Ray K. Metzker 58 AW-20, Chicago 1958
Taibbi
Matt Taibbi's opening statement on the Twitter Files and the censorship industrial complex:
"Twitter, Facebook, Google, and other companies developed a formal system for taking in moderation requests from every corner of government, from the FBI, DHS, HHS, DOD, the Global… https://t.co/WiLeCYXmvx pic.twitter.com/BbMoSYNiR2
— kanekoa.substack.com (@KanekoaTheGreat) March 9, 2023
Garcia
https://twitter.com/i/status/1633877478287773696
Tucker Redfield
Tucker Carlson talks about CDC Director Dr. Robert Redfield saying Dr. Anthony Fauci deliberately covered up the origins of COVID-19:
"This will probably all get lost, and nobody will ever be held accountable for destroying the US economy and killing a million people, but the… https://t.co/oatbUVjXvQ pic.twitter.com/02NU80IJVb
— kanekoa.substack.com (@KanekoaTheGreat) March 9, 2023
Hero
Who is this absolute hero??? pic.twitter.com/DMpPlICfs1
— Dr David Cartland (@CartlandDavid) March 9, 2023
Fiat Information Inflation
https://twitter.com/i/status/1633622889739042817
Cammack
Rep. Kat Cammack and Michael Shellenberger discuss Twitter censoring Stanford Professor Jay Bhattacharya and Dr. Fauci and Collins calling for a "published takedown" of the Great Barrington Declaration (GBD):
"Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, the Stanford Professor, who I don't think… https://t.co/00vVICd80l pic.twitter.com/accrfyf6lO
— kanekoa.substack.com (@KanekoaTheGreat) March 9, 2023
“..draw to a close around summer 2023..”
“..Xi may come to Moscow in late April or early May..”
• Chinese Think Tank Predicts Ukraine Conflict Will End Before Autumn 2023 (RT)
A top Chinese think tank close to the nation’s armed forces has predicted that the Russia-Ukraine conflict will end before autumn of 2023, Japan’s Nikkei newspaper reported on Tuesday, citing sources close to the Chinese government. Beijing considered the assessment solid enough to try to assume the role of a mediator in the standoff before it potentially ends, the media outlet claimed. The assessment was issued by the Academy of Military Sciences (AMS), a Beijing-based think tank that reports directly to the Chinese People’s Liberation Army and regularly issues recommendations to China’s top military decision-making body. The AMS issued its appraisal of the conflict as early as in December, Nikkei said. The newspaper added that the think tank’s view that an end to the hostilities was likely relatively imminent prompted Beijing to take a more active role in seeking a resolution.
The AMS forecast based on a military simulation of the ongoing conflict suggested that it would “draw to a close around summer 2023,” with Russia “having the upper hand,” Nikkei claimed, citing sources close to the Chinese government. The think tank believes that both the Russian and Ukrainian economies would be hard pressed to sustain the hostilities past the summer. The AMS analysis prompted Beijing to come up with a peace proposal, the Nikkei claimed. With this initiative, China sought to restore relations with Europe to ensure the continued flow of investment and technologies to the Chinese economy, the media outlet said. Another of Beijing’s goals was to maintain friendly relations with Kiev, the paper suggested.
“Along with Russia, we can’t afford to lose Ukraine,” a Chinese government source told the media outlet. The Nikkei also claimed that Beijing was contemplating sending economic aid to Kiev as part of its peace plan. Success in the mediation efforts would also help China assume a more prominent position in the eyes of Global South, Nikkei said, calling it another reason behind the initiative. To achieve this, Chinese President Xi Jinping is considering a visit to Moscow, the paper claimed. Beijing has not officially announced any such plans. The Wall Street Journal reported on supposed preparations for a visit in late February. According to the media outlet, Xi may come to Moscow in late April or early May in an attempt to push for multi-party peace talks.
