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The Impotence of the Supreme Court

By Jacob G. Hornberger | FFF |February 3, 2021

Imagine if the DEA established a torture and prison camp in, say, Odessa, Texas. Whenever DEA agents arrest someone suspected of violating America’s drug laws, the suspect is taken to the DEA camp, where he is tortured into giving up names of people involved in the drug trade. Prisoners are denied a trial for years, perhaps forever. If a trial is ever held, a tribunal of DEA officials determines guilt or innocence. Hearsay evidence is admitted at trial — the accused are not permitted to cross-examine witnesses against them. Attorney-client communications are monitored and supervised. Meanwhile, the DEA initiates an assassination program that brings swifter “justice” to drug-law violators. It enables DEA agents to simply kill drug suspects without any indictment or trial at all.

There is no doubt that the U.S. Supreme Court would declare all of this unconstitutional. That is precisely the type of thing that our ancestors wished to avoid. That’s why they enacted the Bill of Rights. They weren’t satisfied with just the Constitution. They knew that the federal government would attract the type of people who would set up these types of camps. They wanted a Bill of Rights to specifically spell out express restrictions on the powers of federal officials.

Take the Fifth Amendment. It expressly states that no person shall “be deprived of life” without “due process of law.” Due process means formal notice of an accusation, such as a grand-jury indictment,” and a trial. That means no assassination because assassination involves killing someone without an indictment or trial.

Thus, if the DEA established an assassination program for drug suspects, it would quickly be declared unconstitutional.

Consider the Sixth Amendment. It states “In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right of speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury….”

Why did our ancestors include that provision? Because they knew that without it, federal officials would jail people indefinitely, perhaps for the rest of their lives. They also knew that if they didn’t make it clear in the Bill of Rights, federal officials would use judges or tribunals, not juries, to decide guilt or innocence.

Thus, if the DEA established our hypothetical system, there is no doubt that the Supreme Court would declare it unconstitutional.

The Sixth Amendment also guarantees the right of an accused to confront witnesses against him. That entails the right to cross examine them. With the use of hearsay evidence, that right is destroyed. Thus, there is no doubt that the Supreme Court would declared the DEA’s “judicial” system unconstitutional.

Given that the Supreme Court would declare our hypothetical DEA torture and prison camp and “judicial” system unconstitutional, why hasn’t it done the same with the Pentagon’s and the CIA’s torture and prison camp at Guantanamo Bay?

After all, that camp has all the characteristics of our hypothetical DEA camp. Moreover, military and CIA officials are every much federal officials as DEA officials. As such, they are just as subject to the Bill of Rights as other federal officials, There is no exception in the Bill of Rights for the military or the CIA.

So, why the difference? Why do the Pentagon and the CIA get a pass on violating the Bill of Rights while the DEA doesn’t?

The answer is very simple: In a national security state, the military-intelligence establishment is sovereign and supreme. It runs the show. It permits the Supreme Court, along with the president and the Congress, to have the veneer of power but it is the ultimate decider of how the federal government is going to run.

It all turns on power. In the final analysis, government is force. It is through force and the threat of force that its commands and orders are carried out. The Supreme Court’s orders are enforced by U.S. Marshalls. Imagine a team of U.S. Marshalls appearing at the Pentagon and CIA headquarters with an order to shut down the torture and prison center at Gitmo. What do they do when the Pentagon and the CIA ignore them? They do nothing because the amount of force wielded by a team of U.S. Marshalls is minuscule compared to the military and intelligence force they are facing.

Everyone in the federal government fully understands this phenomenon. The national-security establishment is all-powerful within the federal government. Its powers are omnipotent. When it comes to enforcing the Bill of Rights against the omnipotent power of the Pentagon and the CIA, the Supreme Court knows full well that it is impotent.

February 3, 2021 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Subjugation - Torture | , , | Leave a comment

German nuns ‘rented’ orphaned boys to businessmen for ‘gang bangs & orgies’ – suppressed report seen by media

RT | February 3, 2021

A report being withheld from the public documents horrific acts of rape and sexual abuse against young boys that were facilitated by nuns belonging to the Cathoic Archdiocese of Cologne in Germany, according to the Daily Beast.

The investigation’s findings, which concluded last month and stemmed from a lawsuit brought against the archdiocese by victims, have not been publicly released, but the contents of the report are said to have been leaked to several media outlets.

Sections of the 560-page report purportedly seen by the Daily Beast detail how nuns who ran a convent in Speyer, Germany between the 1960s and 1970s “rented” orphaned boys to businessmen and clergy, who abused the children, sometimes for weeks at a time, before ‘returning’ them.

According to the outlet, some of the orphans were forced to participate in “gang bangs and orgies” before being returned to the convent where the nuns would discipline them for having “wrinkl[ed] their clothes or being covered in semen.”

The report concluded that 175 children, most of them boys between the ages of 8 and 14, were abused over two decades. Some of the children were intentionally barred from being adopted or taken into a foster home so the nuns could continue to hire them out, the probe allegedly found.

However, the investigation declined to directly blame the nuns involved in the sick scheme, arguing instead that the abuse was the result of “systematic” management errors and the “leniency” accorded to those accused of taking part in the abominable crimes, the Beast reported.

The details were leaked to the press after the archdiocese refused to make the report public, demanding that journalists who viewed the documents sign a confidentiality agreement. All those who attended a press conference announcing the conclusion of the investigation reportedly walked out, refusing to abide by the Church’s terms.

The Archdiocese of Cologne said it had withheld the report because it had failed to fully explain its methodology. However, Bishop Karl-Heinz Wiesmann, who leads the archdiocese, told the media the abuse report was “so gory,” it was not suitable for public viewing. The bishop claims he was so disturbed by the report, he had to take a month away from his duties after reading it.

