troops attempted to seize the plant.

Earlier this month, a Ukrainian drone attack set one of the cooling towers at the plant on fire. Rosatom CEO Alexey Likhachev has discussed the situation at both power plants with IAEA director Rafael Grossi, and invited him to visit Kursk to personally assess the situation, according to the Russian media. Grossi has accepted the invitation and is planning to visit Kursk next week, an IAEA spokesman told AFP. Afterwards, he will visit Kiev and speak with Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky. According to Grossi, the IAEA is very concerned about any combat operations near the Kursk NPP, since it operates the same kind of reactors as the infamous Chernobyl NPP.

“They don’t have a protective dome around them, just the normal roof, which means that the reactor’s core is pretty exposed,” Grossi said. The presence of troops within artillery range “is a source of enormous concern to me and the agency,” he added, without specifying which forces he meant. Moscow has repeatedly criticized the international agency for never identifying the perpetrator of the attacks on nuclear facilities, even though the IAEA staff has known perfectly well that Kiev is to blame. Last week, Russian military journalist Marat Khairullin reported that Ukraine was preparing a “dirty bomb” for a false flag attack on either the Kursk or Zaporozhye NPP. Moscow said it was taking the report seriously and warned that any such attack would be met immediately with “tough military and military-technical countermeasures.”

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“..when he claimed that the Nord Stream gas pipelines were a “legitimate target” for Ukraine..”

• Czech President Sounds Like An International Terrorist – Moscow (RT)

Czech President Petr Pavel sounded like an international terrorist when he claimed that the Nord Stream gas pipelines were a “legitimate target” for Ukraine, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova has said. Pavel made the remarks in response to an article in the Wall Street Journal, which reported last week that Kiev had carried out the September 2022 sabotage that ruptured the key infrastructure built to deliver Russian gas to Germany and the rest of Western Europe. Speaking to the Novinky.cz news outlet on Wednesday, the Czech president argued that if the Nord Stream attack “was aimed at cutting off gas and oil supplies to Europe and [the flow of] money back to Russia, then… it would be a legitimate target [for Ukraine].” Pavel stressed, however, that he does not have “clear incriminating” proof that Kiev was behind the sabotage.

Responding to Pavel’s remarks, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Zakharova wrote in a Telegram post on Wednesday that they were “too much, even for such an eccentric fringe [figure].” “Previously, such ‘ideas’ were only voiced by representatives of banned international terrorist cells,” she added. As an example, Zakharova shared calls by senior figures in Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS) and Al-Qaeda for their supporters to target the US, which according to the Russian diplomat are similar in nature to the remarks by the Czech president. Sources claimed to the Wall Street Journal that Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky had initially approved the attack on the Nord Stream pipelines, but later tried to call it off under pressure from the CIA. However, the then-Ukrainian commander-in-chief, Valery Zaluzhny, allegedly allowed the operation to continue.

The article by the US outlet was published on the same day that Germany issued its first arrest warrant over the Nord Stream blasts. A suspect, believed to be a Ukrainian diving instructor, was identified as ‘Vladimir Z,’ according to media reports. Kiev has denied any role in the Nord Stream sabotage, insisting that Russia blew up its own infrastructure. Moscow has dismissed the allegation as “ridiculous.” Senior Russian officials, including President Vladimir Putin, have previously pointed the finger at the US as the possible culprit behind the Nord Stream explosions. They have argued that Washington had the technical means to carry out the operation and stood to gain the most, considering that the attack disrupted Russian energy supplies to the EU and forced a shift to more expensive US-supplied liquefied natural gas.

Read more …

“..the Ukrainian military “accompanied” Walsh and had reviewed the videos his crew filmed prior to their release “for operational security reasons.”

• Moscow Charges CNN Journalist With Illegal Border Crossing (RT)

Russian authorities have charged CNN chief international security correspondent Nick Paton Walsh, who had been reporting from the Ukrainian-held town of Sudzha, with illegally crossing the state border. Similar charges have been brought against two journalists working for the Italian broadcaster RAI as well as two Ukrainian reporters. Kiev’s forces overran Sudzha, which had a pre-conflict population of 5,000, during their incursion into Russia’s Kursk Region, which began on August 6. Although many residents have fled the area, some civilians remain. Walsh was part of the team of Western reporters who arrived in Sudzha at the invitation of the Ukrainian government. They traveled in an armored convoy with Ukrainian soldiers, filmed damaged buildings in the center of the community and spoke to remaining civilians, some of whom were taking refuge in a shelter.

According to CNN’s Anderson Cooper, the Ukrainian military “accompanied” Walsh and had reviewed the videos his crew filmed prior to their release “for operational security reasons.” The Ukrainians “had no editorial control” over CNN’s reporting, however, he added. CNN rejected Moscow’s accusations, insisting that the channel “has delivered factual, impartial reporting covering both the Ukrainian and Russian perspectives on the war.” It said that Walsh had acted “in accordance with the rights afforded to journalists under the Geneva Convention and international law.”

Moscow has accused the Western reporters of providing “propaganda” on behalf of Ukraine. Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova argued this week that foreign journalists embedded with the Ukrainian troops were staying silent on “Kiev’s crimes against civilians” and “manipulating public opinion.” According to Russian officials, at least 31 civilians were killed during Ukraine’s attack on the Kursk Region and 143 were wounded. Since 2022, the EU has banned several Russian news organizations, including RT, citing “systematic information manipulation” in connection to the Russia-Ukraine conflict. Moscow has responded by banning dozens of Western news outlets.

Read more …

“The more serious issue is that Germany is really losing its position as an economic giant, as an economic superpower..”

• Nord Stream Ecocide & Fall of Germany ‘Engineered by Western Powers’ (Miles)

The United States must answer some day for the destruction of the Nord Stream pipeline and the resultant collapse of its German ally’s economy, says analyst George Szamuely. The senior research fellow at London’s Global Policy Institute joined Sputnik’s The Critical Hour program this week to discuss the controversial incident, which some experts claim represented “the largest single methane gas” release ever recorded. “It’s always remarkable that the most belligerent actors in any drama are the ones who are the furthest away from the action,” said Szamuely, responding to reports that the UK has taken a leading role in providing drones and other equipment for Ukraine’s proxy war against Russia. “The British have been consistently the most belligerent on Ukraine. “If the stakes are so high, why don’t you get involved directly yourself?” the analyst wondered. “Why are you allowing Ukraine to do all the heavy lifting? …

They [the United States] have been consistent in thwarting any possibility of any kind of negotiated outcome, any temporary ceasefires, temporary resolutions. And without doubt they are involved, and they have been involved in this incursion into Kursk. “There is no way in the world it can be done, an invasion, without very accurate satellite intelligence. You can’t do it. You can’t just simply launch an invasion without knowing the terrain, the exact disposal of Russian forces. So clearly this was engineered by the Western powers, the British obviously – the British are now boasting about it – but above all, the Americans.” German authorities claimed they had found a new lead in the case of 2022’s Nord Stream pipeline explosion last week, pinning the blame on a small group led by a Ukrainian diving instructor. The whereabouts of the new suspect are conveniently unknown, the officials claimed.

Germany’s economic growth has cratered in the wake of the country’s loss of cheap Russian natural gas, with the European Commission estimating the country’s GDP will only expand by .1% this year. Polling has shown most Germans remain concerned over the lack of clarity over the pipeline’s explosion, which has widely been alleged by journalist Seymour Hersh and others to have been engineered by the United States. “The more serious issue is that Germany is really losing its position as an economic giant, as an economic superpower,” said Szamuely. “It’s now steadily going from one quarter after another into recession. But even more seriously, the German industries are being sidelined. They’re moving out of Europe and they’re being priced out of markets because there’s just simply the energy costs. They’re now really going through the roof.”

“It has been cheap Russian energy that has powered this German economic miracle,” he noted. “So it doesn’t have it anymore. Germany is ceasing to be competitive and that’s why Germany is now invariably in a recession.” Host Garland Nixon agreed that the situation is “very dangerous,” speculating that the US and its allies are likely escalating their involvement in the Ukraine proxy war to attempt to negate the threat of a newly-reelected President Donald Trump seeking to end the conflict. Szamuely suggested that Republican allies such as notorious neoconservative Lindsay Graham would likely move to impeach Trump in such an event.

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“It’s ironic because they talk about media manipulation, they talk about false narratives, they talk about misinformation and so on and so forth… It’s not that they are scared of misinformation, it’s that they’re scared of the truth.”

• FBI Promises Continued Crackdown on US Journalists, Dissidents (SP.)

The US Federal Bureau of Investigation reportedly plans to continue its “crackdown” on journalists and other dissidents connected to foreign news organizations, with criminal charges under consideration. The agency’s plans were revealed by anonymous officials cited Wednesday in The New York Times. “This month, F.B.I. agents searched the homes of two prominent figures with connections to Russian state media: Scott Ritter, a former United Nations weapons inspector and critic of American foreign policy, and Dimitri K. Simes, an adviser to former President Donald J. Trump’s first presidential campaign in 2016,” the controversial newspaper reported. “More searches are expected soon, some of the officials said, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss investigations. Criminal charges are also possible, they said.” Electronic equipment was reportedly seized from Ritter, while Simes claimed agents removed artwork from his home in Virginia and froze multiple bank accounts. Both men are American citizens.

Attorney and independent journalist John Jackman joined Sputnik’s The Final Countdown program Thursday to discuss the development. “The reach of the deep state – the FBI, CIA – they’re looking at all of us right now,” said Jackman. “They’re really looking to just chill free speech. That’s really what it is at the core of all of this.” “And they’re using all of these different legal justifications – FARA, the Foreign Agents Registration Act – to justify coming after a dissident,” he claimed. “That’s really what it is.” Originally passed in 1938, the Foreign Agents Registration Act was initially conceived as a response to Nazi propaganda during the runup to World War II. The law was revised during the Cold War era to target people engaging in alleged political lobbying, but a handful of prosecutions under the act before 2015 resulted in no criminal convictions. FARA has been enforced more frequently in recent years, however, chiefly against figures associated with Trump.

“The First Amendment should be being screamed from the rafters by the ACLU,” said host Steve Gill in response to the apparent acts of political intimidation. “Why aren’t they defending Scott Ritter? You know, when you’ve got the Democrats having their convention, why aren’t they screaming, in addition to democracy, First Amendment?” “These are politically motivated at the end of the day,” agreed Jackman. “It’s just really what they are. And, they can give all of these different excuses for why they’re targeting certain individuals, but it’s facially obvious.” “We’re heading to another election cycle here in just a couple of months. And so we’re going to start hearing ‘Russia, Russia, Russia.’ Russia is going to be in the paintings, they’re in the walls. They’re everywhere.” “What you’re seeing is not people who are actually, in most cases, even in direct coordination with any legitimate institutions that are based in Russia,” he added. “But it’s people who, on their own accord, are speaking what they feel is the truth, right? … It’s because they’re looking at the world, they’re determining that our media is lying to us at every turn.

