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Pipelines v. USA

By Scott Ritter | Consortium News | October 12, 2022

Intent, motive and means: People serving life sentences in U.S. prisons have been convicted on weaker grounds than the circumstantial evidence against Washington for the attack on the Nord Stream pipelines.

Circumstantial evidence, just like direct proof, can be used to prove the elements of a crime, the existence or completion of certain acts and the intent or mental state of a defendant. Generally speaking, a prosecutor, to obtain a conviction, needs to show beyond a reasonable doubt that a defendant committed a certain act and that the defendant acted with specific intent.

Nord Stream 1 is a multi-national project operated by Swiss-based Nord Stream AG intended to supply some 55 billion cubic meters (bcm) of Russian natural gas annually to Europe by directly transporting it from Russia, through twin 1,224 kilometer-long pipelines laid beneath the Baltic Sea, to a German hub, from which the gas would be distributed to other European consumers.

The first of the twin pipelines was completed in June 2011 and began supplying gas in November 2011. The second was completed in April 2012 and began supplying gas in October 2012. Gazprom, the Russian gas giant, owns 51 percent interest in the Nord Stream 1 pipeline project.

Nord Stream 2 is a near clone of the Nord Stream 1 project, consisting of twin 1,220-kilometer pipelines laid beneath the Baltic Sea connecting Russia to Germany. Started in 2018, it was completed in September 2021. Like Nord Stream 1, the Nord Stream 2 is designed to deliver approximately 55 bcm of natural gas from Russia to Europe through Germany. Nord Stream 2, like Nord Stream 1, is operated by a multinational company in which Gazprom has 51 percent ownership.

Unlike Nord Stream 1, Nord Stream 2 was never allowed to begin supplying gas.

The Nord Stream 1 and 2 pipelines are anathema to U.S. national security policy, which for decades has been sour on the degree to which Russian natural gas dominates the European energy market. This animus was perhaps best captured by a column published in the German newspaper DieWelt in July 2019.

The piece, co-authored by Richard Grenell, Carla Sands, Gordon Sondland (respectively, the U.S. ambassadors to Germany, Denmark and the European Union), was entitled “Europe must retain control of its energy security” and made the argument that the “Nord Stream 2 pipeline will drastically increase Russia’s energy leverage over the EU,” noting that “[s]uch a scenario is dangerous for the bloc and the West as a whole.”

Observing that “a dozen European countries rely on Russia for more than 75 percent of their natural gas needs,” the ambassadors concluded “This makes United States allies and partners vulnerable to having their gas shut off at Moscow’s whim.”

Moreover, the ambassadors claimed,

“European Union reliance on Russian gas presents risks for Europe and the West as a whole and makes U.S. allies less secure. The Nord Stream 2 pipeline will heighten Europe’s susceptibility to Russia’s energy blackmail tactics. Europe must retain control of its energy security.”

The ambassadors also wove in some critical geopolitical context as well, declaring

“Make no mistake: Nord Stream 2 will bring more than just Russian gas. Russian leverage and influence will also flow under the Baltic Sea and into Europe, and the pipeline will enable Moscow to further undermine Ukrainian sovereignty and stability.”

Russia’s “weaponization” of energy against Europe was the topic of a “debate” that Gary Peach and I carried out in December 2018 on the pages of Energy Intelligence, which monitors issues pertaining to global energy security. Gary, one of EI’s senior writers, covers Russian energy.

I argued that “Russia has never sought to use its status as a major supplier of energy to Europe as a vehicle of policy influence,” noting that:

“[t]he weaponization of Russian energy comes in the form of sanctions imposed against Moscow and the pursuit of policies designed to curtail development of Russia’s energy sector. It is far easier to make a case that the U.S. and Europe pose a threat to Russian energy security rather than vice versa.”

Gary, on the other hand, noted that

“Gazprom’s supply contracts exhibit the underlying economic threat from Moscow: The pricing formula is roughly the same for all countries, but those countries in Russia’s good graces receive an arbitrary ‘discount.’” He concluded that “when Gazprom is the only conceivable gas supplier, it has shamelessly abused the monopoly.”

In December 2019 the administration of President Donald Trump imposed sanctions in a desperate last-second bid to prevent the Nord Stream 2 pipeline from being completed.

These sanctions were waived by the administration of President Joe Biden in May 2021 in an effort to be seen as repairing relations with Germany that had been severely frayed during the Trump administration. However, upon completion, Nord Stream 2 was prevented from operating by objections raised by German regulators regarding licensing issues, which were not expected to be resolved until mid-2022.