“The visit to Russia can’t come too soon or too late,” a Chinese source told Nikkei, commenting on the potential visit. According to Nikkei, the “best scenario” for China would be for Russia and Ukraine to start talks right after Xi’s trip to Moscow. China unveiled its 12-point plan to resolve the Ukraine conflict in late February. It included calls for resuming peace talks, condemned unilateral sanctions, and upheld the sovereignty and territorial integrity of all nations. Moscow welcomed Beijing’s efforts aimed at resolving the conflict, while the West has largely brushed off the initiative. NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said that China didn’t have “much credibility” in the issue. US State Secretary Antony Blinken, however, then said that the plan does include some “positive elements.”
“..Russia welcomes Saudi Arabia’s interest in helping facilitate the settlement of the ongoing situation..”
• Ukraine Still Not Interested In Negotiating Conflict Settlement – Lavrov (TASS)
Russia sees no desire on behalf of the Kiev authorities to launch substantial negotiations on the Ukrainian conflict’s settlement, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said on Thursday. “So far, we see no desire on the part of our Ukrainian neighbors to begin serious talks,” Lavrov said at a news conference following talks with his Saudi Arabian counterpart Faisal Bin Farhan Al Saud. “Moreover, I have stated repeatedly that [Ukrainian President Vladimir] Zelensky issued a decree last September prohibiting any negotiations with Russia, while Zelensky’s Western patrons constantly state that Russia should be defeated on the battlefield in order to start talks from a position of strength. Judge for yourself how reasonable such statements are.”
Lavrov noted that Russia welcomes Saudi Arabia’s interest in helping facilitate the settlement of the ongoing situation as soon as possible as well as resolving it in the context of Russia’s legitimate demands, which have for years gone ignored after the unconstitutional coup in Ukraine. “You have mentioned in particular the exchange of prisoners of war. There have been a series of them, with the latest one held recently, literally the day before yesterday,” Lavrov said. “To a large extent, the arrangements that made this possible were made with the assistance of Saudi Arabia and a number of other Arab states. We are grateful and believe that it is important to maintain this course.” The Russian Defense Ministry announced earlier that 90 Russian soldiers had been returned from territory under the control of Kiev. They were airlifted to Moscow by Russian Aerospace Forces planes for medical treatment and rehabilitation at ministry facilities.
Peace talks are dangerous.
• Kiev’s Security Chief Names ‘Dangerous Tendency’ Among Ukrainians (RT)
A growing number of Ukrainians would like to see Kiev launch peace talks with Moscow, the head of the National Security and Defense Council, Aleksey Danilov, admitted on Thursday. The top security official blasted the development as a “very dangerous tendency” when he was live on the Ukrainian talk show ‘Greater Lviv speaks’. “[One should] bear in mind that those [people advocating talks with Russia] are growing in numbers. It is a very dangerous tendency when even people in western Ukraine are starting to talk about such things,” Danilov said, as cited by RIA news agency. He also pointed out a local politician in the western Lviv region that allegedly called on Kiev to sit down at the negotiating table with Moscow.
Russia has previously repeatedly indicated that it was open to communicating with Ukraine if its leaders accepted Moscow’s conditions and recognized what the Kremlin calls the “reality on the ground.” In autumn 2022, four former Ukrainian regions, including the two Donbass republics, officially joined Russia following referendums. Kiev blasted the vote as a “sham” and insisted all four territories remained part of Ukraine, along with Crimea, which joined Russia back in 2014 following another referendum in the wake of the Maidan coup.
Kiev has refused to enter into any negotiations with Moscow since spring 2022, when initial attempts to resolve the conflict through diplomatic means failed. At the time, Ukraine withdrew from talks with Russia following several rounds of negotiations in Belarus and Türkiye. In early October 2022, Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky ruled out negotiations with his Russian counterpart. Kiev is insisting on a military victory over Moscow. During a G20 summit in November 2022, Zelensky ruled out a potential new ‘Minsk-3’ agreement, referring to previous accords designed to resolve the conflict between Kiev and the two Donbass republics.
Jello for brains.