Our government, especially on issues of foreign policy, has lied to us repeatedly, the Ukraine war [and] the conflicts between Israel and Palestine being some of the latest examples.” Ritter has been paid small amounts of money for contributing articles to the website for the Russian television network RT, according to the former US Marine Corps intelligence officer, with Ritter retaining ultimate control over the content of his writing. The former UN weapons inspector’s career suffered after he prominently rejected US officials’ claims of alleged Iraqi weapons of mass destruction during the runup to the United States’ catastrophic war on the Middle Eastern country in the early 2000s. Ritter has offered his analysis to Russian radio and television programs along with other prominent dissidents such as John Kiriakou, a former CIA intelligence officer who was sentenced to prison after revealing the agency’s secret torture program.

“There’s some conflation; I think they’re starting with Russia because if that works then they can move on to, you know, sort of the Martin Niemöller [dynamic],” said host Ted Rall, referring to the German pastor’s famous poem. “First they came for RT, then they came for etcetera, etcetera, etcetera.” “We’re in an environment, in a geopolitical environment that we haven’t been in in a long time,” Jackman observed. “This really does remind me quite a bit of McCarthyism, but I think that this might even be a level beyond that. Because today we’re in a situation where the fundamental dynamics of the elites, the ruling class in this country, are shifting in such a way that their reality is kind of being pulled out from underneath them.” “It’s ironic because they talk about media manipulation, they talk about false narratives, they talk about misinformation and so on and so forth… It’s not that they are scared of misinformation, it’s that they’re scared of the truth.”

Read more …

 

 



 

 

Dog walking

 

 

Donkey

 

 

Test

 

 

Octo shark

 

 

 

 

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

 

 

 

 

 

Debt Rattle July 31 2024

Jul 312024
 
 July 31, 2024  Posted by at 9:00 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , ,  55 Responses »


Gustave Caillebotte Young man by his window 1875

 

• No Primaries, No Alternatives, No Scrutiny: Anti-Democracy Reigns In US (Sp.)
• Trump’s VP Pick Is a Climate Sceptic, and the Knives Are Out (RCE)
• Biden Abandons the Court . . . and His Last Inviolate Principle (Turley)
• Kamala Harris Suddenly Rejects All Of Her Radical Positions (ZH)
• Trump Shooter Was ‘Step Ahead Of Secret Service’ – NYT (RT)
• The Man Who Could Get to the Bottom of the Trump Shooting (Julie Kelly)
• Trump Will Talk To FBI, Debate Harris (Sp.)
• Media Shills Have Received Their New Script: “Conservatives Are Weird” (ZH)
• The Paris Olympics Are The Most French Thing Ever (Marsden)
• Maduro Declares Musk ‘Archenemy’ (RT)
• Hamas Politburo Chief Killed in Tehran (Sp.)
• Haniyeh Murder ‘May Have Been Crossing a Red Line’ – Larry Johnson (Sp.)
• Leaked Emails Reveal ‘Civil War’ At CIA Regime Change Cut-out (RT)

 

 

 

 

Melania

 

 

Wow

 

 

Vote

 

 

Kamala

 

 

Trump ad

 

 

10 million new voters.

 

 

Trump Congress

 

 

My people
https://twitter.com/i/status/1818269133298950253

 

 

 

 

“This is just a very slick PR process that, again, has been engineered by the same elements that got rid of Joe Biden.”

• No Primaries, No Alternatives, No Scrutiny: Anti-Democracy Reigns In US (Sp.)

On July 21, US President Joe Biden announced he would not seek reelection. The announcement came after Democratic primary voting had completed, leaving Democratic voters with no say in the party’s nominee. Meanwhile, third-party candidates are being stonewalled at every turn and the media pretends this is all normal. The American electoral process has degraded into a shambling shell of its former self, propped up with vapid, slick and committee-tested PR campaigns rather than debate. Over the past week, with the tickets of the two major parties all but finalized, the media can not bring themselves to ask a substantive question of either person likely to sit in the White House in less than six months.

“My question is,” YouTube personality and WWE United States Champion Logan Paul asked former US President and Republican nominee Donald Trump, “for other young people in this country who are looking to get ahead, cause for a lot of them, times are tough right now. What would you say to them, kids who want to pursue their own version of the American dream and try to achieve their wildest dreams?” Trump answered that young people should vote for him. Meanwhile, Harris sat down for a non-televised interview with People, which asked her about her relationship with her husband, how much sleep she gets and her favorite nickname (“Momala” as it turns out) but not any policy positions on the economy, immigration, Ukraine or Gaza. Even Paul and his “Impaulsive” co-host Mike Majlak had the good sense to ask Trump about those topics, even if they didn’t challenge him on them.

This is what passes for scrutiny in American politics. Worse, the incumbent president’s party all but refused to hold a primary. Then Biden suddenly resigned from the campaign after weeks of refusing to and his vice president was anointed the new nominee without receiving a single vote. On Saturday, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Seymour Hersh reported that Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Barack Obama threatened to invoke the 25th amendment and force Biden out of office if he did not drop his reelection campaign. “The lords of capital decided that he had to go and, in fact, they made it quite clear he had to go because they said that not only would they stop contributing to his campaign, but they told the DNC get rid of Joe Biden or don’t expect any financial support for any Democrat candidate down ballot,” argued political activist and the 2016 Green Party Vice Presidential nominee Ajamu Sibeko Baraka on Sputnik’s Political Misfits. “This is clear elite extortion.”

“So, this was, in fact, a coup. A coup by the donors and we need to deal with that in that way because it exposes the true nature of this anti-democratic process we have in this country. So, people [who] are committed to democracy, [who] would like to see something that approximates democracy. You can’t continue to support these two anti-democratic parties. That’s a very important point,” he added. To shore up the perception of support, the Harris campaign hosted a series of Zoom calls, bizarrely segregated by race and gender. Black Men for Harris came first, then Black Women for Harris. Then White Women for Harris and finally, White Dudes for Harris. “It is sort of a silly Zoom call,” said Baraka. “But it does reflect the kind of identity reductionist policies we have in this country.” “I mean, why are people supporting Harris? Based on what? What policies? There’s no serious political conversation taking place. This is just a very slick PR process that, again, has been engineered by the same elements that got rid of Joe Biden.”

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If you don’t “believe” that fossil fuels will kill us all -tomorrow morning, preferably- then they must get rid of you. For the planet’s sake…

• Trump’s VP Pick Is a Climate Sceptic, and the Knives Are Out (RCE)

Within a day of ex-President Trump’s announcement of “climate denier” Mr. J. D. Vance as the Republican Vice Presidential nominee, the climate industrial complex and supportive mainstream media had the knives out. A few headlines of the past 24 hours are an indication. The New York Times: “JD Vance Is an Oil Booster and Doubter of Human-Caused Climate Change”. The Independent: JD Vance: “Climate activists alarmed by Trump’s ‘dangerous’ pick for vice president”. The Guardian: “Climate advocates fear picking JD Vance for VP is ‘a dangerous step backward’”. The umbrage taken by media commentators is familiar. CNBC laments that “the former venture capitalist though is a known critic of climate change and renewable energy [italics added].” UK’s The Independent newspaper reports that “[c]ampaigners are responding with alarm to the selection of climate denier and Ohio senator JD Vance as Donald Trump’s vice presidential nominee, with activists warning he represents a “dangerous” voice for the US.”

Mr. Vance’s “eagerness to please Donald Trump” adds to the image of the vice-presidential nominee as an unprincipled politician seeking office. Climate advocacy group Fossil Free Media spokesperson Cassidy DiPaola asserted that “This [VP] choice signals that a potential Trump-Vance administration would likely double down on fossil fuel expansion at a time when we desperately need to transition to clean energy.” Communications director Stevie O’Hanlon of Sunrise Movement, a climate activist organization, said that “Like Donald Trump, JD Vance has proven that he will make it a top priority to roll back climate protections while answering to the demands of oil and gas CEOs.” Does Mr. Vance have a principled stand and is his stance on climate and energy policy worthy of consideration? As the highly polarized debate over climate change over the past few decades has amply demonstrated, the discourse often descends into ad hominem attacks and name calling.

“Climate denier” is a charge that is often used by proponents of climate alarm to shut down critical debate and to deplatform climate sceptics. Lena Moffitt, executive director of the environmental advocacy group Evergreen Action, said this of Mr. Vance: “Donald Trump has chosen an avowed climate denier as his running mate who has used his time in Congress to vote against the environment and shill for fossil fuel corporations at every opportunity.” The “denier” accusation is among the more pernicious if popular epithets used to denigrate sceptics of the so-called “consensus science.” It invokes a comparison to those who engage in Holocaust denial. To be sure, most observers would consider it ludicrous to suggest that questioning the accuracy and predictive power of scientific models is like questioning the historical fact of the genocide of Jews in Europe.

Putting aside epithets and journalistic hit-pieces, it seems a fair question to ask just what do politicians skeptical of the climate alarmist narrative believe? And what are their policy positions regarding the Paris Agreement’s “net zero by 2050” target. This policy target is an imperative, at least nominally, for most current governments in North America and Western Europe? Mr. Vance – lawyer, businessman, former Marine and writer of the bestselling memoir “Hillbilly Elegy”, arisen from the humblest working class background – places himself firmly in the populist right movement. It now looks very likely that Mr. Trump will be the next US president. The assassination attempt on Saturday, his miraculous split-second turn of the head which saved him and the iconic picture of his raised fist with the US flag in the background seconds after being injured make him almost irresistible. Thus Mr. Vance will likely join the Donald Trump next year as his VP in an administration that will seek to rapidly unwind the myriad policy and regulatory constraints that the Biden administration has imposed to shackle the US oil and gas industry at every turn.

Vance has also criticized the “green energy fantasy” of the Biden administration, pointing out that “solar panels can’t power a modern manufacturing economy” and “that’s why the Chinese are building coal power plants.” He has similarly called out wind power turbines. At the Turning Point Action conference last year, he said “they’re hideously ugly. They kill all the birds. And they’re mostly made in China.” The Biden administration’s all-out support for EVs comes in for the same critique. In a July 2022 radio interview, he said: “The whole EV thing is a scam. If you plug it into your wall, do these people think there are Keebler elves back there making electricity in the wall? It comes, of course, from fossil fuels.”

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“..That will only increase pressure to convert the Court into an alternative avenue for social and political reform..”

• Biden Abandons the Court . . . and His Last Inviolate Principle (Turley)

President (and Supreme Court Chief Justice) William Howard Taft once said “presidents come and go, but the Supreme Court goes on forever.” But not if Joe Biden has his way. Indeed, both the president and Court as we know it could be gone. In a failed attempt to save his nomination, Biden offered to “reform” the Court by imposing an 18-year term limit that would jettison the three most senior conservative justices. With only six months left in his presidency, Biden’s efforts are likely to fail, but, unfortunately, could set the stage for activists under a Harris Administration in seeking to change the Court forever. For more than 50 years, Biden staunchly refused to play politics with the Supreme Court and support calls for “reforms” from the left of his party. For a politician who has long been criticized for changing positions with the polls on issues from abortion to criminal justice to gun rights, the Court was one of the few areas of true principle for Biden.

