René Magritte Morning star 1938
John Ioannidis
New data reveals how effective booster shots are against Omicron
New data reveals how effective booster shots are against Omicron pic.twitter.com/KGAQWZv0Ty
— Wittgenstein (@backtolife_2022) February 14, 2022
“And please note that neither Dr. Fauci nor Dr. Collins nor Dr. Lane have any formal training in epidemiology..”
• We’ve Known How To Cure Covid Since March Of 2020: Dr. Robert Malone (JTN)
COVID-19 mask mandates were never necessary, says Dr. Robert Malone. “We’ve known how to cure COVID since about March of 2020,” the mRNA-vaccine-pioneer-turned-critic told “Just the News, Not Noise” TV show cohosts John Solomon and Amanda Head. The sudden scramble two years later by democratic governors to lift mask mandates “is a clear pivot consequent to their horrible polling numbers,” Malone said. “It’s exactly what I predicted when people were asking me, ‘How will we know when this thing is over?’ I’ve said, ‘Well, you’ll know it because they’ll all start giving awards to each other and claiming that they’re the ones that are responsible for curing it.'”
Malone also discussed explosive new data from the Defense Medical Epidemiology Database (DMED) regarding possible COVID vaccine side effects, which three military medical whistleblowers recently came forward with when they saw a significant increase in common vaccine injuries during 2021. “DMED was something that Lt. Col. Theresa Long and some of her colleagues queried when they were busy doing diligence to try to understand what they were seeing with their own warfighter communities that they were sworn to protect as physicians,” Malone explained.
“And they were seeing signals that were unusual, and so they consulted the DMED database and were shocked to find enormous increases in 2021, when the vaccine mandates were implemented to the military, compared to 2020 in a wide variety of diseases, including cancers, things related to reproduction and female reproductive health.” Malone was asked about recently released emails exposing a plan by three top federal public health officials to discredit the anti-lockdown epidemiologists behind the Great Barrington Declaration. The exchange showed the three — then-National Institutes of Health (NIH) Director Francis Collins, National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) Director Dr. Anthony Fauci, and NIAID Deputy Director for Clinical Research and Special Projects Dr. Clifford Lane — coordinating “a quick and devastating takedown” of the premises of the declaration, which espouses “focused protection,” a mitigation strategy prioritizing the most vulnerable populations.
“[T]hey slandered and defamed those three as ‘fringe’ epidemiologists, but they happen to be full professors at the obscure universities Oxford, Stanford and Harvard, I believe,” Malone said sarcastically, referring to Sunetra Gupta, Ph.D., Jay Bhattacharya, MD, Ph.D., and Martin Kulldorff, Ph.D., respectively. “And please note that neither Dr. Fauci nor Dr. Collins nor Dr. Lane have any formal training in epidemiology,” Malone added.
Justin is at 16% in the polls.
#Mooselini
• Canada Invokes Emergency Powers To Deal With Trucker Protest (RT)
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has invoked the Emergencies Act for the first time in Canadian history on Monday, citing the threat of “Freedom Convoy” trucker protests in Ottawa and several border crossings in the US. “This is not a peaceful protest,” Trudeau said in a speech on Monday afternoon, adding that “illegal blockades” have been “disrupting the lives of too many Canadians.” After consulting premiers, government and opposition, “the federal government has invoked the Emergencies Act,” Trudeau said, confirming media reports from earlier in the day that he would do so. The measures will be “time-limited, geographically targeted, as well as reasonable and proportionate to the threats they are meant to address,” the PM said. It does not involve calling in the military, or suspending fundamental rights and freedoms.
“This is about keeping Canadians safe, protecting people’s jobs, and restoring confidence in our institutions,” he said. “We are reinforcing the principles, values and institutions that keep all Canadians free.” Trudeau noted that it was the first time a Canadian government has invoked the Emergencies Act, which was passed in 1988 to replace the War Measures Act of 1914. The WMA was used during both world wars to intern Canadians of German and Japanese origin and impose restrictions on the economy, among other things. It was most recently invoked in 1970 by Trudeau’s father Pierre to crack down on Quebec separatists who had kidnapped a lawmaker. Close to 500 people had been arrested on that occasion.