The shocking revelations come less than a year after a separate investigation found Berlin’s educational authorities and senate had supported and defended placing foster children into the care of known pedophiles. The 30-year policy, which ended in 2003, led to a number of serious cases of abuse, the investigation discovered.

February 3, 2021 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Corruption, Timeless or most popular | , | Leave a comment

Scientists Ominously Warn COVID Is Reducing Fertility

By Steve Watson | Summit News | February 3, 2021

Just when you thought the future couldn’t get much more dystopian, scientists have issued more stark warnings that COVID-19 is reducing fertility in men, and could contribute to depopulation of the planet.

Scientists say that there is increasing evidence in patients of testicular damage and lower sperm counts and mobility, with initial studies revealing the presence of the virus in semen samples.

Researchers at the Justus-Liebig-University in Germany. along with scientists from Allameh Tabataba’i University in Iran have reported  significant inflammation markers in samples of testicular tissue from 84 Covid-19 patients.

They discovered that the inflammation and cellular stress were twice as severe in the Covid-19 positive group as in a control group.

Researchers also noted that sperm was three times slower in COVID patients, and sperm count in general was much lower.

The study found that sperm concentration was reduced by 516 per cent, mobility by 209 per cent and sperm cell shape was altered by 400 per cent.

The researchers further noted that this represents oligoasthenoteratozoospermia, one of the most common causes of subfertility in men.

“These effects on sperm cells are associated with lower sperm quality and reduced fertility potential,” noted lead researcher Behzad Hajizadeh Maleki.

“Although these effects tended to improve over time, they remained significantly and abnormally higher in the Covid-19 patients, and the magnitude of these changes were also related to disease severity,” Maleki further warned.

In addition, Researchers from the Huazhong University of Science and Technology in Wuhan (yes, that Wuhan) have issued a call for a long term study into the effects of the virus on male fertility.

“We propose that there is an urgent need to track male Covid-19 patients during their recovery,” microbiologist Yu Tian and reproductive biologist Li-quan Zhou noted.

Previous studies have pointed toward a correlation between the virus and reduced fertility.

Last year a Miami University study found that COVID-19 can invade tissues in the testicles and  impair sperm function.

In January a review of studies published in the journal Open Biology warned that COVID posses a “global threat to male fertility potential.”

Spanish scientists have also reported worrying signs of the virus attacking male reproductive organs.

Research conducted by Professor Dan Aderka of the Sheba Medical Centre in Tel Aviv, Israel, reported that the virus was present in 13 percent of sperm samples taken from screened COVID-19 patients. He also found a 50 percent reduction in sperm volume, concentration, and motility in patients with moderate symptoms 30 days post diagnosis.

Another study conducted last year by researchers in Shangqiu, China discovered the presence of the virus in sperm, raising concerns that it could be sexually transmitted.

The list of studies linking the virus to potential infertility is endless.

Global fertility rates were already decreasing before COVID at a “jaw dropping” rate, with one study published in The Lancet highlighting that the global fertility rate almost halved to 2.4 in 2017, and projections indicate that it will fall below 1.7 by 2100.

Other studies have noted that the “Total sperm count in North America, Europe, Australia and New Zealand dropped by up to 60% in the 38 years between 1973 and 2011” and more recent research shows the trend is continuing.

In addition, it is projected that the fall out of COVID will lead to a huge decline in the birth rate as people simply choose not to bring children into the world at this time.

February 3, 2021 Posted by | Malthusian Ideology, Phony Scarcity, Timeless or most popular | | Leave a comment

Chile Convicts Dictatorship’s Ex-Agents for Poisoning Prisoners

teleSUR | February 3, 2021

Santiago’s Court of Appeals on Tuesday convicted five ex-officials of Augusto Pinochet’s dictatorship for poisoning seven inmates at the former Chilean Public Prison in December 1981.

Retired Army officers Eduardo Arriagada, Sergio Rosende, Joaquin Larrain, and Jaime Fuenzalida were sentenced to 15 years in prison for Victor Corvalan and Hector Pacheco’s murder.

The victims, who were common prisoners, received lethal doses of botulinum toxin, one of the most powerful venoms produced by humans. The officers will also face jail for the attempt of murder of another five captives.

Justice authorities proved that the ex-agents’ real intentions were to poison the Revolutionary Leftist Movement (MIR) militant Guillermo Rodriguez and his followers Adalberto Muñoz, Ricardo Antonio, and Elizardo Aguilera.

The revolutionaries, who shared cell and meals with Corvalan and Pacheco, overcame the serious injuries produced by poisoned food.

The former prison warden Ronald Bennett was sentenced to 10 years for being an accomplice in crimes against humanity.

The substance that killed the inmates was introduced into the prison as part of a secret maneuver led by the Army Intelligence Directorate (DINE).

According to the court’s ruling, the operation sought to “imperceptibly eliminate opponents of Pinochet’s military regime.”

February 3, 2021 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Deception, Timeless or most popular | , , | Leave a comment

Beijing hopes Washington will follow China’s lead and invite WHO to the US in search for origin of Covid-19

RT | February 2, 2021

The Chinese Foreign Ministry has urged Washington to invite the WHO to conduct traceability testing in the US, citing the fact the American authorities found Covid-19 antibodies in blood donations as early as December 2019.

Speaking on Friday, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin told reporters that Beijing has always maintained close communication and cooperation with the World Health Organization (WHO) on Covid-19 traceability, and he said it was time the US followed suit.

“I hope that the United States will adopt a positive, scientific, and cooperative attitude on traceability issues, as well as maintain transparency, like China, and invite WHO experts to the United States to conduct traceability research and make positive contributions to international anti-epidemic cooperation and scientific traceability.” Wang said.