Even though he refused to answer questions on packing the Court in the 2020 election, he ultimately rejected the call as president. Yet Biden’s final principle fell this month when facing the premature and involuntary end of his candidacy. Faced with being a one-term president, the Supreme Court would have to be sacrificed. Biden opted for the least of the evils in pushing for term limits rather than court packing. It was the more popular option for Biden to yield on. Voters have always loved term limits. The AP-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research found 67% of Americans, including 82% of Democrats and 57% of Republicans, support a proposal to set finite terms for justices. But there were few law professors and even fewer Democratic members clamoring for term limits until conservatives secured a stable majority on the Court. Then, suddenly, the Court had to be “reformed” without delay. It is no accident that the first three justices who would term limited off the Court are conservatives: Clarence Thomas (after 33 years on the Court), Chief Justice John Roberts (after 19 years), and Justice Samuel Alito (after 18 years).

Think, however, about the iconic decisions we would have lost with term limits in place. Liberal Justice Williams Douglas’s 36 years on the Court would have literally been cut in half. He would have been kicked off in 1957. His famous opinions like Griswold v. Connecticut (1965), striking down bans on contraceptives, would not have been written — an ironic result for those seeking limits after the Court’s ruling in Dobbs. Likewise, liberal icon Ruth Bader Ginsberg’s tenure would have ended in 2011 before she wrote her famous dissent Shelby County v. Holder (2013), defending voting rights. Anthony Kennedy’s term would have ended in 2011 rather than 2018, before he wrote opinions such as United States v. Windsor, striking down the Defense of Marriage Act. Obviously, other justices could have written opinions in these cases, but the point is that many justices wrote their best opinions after 18 years on the Court. Moreover, the Framers clearly wanted these positions as lifetime appointments as an added protection against political pressure or influence.

For more than two centuries, presidents have struggled with the Supreme Court, but none (until now) have attempted to end life tenure on the Court. Presidents have served as the firewall for the anger and radicalism that has periodically engulfed the Court. Now President Biden is leading the mob for changing this institution for the first time since its founding. It is a testament to what I call “an age of rage” in my new book. After years of supporting the Court when it was setting aside conservative precedent, liberals now want the Court changed to dump or dilute the majority. It is unlikely to end there. After sending Thomas, Roberts, and Alito packing, many want to go further and pack the Court itself.

Democratic leaders such as Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) have called for outright court packing — a proposal that Vice President Kamala Harris has suggested that she might support. Where Biden is a political opportunist in belatedly joining this movement, Harris is a true believer from the far left. If she is elected, the Congress is still likely to be closely divided. That will only increase pressure to convert the Court into an alternative avenue for social and political reform.

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“..when Harris says “I’m open to that conversation,” it means she has no idea what she’s talking about. And she says that a lot.”

• Kamala Harris Suddenly Rejects All Of Her Radical Positions (ZH)

In 2019, Kamala Harris was rated the ‘most liberal’ Senator in a now-scrubbed rating from GovTrack. She’s on record wanting to abolish ICE (which she compared to the KKK), letting criminals like the Boston Marathon bomber and rapists vote, banning fracking and offshore drilling, defunding the police, providing US taxpayer subsidized healthcare to illegals, and banning private health insurance. According to the NY Times, “video clips of her old statements and interviews are being weaponized as Republicans aim to define her as a left-wing radical who is out of step with swing voters.” “The archive is deep,” said Brad Todd, a Republican strategist and ad maker who is working with David McCormick, the G.O.P. Senate candidate in Pennsylvania, among other campaigns. “We will run out of time before we run out of video clips of Kamala Harris saying wacky California liberal things. I’m just not sure that the rest of this campaign includes much besides that.” To that end, McCormick’s campaign has produced one of the first TV ads to attack Harris on her longstanding positions.

Yet, according to the Times, nevermind all that- Harris is now a reformed moderate – and has suddenly reversed course on virtually all of her most radical views. On Friday, the Harris campaign announced that she no longer wants to ban fracking – a ‘significant shift’ from where she stood four years ago. She’s also reversed course on funding for border enforcement, no longer supports a single-payer health insurance program, and has walked back liberal fever dreams of a mandatory gun buyback. “She is no longer pushing for a single-payer health care system, and on Friday her campaign said she would maintain Mr. Biden’s pledge not to raise income taxes on people making less than $400,000 per year.” -NYT. Packing the Court? Nah…

“On Monday, as Mr. Biden prepared a speech in Texas calling for term limits and ethics guidelines for Supreme Court justices, the Trump campaign resurfaced statements Ms. Harris made in 2019 saying she was “open to this conversation” about expanding the Supreme Court. Ms. Harris, in a statement released by her campaign, endorsed Mr. Biden’s proposal, which does not call for adding additional justices to the court.” According to Matt Bennett, a co-founder of Third Way, a moderate Democratic think tank, Harris has ‘evolved’ into a Biden style centrist (if centrism is defined as letting 20+ million illegals into the country and cooking Americans with inflation). “There’s a tremendous difference in changing one’s policy ideas and changing one’s principles,” said Bennett. “She has not changed her principles. She still thinks climate change is an existential threat — she just doesn’t think the Green New Deal is the way to address it.” Sure Matt.

The Times also hints that Harris is essentially an idiot who didn’t really understand her own positions while running for president in 2020. “…during that race, Ms. Harris also often appeared as if she were not sure what she believed. In a CNN town-hall event the day after what was widely viewed as a successful campaign rollout in Oakland, Calif., she appeared tentative while discussing health care policy, eventually saying she would eliminate private health insurance and institute a single-payer health care program. She would go on to propose an array of policies popular with progressives. She sought to increase pay for public-school teachers by an average of $13,500 through a bump in the estate tax. She also called for an assault weapons ban and said she would sign an executive order mandating background checks for customers of any dealer who sold more than five guns in a year. And she sought to close the gender pay gap by requiring large companies to certify that men and women were paid equally.” As an obvious aside, when Harris says “I’m open to that conversation,” it means she has no idea what she’s talking about. And she says that a lot.

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Building the narrative…

• Trump Shooter Was ‘Step Ahead Of Secret Service’ – NYT (RT)

The man who tried to assassinate Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump at a Butler, Pennsylvania rally had prepared better than the protection detail and was able to slip through the cracks in security, the New York Times has reported. The shooter opened fire at 6:11pm that Saturday, nicking Trump’s ear as the former US president turned away. He was later identified as Thomas Matthew Crooks, 20, from a nearby town. Text messages and after-action reports provided to the Times by Senator Chuck Grassley, an Iowa Republican, revealed that local police had noticed Crooks almost more than 90 minutes before he fired, but kept losing sight of him. Crooks had visited the fairgrounds in Butler on July 7. The Secret Service did not show up until a day later, which is when they decided not to include the AGR warehouse complex in the security perimeter, according to the Times.

On July 13, the day of the rally, the Secret Service did not attend the 9am security briefing for local law enforcement. By 10am, Crooks had bought a ladder and driven to the rally site. He stayed around for over an hour, observing the local police. He then drove back to his hometown, bought 50 rounds of ammunition, and drove back, arriving around 3:35pm, “according to geolocation information from one of his cellphones,” the outlet noted. The Secret Service had not bothered to survey the area with drones, but Crooks did. Around 3:50pm that Saturday, he flew a drone over the site for about 11 minutes, before putting it back into his car and returning to the nearby picnic tables. It was at this point that a local counter-sniper first spotted him, as he finished his shift. The officer warned his colleagues at 4:26pm that someone had “snuck in” and “knows you guys are up there.”

Nothing happened until 5:14pm, Crooks was spotted using a range finder. One of the county counter-snipers took a photo of Crooks. It was shared in the group chat of the local police department at 5:38pm, and then relayed to the Secret Service. One of the two remaining counter-snipers ran out of the AGR building to keep an eye on Crooks until backup arrived, according to Butler County district attorney Richard Goldinger. Crooks had already run off, however, and the sniper returned to post. Four Butler Township officers were pulled from directing traffic to help locate him. One officer texted at 6pm, suggesting that Crooks had moved “away from the event.” In reality, the Times noted, he had climbed onto the roof about 120 meters away from the stage. “There is still confusion about which agency was supposed to oversee the roof,” the Times reported. The Secret Service had left it empty. Beaver County “struggled to find enough volunteers to cover the 12-hour shift,” according to text messages.

Trump took the stage at 6:03pm. Six minutes later, the audience at the rally began pointing to someone on the roof of the warehouse. “Either through luck or preparation,” Crooks had found a spot that let him have a clear shot at Trump, but kept him “somewhat hidden” from the Secret Service, according to the Times. At 6:11pm, Crooks fired at Trump. The Secret Service snipers reacted and fatally shot him. At least eight spent cartridges were found next to his lifeless body. Police who eventually showed up on the roof could not figure out how Crooks had got there. Kimberly Cheatle resigned as the Secret Service director ten days later, after insisting she would not. No one at the agency was reprimanded, fired or otherwise held accountable for the near-fatal incident.

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They’ll silence him.

• The Man Who Could Get to the Bottom of the Trump Shooting (Julie Kelly)

After the evasive House testimony of now-former Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle and FBI Director Christopher Wray’s shortlived suggestion that Donald Trump may not have been hit by a bullet, one man alone may help allay Republican fears that the Biden administration will not conduct a forthright investigation into the attempted assassination of Trump last month: Joseph Cuffari. The Trump-appointed inspector general for the Department of Homeland Security has already opened two investigations into the U.S. Secret Service, which is under the purview of the DHS, related to the agency’s handling of the July 13 shooting. But some Republicans are concerned because, they say, Cuffari has been stonewalled by Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas on other internal examinations – including one that might have revealed Secret Service lapses that might have prevented the attempt on Trump’s life.

Specifically, congressional sources tell RCI that Cuffari’s report, “USSS Preparation for and Response to the Events of January 6, 2021,” has been on Mayorkas’ desk since at least April. The report, according to Politico, will “cast light on a series of embarrassing security lapses for the agency.” And given some comparisons between Jan. 6 and July 13, the report might shed light on systemic issues that impacted both events. For example, unanswered questions remain as to why the Secret Service allowed Trump to take the stage at The Ellipse outside the White House around noon on Jan. 6 amid reports of individuals with weapons in the vicinity – a question many Americans have about the July 13 assassination attempt. Law enforcement and spectators noted the presence of a suspicious individual, later identified as the gunman, Thomas Matthew Crooks, at least a half hour before Trump took the stage in Butler, Pennsylvania.

In addition, no one has explained how the Secret Service failed to notice an alleged pipe bomb found outside the Democrat National Committee DC office on Jan. 6 – while then Vice President-elect Harris was inside the building. Previous reporting by RCI shows multiple law enforcement officers, including one with a bomb-sniffing dog, walking past the bench where the device was found. Rep. Barry Loudermilk, chairman of a House subcommittee tasked with a separate investigation into Jan. 6 as well as the now-defunct J6 committee, recently accused Mayorkas of intentionally holding the release of the report. The Georgia Republican told Mayorkas in a letter that “the failure to provide an in-depth review of the department’s security planning and operational failures related to January 6 not only raises concerns about the department’s botched planning for former president Trump’s rally in Pennsylvania on July 13, 2024, but it is quite possible that such reports could have prevented the security breakdown that resulted in the near assassination of a former president and presidential candidate.”