Thousands of Canadian truck drivers and their sympathizers have taken part in nationwide protests since January 22, with a “Freedom Convoy” driving across the country to picket the parliament in Ottawa starting on January 29. The protesters demand an end to Covid-19 vaccine and mask mandates. Trudeau has denounced the truckers as a “fringe minority with unacceptable views” and accused them of bigotry, racism, Nazism and violence, refusing to meet with them. Though several Canadian provinces have announced the end of pandemic restrictions, Trudeau is still refusing to lift the federal mandates.
Despite Justin Trudeau granting himself dictatorial powers just moments ago, the protest continues On Parliament Hill. I am here because we cannot trust the CBC with this moment. https://t.co/nqV5X2Hp0v. pic.twitter.com/yDdDvLTdPZ
— Keean Bexte (@TheRealKeean) February 14, 2022
Federal Emergency Act so far rejected by New Brunswick, Quebec, Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba.
• Multiple Canadian Premiers Oppose Trudeau Invoking Emergencies Act (Rebel)
Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe has been making headlines recently, first for standing in support of the truckers convoy, then for being the first premier in Canada to announce an end to vaccine passports in their province. A few other Canadian premiers followed shortly after, with Progressive Conservative Premier Heather Stefanson announcing the planned loosening of restrictions in Manitoba as well. Now, both premiers, followed perhaps somewhat surprisingly by Quebec Premier Francois Legault, are taking a strong stance on the recent news that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is likely to invoke the Emergencies Act as a response to the Freedom Convoy in Ottawa and supportive protests happening across the country along the Canada-U.S. border. Others premiers are rumoured to follow suit.
First, in a statement on Twitter, Premier Moe said: “The illegal blockades must end, but police already have sufficient tools to enforce the law and clear the blockades, as they did over the weekend in Windsor. Therefore, Saskatchewan does not support the Trudeau government invoking the Emergencies Act. If the federal government does proceed with this measure, I would hope it would only be invoked in provinces that request it, as the legislation allows.” The relatively new Conservative premier of Manitoba, Heather Stefanson, also put out an official statement this afternoon, sharing it on Twitter with the caption: “I am proud of Manitoba’s law enforcement officials and have full confidence in them to protect our communities. The proposal from the federal government to use the Emergencies Act is not helpful to the situation at the Emerson Border.”
Quebec Premier Francois Legault, who has been much more strict on COVID-19 restrictions and vaccine mandates, also spoke up, stating “We don’t want it in Quebec territory.” Later in the day, Alberta Premier Jason Kenney also announced his opposition to the use of the Emergencies Act. “This morning I told Prime Minister Trudeau that Alberta’s government is opposed to the invocation of the federal Emergencies Act,” Kenney wrote on Twitter. “We have all of the legal tools and operational resources required to maintain order. The Act would add no relevant additional powers or resources.”
BREAKING: Canada is now regulating crowdfunding platforms and crypto currency under the Terrorist Financing Act. pic.twitter.com/SMzVqonD8v
— True North (@TrueNorthCentre) February 14, 2022
“Not only are people subject to get their bank accounts frozen, but the decision also to freeze the accounts is entirely up to the reviewer, and the reviewer is protected by the government from civil liability for their decision.”
• Trudeau Authorizes Bank Accounts Frozen for Social Media Posts (CTH)
The triggering of an official invocation of the Canadian Emergency Measures Act to eliminate protests is stunning. Using the Emergency Act to target individual citizens in Canada, and their bank accounts, is yet again another level of astonishing. The Canadian Civil Liberties Association has announced their opposition to the government declaration:
I am carefully reviewing the details of the authorization because according to the public statements by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland, they have authorized banks, financial institutions and insurance carriers to suspend the accounts of Canadian citizens based on their social media postings. Yes, you read that correctly. Support of “blockades and/or occupations” are specifically noted. Anyone in Canada (individual or business) who supports or “furthers” the Freedom Convoy or Freedom Protest on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter or any other social media platform, is a target to have their bank accounts frozen and insurance policies nullified. But wait, it gets worse.