The spokesman told reporters that traceability testing was a very complex issue, with many clues, reports and studies needing to be taken into account.

“I will give you an example. According to a research report by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, there were antibodies to the new coronavirus in some American blood donations in December 2019. This means that the new coronavirus may have appeared in the United States at that time, earlier than the official US report,” Wang stated, reinforcing Beijing’s call for Washington to invite the WHO to America.

Wang continued to point out that China has conducted multiple rounds of in-depth exchanges and shared a lot of information and research results with international partners, including the WHO.

WHO experts are currently in China investigating the source of Covid-19, and they visited a wet market in Wuhan on Sunday. It has been widely suggested that a Chinese wet market was the environment where Covid-19 first passed to humans.

Scientists are still exploring a number of theories relating to the origins of the virus.

February 3, 2021 Posted by | Aletho News | , , | Leave a comment

Lithuania is training the Ukrainian military despite its own inexperience

By Paul Antonopoulos | February 3, 2021

Lithuanian military instructors trained the Ukrainian Armed Forces (UBS) last month as a group of specialists from the National Defense Volunteer Force, the Training Doctrine Headquarters, the GKS Air Base and the Engineering Battalion went to Ukraine. The Lithuanian Ministry of Defense is attempting to bring the Ukrainian army closer to NATO standards by helping the reformation of military education and fund the training of Ukrainian officers at the Baltic Defense College. Decisionmakers in the Lithuanian capital of Vilnius think they can assist Ukraine in joining NATO.

NATO granted Ukraine enhanced partnership status in June 2020 and the UBS switched to NATO’s military rank system in January this year. This increased Ukraine’s access to Alliance programs and military maneuvers. The Ukrainian Defense Ministry set a goal – to bring the Ukrainian military into compliance with NATO requirements. Ukrainian soldiers even began to learn English. This Lithuanian leadership over Ukraine is strange considering the vast differences between their military capabilities.

In the Global Firepower military ranking for 2021, Ukraine ranks 25th in the world despite supposedly having outdated standards. Lithuania is ranked 85th. For 2021, Kiev will spend $9.6 billion dollars on its military and Lithuania only $880 million. The UBS has 255,000 soldiers in their ranks, and Lithuania has only 20,565. Ukrainian warplanes and tanks are incomparable to Lithuania’s fleet. In addition, Ukraine has a defense industry, something the Baltic country does not. This huge difference in ranking and data brings to question why Lithuania is “teaching” Ukraine about military matters.

If specific quantitative indicators are ignored and some abstract NATO standards are prioritized, the Alliance’s operations in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya and elsewhere are considered catastrophic failures as they did not achieve any peace or stability after the Alliance’s regime change operations. Lithuania’s planned participation in NATO’s 2021 international operations in Afghanistan, Iraq, Bahrain, Central African Republic, Mali and Kosovo is very modest with only 170 soldiers – this hardly constitutes as major wartime experience. In fact, Ukraine has more military experience than Lithuania when we consider the conflict in Donbass.

Lithuania will help Ukraine adapt to NATO standards, but despite Kiev’s loud statements about full membership by 2030, it is unlikely to be achieved. Replacing weapons and training hundreds of thousands of soldiers to NATO standards is a very complex, expensive and time-consuming process. As an example, Poland, which has been in the Alliance for 20 years, has not yet been able to completely get rid of its Soviet-era weaponry.

The problem of technological disadvantage also applies to the Lithuanian Armed Forces. Lithuania’s military-political ambitions, its desire to become NATO’s main center in the Baltic region against Russia, and becoming the main trainer of the UBS goes beyond their actual capabilities. Lithuania’s military spending exceeds 2% of GDP per year and is one of the very few countries to actually meet this criterion. However, the entirety of Lithuania’s GDP is only $54.63 billion, tiny compared to Ukraine’s $154 billion or Russia’s $1.7 trillion. Lithuania plans to increase its military spending to 2.5% of GDP. Although Lithuania is extremely ambitious, the reality is that NATO only views the Baltic country as a bridgehead against Kaliningrad in a potential war against Russia.

The indefinite stay of foreign military forces in Lithuania has been ongoing since 2017. Lithuania has the largest number of NATO military facilities in the region and the significant foreign presence demonstrates the powerlessness of their military despite their constant provocations against Russia and even Belarus. Lithuania has no tanks and most of their armored personnel carriers and military transport helicopters are Soviet remnants. In addition, Lithuania’s Naval Forces were formed by purchasing scrapped British trawlers and patrol cutters without missile armaments, something that is hardly up to NATO standards.

Lithuania joined NATO in 2004, long before Crimea reunited with Russia, and the militarization and utilization of the Baltic country’s sovereignty began immediately after they joined the Alliance.

An example of Lithuania’s military weakness is the 2006 agreement with Denmark, in which their only brigade at the time, the so-called Iron Wolf, was part of a Danish division and hence subordinated to foreigners. The brigade was eventually relocated to a German division, but the Danish division received a new Lithuanian brigade. Apparently, Lithuania’s military, which depends on the decisions of foreign commanders, is now capable of training and instructing the Ukrainian military.

The reality is that the strategic security of the Baltics is determined not by NATO forces in Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia, but by good neighborly relations with Russia that has expressed endlessly that it has no interest in a military conflict. Vilnius however refuses to take this into account while it increases its military budget and facilitates Ukraine’s attempt to join NATO.

Paul Antonopoulos is an independent geopolitical analyst.

February 3, 2021 Posted by | Militarism | , | Leave a comment

Armed conflict between Venezuela and Guyana will involve US forces

By Lucas Leiroz | February 3, 2021

A new focus of tensions is emerging in South America. Since the discovery of oil in Guyana, this country has been increasingly approaching Washington both as an economic partner and as a political ally. The Americans see the partnership with the Guyanese as an opportunity to fill the void left in the global oil market with the economic sanctions imposed on Venezuela. But, in addition to a mere economic alliance, the ties between both countries are also rising to the military sphere, which is generating concerns in Caracas.