Top Democrats have long sought to remove Cuffari – a former investigator for the Air Force and Department of Justice whom Trump appointed in 2019 in 2019 – from office. The coordinated effort began when the IG notified Congress that a trove of Secret Service texts from January 5 and 6, 2021 had been deleted in late January 2021 under the Biden administration. The purge occurred weeks after every federal agency received a directive from Congress to preserve all evidence related to January 6. Cuffari said messages belonging to at least 24 Secret Service officials including then director James Murray and Cheatle, who was an assistant director of the agency on January 6, were gone. So, too, were the texts of then acting Homeland Security Secretary Chad Wolf and acting deputy secretary Ken Cuccinelli, both Trump appointees. His office subsequently opened a criminal investigation into the matter.

“The USSS erased those text messages after OIG [Office of Inspector General] requested records of electronic communications from the USSS, as part of our evaluation of events at the Capitol on January 6,” the inspector general wrote in a July 2022 letter to chairmen of both the Senate and House Homeland Security committees, including Rep. Bennie Thompson, who also chaired the Jan. 6 committee at the same time. Cuffari further flagged the DHS’s lack of cooperation with his inquiry, something he had already pointed out in an earlier report to the committees. “DHS personnel have repeatedly told OIG inspectors that they were not permitted to provide records directly to OIG and that such records had to first undergo review by DHS attorneys,” Cuffari continued in the letter.

Not true, responded Secret Service spokesman Anthony Guglielmi. He claimed the texts had been deleted when cell phones were reset to factory settings as part of a device replacement program. “The insinuation that the Secret Service maliciously deleted text messages following a request is false.” (Guglielmi’s truthfulness was brought into question recently when he claimed it was “absolutely false” that the Secret Service rejected the Trump campaign’s multiple requests for additional security prior to the Pennsylvania rally. The Washington Post later confirmed that top Secret Service officials “repeatedly denied” requests for more manpower and equipment to protect the former president at large events.)

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“The answer is yes. I’ll probably end up debating. The answer is yes, but I can also make a case for not doing it,”

• Trump Will Talk To FBI, Debate Harris (Sp.)

Former US President Donald Trump said in an interview that he would talk to the FBI on Thursday about the attempt on his life at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, earlier this month. “[The FBI are] coming in on Thursday to see me,” Trump told Fox News on Monday. Trump further said that he believed there should have been security officers on the roof of the building where the gunman had been positioned during the shooting. Moreover, the Republican presidential nominee said that the US Secret Service should have been communicating with the local police, which it wasn’t. On July 13, Trump suffered a gunshot wound to his right ear and was briefly hospitalized following an assassination attempt at his rally in Butler. Thomas Crooks, 20, killed a member of the audience and injured two others in the crowd before the Secret Service neutralized him. The FBI continues to investigate the assassination attempt.

The incident prompted US Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle to resign following criticism of the agency for not preventing the assassination attempt. Trump also commented on the possibility of him debating the presumptive Democratic nominee for President, Vice President Kamala Harris. “The answer is yes. I’ll probably end up debating. The answer is yes, but I can also make a case for not doing it,” Trump said in the interview. Trump and Harris are currently set to participate in a ABC-hosted debate on September 10. Trump explained that he could decide to cancel a debate because he did not want to reward “fake news,” adding that ABC could end up making tens of millions of dollars off the debate. He also described the ABC network as a “terrible outfit.”

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It all sounds weird.

• Media Shills Have Received Their New Script: “Conservatives Are Weird” (ZH)

As August approaches and the campaign season enters the final stretch, there have been some not-so-surprising developments in the behavior of Big Tech search engines, social media and the narratives being spread by establishment news organizations. Search terms for Donald Trump have been suspiciously absent on Google. Trump’s speeches are being consistently edited out of context. And, media platforms are blatantly parroting the same scripted talking points in a way that would make Joseph Goebbels blush. As he once stated: “Think of the press as a great keyboard on which the government can play.” This mantra has never been more obvious than it is today. The new narrative that every progressive shill is reciting on nearly every major news platform? Donald Trump and JD Vance are ‘just plain weird’, and conservatives are all weird by extension…

It’s hard to say who this talking point is meant to appeal to, but Democrats are clearly very proud of it. No doubt they paid an obscure think-tank a lot of money to develop it. However, the slogan slinging tactics of the elections of yesteryear are not very impressive to most of the voting public today. In the midst of stagflationary crisis, cultural sabotage, national instability and a Democratic Party seemingly intent on starting WWIII, Americans are not interested in slogans, Americans want solutions. If you repeat a lie loud enough and often enough, it just annoys the public even more. Perhaps the shift of Gen Z men towards more conservatives ideals has got the progressives scrambling to come up with relatable slogans. They are already referring to Kamala Harris as the “Gen Z meme queen.” Of course, as everyone knows, the political left does not know how to meme. It feels like desperation because this is their candidate going into November…

One could guess that labeling conservatives as “weird” is meant to marginalize the undeniable momentum away from woke demagoguery. Notice that Pride Month was barely a blip on the radar in 2024, Biden just got booted from his own campaign, the Trump assassin missed and the Olympics is losing sponsorships after going woke in their opening ceremonies. Leftists are not having a good year. The pedulum is swinging back and they know it. While we wait for Kamala Harris to say or do anything to deserve the avalanche of praise she has been receiving from the media since replacing Biden as the Democratic candidate, the “memes” are certain to flow with each new narrative being more cringe inducing than the last. None of it will be useful in papering over the fact that Kamala Harris is one of the weirdest and most unsettling presidential hopefuls of all time.

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“If their surveillance-industrial complex pals were going to stuff their pockets under the pretext of Games security, then couldn’t they just spy on us in peace without all the added bureaucratic nonsense?”

• The Paris Olympics Are The Most French Thing Ever (Marsden)

French culture isn’t just about masked balls at Versailles anymore. As the Paris Olympic Games have proven, it’s now also debating whether drag queens’ balls were adequately masked. Looks like Thomas Jolly, the Games’ Opening Ceremony director, is just now coming to the realization that the entire world doesn’t function like Paris Left Bank intellectuals. He bit off more than he could chew by transmitting a French art house vibe to every country around the globe, some of which – from Morocco and Algeria to China and the US – straight up censored parts of the show that perhaps should have come with a disclaimer in the same way that risqué French films do. Because it turns out that kids – and even some adults – weren’t quite ready to witness a giant Smurf rolling around in a fruit bowl in front of a bunch of drag queens re-enacting what appeared to be the Last Supper.

And the fact that French blasphemy laws were abolished two years after the French Revolution, enshrining a right that became a cornerstone of French free speech, didn’t matter to those who felt offended, which included everyone from religious figures to left-wing France Unbowed leader Jean-Luc Melenchon. France has defended religious satire as free expression, even when cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed led to a terrorist massacre in January 2015 at the Parisian headquarters of the magazine Charlie Hebdo, which published them. So this is just France being France, which wasn’t very well received, including by some of the most progressive-minded French officials. One US-based advertiser – the wireless company C Spire – has already said it was yanking their Olympic advertising. Guess there’s a dice roll with the risk that your product might end up somewhere in the vicinity if a clip or screencap of a bunch of drag queens, or a saucy Papa Smurf, and that wasn’t quite the vibe that you were going for when you signed up for high-level sports sponsorship.

There was also an onslaught of reports of X (former Twitter) social media users being hit with copyright takedown notices for posting some of the controversial scenes from the opening show for debate and discussion. Not surprising that the International Olympic Committee, guardian of the Olympic brand, might not want the images etched into history of these Games, to be dominated by things like closeups of drag queens’ crotches for the purpose of debating whether the world actually witnessed some fruit tumbling out of a pair of plum smugglers in a wardrobe malfunction – or whether it was just an everyday pantyhose rip. You know, the kind of thing that could happen to any dude in an average day at the office. The Games have really showcased that world-famous French rigor.

[..] The trains stopped running last week around France due to sabotaged lines. Israel has already blamed that on Iran. The average French person’s mind just went straight to everyday, garden variety French incompetence – the kind that would also would explain all the heavy-handed “security theatre” during the Games. The government required everyone to apply online for QR Codes if they wanted to even cross the downtown core, which was turned into a maze of 44,000 barricades days before the opening ceremony. And the excuse had to be a good one – like you lived there or had an appointment. And the Interior Ministry had already used the Games as a pretext for loading up on new high-tech surveillance systems, from surveillance drones and anti-drone systems to crowd scanners coupled with Minority Report style artificial intelligence algorithms. If all of it actually worked, then why give people the run-around? If their surveillance-industrial complex pals were going to stuff their pockets under the pretext of Games security, then couldn’t they just spy on us in peace without all the added bureaucratic nonsense?

Speaking of national security, a bunch of hackers leaked the military background of Israeli athletes, a country with mandatory service and currently involved in an active conflict criticized by the UN’s International Court of Justice and accused of apartheid – an offense that the IOC explicitly cites as justification for Games exclusion. Meanwhile Russian athletes who have never even been in the army can’t even compete in their country’s name. So what happens if a Russian wins a gold medal? The IOC created a special flag just for them, which looks like someone’s kid whipped it up in about five minutes on an app. They also made a new anthem with no lyrics for Russian athletes that sounds like the opening soundtrack for a make-believe fantasy movie. Which is really what all this is: one big Hollywood-grade fantasy that one of the top Olympic nations since forever doesn’t even exist now at the Olympics.

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A conversation neither should be involved in. Remember Juan Guiado and the CIA?

• Maduro Declares Musk ‘Archenemy’ (RT)

Venezuela’s President Nicolas Maduro has accused SpaceX and Tesla CEO Elon Musk of trying to disrupt peace and stability in the South American country. The National Electoral Council (CNE) of Venezuela on Sunday declared Maduro the winner of the country’s presidential election, announcing that with 80% of ballots counted, he had secured more than 51% of the vote, compared to 44% for his main rival, Edmundo Gonzales. Supporters of Western-backed Gonzalez have taken to the streets following the release of the official results, claiming that the vote was rigged. Musk, who owns social media platform X (formerly Twitter), took to it on Monday to accuse Maduro of “major election fraud.” The Venezuelan president responded to the claims by challenging the billionaire to a fight, during an address he made on national television.

“Social media creates a virtual reality, and who controls the virtual reality? Our new archenemy, the famous Elon Musk,” Maduro stated, pointing to a cellphone. He then accused Musk of seeking to come “with his rockets and an army to invade Venezuela” but did not elaborate on the claim. “At least you showed your face, because we knew that you were behind everything,” Maduro claimed. “With your money, with your satellites. It is the representation of fascist ideology in the world.” The Venezuelan president went on, challenging Musk “Do you want to fight? Let’s do it … I’m ready. I’m not afraid of you, Elon Musk. Let’s fight, wherever you want.”