Not only are people subject to get their bank accounts frozen, but the decision also to freeze the accounts is entirely up to the reviewer, and the reviewer is protected by the government from civil liability for their decision. “Support” and “affiliated with” are loosely defined, and as a result a guy delivering pizzas to an Ottawa “occupation” truckdriver is also running the risk of seeing his bank account frozen simply for providing the food. I can see why the Canadian Civil Liberties Assocation would take issue with this declaration. A banking employee who does not like the politics of a customer as revealed by a review of their social media postings, and merely “suspects” the account holder of supporting or furthering the action, can -without any liability- block the bank accounts of any customer or account holder; and they do not need to provide an explanation.
Freeland: “As of today, a bank or other financial service provider will be able to immediately freeze or suspend an account of an individual or business affiliated with these illegal blockades without a court order. In doing so, they will be protected against civil liability. Federal government institutions will have a new broad authority to share relevant information with banks and other financial service providers to ensure that we can all work together to put a stop to the funding of these illegal blockades.”
“..how can you justify going to a measure like an emergency, measures where a lot of powers can be imposed upon the citizens, when you have not even yourself taken any action to engage.”
• Freedom Convoy Organizers Say They’re Not Deterred by Emergencies Act (ET)
Freedom Convoy organizers say they will continue to protest on Parliament Hill despite the federal government’s declaration of a state of emergency. “We are not afraid. In fact, every time the government decides to further suspend our civil liberties, our resolve strengthens and the importance of our mission becomes clearer,” organizer Tamara Lich said on Feb. 14 in anticipation of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau invoking the Emergencies Act over the protests demanding an end to COVID-19 mandates. “We will remain peaceful, but planted on Parliament Hill until the mandates are decisively ended. We recognize that there is a democratic process within which change occurs. We have never stepped outside of that process, nor do we intend to.”
Trudeau is the first prime minister to use the Emergencies Act. The act replaces the War Measures Act, which was last used by Trudeau’s father, then-prime minister Pierre Trudeau, in 1970 during the October Crisis when Quebec separatists kidnapped and killed Quebec cabinet minister Pierre Laporte. The act gives the state additional powers to deal with the protests and blockades, such as providing legal tools to cut funding to protesters, as well as freezing the corporate accounts of companies whose trucks are used in any blockades and removing their insurance. The province of Ontario and the city of Ottawa have also declared states of emergency over the protests.
[..] Brian Peckford, former premier of Newfoundland who is acting as a spokesperson for the Freedom Convoy, said this is “a very, very strange moment in our history.” “This is again government overreach. We don’t do these kinds of things in Canada. We engage in dialogue,” Peckford said. “It’s my understanding that the government of Canada has not reached out once to the truckers since they have arrived in this capital city. I find that very hard to understand, because how can you justify going to a measure like an emergency, measures where a lot of powers can be imposed upon the citizens, when you have not even yourself taken any action to engage.”
Ron Johnson
Here’s a simple solution to the Canadian trucker strike. End the pointless and idiotic vaccine mandates. Respect everyone’s freedom and personal health autonomy. pic.twitter.com/LOzXxtSiOc
— Senator Ron Johnson (@SenRonJohnson) February 14, 2022
“..it was his incompetence that made such an extreme measure necessary..”
• Trudeau Has Gone Too Far (Toronto Sun Ed.)
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s unjustified invoking of the Emergencies Act is deeply problematic and will have long-lasting consequences for the country. Ever since the freedom convoy first touched base in Ottawa a couple of weeks ago, the PM has gone out of his way to increase the tensions. The Liberal government appeared to be hoping for some sort of Jan. 6 style event as happened in the United States last year. All of their rhetoric indicated they were keen to see such an event go down. It never did. The convoy has been peaceful throughout. The only real violence so far has been a vehicular ramming conducted against protesters, which sent four people to hospital. You don’t hear much about that though. Trudeau never condemned it.
Instead, Trudeau has called protesters every name in the book even though they are a diverse crowd in every sense of the word. Now he is giving himself extraordinary powers to deal with these protests. One of the most disturbing parts is how they can now dictate that banks freeze people’s accounts without a court order. People like Canadian hero Kevin Vickers — the Sargeant-at-Arms who personally thwarted the 2014 terrorist attack on Parliament Hill — have called for calm and dialogue. Trudeau doesn’t want that though. He just wants division and more hostility. It appears to be in this spirit that the PM has decided to invoke the Emergencies Act for the first time in Canadian history. At least four Premiers opposed him.