• Commander: US Must Focus on Sinking Chinese Ships in Future War (Antiwar)
The head of United States Pacific Air Forces said Wednesday that the US needs to focus on sinking Chinese ships in a potential conflict with China as US military leaders are speaking more bluntly about a direct war with Beijing despite the risk of it turning nuclear. Gen. Kenneth Wilsbach said the need to focus on sinking ships was the lesson of China’s response to former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) visiting Taiwan last August. The trip provoked China’s largest-ever military drills around the island, which included a simulated blockade.
“You saw when Speaker Pelosi went to Taiwan, what [China] did with their ships,” Wilsbach said at a symposium in Colorado, according to Military.com. “They put them on the east side of Taiwan … as a sort of blockade.” Wilsbach said the US wants to focus on deterring China from attacking Taiwan, although Beijing’s actions and rhetoric make clear more US military support for the island makes a conflict more likely. He said if China does attack, sinking ships would be the first priority. “We’ve got to sink the ships,” Wilsbach said. “Sinking ships is a main objective of not only PACAF [Pacific Air Forces] but really anyone that’s going to be involved in a conflict like this.”
Do they make up the details as they go along?
• Kremlin: No Pro-Ukrainian ‘Doctor Evil’ Behind Nord Stream Attacks (TASS)
The Kremlin does not believe that some pro-Ukrainian individuals could have been behind the Nord Stream explosions, as only a handful of intelligence services are capable of committing such a terrorist attack, Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on Thursday. “As for [the idea that there exists] some sort of pro-Ukrainian ‘Doctor Evil’ who [allegedly] organized this: it’s hard to believe. It was too difficult an operation that could only be carried out by a well-trained state-sponsored special service. There are not that many of them in the world,” he said, commenting on a number of foreign media publications about the terrorist attack on the Nord Stream pipelines. He highlighted that media reports about who was allegedly behind this terrorist attack had been “released simultaneously in different countries.”
“You see that the Anglo-Saxons, whom we’ve been talking about from the very beginning, are working up a sweat. They obviously are having a lot of uncomfortable interactions with the Germans due to this terrorist attack,” Peskov said. The Kremlin official stressed that it is necessary to identify those who ordered the crime and those who executed it, “because it is too dangerous a precedent to [permit] the commission of an act of terror against an internationally critical piece of energy infrastructure.” “We are still calling for a prompt, transparent probe. We are still demanding that we be given access to this investigation. We believe that one should not soft-pedal it. Diverting attention <…> to some secondary theories and hypotheses – [this] should not be allowed either,” the Kremlin spokesman said.
As the Wall Street Journal reported on Wednesday, the German probe has almost completely ruled out the initial theory of Russia’s involvement in the sabotage of the Nord Stream and Nord Stream 2 gas pipelines, while the United States does not believe in Russia’s culpability either. On Tuesday, the New York Times reported, citing US officials, that a “pro-Ukrainian group” that acted without the knowledge of US authorities could have committed the sabotage on the gas pipelines. The Zeit newspaper wrote that German investigators had identified a vessel used by the saboteurs. The company that rented it allegedly belonged to Ukrainian citizens and was registered in Poland. On Wednesday, the Times [of London] reported that European intelligence agencies were aware of the name of a “private sponsor” of the sabotage. While his identity is not being disclosed by the security services, he is described as a wealthy Ukrainian who purportedly has no links to President Vladimir Zelensky and his government.
“The UN Secretariat which Moscow has asked to conduct an unbiased probe into the incident has been “absolutely passive and aloof,” he lamented.”
• Lavrov Lays Into West’s Latest Nord Stream Explanation (TASS)
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov on Thursday called attempts by Western media to shift the blame for the blasts on the Nord Stream gas pipelines on to a Ukrainian oligarch shameful. “The attempts to explain, with reference to some Western intel services, that a certain Ukrainian oligarch was behind these (blasts on the gas pipelines – TASS), I think, are shameful for all those who have been pushing such a version through Western media outlets,” Lavrov said at a news conference following talks with Saudi Foreign Minister Faisal Bin Farhan Al Saud. Russia’s top diplomat slammed what he said was a disgraceful reaction by Western media to the blasts and assured that the reports would not go unnoticed. The UN Secretariat which Moscow has asked to conduct an unbiased probe into the incident has been “absolutely passive and aloof,” he lamented.