Musk, in response, shared the video of Maduro’s speech on X, with a caption in Spanish that translates as “The donkey knows more than Maduro.” It’s not the first case of Musk’s confrontation with senior foreign officials. In April, the businessman clashed with a Supreme Court justice in Brazil over free speech, as well as far-right accounts and misinformation on X. Maduro will be serving a third consecutive six-year term, having first taken office in 2013 following the death of President Hugo Chavez. In his victory speech, Maduro mocked the opposition, which, he said, “cries fraud” at every election. The Venezuelan president said his reelection would bring peace and stability.

Sachs

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Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov: “This is all very wrong. This is an absolutely unacceptable political assassination, and it will lead to further escalation of tensions..”

• Hamas Politburo Chief Killed in Tehran (Sp.)

Hamas politburo chief Ismail Haniyeh was killed in the Iranian capital of Tehran, the Palestinian militant group said in a statement on Wednesday. The agency said Haniyeh and one of his bodyguards were “martyred” after their residence in Tehran was targeted. “With condolences to the heroic nation of Palestine, the Islamic nation, the combatants of the Resistance Front, and the noble nation of Iran. This morning (Wednesday), the residence of Mr. Dr. Ismail Haniyeh, the head of the political office of the Islamic Resistance of Hamas, was hit in Tehran; and following this incident, he and one of his bodyguards were martyred,” a statement from the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) read. Iran is investigating the causes of the killing of Hamas politburo chief, Ismail Haniyeh, and his bodyguard in Tehran, with the results to be announced soon, the Tasnim news agency reported on Wednesday, citing the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.

Earlier on Wednesday, the Palestinian movement, Hamas, said that Haniyeh was killed in an Israeli attack on his residence in Tehran after he took part in the inauguration of Iran’s newly elected president. The Palestinian movement, Hamas, said on Wednesday that the movement’s politburo chief, Ismail Haniyeh, was killed in an Israeli attack on his residence in the Iranian capital of Tehran. “The Islamic Resistance Movement Hamas expresses condolences to the sons of our great Palestinian people … Ismail Haniyeh, the head of the movement … was killed as a result of a treacherous Zionist attack on his residence in Tehran after he participated in the inauguration ceremony of the new president of Iran,” the movement said on Telegram. Iran’s new president, Masoud Pezeshkian, was sworn in on Tuesday. Israeli army declines to comment on the situation, saying that they “do not respond to reports in the foreign media”, CNN says.

A representative of the US government has confirmed to the media that Washington is aware of the situation. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas strongly condemned the killing of Hamas politburo chief, Ismail Haniyeh, the WAFA news agency reported on Wednesday. Abbas also called the killing a cowardly act and a dangerous escalation, the report read. At the same time, Abbas called on Palestinians to be united and patient in the face of the Israeli occupation. The Iranian Foreign Ministry said in a statement that the incident will strengthen the ties between Tehran and Palestine. The Turkish Foreign Ministry stressed that Israel is not seeking peace, and should be stopped before conflict escalates. The killing of Hamas politburo chief Ismail Haniyeh is a cowardly act that will not go unanswered, Hamas political office deputy head Musa Abu Marzouk said on Wednesday.

Moscow considers the death of Hamas politburo chief Ismail Haniyeh to be an example of absolutely unacceptable political assassination, which threatens further escalation in the region, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov told Sputnik on Wednesday. “This is all very wrong. This is an absolutely unacceptable political assassination, and it will lead to further escalation of tensions,” Bogdanov said.

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“This attack [on Haniyeh] was so blatant that I don’t think there will be any restraint on the part of Iran or Hezbollah..”

• Haniyeh Murder ‘May Have Been Crossing a Red Line’ – Larry Johnson (Sp.)

Hamas has already pledged to take revenge after the Palestinian militant group’s political bureau chief Ismail Haniyeh was assassinated in Tehran. The assassination of Ismail Haniyeh “clearly had the support and foreknowledge of the United States and the United Kingdom,” retired CIA intelligence officer and State Department official Larry Johnson insisted in an interview with Sputnik. “I say that because we also have news reports now coming in that the US and UK warships are headed into the Mediterranean. On one of the US ships is probably a Marine Expeditionary Unit,” Johnson said. So the situation “has now escalated tensions in the region beyond what they were, even after the attack on the Iranian consul in April in Beirut,” according to him.

Responding to that attack, Iran “sent a very clear message to Israel that in the future, any further provocations like this would be met with force, and now both Hezbollah and Iran have been incited to respond and Israel is calculating that it can withstand the blows,” the former CIA intelligence officer added. “This is extremely dangerous. […] This attack [on Haniyeh] was so blatant that I don’t think there will be any restraint on the part of Iran or Hezbollah. I think that this may in fact have been crossing a red line. It is extremely worrisome because this has the hallmarks of being able to spin out of control. And it is, we’re now in a situation of wait and see,” Johnson stressed.

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$200 million a year: “..Bednarz had berated him for not using pronouns on his business cards and email signature..”

• Leaked Emails Reveal ‘Civil War’ At CIA Regime Change Cut-out (RT)

The biggest public relations fiasco in the history of the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) has resulted in two senior officials ending up fired and a “civil war” of sorts between the old neoconservative cadres and the new “woke” management, according to documents obtained by The Grayzone. The fiasco in question was the phone call between the NED vice-president for communications Leslie Aun and the Grayzone’s Max Blumenthal and Alex Rubinstein, which the independent outlet published in May 2023. Aun initiated the call to address Rubinstein’s description of the Endowment as a “CIA cutout,” but ended up saying “I don’t know” a lot instead. On Tuesday, the Grayzone published several emails between Michael Allen – who used to be the editor of the NED’s ‘Democracy Digest’ blog – and the Endowment’s founding president Carl Gershman, revealing that the fallout from the call’s publication may have cost Aun and Allen their jobs.

“Amateur hour – hugely embarrassing!” Allen emailed Gershman and NED VP for government relations, David Lowe, a day after the recording was posted on YouTube. “I specifically counseled against her talking to these people.” Lowe described Aun’s performance as “breathtakingly ignorant” and “too painful to listen to.” Both he and Gershman, who retired in 2021, appeared to disparage the new NED president Damon Wilson for hiring her. Gershman described the call as a “disastrous screwup” and described Aun as “obviously clueless,” a “moron,” and a “clueless wonder” whose hiring was an “egregious error” reflecting Wilson’s focus on media and image. In messages to Gershman and Lowe, Allen blamed NED communications director, Christine Bednarz, who reportedly encouraged Aun to talk to the Grayzone. Allen also blamed Bednarz for instituting mandatory “diversity, equity and inclusion” training and berating him about his “white male privilege.”

In one email, Allen complained about the DEI training agenda including “microaggressions” and the “ideological, not historical” 1619 Project, noting that Bednarz had berated him for not using pronouns on his business cards and email signature. In a June 5, 2023 email to Gershman, Allen complained about the communications team focusing on the “more urgent matter of NED’s LGBTQIA+ agenda” rather than the Grayzone fallout. Another point of conflict arose after the October 7 Hamas attack on Israel, with Allen complaining that several NED staffers “promoted and attended the pro-Palestinian march organized by ANSWER” and that the NED president still backed Black Lives Matter on Facebook even after they “enthusiastically celebrated the Hamas massacres.”At one point, Gershman asked if Bednarz harbored some kind of personal resentment for her Israeli ex-husband, or if she was “just a woke flake,” to which Allen replied: “The latter, combined with a certain megalomania and defensive resentment over the Grayzone fiasco.”

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Ehrlich

 

 

Dogs&food
https://twitter.com/i/status/1818204396041154600

 

 

Legend

 

 

Anaconda

 

 

Whale shark

 

 

 

 

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Debt Rattle July 30 2024

Jul 302024
 
 July 30, 2024  Posted by at 9:01 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , ,  69 Responses »


Eugène-Louis Boudin Laundresses on the Beach at Étretat 1892

 

• Rebel Archbishop Slams Olympics’ “Vile Attacks On God” (ZH)
• Most Americans Want Biden To Resign Now – Poll (RT)
• Biden Proposes Plan to Reform Supreme Court (ET)
• Where Matters Stand (Paul Craig Roberts)
• Trump Agrees To FBI Interview For Assassination Attempt Probe (RT)
• You’ll Never Work in This Town Again! (Kunstler)
• Why Harris Became The Only Possible Opponent For Trump (Lolaev)
• Maduro Wins Third Term (RT)
• EU Diplomats Ordered To Slash Spending – FT (RT)
• Poland Suggests Hungary Leave NATO and EU (RT)
• EU Readies ‘Carrot-and-Stick” Trade Strategy to Deal With Trump (Sp.)
• 2 Days After Trump Crypto-Crowning, Biden Admin Sells Out (ZH)
• A Tale of Two Cats (Paul Craig Roberts)

 

 

 

 

21x

 

 

USSS

 

 

Orban

 

 

Shapiro

 

 

George Webb

 

 

Butler PA
https://twitter.com/i/status/1817961189453992170

 

 


© Getty Images / Trump Campaign Office / Handout/Anadolu

 

 

 

 

First covered him about a month ago. Can’t find anything that would hurt his credibility.

Former Vatican ambassador to the USA and Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò is an Italian Bishop of the Catholic Church. He is facing charges in an extrajudicial criminal trial by the Vatican’s Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith. The accusations include committing schism, denying the legitimacy of Pope Francis, and rejecting the Second Vatican Council.

Viganò recently labeled Pope Francis a servant of WEF, before being excommunicated 3 weeks ago by the same pope. He also called Macron an ’emissary of the World Economic Forum,’ who ‘passes off a transvestite as his own wife with impunity, just as Barack Obama is accompanied by a muscular man in a wig.’

He sounds like an interesting conversation partner, but how much longer does this 83-year old have to live?

• Rebel Archbishop Slams Olympics’ “Vile Attacks On God” (ZH)

[..] Needless to say, Christians are pissed [..]…including Italian Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò – the former papal nuncio to the United States who questioned the legitimacy of Pope Francis and the authority of the Second Vatican Council, and was excommunicated three weeks ago for “his refusal to recognize and submit to the Supreme Pontiff.” In a scathing rebuke of the Olympics, Viganò called the opening ceremony “the latest in a long series of vile attacks on God, the Catholic Religion and natural Morality by the antichristic elite holds that hostage Western countries.” “We a dystopian dance macabre in Holograms of the horsemen of the Apocalypse alternated with a plump blue Dionysius, served under a bell of various courses; the parody of the LGBTQ+ Last Supper…” the letter continues.

Viganò also pointed to “disconcerting scenes at the 2012 London Olympics, the 2016 of inauguration of the Gotthard Tunnel, and the 2022 Commonwealth Games, featuring infernal figures, goats, and terrifying animals.” The elite who organizes these ceremonies demand not only the right to blasphemy and the obscene display of the foulest vices, but even their mute acceptance by Catholics and decent people, who are forced to suffer the outrage the most sacred symbols of their Faith and the very foundations of the Natural Law desecrated. -Carlo Maria Viganò.