In the lead up to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the Biden administration devised a plan to punish Russia by imposing severe economic sanctions which would target the Russian energy sector, including measures designed to halt the delivery of gas from Russia to Germany via the Nord Stream pipelines.

One of the issues confronting U.S. policy makers was finding the right mix of sanctions that would succeed in harming Russia without destroying the European economy in the process. Policy makers on both sides of the Atlantic, however, recognized that meaningful sanctions which targeted Russian energy contained collateral risk to the European economy which could not be avoided.

One of the mechanisms that U.S. and E.U. policy makers were hoping would alleviate the economic consequences of sanctioning Russian energy was to increase the supply of U.S. liquified natural gas (LNG) to Europe. Since 2016 the amount of LNG supplied by the U.S. to Europe has increased, with more than 21 bcm delivered in 2021.

But 21 bcm couldn’t begin to offset the quantity of natural gas being shipped by Russia to Europe in case of any large-scale disruption of Russian energy supplies brought on by the imposition of economic sanctions that targeted the Russian energy sector.

After the Russian invasion of Ukraine — and the realization that the energy disruption to Europe was going to be far greater than had been anticipated — Biden made good on his promise to increase the supply of U.S. LNG to Europe. But the quantities still fell far short of demand, and at prices that were, literally, bankrupting all of Europe.

The Victims

With Germany blocking the operation of Nord Stream 2 and sanctions precluding the repair of the Nord Stream 1, the German population began bearing the brunt of the sanctions on Russian energy.

Despite their government’s insistence that it would remain resolute in confronting what it perceived as Russian aggression against Ukraine, the German people had other plans. By Sept. 26 they began taking to the streets in large numbers to demand that their government open the Nord Stream 2 pipeline and provide the German people and economy with the energy needed to survive.

The Crime

On Sept. 26, the Nord Stream 2 pipeline reported a massive drop in pressure. The next day, the Nord Stream 1 pipeline reported the same. A Danish fighter jet, flying over the pipeline route, reported seeing a one-kilometer diameter disturbance in the water off the island of Bornholm, directly over the Nord Stream 2 pipeline, created by the massive release of natural gas underwater. (Danish authorities have estimated that between the two pipelines the total amount of methane released into the atmosphere was around 500,000 metric tons.)

The incident took place in the exclusive economic zone of Sweden, and the Swedish Security Service took the lead in investigating what had happened. (Curiously, Russia was not invited to participate, despite having a vested economic and security interest in the matter.)

“After completing the crime scene investigation,” the Swedes reported, “the Swedish Security Service can conclude that there have been detonations at Nord Stream 1 and 2 in the Swedish economic zone,” noting that the blasts had caused “extensive damage” to the lines.

The Swedes also declared that they had retrieved some materials from the incident site, which were being analyzed to determine who was responsible. This evidence, the Swedes stated, “strengthened the suspicions of gross sabotage.”

While all parties involved with the Nord Stream pipeline “sabotage” concur that the cause was manmade, no nation outside Russia has named a suspect. (Russian President Vladimir Putin has attributed the attack, which Russia has labeled an act of “international terrorism,” on the “Anglo-Saxons” — the British and Americans.)

Biden dismissed the Russian claims. The pipeline attack “was a deliberate act of sabotage and the Russians are pumping out disinformation and lies,” the U.S. president said. “At the appropriate moment, when things calm down, we’re going to be sending divers down to find out exactly what happened. We don’t know that yet exactly.”

But we do know. Biden told us himself. So did Secretary of State Antony Blinken. So did the U.S. Navy. Between the three, we have incontrovertible evidence of intent, motive and means — more than enough needed to prove guilt beyond any reasonable doubt in a court of law.

Intent

Speaking to reporters on Feb. 7, Biden declared “If Russia invades, that means tanks or troops crossing the border of Ukraine again, there will no longer be a Nord Stream 2. We will bring an end to it.”

When a journalist asked how Biden could do such a thing, given that Germany was in control of the project, Biden retorted: “I promise you: We will be able to do it.”

No prosecutor has ever had a more concise statement of intent — a veritable confession before the event — than this. Joe Biden should be taken at his word.

Motive

When asked by reporters on Oct. 3 to comment on the Nord Stream pipeline attacks, Blinken responded in part by noting that the attack was “a tremendous opportunity to once and for all remove the dependence on Russian energy and thus to take away from Vladimir Putin the weaponization of energy as a means of advancing his imperial designs.”