“Reporters [have been asking] the secretary general and his representatives whether they find it necessary to investigate the screaming reports that have popped up about how the West views last September’s terrorist attack on the Nord Streams. Both the [UN] secretary general and his employees have been dodging these justified questions,” Lavrov added. On Tuesday, the New York Times reported, citing US officials, that the latest intelligence data suggest a pro-Ukrainian group could have been behind the sabotage at the Nord Stream 1 and 2 pipelines. Also on Tuesday, Germany’s Zeit published a report saying that German investigators had identified the ship that was used by the saboteurs. The company that rented it was allegedly owned by Ukrainian nationals and was registered in Poland.
“Russia intends to share with the UN Security Council the exchanges it had with Germany, Denmark, and Sweden..”
• Moscow To Expose Nord Stream Stonewalling – Official (RT)
Russia intends to share with the UN Security Council the exchanges it had with Germany, Denmark, and Sweden regarding the sabotage of the Nord Stream pipelines, a senior Russian diplomat has revealed. Moscow is seeking to press its case for an impartial, UN-backed investigation of the incident. Dmitry Polyansky, the deputy head of the Russian mission to the UN, told US political commentator Jackson Hinkle on Thursday that Moscow is not participating in investigations conducted by the three European countries, “not because we don’t want to, but because they keep us at bay.” The diplomat claimed that, in a nutshell, the message from the three nations was: “We are doing what we are doing, mind your own business.”
The Russian mission will distribute the exchanges among members of the UN Security Council in an effort to initiate an “independent, unbiased international investigation with all parties concerned,” Polyansky added. Moscow wants the UNSC to authorize Secretary General Antonio Guterres to launch a probe into the attack on the undersea energy links, which were built to pump Russian natural gas directly to Germany. Three of the four pipes were ruptured by explosions in September last year in the territorial waters of Denmark and Sweden. According to Polyansky, Russia intends to put its proposal to a vote by the end of March, although Western powers will inevitably object. Veteran US investigative journalist Seymour Hersh reported last month that the sabotage was a clandestine US-Norwegian operation meant to prevent Germany from straying from the American-led campaign of sanctions against Russia.
Moscow’s ambassador to the UN, Vassily Nebenzia, called the revelation “more than a smoking gun.” The US and Norway have denied Hersh’s allegations. A series of publications in American and German media suggested this week that a Ukrainian oligarch had sponsored the operation, which was said to have been conducted by a small team of private divers from a rented yacht. Polyansky claimed the reports were an obvious attempt to distract the public. The diplomat insisted that the Nord Stream incident was “an extreme act of sabotage” and that the perpetrators should face accountability. Should that not happen, it would open a dangerous new chapter in international relations where attacks on civilian infrastructure are condoned, Polyansky argued.
“It is definitely important to us that there is calm along our borders and of course, the current situation there leaves much to be desired..”
• Kremlin: Unrest In Georgia Cause For Concern, Not Russia’s Fault (TASS)
Russia has no connection to the Georgian foreign agent bill that has caused protests in the country, Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on Thursday. “The Kremlin did not inspire anything and has absolutely nothing to do with this,” he stressed. Peskov pointed out that the United States was a pioneer in terms of such laws. “If we understand correctly, one of the versions of the [Georgian] bill was actually very similar to the US law on the matter. The second version did not resemble the US law so much and was much softer. However, we certainly have nothing to do with any of them,” Peskov said.
He added that the unrest in Georgia was cause for concern. “It is our neighboring country after all, and although we don’t actually maintain relations with Georgia, we are certainly concerned about the situation there. It is definitely important to us that there is calm along our borders and of course, the current situation there leaves much to be desired,” he noted. Thousands of protesters took to the streets of the Georgian capital of Tbilisi on March 7-8 after lawmakers had passed the first reading of the Georgian version of a foreign agent bill. On March 9, the ruling party decided to withdraw the bill from parliament.