On January 21, regional tensions reached their peak. Guyanese fishing boats Nady Nayera and Sea Wolf were intercepted by Venezuela after an illegal incursion into Venezuelan territory. Caracas, not having authorized the entry of the vessels, interpreted the maneuver as dangerous to national security and kept the boats under its control. However, this Venezuelan version of the facts was denied by Georgetown, which claimed that the ships were detained within Guyana’s Exclusive Economic Zone.

Some noteworthy factors preceded this escalation of tensions. On January 7, Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro signed a decree that establishes the formation of a new maritime territory on the Atlantic coast. The decree includes part of the Essequibo region, in which there is a territorial dispute with Guyana. The so-called “Guyana Essequiba” refers to a territory currently under the rule of Guyana that previously belonged to Venezuela, having been transferred to Guyanese possession after an arbitrary sentence in an international court organized by the United Kingdom at the end of the 19th century.

Venezuela has since claimed sovereignty over Essequibo, but tensions have been mild most of the time. However, Guyana, since aligning with the US, has been adopting more aggressive measures in the region. The US armed forces recently began military exercises in Guyana and deployed several military ships along Essequibo’s 159,000 km². The territory is rich in oil and the American justification for the exercises is precisely to protect the oil extraction bases installed by the company ExxonMobil. In the midst of such circumstances, Venezuela has its national sovereignty violated and is therefore trying to establish minimum measures to guarantee its interests.

However, despite the rivalry having resumed an old territorial dispute, it is necessary to emphasize that there is an agreement in force on Essequibo that Guyana is directly violating. In 1966, Guyana and Venezuela signed the Geneva Agreement, mediated by the United Nations, which determined which activities would be permitted in which area of ​​Essequibo. In this document, oil exploration by foreign companies is not allowed. Since 2015, the Guyanese government has violated the pact, allowing multinationals to explore for oil there. In 2018, Venezuela had already intercepted ExxonMobil vessels that invaded its territory to explore oil. Now, Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro has determined the creation of a Special Strategic Zone to increase security over Essequibo because the tendency is for territorial violations to increase further, considering that regional diplomacy is already broken, and that Guyana has become a satellite nation of Washington’s interests – which publicly plans to overthrow Maduro. The Venezuelan decision was condemned by the president of Guyana, Irfaan Ali, which prompted Caracas to issue a statement saying that such positions suggested preparation for an armed confrontation.

The Guyanese attitude has not changed over time. Now, once again, ships have entered Venezuelan territory, leading to their capture by the Bolivarian forces. If that situation continues, the Venezuelan response to foreign incursions may become increasingly rigid and the armed forces are likely to start taking down invasive vessels, which will lead to Washington’s severe responses. Currently, we can no longer regard the South American scenario as “unlikely” for a war to arise. The security crisis is widespread and with Biden in power many experts suggest that American foreign policy will become more aggressive and interventionist. Guyana has a much weaker military apparatus than the Venezuelan State and cannot face the neighboring country with its own forces. It remains to be seen what Washington’s willingness to invest in a conflict in South America will be.

More than ever, a new international agreement is needed to establish a new regulation for the region. The agreement, however, must be impartial and try to favor both nations. In an ideal scenario, the other South American nations, being co-participants in the disputes, should mediate such an agreement. But, today, the political structure of South America is absolutely broken, and no nation has sufficient diplomatic strength to resolve a demand of this nature.

Lucas Leiroz is a research fellow in international law at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro.

February 3, 2021 Posted by | Illegal Occupation | , , , | Leave a comment

Whitney Webb Interview – Starbucks COVID Connection, GameStop Suspicions & WEF Cyber Pandemic Simulations

Ryan Cristián | The Last American Vagabond | February 1, 2021

Joining me today is Whitney Webb to discuss some of her recent research into an alarming connection Starbucks has to the COVID-19 vaccine agenda, as well as some suspicions about the GameStop fiasco, as well as the WEF and its “Cyber Pandemic” simulations.

Video Source Links:

Gamestop

https://wallstreetonparade.com/2021/01/gamestop-promoter-keith-gill-was-no-amateur-trader-he-held-sophisticated-trading-licenses-and-worked-in-the-finance-industry/

https://wallstreetonparade.com/2021/01/gamestop-shares-dark-pools-owned-by-goldman-sachs-jpmorgan-ubs-et-al-have-made-tens-of-thousands-of-trades/

https://wallstreetonparade.com/2021/01/gamestop-shares-5-count-felon-jpmorgan-could-have-made-upwards-of-174-million-yesterday/

https://www.cnbc.com/2021/01/29/app-robinhood-gamestop-class-action-lawsuit.html

https://pulse2.com/donotpay-robot-lawyer-raises-4-6-million/

https://socialdraft.com/pt/snoop-dogg-invests-50-million-in-reddit/

https://www.cnbc.com/2021/01/28/gamestop-republicans-warn-of-trump-style-populist-revolution.html

https://investorplace.com/2021/01/pltr-stock-13-things-to-know-about-frequent-wsb-reddit-target-palantir-on-demo-day/

Starbucks

https://www.govtech.com/health/Washington-Draws-on-Private-Sector-Experts-for-Vaccine-Rollout.html