According to Viganò, “Satan makes nothing: only he ruins everything. He does not invent: he tampers. And his followers are no different: they humiliate woman’s femininity in order to erase the motherhood that recalls the Virgin Mother; they castrate man’s manhood in order to tear from the image of God’s fatherhood; they corrupt the little ones in order to kill in them and make them victims of the most abject wokeism.” Viganò says it’s “no coincidence” that the ceremonies were presided over by French President Emanuel Macron, an ’emissary of the World Economic Forum,’ who ‘passes off a transvestite as his own wife with impunity, just as Barack Obama is accompanied by a muscular man in a wig.’

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That would mean President Kamala. They’re not ready for that. She will never be.

• Most Americans Want Biden To Resign Now – Poll (RT)

Most American voters agree that US President Joe Biden should resign from office now, while a vast majority approve of his decision not to seek reelection, a Rasmussen Reports poll has suggested. The survey results released on Friday showed that 52% of respondents agree that Biden should resign before his term expires. The same poll found that 76% supported his decision to drop out of the race. Only 18% of respondents disapproved of Biden ending his campaign. The poll was conducted from July 22 to 24 and involved 1,074 registered voters. Immediately after Biden announced that he was quitting the race, Republican lawmakers in Congress started to openly call for him to leave the White House before his term expires.

House Speaker Mike Johnson claimed earlier this month that if Biden is not fit to run for president, “he is not fit to serve as president” adding that “he must resign the office immediately.” “Doesn’t have the mental acuity or cognitive ability to run a political campaign but can serve for six more months as president? He should resign,” Republican Congresswoman Nancy Mace wrote. Senator Rick Scott, former governor of Florida, echoed these remarks. “Let me be clear, if Joe Biden can’t run for re-election, he is not capable of serving as president for the next six months and needs to resign today,” Scott said. “While we welcome the news that one of America’s most destructive presidents will be denied a second term, it changes very little as to the stakes of this election.”

Biden announced that he was ending his reelection campaign on July 21. The announcement came after weeks of growing concerns among Democrats and party donors over his declining health and ability to defeat Donald Trump in November, especially after his disastrous performance in the debate against his Republican rival. While initially defiant, Biden argued that the move was necessary, given the high stakes of the election. In the wake of his withdrawal, Biden endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris as his successor. Harris has so far secured the support of the Clintons and the Obamas; however, in the polls she lags behind the former US president, according to the latest surveys.

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On his way out, the sitting duck president is made to “reform” the highest court in the land. All the blame will be his, but he’ll already be gone..

• Biden Proposes Plan to Reform Supreme Court (ET)

President Joe Biden called for Congress to back his proposals for two significant changes to the U.S. Supreme Court and a change to the U.S. Constitution. In an op-ed published the morning of July 29, the president outlined his reasoning for pursuing changes that have long been sought by progressive camps. “This nation was founded on a simple yet profound principle: No one is above the law. Not the president of the United States. Not a justice on the Supreme Court of the United States. No one,” the president wrote in a Washington Post op-ed. According to a White House official, President Biden will call for Congress to back term limits for Supreme Court justices and a code of ethics enforceable by the legislative branch. He also will propose an amendment to limit the extent of presidential immunity afforded by the Constitution, proposing that former presidents be granted no immunity for crimes committed while in office.

Citing his 36 years as a U.S. senator and former chairman and ranking member of the Judiciary Committee, President Biden said that while he has “great respect for our institutions and separation of powers,” what is happening now in the United States is “not normal, and it undermines the public’s confidence in the court’s decisions, including those impacting personal freedoms.” “We now stand in a breach,” the president wrote. In recent years, the Supreme Court released some decisions that sparked criticism from Democrats and progressives, including its overturning of Roe v. Wade and, more recently, its 6–3 ruling that presidents and former presidents are, in principle, immune from prosecution for official acts. Today, the president made clear his resolve to dedicate time during his last five months in office to back changes that he says can restore trust and accountability in both the Supreme Court and the presidency, a White House official told The Epoch Times.

The announcement was made a week after President Biden withdrew from the 2024 presidential race and endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris. In 2020, as a presidential candidate, he promised to create a commission to study potential changes to the Supreme Court as progressives called for the expansion of the Supreme Court. The commission published a 294-page report to the president in December 2021. President Biden has not acted on that report until now. The president is scheduled to speak on Monday about his plan, from the LBJ Presidential Library, while commemorating the 60th Anniversary of the Civil Rights Act. The move is the first significant effort by a president since Franklin D. Roosevelt’s progressive court-packing plan to advocate changes to the workings of the Supreme Court. President Roosevelt’s push for a more favorable court ultimately failed in the face of significant opposition.

President Biden’s proposal follows years of progressive advocacy to push their preferred reforms on the judicial branch, which has met resistance from those who hold originalist views widely preferred within the GOP. The White House says that term limits for Supreme Court justices would help ensure that the timing of court nominations is more predictable and less arbitrary, reducing the chance that any single presidency is advantaged by the retirement times of justices. Additionally, a binding code of conduct for justices, including the disclosure of gifts, refraining from public political activity, and recusal from cases with conflicts of interest, would improve public trust in the institution, the White House said.

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“By implanting a close election in the voting public’s mind, the Democrats can steal the election.”

• Where Matters Stand (Paul Craig Roberts)

The assassination issue has been reduced to operational failure and insufficient budgetary resources for the Secret Service, and the assassination has been moved aside by Kamala’s emergence as the Democrat candidate for President. The presstitutes are again speaking with one voice preparing the narrative of a close election that makes it possible to use the election theft mechanisms that have been legalized by the Democrats in the swing states. Biden had to go because he was too discredited as a viable candidate for the Democrats to be able to steal the election in his behalf. Kamala, previously soundly rejected by Democrats as a presidential candidate is now being hyped as the candidate able to defeat Trump. Rigged polls are now showing a neck and neck contest, with Trump sometimes ahead by one point and Kamala ahead by 3 points. The purpose of these rigged polls and the media emphasis on what a viable and challenging opponent Kamala presents is to prepare the public’s acceptance of another stolen election.

In 2020 Trump got more votes than he got in 2016. Yet somehow he lost to Biden whose few campaign rallies attracted minimal attendance, but despite the lack of interest Biden got more votes than Hillary in 2016 and, if memory serves, the largest number of votes in US electoral history. Clearly no such thing happened. Trump supporters take for granted that Trump is already elected. This confidence is not justified. They, and Trump himself, need to pay attention to how the presstitutes and the elite are creating a winning persona for Kamala. By implanting a close election in the voting public’s mind, the Democrats can steal the election. I think that is what will happen, thus ridding the ruling establishment of Trump’s threat to take away their power. Lies and election theft have always been part of American politics. Power, not ideas, is what is important to the contestants and their backers. However, in 2016 a major change occurred. In his campaign Trump said he intended to normalize relations with Russia.

This was a direct threat to the power and budget of the military/security complex which needs Russia as an enemy to justify its power and budget. Trump also said in his inauguration speech that he was taking power away from the ruling establishment and giving it back to the people. No president had ever spoken in this way. Trump revealed himself as an existential threat to the ruling elite. The power elite assembled at his speech smiled and laughed at the unaware clown and soon began their political assassination of Trump with Russia-gate, two impeachments in the House of Representatives, pornstar-gate, documents-gate, and an “insurrection” that has put 1,000 of Trump’s supporters in prison as “insurgents” as a warning to others. Trump’s challenge to the ruling elite and the massive support he received from the traditional American population scared the ruling elite whose control over America had been gradually tightened. The ruling elite decided on a coup.

The Republican Party, whose voters stood with Trump, had to go. What we have witnessed in the Biden regime is the elite’s decision to install a one-party state completely under their control. Rino Republican response is to continue in existence by out-competing Democrats in serving the interests of the ruling elite. Unsure of their ability to whore as well as Democrats is why the Republican Senate leader hates Trump. Trump has brought matters to a fight or surrender decision that Republicans prefer to avoid. Concerning the assassination, we have no idea what effect it will have on Trump. Will he pull in his horns in order to continue his life? What we do know is that like the assassinations of John F. Kennedy, Robert F. Kennedy, 9/11 and other such CIA/FBI/Joint Chiefs events, there will be no real investigation. No important evidence will even be mentioned–such as the acoustic evidence of the shots and their location, such as the upward trajectory of the bullet that struck the person in the corner at the top of the stand above Trump.

How did Crooks’ shot allegedly fired at Trump, which would have had a downward trajectory strike a person above Trump? FBI director Wray prepares the cover by saying that Trump was not struck by a bullet but by shrapnel. In other words a bullet disintegrated and flew upward. Examination of the person’s wound would reveal whether it was a bullet or shrapnel. We will be told whatever fits the official narratives if we are told anything at all. Having watched many coverups in my lifetime, I tried to prevent this one by early reporting the ignored real evidence before Republicans, delighted in giving Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheaters a verbal beating, a mistake as it outraged women, moved the issue off target. Once a coverup is set in stone with an official narrative, it is immune to evidence, like the assassinations of John and Robert Kennedy and 9/11. Evidence does not count once an official narrative has been established.

[..] The House of Representatives has voted unanimously to set up an investigative task force over the attempted assassination of Donald Trump. The fact that it is unanimous means that it will touch no real issue. Indeed, the investigation is limited to determining the nature of the failures of the Secret Service that permitted the assassination attempt by Thomas Matthew Crooks. The most likely result will be a larger budget for the Secret Service and, perhaps, a ban on such outdoor events. In other words the narrative is that the Secret Service failed to stop Crooks. There is to be no examination if there were other shooters, if Crooks was merely a patsy, no examination of acoustic evidence, no explanation for an upward bullet trajectory. Nothing but a verification of the official narrative.

Who will the House rely on for the investigation? The House will rely on the suspects themselves–the Secret Service, the FBI, Homeland Security. FBI Director Wray, a Trump appointee, will respond to the House in keeping with the official narrative. The Republicans will be made impotent by being submerged in the official explanation. At this point we do not know if Crooks fired a single shot. Despite Crooks being overlooked by Secret Service from two directions there are no videos of Crooks firing. Indeed, he was killed by a shot a quarter of a minute after all firing had stoped by a bullet that caused instant death. If he was in position firing his rifle, why is his dead body 7 feet away from the rifle?

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To find out what he knows about their role?!

• Trump Agrees To FBI Interview For Assassination Attempt Probe (RT)

Former US President and Republican Party 2024 presidential nominee Donald Trump said he would sit for an interview with the FBI, as part of an investigation into this month’s attempt on his life, the agency announced on Monday. Trump narrowly avoided death at a rally in Pennsylvania earlier this month, when he was shot in the ear. One person in the audience was killed, and two more were wounded. The FBI wants to “get his perspective on what he observed, just like any other witness to the crime,” Special Agent in Charge of the FBI’s Pittsburgh Field Office Kevin Rojek told reporters in a conference call. He explained that this kind of interview is standard practice for a victim of a crime. More than two weeks following the attempt on Trump, the FBI investigation has yet to establish the shooter’s motive.