“..EU nations and other “upper-middle income countries” are receiving 81% of the grain from Ukraine, with only 2.6% going to the countries that need it the most..”
• US To Discourage Africa From Doing Business With Russia – Official (RT)
US Deputy Treasury Secretary Wally Adeyemo is planning a trip to Africa, where he will press officials in Ghana, Nigeria, and another unnamed country to cut their business ties with Russia, he said on Wednesday. Speaking to ‘Pod Save the World’ host Ben Rhodes, Adeyemo said that the trip would take place this month. The goal of the trip, he explained, will be to convince those countries that the worldwide spike in food and energy prices is the fault of Russia, even though US President Joe Biden has admitted that Washington’s sanctions on Russia have raised costs in “an awful lot of countries.” “Our goal is to make very clear to [these] countries from an economic standpoint: your economic interests are aligned with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine ending as soon as possible,” Adeyemo said.
The US is “trying to do everything we can to reduce the costs [that Africa is] facing due to this war,” he claimed, adding that Africans “should be asking Russia to do the same.” Ghana and Nigeria, like many other African nations, rely heavily on grain and fertilizer imports from Ukraine and Russia. Although Russia and Ukraine signed a deal last August to establish a safe corridor to transport grain from Ukrainian ports to countries facing food insecurity, Moscow warned earlier this month that EU nations and other “upper-middle income countries” are receiving 81% of the grain from Ukraine, with only 2.6% going to the countries that need it the most.
Meanwhile, Western sanctions are impeding the delivery of Russian grain by sea. Kiev also continues to block a vital ammonia pipeline, causing a shortage of the compound that could be used to produce seven million tons of fertilizer, the Russian Foreign Ministry stated. Adeyemo said that the US does not want African nations to trade with Russia. “They can support Russia, which is a small economy that’s getting smaller because of our actions, or [they] can continue to have access to doing business with companies and individuals in countries that represent more than 50% of the global economy,” he told Rhodes.
While both Ghana and Nigeria voted at the United Nations to condemn Russia’s military operation in Ukraine, neither have imposed sanctions on Moscow. The majority of UN members have taken a similar position, which the US Treasury has worked to change. In a visit to Türkiye, the United Arab Emirates, and Oman last month, Brian Nelson, the department’s undersecretary for terrorism and financial intelligence, warned that these countries could lose access to Western markets if they continued to trade with sanctioned Russian entities. Adeyemo’s boss, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, went on a similar junket to Senegal, Zambia and South Africa in January.
Overkill.
• Oscars Reportedly Say No To Zelensky (RT)
Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky’s bid to appear virtually at the Academy Awards has been rejected for the second year in a row, Vanity Fair said on Thursday. Mike Simpson, a high-powered Hollywood agent from the WME agency who also represents directors Quentin Tarantino and Bong Joon Ho, was supposedly sent in to try to clinch the deal, but the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences was not swayed, the article says. The Academy declined to comment to Vanity Fair. Zelensky’s efforts to appear at the Oscars last year were also rebuffed, reportedly because the Academy wanted to “steer clear of anything political.” Oscars producer Will Packer also allegedly complained that Hollywood was fawning over Zelensky because those affected by the conflict in Ukraine were white, while the many wars impacting non-white people around the world have been largely snubbed by the cultural elite.
Hollywood actor and vocal Zelensky supporter Sean Penn called for a boycott of the awards show and even vowed to melt down his own Oscar statues if his friend was not permitted to speak, a campaign that gained little traction at the time. While Penn did not end up liquefying his awards, he did give one of them to Zelensky during a visit to Kiev, and has not commented on this year’s developments. The Ukrainian president has been ubiquitous at large-scale public events in the West since the start of Russia’s military offensive in Ukraine last year, appearing via video link to plead for financial and moral support at the Cannes, Venice, and Berlin film festivals, the Grammy Awards, the Glastonbury music festival, and even the New York Stock Exchange, where he rang the opening bell “virtually” in September.