“We have all of the legal tools and operational resources required to maintain order,” Alberta Premier Jason Kenney wrote, in explaining his opposition. “The Act would add no relevant additional powers of resources.” Kenney added that this decision may only “escalate a tense situation” and that Trudeau needs to “end the cross border trucker vaccine mandate, as it serves no useful public health purpose.” The controversial blockade of the Ambassador Bridge was already resolved. The grounds for invoking this act are, according to Joanna Baron of the Canadian Constitution Foundation, “extremely thin”. The protests may be a nuisance and many people may disagree with them, but that doesn’t justify this decision. The only thing that can be said in defence of Trudeau’s invoking of the Emergencies Act is that it was his incompetence that made such an extreme measure necessary.
War Face
https://twitter.com/WeAreTheMSM/status/1493373657061670913
Trudeau, Freeland etc. are among the WEF’s Young Global Leaders.
• Canada In A Sad State; Plenty Of Blame To Go Around (Lilley)
One question kept going through my mind as I watched the events of the last several days. How did we get here? How did we get to the point where both the Ontario and federal governments had to invoke emergency legislation to deal with what started as a political protest? How did we end up at the point where a good portion of the nation’s capital can’t be said to be under any government control or that several border crossings have been shut down? There’s plenty of blame to go around. On the most basic level, there are the actions of the protesters who descended upon Ottawa, and more detrimental to the country, the border crossings. The protest in Ottawa turned into an occupation that annoyed locals while amusing many other Canadians, who hate the capital almost as much as they hate Toronto.
Eventually though, the bemusement across the country gave way to discomfort, and now we’re at the point where 72% of Canadians told the Angus Reid Institute that the protesters need to go home. The frolicking has worn out its welcome, the blocking of border crossings in Windsor, Coutts, Surrey and Emerson has annoyed the nation. We can’t forget the city administration in Ottawa, including its police service, when doling out blame. Somehow city and police leadership in Ottawa missed what everyone else heard ad nauseam before the convoy got to Parliament — they were coming to stay until all their demands were met. Police chief Peter Sloly said he expected them to leave town after the first Sunday. A quick scan of the news would have shown him otherwise. Local handling of the protest since the arrival has been missing in action to put it mildly.
Blame must also go to Trudeau and his government. While much has been said regarding Conservative MPs welcoming the protesters in Ottawa — leadership candidate Pierre Poilievre even saying he is proud of them and stands with them — the Conservatives are not in government. This protest started in opposition to Trudeau’s decision to impose a requirement that truckers crossing the Canada-U.S. border be fully vaccinated. But it has grown into so much more, a mass protest against COVID-19 measures in general. Like he has done so many times, Trudeau attacked those opposed to him in the harshest terms. He called them a “small fringe minority” and said they had “unacceptable views.” He’d previously described those opposed to his COVID policies as racist and misogynistic.
“Twitter’s “distribution of hacked materials” policy bans “the use of our services to directly distribute content obtained through hacking by the people or groups associated with a hack.”
• Twitter Won’t Censor Tweets Linking To Hacked Freedom Convoy Donor List (DC)
Twitter is allowing posts to remain on its platform containing the private information of Freedom Convoy donors reportedly obtained through hacking, according to a review of Twitter’s platform by the Daily Caller News Foundation. Crowdfunding service GiveSendGo was reportedly hacked late Sunday and the personal information of donors to the Freedom Convoy, a group of truckers and individuals protesting Canada’s COVID-19 restrictions, was given to leak-hosting site Distributed Denial of Secrets, the organization said on its website. GiveSendGo has yet to publicly confirm the hack[..]. Twitter’s “distribution of hacked materials” policy bans “the use of our services to directly distribute content obtained through hacking by the people or groups associated with a hack.”
This includes “posting Tweets which include links to hacked content hosted on other websites” as well as “posting hacked content on Twitter (e.g., in the text of a Tweet, or in an image).” A review of Twitter’s platform by the DCNF found several tweets appearing to contain screenshots of the hacked donor list or links to files containing what appeared to be the hacked materials. The donor list contains personally identifying information including full names, zip codes, email handles and IP addresses, as well as donation messages, according to a review of the hacked materials by the DCNF. Twitter previously censored a tweet from the New York Post in October 2020, one month before the 2020 presidential election, linking to a story allegedly containing emails from Hunter Biden’s laptop. The social media company cited its hacked materials policy as the reason for its actions.