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/washington-state-taps-starbucks-help-covid-vaccine-rollout-n1254607

https://seattle.eater.com/2021/1/19/22239198/starbucks-helping-washington-covid-vaccine-rollout

https://medium.com/wagovernor/inslee-announces-state-plan-for-widespread-vaccine-distribution-and-administration-62196dcf5ecf

https://stories.starbucks.com/stories/2021/offering-to-serve-starbucks-joins-effort-to-help-speed-covid-19-vaccination-delivery/

https://indd.adobe.com/view/1cf8a47e-8cb0-4de8-9237-ab6ce31e7701

https://www.challengeseattle.com/our-members

https://globalassets.starbucks.com/assets/b8aff5b9920e457a8bf8c986d25206ff.pdf

https://www.fool.com/investing/2016/12/21/starbucks-has-big-plans-for-artificial-intelligenc.aspx

https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/companies/how-starbucks-is-using-ai-to-fuel-its-growth-deepen-customer-relationships/ar-BB1c46Ta

https://www.yahoo.com/lifestyle/starbucks-one-ai-enabled-coffee-202146442.html

https://stories.starbucks.com/stories/2020/how-starbucks-plans-to-use-technology-to-nurture-the-human-spirit/

https://www.geekwire.com/2019/digital-initiatives-artificial-intelligence-continue-fueling-innovation-starbucks/

https://www.geekwire.com/2019/microsoft-teams-starbucks-predictive-drive-thru-ordering-bean-cup-blockchain/

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2020/mar/01/children-work-for-pittance-to-pick-coffee-beans-used-by-starbucks-and-nespresso

https://news.mongabay.com/2019/05/slave-labor-found-at-second-starbucks-certified-brazilian-coffee-farm/

https://fairworldproject.org/starbucks-has-a-slave-labor-problem/

https://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/24/business/starbucks-falls-short-after-pledging-better-labor-practices.html

https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/resources/videos/build-2019-starbucks–deep-brew–hyper-personalization-applications-with-reinforcement-learning-at-starbucks/

https://news.microsoft.com/transform/starbucks-turns-to-technology-to-brew-up-a-more-personal-connection-with-its-customers/

https://stories.starbucks.com/stories/2019/knowledge-is-valuable-coffee-journey-going-digital-for-customers-farmers/

February 2, 2021 Posted by | Deception, Timeless or most popular, Video | , | Leave a comment

Why the Biden regime has set itself up for failure on the Iran nuclear deal

By Scott Ritter | RT | February 2, 2021

By laying out unrealistic demands to Iran and engaging in fearmongering about its nuclear program, Secretary of State Tony Blinken has underscored America’s real intent about rejoining the controversial agreement.

[Proclaimed] President Joe Biden has made rejoining the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA, popularly known as the Iran nuclear deal) one of the top priorities of his administration, reversing course from the direction taken by former President Donald Trump who, in May 2018, withdrew the US from the landmark 2015 agreement.

However, the gap between Biden’s stated desire and the ability of his foreign policy team, headed by Secretary of State Antony Blinken, to bring it to fruition may be insurmountable.

In a recent statement, Blinken warned that if Iran continued to unilaterally lift the various restrictions on its nuclear program mandated under the JCPOA, it would be able to produce enough fissile material for a nuclear weapon within “a matter of weeks.”

But this assertion is fundamentally flawed. In keeping with its policy of ending JCPOA restrictions as a remedial action permitted under Article 36 of the agreement should other parties be in fundamental noncompliance (which the US is, by issuing sanctions), Iran has begun the process to enrich uranium to 20 percent, and convert that uranium to metal. This would be used to produce fuel plates needed to power a research reactor in Tehran used to produce medical isotopes.

As of January 29, Iran had accumulated some 17 kilograms of 20 percent uranium, part of a strategic plan to produce 120 kilograms of the material per year, at a rate of 10 kilograms per month on average.

Iran would need to convert some 250 kilograms of 20 percent enriched uranium into 25 kilograms of the 90 percent enriched uranium needed for a nuclear weapon. Under Iran’s plans, which have been briefed to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and are being monitored by IAEA inspectors, it would take approximately two years for Iran to accumulate that amount of 20 percent enriched uranium – a fact incompatible with Blinken’s assessment of “a matter of weeks.”

Further undermining Blinken’s contention is the fact that, by converting the 20 percent enriched uranium into metallic fuel plates, Iran has made it impossible to use this material in any “breakout” weapons program, given the complexities associated with reconverting the metal into uranium hexafluoride for subsequent insertion into gas centrifuges for follow-on enrichment to 90 percent. As such, Iran’s actions actually inhibit its ability to pursue a nuclear weapon, something Blinken ignores completely.

But Blinken’s Iran problem goes much further than giving misleading statements about the country’s nuclear capabilities and intent. His prescription for the US rejoining the JCPOA is little more than a poison pill designed to kill the agreement. “Iran is out of compliance on a number of fronts,” Blinken recently said, ignoring the country’s citation of its rights under Article 36 (which means that until the US lifts sanctions, Iran is in fundamental compliance), and the fact that Iran has signaled that all of its measures taken to date are “fully reversible.”

“[I]t would take some time, should it [Iran] make the decision to do so, for it to come back into compliance and time for us then to assess whether it was meeting its obligations,” Blinken said. If Iran were to return to the deal, it would only serve as a precursor to what Blinken called a “longer and stronger agreement” that would address other “deeply problematic” issues.

The biggest hurdle is that Iran has ruled out linking a US return to the JCPOA with any negotiation of a new agreement along the lines that Blinken spoke of. An Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman, Saeed Khatibzadeh, rejected any notion of US-Iranian bilateral negotiations about the JCPOA. “The US needs to return to its commitments,” Khatibzadeh said, “and if that happens, it will be possible to negotiate within the framework of the joint commission of the JCPOA.”

The Iranian position makes sense from a legal standpoint – it is, after all, the US that has left the agreement and, if it seeks to rejoin it, all negotiations must take place within the framework of the agreement itself, and not some new negotiating mechanism that does not conform to the letter of the law.