Blinken further declared that the U.S. would work to alleviate the “consequences” of the pipeline attack on Europe, alluding to the provision of U.S. LNG at exorbitant profit margins for U.S. suppliers — another “opportunity.”

Prosecutors often speak of cui bono, a Latin phrase that means “who benefits,” when seeking to import motive for a crime committed, under the presumption that there is a high probability that those responsible for a specific crime are the ones who stand to gain from it.

Blinken. Tremendous opportunity.

Cui Bono.

Means

In early June, in support of a major NATO exercise known as BALTOPS (Baltic Operations) 2022, the U.S. Navy employed the latest advancements in unmanned underwater vehicle, or UUV, mine hunting technology to be tested in operational scenarios.

According to the U.S. Navy, it was able to evaluate “emerging mine hunting UUV technology,” focusing on “UUV navigation, teaming operations, and improvements in acoustic communications all while collecting critical environmental data sets to advance the automatic target recognition algorithms for mine detection.”

One of the UUV’s used by the U.S. Navy is the Seafox.

In September, specialized U.S. Navy helicopters — the MH-60R, capable of employing the Seafox UUV — were tracked flying off the Danish island of Bornholm, directly over the segments of the Nordstream 1 and 2 pipelines that were later damaged in the sabotage incidents.

To quote TASS,

“On November 6, 2015, the NATO Seafox mine disposal unmanned underwater vehicle was found during the scheduled visual inspection of the Nord Stream 1 gas pipeline. It lay in space between gas pipelines, clearly near one of strings. NATO said the underwater mine disposal vehicle was lost during exercises. Such NATO exercises when the combat explosive device turned out to be exactly under our gas pipeline. The explosive device was deactivated by Swedish Armed Forces at that time.”

Guilty Beyond Reasonable Doubt

The burden that exists to prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt “is fully satisfied and entirely convinced to a moral certainty that the evidence presented proves the guilt of the defendant.”  In the matter of the Nord Stream 1 and 2 attacks, this burden has been met when it comes to assigning blame to the United States.

Biden all but confessed the crime beforehand, and his secretary of state, Blinken, crowed about the “tremendous opportunity” that was created by the attack. Not only did the U.S. Navy actively rehearse the crime in June 2022, using the same weapon that had been previously discovered next to the pipeline, but employed the very means needed to use this weapon on the day of the attack, at the location of the attack.

Guilty as Charged

The problem is, outside of Russia, no one is charging the United States. Journalists run away from the evidence, citing “uncertainty.” Europe, afraid to wake up to the reality that its most important “ally” has committed an act of war against its critical energy infrastructure, condemning millions of Europeans to suffer the depravations of cold, hunger and unemployment —all the while gouging Europe with profit margins from the sale of LNG that redefine the notion of “windfall” — remains silent.

There is no doubt in any thinking person’s brain as to who is responsible for the attacks on the Nord Stream 1 and 2 pipelines. The circumstantial case is overwhelming and fully capable of winning a conviction in any U.S. court of law.

But no one will bring the case, at least not at this moment.

Shame on American journalism for ignoring this flagrant attack on Europe.

Shame on Europe for not having the courage to publicly name their attacker.

But most of all, shame on the administration of Joe Biden, who has lowered the U.S. to the same standard of those it hunted down and killed for so many years — a simple international terrorist, and a state sponsor of terrorism.

October 15, 2022 Posted by | Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | , | Leave a comment

As the Climate Refuses to Break Down on Cue, the Pseudoscience of ‘Attribution Studies’ Rises Up to Plug the Holes

BY CHRIS MORRISON | THE DAILY SCEPTIC | OCTOBER 14, 2022

The last few years have seen the climate alarmist industry go all in on ‘attributing’ bad weather to humans causing the climate to change. As global warming goes off the boil and the climate resolutely fails to break down on cue, an entire industry of pseudoscience has sprung up to scour the world and catastrophise every unusual natural weather event or disaster. It will not come as a surprise to discover that such attribution is based on climate models. As we shall see, the models do nothing more than produce worthless guesses.

When Professor Richard Lindzen of MIT noted that the current climate narrative is “absurd”, but trillions of dollars says it is not “absurd”, he was undoubtedly thinking of the product of climate models. Roger Pielke, a noted science writer and a professor at the University of Colorado Boulder, is particularly scathing about attribution work: “I can think of no other area of research where the relaxing of rigour and standards has been encouraged by researchers in order to generate claims more friendly to headlines, political advocacy and even lawsuits. But there you go.”