“Joe Biden” has so far failed to deliver that war with Russia over Ukraine he promised us..”
Things are turning, indeed, out there… out in the truck stops and the households fending off repossession and the small businesses struggling desperately for survivial — even in the degenerate halls of government, state-by-state. The armature of Covid-19 tyranny is getting rapidly dismantled by politicians close to running for their very lives. The home-folks have had enough of their insolence and they’re sharpening the tines of their pitchforks. Events also conspire to put the schnitz on the alleged Globalists dream of digital tyranny — if there even is such a cabal of Globalists, which I’m not sure about, or just a coterie of feckless hacks swept along by a malefic zeitgeist, Canada’s Justin Trudeau being the poster-boy for that breed. The timing has gone all awry on them. The Covid-19 hysteria draws to a close against their wishes to drag it on forever.
Even the triple-vaccinated are sick of it — and not a few of them are sick because of it. Governments and the corrupt medical establishment won’t touch this info with a stick, but the morticians and insurance execs are hopping up and down about what looks like a supernatural die-off of folks between 18 and 60 generally not susceptible to early death. Kind of worrisome, a little bit. Anybody with half-a-brain left is declining the offer of yet another booster — though Dr. Fauci was still tirelessly selling them last week. Mainly, though, the window-of-opportunity has closed, in the USA, anyway, for anymore vaccine passport nonsense, and with that goes the dream of roping every last citizen into a corral of total social control, including central bank digital currencies that would turn everyone into a yo-yo to be jerked-around by government.
“Joe Biden” has so far failed to deliver that war with Russia over Ukraine he promised us — which would be like two Craig’s List customers fighting over a twenty-year-old Jeep Wrangler up on blocks with the engine missing. Ukraine president Zelensky is a professional comedian, of course, so one must admire his gag of inviting “Joe Biden” to visit his country, the Gem of Eurasia, “in the coming days,” Mr. Zelenski said, “which will be a powerful signal and contribute to de-escalation.” Plus, all the pierogi and cabbage the US president can eat. All this made National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan gnash his teeth for the trouble he has gone to in prepping the sore-beset American people for World War Three.
“Pick one. Masks, social distancing, kids in schools/not in schools, swabs-up-nose, etc. It’s all bull****, and you saw it on display last night.”
• Go Ahead, Defend It Now (Denninger)
Pick one. Masks, social distancing, kids in schools/not in schools, swabs-up-nose, etc. It’s all bull****, and you saw it on display last night. A packed-full stadium with exactly nobody distancing anything and zero mask enforcement of any sort. They didn’t even try to fake it. If you send your kid to school and let him or her put up with this crap today for one more minute you’re a monster. If you put up with it anywhere for another 15 minutes yourself then you’re stupid. I mock your stupidity. I will openly point and laugh at your ragged face wherever and whenever I see it. You had the “most-serious” game of sportball all year with wild defiance of any such crap in your face, in the city and state with the most-restrictive mandates of all, and exactly nobody gave a wet crap so long as they were cheering on their team after declaring themselves “above it all” simply by buying tickets and, in some cases, paying a thousand bucks to park their car besides.
Save me the bull**** about “vax passports” while you’re at it. You know ******ned well the jabs don’t stop you from getting or transmitting the virus and tens of thousands of bare-faced screaming people packed literally shoulder-to-shoulder expelled whatever they had in their throat and lungs onto everyone within 20′ of them for more than two hours. If the bug was in there, and know damn well it was, the love was spread. Today you burn your mask — or you’re stupid. Today you refuse to allow your children to be abused for one more minute — or you’re a ****ing monster who deserves every evil thing that can possibly happen to you and when it does I will cheer your demise. And today you tell your government to shove its vax passport and all other mandates up its ass sideways and warn them that if they ever try this bull**** again you’re going to remove them and you don’t care how or you’re so far beyond stupid you deserve to be smote.