Some of these mechanisms of control are permanent, such as a ban on any Iranian work on nuclear explosive devices and on the reprocessing of spent reactor fuel, needed for the separation of plutonium. These two bans represent the most effective means of blocking Iran’s path toward a nuclear weapon. So, too, do the enhanced inspection arrangements which enable inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency to request access to undeclared sites.

One of the fundamental flaws in the Iranian position, however, is its failure to recognize that, from the US’ perspective, the JCPOA was never meant to be an agreement which would reach fruition, but rather a stop-gap tool used by the US to contain Iran’s nuclear program in a manner which conformed to US domestic political concerns, and not the reality of Iran’s nuclear ambition. In short, the JCPOA was designed to ensure that Iran would not be able to acquire enough fissile material usable in a nuclear device for at least a year after violating the mechanisms of control envisioned under the agreement.

Others, however, expire under the terms of so-called ‘sunset clauses’. Two of the most important ‘sunset clauses’ involve Iran’s ability to increase the number and types of enrichment centrifuges (expiring in 2025) and increase the amount of low enriched uranium it can stockpile (expiring in 2030). The Iranians view these two clauses as the most important achievements of the JCPOA negotiations, as they guarantee that Iran will be able to fulfil its plans for a viable indigenous nuclear energy program, a right guaranteed to it under Article IV of the nonproliferation treaty, to which it is a signatory.

This, however, was never the intent of the US. According to President Barack Obama, whose administration negotiated the JCPOA, the purpose of the ‘sunset clauses’ was to buy time for Iran, once sanctions were reduced, to “start focusing on its economy, on training its people, on reentering the world community, to lessening its provocative activities in the region.”

According to Obama, by entering the JCPOA, the US made it possible to “strengthen the hand of those more moderate forces inside of Iran.” The JCPOA was “not dependent on anticipating those changes. If they don’t change at all, we’re still better off having the deal.”

Obama’s point of view was driven by US intelligence assessments which, in 2015, put Iran’s “breakout times” at two or three months. By entering the JCPOA, the US was “purchasing for 13, 14, 15 years assurances that the breakout is at least a year … that – that if they decided to break the deal, kick out all the inspectors, break the seals and go for a bomb, we’d have over a year to respond. And we have those assurances for at least well over a decade.”

The important takeaway is what Obama said next. “And then in years 13 and 14, it is possible that those breakout times would have been much shorter, but at that point we have much better ideas about what it is that their program involves. We have much more insight into their capabilities. And the option of a future president to take action if in fact they try to obtain a nuclear weapon is undiminished.” In short, if Iran did not use the JCPOA as a vehicle to understand that it did not need a nuclear program, and voluntarily abandon its nuclear activities, then the US would take action that would prevent the ‘sunset clauses’ from ever expiring.

Time is running out for Biden and Blinken if they hope to revive the JCPOA. Iran’s conservative-dominated parliament has set a deadline of February 21 for the US to lift sanctions that had been reimposed when Trump removed the US from the JCPOA. If the US fails to act, then Iran will likely suspend the enhanced inspections of its nuclear sites by the IAEA, and further increase its uranium enrichment capacity.

Unfortunately for Obama, Biden, and the proponents of the JCPOA, Trump wasn’t willing to play that game. Recognizing that the underlying logic behind the Obama approach to the JCPOA was predicated on the belief that Iran’s nuclear weapons ambitions were only being temporarily delayed by the ‘sunset clauses’, Trump simply withdrew from the agreement, moving the time for presidential action forward by a decade. In many ways, Trump’s approach to Iran, while fundamentally flawed, was at least honest. The same cannot be said about the Obama administration which negotiated the original deal, or the Biden administration which is now compelled to deal with the fallout of Obama’s deceit and Trump’s actions in response to that deceit.

“We have said time and again that if the US decides to go back to its international commitments and lift all the illegal sanctions against Iran, we will go back to the full implementation of JCPOA, which will benefit all sides,” Majid Takht-Ravanchi, Iran’s ambassador to the United Nations, said recently. But Takht-Ravanchi’s comments assume that the Biden administration can move forward on the JCPOA in good faith, rather than with the intent of the original US negotiation.

The Obama administration, however, never intended the JCPOA to be anything other than a stop-gap measure designed to buy the US time when it came to managing Iran’s nuclear program. Thanks to Trump, the clock has run out. For Biden, Blinken, and the rest of the Obama-era policy makers who are now back in power and who sowed the seed of this, the time has come to reap the whirlwind. Biden may seek to blame Trump for failing to rejoin the JCPOA, but he only has himself to blame.

Scott Ritter is a former US Marine Corps intelligence officer and author of ‘SCORPION KING: America’s Suicidal Embrace of Nuclear Weapons from FDR to Trump.’ He served in the Soviet Union as an inspector implementing the INF Treaty, in General Schwarzkopf’s staff during the Gulf War, and from 1991-1998 as a UN weapons inspector. Follow him on Twitter @RealScottRitter

February 2, 2021 Posted by | Deception, Timeless or most popular, Wars for Israel | , , | Leave a comment

Claims of Silicon Valley bias are ‘disinformation’, say researchers citing disgraced partisan ‘experts’ and Big Tech itself

By Nebojsa Malic | RT | February 2, 2021

Silicon Valley wants you to know that even thinking they might be biased against conservatives is ‘disinformation,’ and cite a paper informed by censorious busybodies, partisan hacks and their own executives to prove it.

Twitter spokesman Nick Pacilio approvingly quoted the Washington Post story about a report arguing that the “claim of anti-conservative animus on the part of social media companies is itself a form of disinformation: a falsehood with no reliable evidence to support it.”