However, Americans appear to be tiring of the comedian-turned-politician’s routine, with polls showing a growing portion of the electorate believes too much of their money is being sent to Ukraine. A recent analysis by German research firm Statista found President Joe Biden’s administration had spent more money on military aid to Ukraine than the US spent annually to fight its own war in Afghanistan. Italy’s Sanremo song festival last month pulled a planned Zelensky appearance after widespread criticism that saw one of the event participants forgoing his own live appearance in protest.
She’s been there for many years.
• Fire Victoria Nuland — Don’t Let Her Drive War (CN)
For the women of Ukraine, the illegal Russian invasion — which Nuland provoked over the years with NATO expansion — has led to heightened sex trafficking and increased gender violence. According to the United Nations and relief organizations, this includes not only rape as a weapon of war, but “intimate partner violence and sexual harassment.” With Ukraine under martial law and men aged 18-60 forced to the front lines, young women refugees — often unaccompanied — are vulnerable to abuse at border crossings. On International Women’s Day, women don’t let women drive war. Instead, we at CODEPINK urge Biden to fire Nuland and pursue a people-centered feminist foreign policy that employs diplomacy to bring this war to an end now.
The fact that Nuland was given a diplomatic job in the Biden administration in the first place never ceases to amaze because her record reads like a war criminal’s rap sheet. Nuland served as Vice President Dick Cheney’s deputy national security adviser from 2003-2005, during the illegal U.S. invasion and occupation of Iraq, a painful chapter in U.S. history that left over a million Iraqis dead and thousands of U.S. soldiers in body bags. In 2005, Nuland became ambassador to NATO, where she lobbied Europe to participate in the disastrous U.S. occupation of Afghanistan. In persuading other governments the U.S. could win that war, she sold a lie across Europe to prolong a near 20-year occupation that left Afghanistan broke, with 6 million children and adults at risk of starvation. In May 2013, Nuland was nominated to act as assistant secretary of state for European and Eurasian affairs, where she was supposed to employ diplomacy in relations with Russia, Ukraine and other former Soviet states.
Instead, Nuland and the White House hurled $5 billion in taxpayer money at Ukraine to overthrow its democratically elected president and engineer a transition government to privatize Ukraine and prepare for war with Russia. After Nuland passed out pastries during the Maidan coup, before President Viktor Yanukovych fled under a hail of bullets, Nuland was caught in a scandal involving a leaked phone call. On the phone with U.S. Ambassador Geoffrey Pyatt, Nuland was secretly recorded saying “F .. the EU” if the European Union did not approve of her choices to run Ukraine’s transition government. The West gasped at her use of profanity. The more egregious profanity, however, was her insistence on manipulating the political affairs of another country to provoke Russia.
“He made himself the image of the riot, didn’t he? For good or bad, he made himself the very image of this whole event.”
• Did the “QAnon Shaman” Get Shafted on Sentencing? (Turley)
If there is one image from Jan. 6th that will remain indelible with the day, it is the “QAnon Shaman.” Bare chested and wearing an animal headdress, horns and red-white-and-blue face paint, Jake Angeli Chansley is to the Capitol riot what Rosie the Riveter was to World War II. Howling and “chanting an unintelligible mantra” on the Senate floor, he is the embodiment of the unhinged rage that led to one of the most disgraceful attacks on our constitutional process in history. However, the newly released Fox footage from that day raises serious questions over the prosecution and punishment of Chansley. The videotapes aired on Tucker Carlson this week show Chansley being escorted by officers through the Capitol. Two officers appear to not only guide him to the floor but actually appear to be trying to open locked doors for him. At one point, Chansley is shown walking unimpeded through a large number of armed officers with his four-foot flag-draped spear and horned Viking helmet on his way to the Senate floor.