“..when viewed in light of other publicly available information, demonstrate an apparent effort by you and Dr. Collins not only to cover up the concerns those virologists raised, but to suppress scientific debate about the origins of Covid-19..”
• GOP Lawmakers Demand Answers From Fauci (RT)
US Republican lawmakers have sent a letter pressing chief White House medical advisor Dr. Anthony Fauci for answers about his alleged silencing of concerns that the Covid-19 virus originally came from a Chinese lab. The letter, sent on Monday by three US House members, cited emails suggesting that Fauci and Dr. Francis Collins, then director of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), tried in early 2020 to quash speculation among scientists that the virus may have originated in the Wuhan Institute of Virology. Instead of alerting national security officials to the pandemic’s potentially unnatural origin, Fauci and Collins sought to shut down the debate, the GOP lawmakers said.
The emails, which were obtained by media outlets under Freedom of Information Act requests, reportedly showed that some virology experts saw reason to believe that the virus was lab-created. Some of the messages made reference to a February 2020 conference call in which many scientists leaned toward the lab-leak theory. For instance, Tulane Medical School professor Robert Garry said he could see no “plausible natural scenario” for some aspects of Covid-19 otherwise. “However, those same email communications, particularly when viewed in light of other publicly available information, demonstrate an apparent effort by you and Dr. Collins not only to cover up the concerns those virologists raised, but to suppress scientific debate about the origins of Covid-19,” the letter said.
Representatives Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-Washington), Brett Guthrie (R-Kentucky) and Morgan Griffith (R-Virginia) signed the letter. They demanded that Fauci provide details on how those conversations with scientists were initiated and who consulted him and Collins on Covid-19’s likely origins. The lawmakers also requested information on any communications by Fauci and Collins with Chinese scientists, as well as documents related to US funding of the research in Wuhan.
“I have to speak with our people as President, and I say the truth to people, and the truth is that we have different information.”
• ‘False Crisis’ Regarding Russia Hurts Relations Between US And Ukraine (JTN)
The situation in Ukraine is a “false crisis” that has hurt relations between Washington and Kyiv, as the Biden Administration increasingly claims to know the date and method of a Russian incursion against its neighbor, experts told Just the News. The experts made their comments Monday while appearing on the John Solomon Reports podcast. “It’s a false crisis,” said international relations expert Kiron Skinner, who served as an adviser at the State Department under Donald Trump. She made that assessment, she noted, because “there’s been a war of attrition going on between Kyiv and Moscow for eight years.”
International tension has spiked recently as Russia maintains an estimated 100,000 troops along its border with Ukraine and has issued ominous statements about “the start of a countdown” and claims that Moscow is being “provoked.” The U.S. has repeatedly announced that Moscow plans to stage a “false flag” provocation in order to justify an attack on Ukraine, and has said that the attack is “imminent,” and could occur this week. The State Department on Monday shuttered its main embassy in Kyiv, and moved the operations to the western city of Lviv. The announcements and predictions strike a sour note in government circles in Kyiv, according to Dan Hoffman, a former station chief for the CIA in Moscow.
“The relationship between the United States and Ukraine is strained right now, to say the least, because Russia has got 130,000 troops on the border,” Hoffman told Just the News. “President Zelenskyy, rightly so, is questioning, well, where’s the intelligence?” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Sunday said that he had not seen the intelligence assessments regarding an invasion, and that the warnings were stoking panic. “I think there is too much information out there today about a deep full scale war on Russia’s part,” Zelenskyy said. “There is even talk of appropriate dates. We understand all the risks. We understand that the risks are there. If anyone has any additional information about a 100% chance of an invasion, they should give it to us.”
Alternating between English and Ukrainian, Zelenskyy continued: “I have to speak with our people as President, and I say the truth to people, and the truth is that we have different information.”
https://twitter.com/Veracious311/status/1493317362778578945
Transnistria, officially the Pridnestrovian Moldavian Republic, is an unrecognised breakaway state located in the narrow strip of land between the river Dniester and the Moldovan–Ukrainian border that is internationally recognised as part of Moldova. Its capital and largest city is Tiraspol.