Nothing to see here, folks, just a former press secretary for Democrat Kamala Harris (it’s in his bio) retweeting a newspaper that openly endorsed the Biden-Harris ticket saying that Democrats are right and Republicans are wrong, right?

Before the “fact checkers” declare that actually, Pacilio was a spokesman for Harris in 2011-2014, when she was California’s attorney general – the point is that he doesn’t bother hiding his political allegiance, and neither does the Post. But it would be wrong to judge a report solely by the people who endorse it, so let’s take a look at it, shall we?

Authored by Paul M. Barrett, deputy director of Stern Center for Business and Human Rights at New York University (NYU) and research fellow J. Grant Sims, the 28-page paper is a regurgitation of talking points by mainstream media, “disinformation researchers” advocating for censorship under the guise of ‘Russiagate,’ and Big Tech companies themselves. Looking at their 74 endnotes, one finds multiple mentions of mainstream media outlets, but also citations of the Democrat propaganda shop Media Matters, the German Marshall Fund, and even the Biden-Harris campaign.

Any study of social media censorship that doesn’t address the New York Post getting locked out by Twitter and suppressed by Facebook over the story about Hunter Biden’s laptop in the run-up to the 2020 election is a farce. This report mentions it exactly once – in a “conservatives pounce” way, no less.

Describing the NY Post story as “questionable” and “apparently based on stolen emails,” the researchers claim it was a case of “reasonable decisions wrapped in mystifying processes.” Their conclusion mirrors the (footnoted) Washington Post editorial, literally headlined “Twitter and Facebook were right to suppress a Biden smear. But they should tell us why they did.” No bias here, everyone!

In other words, they literally want increased censorship on social media platforms, justified by the conservatives supposedly “falsely” claiming they’re being censored.

To no one’s surprise, the researchers conclude that platforms need a “content overseer” executive who would report directly to the top, and “do a better job of protecting users and society at large from harmful content.” They also want the Biden administration to either set up a new agency for digital oversight or give more power to existing ones, and reform Section 230 – the legal shield protecting platforms from lawsuits over content – to make it conditional on their censorship, or as they put it, “acceptance of a range of new responsibilities related to policing content.”

Now comes the best part. Among the people the authors thanked for their “time and insight” are representatives of Google, Twitter, and Facebook; two people from NewsGuard, a few Big Tech apologists from the neoliberal and neoconservative circles, a former Obama White House tech policy advisor – identified here by his new gig at Harvard Kennedy School – and Renée DiResta of the Stanford Internet Observatory. 

DiResta has made herself quite a career at Stanford, producing alarmist reports of what Russia “might” do to harm American democracy or something, but she started out as research director at a shop called New Knowledge. This group of “tech specialists who lean Democratic,” to use a New York Times understatement, was literally caught running a false flag “Russian bot” operation on Twitter in 2017, during the US Senate special election in Alabama, in order to elect a Democrat.

Her inclusion is just the cherry on top of the giant hypocrisy cake that is the Barrett-Sims paper. It’s worse than merely factually wrong: it’s an exercise in gaslighting, projection and breath-taking dishonesty, it relies on self-serving and dishonest sources, and literally advocates for censorship. Whatever it takes to protect Our Democracy from “disinformation,” I guess.

Once the story of that broke – in December 2018, too late to change anything – New Knowledge quietly rebranded as Yonder, and that was it. No accountability. Instead of being disqualified as partisan hacks, the Senate Intelligence Committee doubled down on “insights” from New Knowledge/Yonder to insist there was “Russian meddling” in the 2016 election. DiResta simply moved to Stanford and kept doing the same thing.

Nebojsa Malic is a Serbian-American journalist, blogger and translator, who wrote a regular column for Antiwar.com from 2000 to 2015, and is now senior writer at RT. Follow him on Telegram @TheNebulator and on Twitter @NebojsaMalic

February 2, 2021 Posted by | Fake News, Full Spectrum Dominance, Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Progressive Hypocrite | , | Leave a comment

Fake News Over What’s Fit to Print a NYT Specialty

By Stephen Lendman | February 2, 2021

Like other establishment media, the NYT operates as a mouthpiece for wealth, power and privilege.

It long ago abandoned news fit to print, state-approved propaganda featured instead.

Relying on its reports for news, information and analysis assures mind manipulation over truth and full disclosure on major issues of the day.

The self-styled newspaper of record is consistently on the wrong side of cutting-edge ones relating to the health, welfare, and rights of ordinary Americans and others abroad.

Instead of denouncing US imperial wars on invented enemies, it cheerleads them.

Instead of opposing hazardous to health covid vaccines, it supports mass-vaxxing in flagrant violation of the Nuremberg Code.

Instead of advocating for peace, equity, justice and the rule of law, it long ago abandoned these principles.

In its latest edition, the Times reinvented what happened in the run-up to last November’s US presidential election and its aftermath.

It continued to suppress indisputable evidence of election fraud in a fake news piece titled: “Trump’s Campaign to Subvert the Election (sic).”

What happened last November was a selection, not an election, for the nation’s highest office.

Trump won. Biden lost. He’s now America’s 46th president, his predecessor a private citizen again.

The will of US dark forces triumphed over popular sentiment, rendering Biden/Harris illegitimate.

To its disgrace, the Times pretends otherwise.

A litany of bald-faced Big Lies defined its election reporting.

In its latest edition, it defied reality once again by falsely claiming the following:

“There was no substantial evidence of election fraud (sic), and there were nowhere near enough ‘irregularities’ to reverse the outcome in the courts (sic).”

“Mr. Trump did not, could not, win the election, not by ‘a lot’ or even a little (sic).”

“Allegations of (Dem) malfeasance had disintegrated in embarrassing fashion (sic).”

No “suitcase(s) of illegal ballots” were found (sic).”