It is otherworldly footage. While I admit that I approach these stories from the perspective of a long-standing criminal defense attorney, I would be outraged if I was unable to see such evidence before a plea or sentencing. At no point in the videotapes does Chansley appear violent or threatening. Indeed, he appears to thank the officers for their guidance and assistance. On the Senate floor, Chansley actually gave a prayer to thank the officers agreed “to allow us into the building.” Before addressing the legal implications of this footage, one thing should be clear. The public should have been given access to this footage long ago and the Jan. 6th Committee withheld important evidence on what occurred inside the Capitol on that day.
While it is understandable that many would object to Carlson being given an exclusive in the initial release, many in the media are denouncing the release of the footage to the public at all. The press and pundits are now opposing greater transparency in resisting any contradiction of the narrative put forward by the Jan. 6th Committee. Indeed, MSNBC’s Jason Johnson angrily objected that this is “federal evidence” — ignoring that it is evidence that was denied to criminal defendants. This is not just material that the public should be able to see, it was potential evidence in criminal cases like that of the QAnon Shaman. When the footage aired, I wrote a column raising the question of whether this evidence was known to or shared with Chansley’s defense. After all, he was portrayed as a violent offender by the Justice Department at his sentencing.
It now appears that the answer is no. I spoke with Chansley’s new counsel, Bill Shipley, and confirmed that defense counsel did not have this material. In the hearing, federal prosecutor Kimberly Paschall played videos showing Chansley yelling along with the crowd and insisted “that is not peaceful.” That portrayal of Chansley would have been more difficult to maintain if the Court was allowed to see images of Chansley casually walking through a door of the Capitol with hundreds of other protesters and then being escorted by officers through the Capitol. At no point is he violent and at no point is he shown destroying evidence. Instead, he dutifully follows the officers who facilitate his going eventually to the unoccupied Senate floor.
We all knew that Chansley was treated more harshly because of his visibility. It was his costume, not his conduct, that seemed to drive the sentencing. In the hearing, Judge Royce Lamberth noted, “He made himself the image of the riot, didn’t he? For good or bad, he made himself the very image of this whole event.” Lamberth hit Chansley with a heavy 41-month sentence for “obstructing a federal proceeding.”
https://twitter.com/i/status/1634003776146219009
“Trump noted that while he still thinks highly of the talk show star, he said the feeling is no longer mutual, adding “Sadly, once I announced for president, she never spoke to me again.”
• Trump To Publish ‘Private’ Letters From Foreign Leaders (RT)
Former US President Donald Trump is set to publish scores of letters from a range of world leaders, celebrities, athletes and business moguls, among them North Korea’s Kim Jong-un, the late Princess Diana and even Hillary Clinton. Trump announced the upcoming book in a social media post on Thursday, while Winning Team Publishing, which will print the collection, stated the work will present the “incredible, and oftentimes private” communications with Trump over the last 40 years. “We had lots of great letters from lots of great people and not so great people, to be honest with you,” Trump told reporters on Thursday. “But they’re very famous people. And probably there’s never been such diversity as this in terms of people where the letters come from and who they come from.”
In addition to some 150 letters from big names ranging from Oprah Winfrey, Michael Jackson, US Presidents Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan and Barack Obama, golf legend Arnold Palmer and even his bitter rivals in the Clinton family, the book will also contain “original commentary” from Trump and a collection of photos. It is set for release next month, following his first book published last year, ‘Our Journey Together,’ which raked in $20 million in sales after just two months on the shelves. One letter from Winfrey dated to the year 2000 gives effusive praise to Trump, saying “too bad we’re not running for office. What a team!” Trump noted that while he still thinks highly of the talk show star, he said the feeling is no longer mutual, adding “Sadly, once I announced for president, she never spoke to me again.”
Trump previously said North Korea’s supreme leader penned him “beautiful letters” and that they “fell in love” during his time in office. His correspondence with Kim has taken on new importance after the federal government launched a probe into whether he had retained classified material after leaving the White House, which was reportedly triggered after officials noticed letters from the North Korean leader were missing from Trump’s presidential archives.
Censorship-Industrial Complex.