• State Dep. Tells US Citizens To Leave Belarus And Transnistria ‘Immediately’ (JTN)
The State Department on Monday told U.S. citizens in Belarus and Moldova’s unrecognized breakaway state of Transnistria to “depart immediately via commercial or private means.” Both countries are at travel advisory Level 4, the highest possible. The State Department warns U.S. citizens to not travel to Belarus due to “arbitrary enforcement of laws, the risk of detention, unusual and concerning Russian military buildup along Belarus’ border with Ukraine, COVID-19 and related entry restrictions.” Americans are warned to not travel to Moldova due to “COVID-19, the unusual and concerning Russian military activity around Ukraine, and the unresolved conflict between the breakaway region of Transnistria and the central government.”
Transnistria is on the southwest border of Ukraine. The region has been described as where the Soviet Union and Communism “never died.” Late last month, the State Department ordered the evacuation of family members of U.S. diplomats from the embassy in Minsk. The department on Monday also announced plans to relocate the U.S. embassy in Kyiv to Lviv in western Ukraine. The State Department last week urged U.S. citizens in Ukraine “to depart now,” warning that the U.S. government would be unable to evacuate American citizens in the event of Russian military action.
“..rationing seems to be a silly idea but it was done during WW2 and, if there is a serious economic crash — as it is perfectly possible — it can return.”
• How We Became What We Despised (Ugo Bardi)
The combination of abundant resources and relatively low military expenses made it possible for the American citizens (most of them, at least) to enjoy an extravagant lifestyle, unthinkable elsewhere in the world. They lived in suburban houses, had two cars in every garage, could go wherever they wanted, had overseas vacations every year, could buy whatever they wanted without standing in line. The US citizens could even afford a certain degree of variety in the information they received. The state control on the media was enacted in subtle ways, giving citizens the illusion that they were not exposed to propaganda. It was the kind of lifestyle that president Bush said was “not up for negotiation” — except that when you deal with Nature, everything is up to negotiation.
The current problem is that the resources that made the West so rich and so powerful, mainly crude oil and other fossil fuels, are not infinite. They are being depleted, and production costs increase with depletion. And that’s not the only problem: something else is choking the Western economic system: it is the enormous cost of the health care system. In 2018, the US spent $3.6 trillion in health costs, nearly 18% of its GDP. Today, it is probably more than that. Yes, health costs in the US are ten times larger than military costs. It is probably not a coincidence that troubles started to appear when these costs reached the same level, about 20%, of the military expenses for the Soviet Union.
Someone has to pay for those costs and, as always, they fall on the middle class, which becomes poorer and poorer. On one extreme of the wealth distribution curve, former middle class citizens are losing everything they had and they are being gradually squeezed out of the market. And here is the problem: those who have no money to spend can’t buy their sweet buns. They become “non-people,” aka “deplorables.” What is to be done with them? A possible solution (that I am sure some elites are contemplating), is just to let them die and cease to be a problem (it is the zombie scenario). But we are not there, yet. The elites themselves don’t want the chaos that would result from starving a large fraction of the citizens. How to avoid that?
The solution is well known from ancient times: it is rationing. The Romans had already developed a system called “Annona” that distributed food to the poor. During WW2, the US had ration books, ration stamps, food stamps, and the like. The Soviets used a kind of funny money called “ruble.” In the West, rationing seems to be a silly idea but it was done during WW2 and, if there is a serious economic crash — as it is perfectly possible — it can return. It must return because without rationing we’ll have the zombie apocalypse all over simply because there is no mechanism in place to limit those who still have money from hoarding all they can, when they can.
Tucker Lee Smith
.@LeeSmithDC says he keeps hearing people comparing the scandal to Watergate when it doesn’t compare to Watergate at all. We are talking about some of the most secure communications in government been Surveiled by political operatives. pic.twitter.com/f22h5V92vV
— The Dirty Truth (Josh) (@AKA_RealDirty) February 15, 2022
Jon Stewart – Hoenig
Federal Reserve President (Kansas City) Thomas Hoenig Outlines The US Dollar Is A Fiat Fraud Based On Confidence & Mass Delusion. pic.twitter.com/TDRpVkMWEP
— Ben Rickert (@Ben__Rickert) February 14, 2022
https://twitter.com/Owl__Kitty/status/1492783828704055297
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