The gunman, later identified as 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks, fired several shots at the Republican presidential nominee as he was mid-speech at an open-air campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania on July 13, grazing Trump’s ear. “While the FBI investigation may not yet have determined a motive, we believe the subject made significant efforts to conceal his activities,” Rojek said. The agency believes his actions illustrate “careful planning ahead of the campaign rally,” the FBI official added. He noted Crooks had a small social circle, which “appears to be limited to his immediate family,” and had “few friends and acquaintances throughout his life.”

The would-be assassin had used aliases to make purchases related to firearms and explosives, Rojek explained. Earlier this year, Crooks bought “six chemical precursor-related purchases online of materials used to create the explosive devices recovered in the subject’s vehicle and home,” he said. The failed assassination has spurred widespread criticism and questions about what security measures were put in place before the event. Last week, FBI Director Christopher Wray said the agency will leave “no stone unturned” as it looks into what happened. A day earlier, Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle resigned admitting her agency had failed to properly guard the Republican frontrunner.

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“..what kind of public spectacle the Left could come up with to beat the Olympic opener. Maybe human sacrifice, say Hillary Clinton eating a parboiled toddler in front of three thousand shrieking cat-ladies at the Democratic National Convention. Has it come to that?”

• You’ll Never Work in This Town Again! (Kunstler)

Did we just witness the suicide of Wokery? I think you saw what’s called, in the argot of progressive thinking, the “queering” of the Olympics. That was some spectacle. First, Death on a Pale Horse came galloping down the Seine River so that no one would miss the point of the symbolism to follow: the beheaded Marie Antoinette portrayed singing in the window of a flaming palais (revolution anyone?). . . . Then, a tableau vivant of DaVinci’s The Last Supper “queered” to-the-max with a tattooed land-whale in the Jesus seat offering a Satan hand-signal among the swaying drag queens, plus one child ostentatiously in the mix (say, whu?). . . followed by a blue Dionysius crooning about nudity (“Nu”) on a giant fruit platter, with his ball-sack clearly on display among the cherries and nectarines. . . . It rained. . .tant pis. . . . The power went out and Paris ceased to be the City of Light. Finis. . . .

Not all of Western Civ was amused by these. . . antics. Many complained that the show portrayed Christianity in a less than favorable light. Ya think? The next day, the Paris-24 organizing committee offered the world an apology of sorts. Spokesperson Anne Descamps explained that the idea was “to celebrate community tolerance.” Or, shall we say, to test it? Apparently, it flunked the test. Director of the extravaganza, Thomas Jolly, said (translation), “Our intention was never to be impertinent.” Of course, he lies, and of course it is the foundational premise of those in the Satanic fold to lie about everything. (Just as America’s Democratic Party lies about everything.) Within hours, sponsors revolted and pulled their support for the games altogether. Lord knows what the BRICs nations make of all this. Probably something like pity.

Two-hundred-thirty years ago in Paris the Jacobin faction behind the Reign of Terror was put out of business, suddenly, all in one night, really, after turning French daily life upside-down and inside-out for one year, to the huge annoyance of the French public. On July 27 (9 Thermidor), 1794, chief Jacobin activist Maximillian Robespierre made a speech before the Convention (national assembly) denouncing those who were denouncing him (theories of conspiracy!), and the audience commenced to pelt him with fruit, vegetables, and opprobrious invective. Cries rang out for his arrest. Before long: pandemonium in the chamber! The Jacobins fled and took refuge in the city hall (Hôtel de Ville), but it was too late. The whole city had turned on them. Robespierre got shot in the jaw, possibly by himself. The Jacobin gang were declared “outlaws.” The following evening, The Jacobin leaders were all executed by guillotine in the Place de la Concorde.

Thus began the Thermidorian Reaction — called that, because the Jacobins had added an extra mid-summer month, Thermidor, to their cuckoo calendar. Now, one might ask, was July 27, 2024, the start of the revolt against progressive Woke-ism? It’s hard to imagine what kind of public spectacle the Left could come up with to beat the Olympic opener. Maybe human sacrifice, say Hillary Clinton eating a parboiled toddler in front of three thousand shrieking cat-ladies at the Democratic National Convention. Has it come to that?

It’s hard to escape the feeling now that our own reign-of-terror, the Woke-Marxist psychopathocracy, has played out its string. A month of garish events and revelations has left the USA a hot mess: the momentous Supreme Court decisions, the debate horror show, the attempted assassination of Mr. Trump and the many loose ends still hanging from it, the (probably) coerced election withdrawal of “Joe Biden” and the shocking discovery (to many) that he’s only partly still there, and the elite selection process that “nominated” Kamala Harris — these strange doings have rocked the American Zeitgeist. The artificially-induced rapture that attended the apotheosis of Veep is sputtering out as the internet explodes with memes putting her clueless vacuity on laughable display.

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“..the Republican nominee was the number one newsmaker, enjoying an absurd amount of publicity unlike Harris, who stayed in Biden’s shadow for almost four years. Elections in the United States are more personalized, which means they require more time and money for media promotion of the candidate. A comparison of US election campaigns with European countries reveals this key difference.”

• Why Harris Became The Only Possible Opponent For Trump (Lolaev)

After the apparent loss of the first presidential debate, the obvious question concerning presidential elections was “How long until Biden drops off from the election?” The final days of Biden’s presidential campaign after the debate were reminiscent of the sinking of the Titanic: the inexorability of the crash was matched only by its swiftness. Everyone whose support seemed unshakable back in the fall, like Democratic leaders in the House of Representatives and Senate, prominent left-leaning journalists and major donors to the Democratic Party, turned away from Biden. Finally, in a very rare but not unexpected decision, Joe Biden announced his withdrawal from the election, saying that it was time to “pass the torch to a new generation.” In social media posts, he explained his decision as “best for the party, the presidency and American democracy.”

Biden became one of the few sitting American presidents who decided not to run for a second term. This moment is unique in US political history, since Biden’s decision was made shortly before the next presidential election, after he had already effectively received the Democratic nomination. The primaries ran from January to June but, by March 2024, Biden had secured enough votes to become the presumptive Democratic nominee. There have already been similar precedents in US history: in the 20th century, Lyndon B Johnson and Harry S Truman also did not run for a second term. However, they took office after the death of the sitting presidents and eventually served more than just one presidential term. Truman served all but 82 days of almost two terms. The last time Lyndon B Johnson was the one to announce his decision not to run for reelection in 1968. Like Biden, Johnson had health problems: he died two days after the end of his supposed second full term as president.

In addition, he also lost the support of important factions within his own party, in his case due to his failure to overcome the foreign-policy stalemate of the Vietnam War. Fearing a split in the Democratic Party and failure in the primaries, he announced at the end of a lengthy televised address on the War in Vietnam that he would not seek or accept his party’s nomination for a second term. Biden’s support for Vice President Kamala Harris for the Democratic nomination was obvious and perhaps the only possible option in the absence of time for full-fledged primaries. Delegates to the party’s convention in Chicago in mid-August are likely to support it. Any internal conflicts within the Democrats will benefit Trump, something Biden and Harris will emphasize at every opportunity leading up to the convention in order to secure the nomination of the sitting Vice President.

Trump has long argued that Biden is not capable of governing the country, but after the president announced his withdrawal from the 2024 race, he definitely did not actually become the beneficiary of this decision. For the Republican nominee, maintaining the status quo would have been much more profitable, since it almost guaranteed him another four years in the Oval Office. Still, Trump showed his strength and political might, as in just a few days he not only survived an assassination attempt but also, in a powerful move, ousted his opponent from office after a single debate. The lack of alternatives to Harris’ candidacy for Democrats, however, does not invalidate a number of problematic issues related to her nomination. She faces an uphill battle: She has only about 100 days to convince American voters to support her in the presidential election. That short time frame stands in stark contrast to former President Donald Trump’s campaign, which began in November 2022.

His campaign was more than full of bright events, many of which, however, had negative consequences. But this does not change the fact that the Republican nominee was the number one newsmaker, enjoying an absurd amount of publicity unlike Harris, who stayed in Biden’s shadow for almost four years. Elections in the United States are more personalized, which means they require more time and money for media promotion of the candidate. A comparison of US election campaigns with European countries reveals this key difference. Parliamentary systems tend to be centralized, with candidates going to elections with well-known party agendas, which reduces differences between candidates within the same party. This means that if, for any reason, a candidate is replaced, voter support is less dependent on candidate recognition and policy track record, unlike in the US.

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Give the pushback against him, imagine how popular he must be to win regardless.

Note: Venezuela has the biggest oil reserves of any country.

• Maduro Wins Third Term (RT)

Nicolas Maduro has won Venezuela’s presidential election, according to official results. The leaders of Russia and China have congratulated the head of state on securing a third term. The head of the National Electoral Council (CNE), Elvis Amoroso, announced shortly after midnight on Sunday that with 80% of ballots counted, Maduro had secured more than 51% of the vote, compared to 44% for his main rival, Edmundo Gonzales. Addressing supporters in Caracas, Maduro has described his victory as “a triumph of peace and stability.” The Venezuelan opposition has fiercely disputed the result, claiming election rules were violated, and Gonzales has also claimed victory. Opposition leader Marina Corina Machado, who was barred by a court from running for office over corruption-related charges, has rejected Maduro’s victory, claiming: “We won and the whole world knows it.”

Following the vote, Venezuela’s electoral authority, which the opposition views as favoring the ruling party, did not immediately release the tallies from each of the 30,000 polling stations nationwide, according to media reports. Maduro, 61, thanked his supporters and mocked the opposition, which he said “cries fraud” at every election. The results have drawn mixed reactions from international leaders. Russian President Vladimir Putin congratulated his Venezuelan counterpart on Monday, pointing to the strategic importance of the Moscow-Caracas partnership. He expressed confidence that Maduro will continue the “progressive development” of bilateral relations “in all areas” and said he is always welcome in Russia. Beijing has also congratulated Maduro, and lauded Venezuela for “smoothly holding its presidential election,” China’s Foreign Ministry Spokesman Lin Jian said on Monday.

Meanwhile, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken was among those voicing skepticism, saying there were “serious concerns” that the result “does not reflect the will or the votes of the Venezuelan people.” Chilean President Gabriel Boric called the result “hard to believe” and demanded “total transparency.” Maduro has received congratulations from his regional allies, including the leaders of Cuba, Honduras and Bolivia. “Nicolas Maduro, my brother, your victory, which is that of the Bolivarian and Chavista people, has cleanly and unequivocally defeated the pro-imperialist opposition,” said Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel. “The dignity and bravery of the Venezuelan people had triumphed over pressure and manipulation,” he added. Maduro will be serving a third consecutive six-year term, having first taken office in 2013 following the death of President Hugo Chavez.

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Let Elon Musk clean up that organization. He’s good at it.