“Dead voters… turn(ed) up alive (sic).”

No evidence showed “Dominion Systems voting machines had transformed thousands of Trump votes into Biden votes (sic).”

All of the above are bald-faced Big Lies, further proof that the self-styled newspaper of record is a lying machine, that nothing it reports on major issues can be taken at face value.

It called legitimate efforts to expose brazen election fraud by Trump’s legal team “an extralegal campaign to subvert the election (sic), rooted in a lie so convincing to some of his most devoted followers that it made the deadly Jan. 6 assault on the Capitol almost inevitable (sic).”

No “deadly” assault on Capitol Hill occurred.

It was stormed by anti-Trump hooligans, bussed in for the orchestrated anti-DJT false flag — falsely blamed on him and his supporters who had nothing to do with what happened.

The Times reinvented reality with its fake news claims.

Throughout Trump’s tenure, it consistently bashed him for the wrong reasons, ignoring his real wrongdoing because the vast majority in Washington share guilt.

Trump’s upcoming Senate trial next week for inciting insurrection lacks legitimacy.

With the vast majority of Republicans opposing the phony charge, acquittal is virtually certain.

A two-thirds Senate super-majority required to convict is nowhere in sight.

Substituting fiction for fact, the Times said the following:

Pre-and-post-Election 2020, “forces of disorder were… directed by (Trump) in one final norm-defying act of… reality-denying (sic).”

His legal team “skated the lines of legal ethics and reason (sic).”

Daily “the lie grew (sic), finally managing to… upend the peaceful transfer of power that for 224 years had been the bedrock of American democracy (sic).”

What the Times calls “democracy,” is government of, by, and for privileged interests exclusively at the expense of most others.

It’s been the American way from inception that includes numerous past instances of federal, state and local election fraud since at least the early 19th century.

Throughout his tenure, Trump was wrong time and again on domestic and geopolitical issues.

On brazen Election 2020 fraud, he’s right. Indisputable evidence backs him.

Anti-Trump dark forces manipulated results in key battleground states to hand Biden/Harris the election DJT legitimately won.

Elected to a second term, he’s out, Dems in the old-fashioned way — by brazen election fraud carrying the day.

Claims by the Times otherwise blackens its tattered reputation more than already.

Its overly-lengthy piece was long on fake news propaganda — bereft of journalism the way it should be, what’s absent in virtually all its reports on major issues, rubbish featured instead.

The bottom line is that now-private citizen Trump was denied reelection by brazen fraud.

Fake news claims otherwise by the Times and other establishment media represent some of the worst fourth estate rubbish in memory.

Their Election 2020 reports read like bad fiction, reality airbrushed out in support of loser Biden over winner Trump.

February 2, 2021 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Deception, Fake News, Mainstream Media, Warmongering | , | Leave a comment

New York Times Calls For Biden to Appoint “Reality Czar” to Fight “Disinformation”

RT | February 2, 2021

Striving to silence voices with which the mainstream media disagrees, the New York Times has urged President Joe Biden to appoint a “reality czar” to lead the fight against “disinformation and domestic extremism.”

And yes, George Orwell fans, America’s supposed newspaper of record used the phrase “reality czar” in describing the task-force leader that several “experts” recommended would be needed to take charge of the cross-agency “strategic response” to those odious people who say things deemed false by the government. This would be equivalent to the Ministry of Truth in Orwell’s ‘1984’, and the New York Times’  ‘experts’ see the secretary of truth, or reality czar, turning loose the tools of Big Brother to crack down on those conspiracy theorists who have created “the reality crisis.”

Of course, Roose’s experts also said Biden’s administration would need to be given peeks into those “black-box algorithms” at Twitter, Facebook, etc. to “open the hood on social media” and properly investigate reality offenders.

“It sounds a little dystopian, I’ll grant,” Times technology columnist Kevin Roose conceded on Tuesday, “but let’s hear them out.” He went on to say that the “tip-of-the-spear” task force could hold regular meetings with social media platforms and demand “structural changes,” such as violating the privacy of their customers under special government exemptions.

The targets of such scrutiny would, of course, include purveyors of the QAnon conspiracy theory. Roose’s other examples of “collective delusions” included the “baseless theory” that Covid-19 was manufactured in a Chinese lab.

In lieu of having a reality czar installed already, it’s not clear where the Times got the official ruling that the Chinese lab theory is baseless. Just last month, the US State Department said it had new information suggesting that the pandemic could have emerged from a lab in Wuhan, China, where evidence claimed to show researchers became sick with coronavirus-like symptoms in the fall of 2019, months before the first identified case of Covid-19 was reported in Wuhan. China has vehemently refuted such allegations, reminding that it was the first country to identify and report its cases to the world in what they say was likely one of multiple simultaneous outbreaks of the new disease.

The call for a reality czar comes amid assertions by media outlets and Democrat politicians that the US has a domestic terrorism crisis, rooted largely in white supremacy and unhinged support for former President Donald Trump. CNN has campaigned for its largest competitor, Fox News, to be forced off the air for reporting falsehoods.

Some observers suggested that the reality task force should start by responding to the falsehoods reported by the mainstream media, including false allegations that Trump’s campaign colluded with the Russian government to steal the 2016 presidential election.

Free-speech advocates said the Times’ call for a reality czar was predictable. “Ah, the Ministry of Truth,” UK journalist Raheem Kassam said. “I’ve been waiting for this one.”

“People who spent four years ranting about Russians taking over the government and now ranting about a coup want to appoint themselves to explain reality to the rest of us,” one Twitter user said.

See also:

NYT editor apparently deactivates Twitter account after being ridiculed for tweeting ‘I HAVE CHILLS’ when Biden plane landed

February 2, 2021 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance, Progressive Hypocrite | , | Leave a comment