• Matt Taibbi Releases Twitter File Review #18 (CTH)
Journalist Matt Taibbi released another Twitter File review today showcasing how the opinion of government interests was pushed toward content censorship regardless of the truth within it. File #18 release is a walk through all of government interests from COVID-19, Vaccination Compliance and maintenance of the Trump-Russia narrative. I strongly suggest everyone to review the citations Taibbi presents from the documents contained within Twitter’s internal communication. . One aspect that draws particular interest to those who spent years deconstructing the false Trump-Russia narrative, appears in the section beginning in Tweet #34 where Taibbi again visits the influence of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (SSCI).
At the epicenter of the SSCI effort we have always found then Vice-Chair Mark Warner manipulating events. Taibbi pulls this thread a little further with his review of how the SSCI contracted with outside government agencies to maintain the false premise of Russian interference in the 2016 election. A name that might be familiar to those who read the SSCI report on “Russian Active Measures and Disinformation in the 2016 Campaign” might be familiar to you. Taibbi notes: Profiles portray [Renee] DiResta as a warrior against Russian bots and misinformation, but reporters never inquire about work with DARPA, GEC, and other agencies. In the video below from @MikeBenzCyber, Stamos introduces [Renee DiResta] as having “worked for the CIA.”
DiResta has become the public face of the Censorship-Industrial Complex, a name promoted everywhere as an unquestioned authority on truth, fact, and Internet hygiene, even though her former firm, New Knowledge, has been embroiled in two major disinformation scandals. This, ultimately, is the most serious problem with the Censorship-Industrial Complex. Packaged as a bulwark against lies and falsehood, it is itself often a major source of disinformation, with American taxpayers funding their own estrangement from reality. DiResta’s New Knowledge helped design the Hamilton 68 project exposed in the #TwitterFiles. Although it claimed to track “Russian influence,” Hamilton really followed Americans like “Ultra Maga Dog Mom,” “Right2Liberty,” even a British rugby player named Rod Bishop.
“Even Coast Guard Intelligence thinks it’s hogwash.” “Let that sink in.”
• White House Claims Jan 6 Tapes Are Russian Disinformation (BBee)
Previously unseen footage, shown for the first time on Tucker Carlson Tonight, sparked controversy for its purported portrayal of the Deadly Jan 6 Attack on the U.S. Capitol Insurrection™ as a “mostly peaceful” protest, but the intelligence community has gone on the record to claim all security footage from the event is nothing but Russian disinformation. “It is the consensus of the intelligence community that security footage from the Capitol building is part of an elaborate Russian disinformation scheme,” said White House Press Secretary Jean-Pierre. “Even Coast Guard Intelligence thinks it’s hogwash.” “Let that sink in.”
Fox News reporter Peter Doocy was quick to point out that the House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol™ had access to the same footage. “Does that mean they were also duped by Russian disinformation?” “Only the footage showing peaceful protestors is Russian,” answered Jean-Pierre. “Duh!” Doocy tried to ask a follow-up question but was promptly shut down. “I shouldn’t have to explain this,” Jean-Pierre argued. “The last time the intelligence community agreed on anything was when they said there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. So obviously, we take their claims very seriously.” At publishing time, the FBI was investigating how Russians gained access to the U.S. Capitol Building to install security cameras in the first place.
FBI subsidiary
Rep. Mike Johnson says the federal government used Twitter to censor American's speech:
"Twitter was basically an FBI subsidiary before @elonmusk took it over… The Twitter files should be a matter of bipartisan concern for every member of Congress and every American citizen… https://t.co/dkrtKXkctJ pic.twitter.com/DOXylt1C6w
— kanekoa.substack.com (@KanekoaTheGreat) March 9, 2023
Covid cover up
Covid cover-up proving to be a monumental scandal pic.twitter.com/9m3mQvMaUG
— Wittgenstein (@backtolife_2023) March 9, 2023
Whale shark
https://twitter.com/i/status/1633775531597471746
Polar
Polar bear and her cub. Video by Ruth Elwell Steck pic.twitter.com/oPrjmUIwUZ
— Fascinating (@fasc1nate) March 9, 2023
Butterfly
https://twitter.com/i/status/1633682217779236866
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