• EU Diplomats Ordered To Slash Spending – FT (RT)

EU diplomats have been ordered to shelve planned travel and cancel functions after “significantly” exceeding their budget this year, the Financial Times has reported, citing unnamed officials. The bloc’s External Action Service (EEAS), which acts as the EU foreign ministry, has been told to cut €43 million ($46.5 million), or almost 5% of its planned budget, after breaching agreed spending limits, the newspaper wrote, citing sources briefed on the issue. The diplomatic service must adjust to “severe austerity measures” and will have to sell property to balance the books, the sources said. The financial squeeze will worsen next year and will make it “impossible” for the EU to maintain its existing diplomatic footprint in areas such as Africa and Latin America, they added. The EEAS has a network of more than 140 overseas delegations and offices promoting EU interests around the world.

Running repairs and maintenance in dozens of the bloc’s delegations is impossible, which raises serious security concerns, the report claimed. The EEAS is mainly funded from the EU budget, which in turn is financed by individual EU countries, in proportion to their gross national income. Customs duties on imports from outside the bloc also contribute to its financing. An EEAS spokesperson told the FT it had cut “all the expenditure we possibly could” and had halved the budgets of overseas offices “despite the crippling effects on our global outreach.” Another official said the bloc’s diplomatic service is in “dire straits” financially, adding that “the world needs more diplomacy, not less.” Meanwhile, the EU and its member states provided or committed over €143 billion ($154.6 billion) to Ukraine between February 2022 and March 2024, according to the European Council data.

The bloc also banned imports of a wide range of goods from Russia, including oil and gas, as part of an unprecedented sanctions campaign over Moscow’s military operation against Ukraine. “The war in Europe [and] increasing instability in our neighborhood and globally” are the main challenges for European foreign policy, the bloc’s next foreign policy chief, Kaja Kallas, said last month. The former Estonian prime minister, known for her hardline anti-Russian stance, is set to succeed Josep Borrell as the head of the EEAS in the autumn.

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No, you’re stuck with your neighbors.

• Poland Suggests Hungary Leave NATO and EU (RT)

Hungary can leave the European Union and NATO if it does not like the blocs’ policies, Poland’s Deputy Foreign Minister Wladyslaw Teofil Bartoszewski suggested on Sunday. The comments came in response to Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s sharp criticism of Warsaw’s policies the day before. During a visit to Romania, Orban had accused Poland of pursuing “the most sanctimonious and two-faced policy in the whole of Europe,” saying it is “obliviously doing business with the Russians,” while “morally lecturing” Budapest for doing the same. ”We do not do business with Russia, unlike Prime Minister Orban, who is on the margins of international society – both in the European Union and NATO,” Bartoszewski retorted, as quoted by PAP news agency. “I don’t really understand why Hungary wants to remain a member of organizations that it doesn’t like so much,” Bartoszewski continued.

”If you don’t want to be a member of a club, you can always leave,” added the official, suggesting that Orban create a union with Russia instead. Hungary’s prime minister was condemned by a number of EU politicians earlier this month for going against the bloc’s policies and embarking on a “peace mission” to try and find a diplomatic solution to the Ukraine conflict, during which he visited Kiev, Moscow and China. Budapest has been granted exemptions from the EU sanctions and continues to buy oil and gas from Russia. During his speech in Romania, Orban did not specify what he was referring to when saying that Poland was still doing business with Moscow. The Russian financial daily Vedomosti reported last week that Poland had emerged as a top buyer of the Russian fertilizer urea. The publication cited Eurostat data as showing that Warsaw had increased imports by 25% between January and May this year, compared to the same period in 2023, amid a bloc-wide increase of Russian fertilizer imports. EU sanctions against Russia exclude food supplies and fertilizers.

The Polish financial daily Rzeczpospolita reported in February that compared to 2019–2021, the period before the introduction of a broad range of sanctions against Russia, Poland’s trade turnover with some Eurasian countries, such as Kyrgyzstan and Armenia, had increased by several hundred percent. The publication went on to suggest that the trade between Poland and Russia was continuing though intermediaries in other countries, thus bypassing the sanctions. Poland has been among the most vocal supporters of Ukraine in its conflict with Russia. It has served as NATO’s primary conduit for weapons, ammunition, and equipment deliveries to Kiev, while maintaining it is not actually a party to the hostilities.

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The EU has no face or voice. Ursula is a US ambassador.

• EU Readies ‘Carrot-and-Stick” Trade Strategy to Deal With Trump (Sp.)

EU Trade Commissioner Valdis Dombrovskis earlier expressed hope that Brussels and Washington would avoid a repeat of past “confrontation” related to the two’s tariff war initiated by then-President Donald Trump in 2018. The European Union is hammering out a two-step trade plan to tackle Donald Trump if he wins a second term as US president, the Financial Times (FT) has reported. “We have to show we are a partner for the US, not a problem. We will look for deals, but we are ready to defend ourselves if it comes to it. We won’t be guided by fear,” an unnamed EU source told the newspaper. If Trump prevails in the November election, EU negotiators are reportedly planning to immediately approach his team, to discuss US products that the EU could buy in larger quantities.

A possible collapse of the talks and Trump’s subsequent imposition of higher tariffs, could prompt the European Commission’s trade department to draw up lists of US imports for retaliatory duties of 50% or more,” according to the source. The FT noted in this regard that EU officials “see the carrot-and-stick approach as the best response” to Trump’s previous pledge to impose a tariff of at least 10% on all $3 trillion worth of US imports in the event of his victory on November 5. EU Trade Commissioner Valdis Dombrovskis has meanwhile stressed the importance of the bloc and the US working together on trade, but added that Brussels “defended our interests with tariffs, and we stand ready to defend our interests again if necessary.” Then-US President Trump initiated his country’s tariff war with the EU in March 2018, when he announced a 25% duty on imported steel and 10% tariff on aluminum, which prodded the bloc to retaliate with tit-for-tat levies worth about $3 billion.

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“..Orange Man bad – orange man likes bitcoin – bitcoin bad!”

• 2 Days After Trump Crypto-Crowning, Biden Admin Sells Out (ZH)

It appears the Biden administration does not want former President Trump’s plan to enable a strategic bitcoin reserve to come to fruition (or at the very least, shrink the size of the reserve dramatically). Less than 48 hours after Trump spoke at a major Bitcoin conference in Nashville about his ambitious goals for bitcoin in America, the Biden administration has decided that this is an opportune moment to transfer around $2 billion worth of its bitcoin stockpile (e.g. Silk Road confiscations). The timing is risible…and transparent…Orange Man bad – orange man likes bitcoin – bitcoin bad! This transfer – and its implications of potential selling pressure overhang – sent Bitcoin reeling after briefly tagging $70,000…

Presumably, Biden and Harris are against the Trump HODL? And this is all the more odd considering the pleading letter written by various Democratic lawmakers urging the administration to back off their crypto war. We give the last word to well-known crypto billionaire (and major Dem donor), Mike Novogratz: “Tone deaf anyone??? Moving Silk Road BTC two days after Trumps pledge to not move them is just dumb!!!!” Read the room, indeed! Presumably, once again, ideology trumps all common sense.

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Lovely story.

“..if they vaccinate their cats they die when they are ten years old. If they don’t vaccinate them they live twice as long.”

• A Tale of Two Cats (Paul Craig Roberts)

A friend recently sent me a book, My Beloved Monster, by Caleb Carr. It is about a cat, certainly no monster, rescued by Carr that rescued him from depression and self-pity over his ailments. The cat, Masha, is a Siberian Forest Cat, not a large cat but, like many cats, a guardian of her territory. This brought Masha into conflict with a black bear which reminded me of my own little darling, Devil. In the earlier years of this website, readers were interested in my cats. Many wrote to me with stories of their own. I had taken in a young female stray, a victim I think of the housing foreclosures of 2007-08 when people forced to leave their residences abandoned their pets. In March of 2008 she presented me with seven kittens, all of which had bob tails. They were unusual and everyone wanted them. I kept the two runts. The male, Boy, grew into 25 pounds, and the female thought she was a leopard. She is absolutely fearless and a determined defender of her territory.

I have yet to figure out how cats decide on the extent of their territory, but the female earned one of her two names, Devil, by her defense of her territory. Her other name is My Little Darling. In my Blue Ridge Mountain home I took them out in harness with long leads. Devil tended to go after Copperheads, and although she was faster than they, I didn’t want to risk her being bitten. Thus the leads that gave me some control. One autumn I had them out. Devil was after a lizard. I noticed that Boy was on high alert. Looking for the cause, there was a 400 pound bear walking toward us. Normally black bears are not aggressive toward humans unless you are stupid enough to get between a mother bear and her cubs or to feed a bear and run out of food before the bear runs out of hunger. It was autumn and I wondered if cats might be included in the bear’s hibernation diet. I pulled Devil off the lizard chase and we headed for the front door.

Devil didn’t see the bear until we reached the front steps. Then ears flat, hackles up, the most incredible snarls and growls off she went for the bear. She pulled the lead out, and with tension on the lead she turned around and started pulling out of the harness. I had to run forward to remove the tension at which time she renewed her advance on the bear. The bear stood on his rear legs. I remember thinking he was bigger than a pro-football tackle. When I grabbed Devil we were within 12 feet of the bear. I headed for the front door where Boy was waiting for the door to open, put Devil down in order to open the door and off Devil went across the front porch to continue her attack on the bear. Fortunately at the end of the porch was a rock waterfall and pool and I caught her as she hesitated in figuring out how to avoid the water. I got her inside, Boy sought safety under the bed. Devil sat by the front door for 30 minutes growling and snarling. As I concluded, she thought she was a leopard.

Carr’s Masha, apparently, saw herself the same way. One evening she didn’t return home. Carr, who could barely walk, went looking for her in a rainstorm. Eventually he found her up in a tree. She wouldn’t come down. Carr went and got a ladder and managed despite his incapacity to get her out of the tree. On return to the house he discovered her wounds. At the veterinarian hospital the next morning, the vet said, judging from the wounds, that Masha had had an encounter with a bear before her lacerations of the bear’s face convinced the bear to retire from the confrontation and leave the scene. Masha’s claws had bear hair, skin, and blood. Masha recovered and the love affair between Carr and Masha continued for 17 years. Devil is 16. I lost Boy in 2018 before he reached 11. Many readers sent sympathy. The vets in the two practices who tried to save Boy from cancer both told me that the required vaccines Big Pharma has lobbied through corrupt state legislatures were the cause of the cancer. I immediately ceased vaccinating.

In my life, not all lived in urban hellholes like New York City and Washington DC, I never encountered a rabid animal. I grew up on my grandparents’ farm. I had a home in the Blue Ridge mountains for 20 years. Cottonmouth moccasins along the creek were the danger, not rabid animals. When I was a kid, dogs at six months of age got one rabies shot for life. Cats got no shots of any kind. An indoor car needs no shots, but Big Pharma has it that vets are prohibited from treating an unvaccinated cat or dog. Even for outdoor cats, the chance of encountering a rabid animal is far less than the danger to the cat of the vaccines. Everyone I know tells me that if they vaccinate their cats they die when they are ten years old. If they don’t vaccinate them they live twice as long.

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Kamalabook

 

 

1st day

 

 

Kitty cat
https://twitter.com/i/status/1817578405141033375

 

 

Deer cat

 

 

Let me dig

 

 

 

 

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