It is simple to explain what ‘attribution’ models do. First they simulate a climate with no human involvement that does not exist, and then compare it with another simulation that is supposed to reflect the involvement of humans burning fossil fuel. Any weather event at a local level that is magnified in the second is, abracadabra, said to be due to human-caused climate change.

To take such results seriously it must be assumed that the models have correct information in the first place. An inability over 40 years for climate models to predict an accurate temperature would seem to indicate they are work in progress. Ignorance of the equilibrium climate sensitivity (ECS) number – the amount the Earth will warm if carbon dioxide is doubled in the atmosphere – would be considered another handicap. In addition, it is interesting to observe some academics attempting to produce a perfect model capable of such precision when they are mapping a climate system that is non-linear with numerous, only partially understood, powerful forces at work. How anyone can take the results seriously, with all the inevitable ‘garbage in-garbage out’ possibilities, is a mystery. Measuring cats in a sack might be considered a marginally easier task.

Attribution studies fail the falsification principle outlined by the science philosopher Karl Popper. This is held to be the test that differentiates real science from pseudoscience. Any hypothesis must be testable and conceivably proved false. Unless a suggestion can be tested in this way, it is opinion, guesswork, or, more uncharitably, crystal ball-gazing. Stating, for instance, that a bad storm was caused by humans when a natural explanation is also available, or calculating that wildfires will consume so many more acres than before, is unprovable. It therefore fails the test to be termed science.

Of course, the attribution claims are all over the popular prints. Within just a few days of last July’s U.K. brief heatwave, the Guardian was reporting: “Climate breakdown made U.K. heatwave 10 times more likely, study finds.” Of course there was a natural explanation for the soaring summer temperature, caused by southern winds being supercharged by an adjacent intense low pressure system. Friederike Otto from the Grantham Institute at Imperial, an operation partly-funded by the green billionaire investor Jeremy Grantham, said the 10 times finding was worrying, and if carbon emissions were not rapidly cut it could be “even worse” than previously thought.

According to Roger Pielke, the rise of individual ‘event attribution’ studies coincides with frustration that the IPCC has not ”definitively concluded” that many types of extreme weather have become commonplace. In his view they offer “comfort and support” to those focused on climate advocacy. Since they fill a strong demand in politics, Pielke suggests they are “here to stay”.

Friederike Otto is at the forefront of such studies and is the co-lead of World Weather Attribution (WWA), a body that specialises in near-instant weather attributions. On her Grantham CV, Otto claims WWA provides “timely scientific evidence” on single events, “paving the way for new sustainability litigation”.

Meanwhile any scientific work that, by suggesting the climate is not breaking down, is inconvenient for those promoting the command-and-control Net Zero political project, is be suppressed. Otto was one of four “experts” used by state-owned Agence France-Presse in a footling ‘fact check’ of a recent paper from four leading Italian scientists. They argued that a climate emergency is not supported by the data. She said the authors, including two physics professors, were “of course” not writing in good faith. “If the journal cares about science they should withdraw it loudly and publicly, saying that it should never have been published,” she demanded.

Contacted by the Daily Sceptic, she added that the paper was “bad science”. She obviously feels able to try to cancel professorial physics authorities since she has a “diploma” in physics from the University of Potsdam. Otto’s doctorate was in the philosophy of science, and before joining Grantham she spent 10 years teaching in the School of Geography at Oxford University. “I am not trying to ban anyone and I do not think it is relevant whether their first degree is in art history or physics,” she explained

Otto is also behind a WWA guide for journalists titled: “Reporting extreme weather and climate change“. In a foreword, the former BBC Today editor Sarah Sands bemoans the time when the former U.K. Chancellor Nigel Lawson managed to suggest there had been no increase in what she called extreme weather. I wish we had this guide for journalists to help us mount a more effective challenge to his claim, wrote Sands.  These days , she enthused, attribution studies have given us significant insight into the horsemen of the climate apocalypse.

“In this way we are able to move from anecdote and conjecture, from superstition and wishful thinking, to science. We have evidence and we have facts. They are a secure foundation for news,” she said.

Science? Unverified guesswork would be more accurate. Popper must be turning in his grave.

Chris Morrison is the Daily Sceptic’s Environment Editor.

October 15, 2022 Posted by | Corruption, Deception, Fake News, Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Science and Pseudo-Science | Leave a comment

‘Settled Science’ is a Contradiction in Terms

BY DR JAMES ALEXANDER | THE DAILY SCEPTIC | OCTOBER 15, 2022

In a recent piece for the Daily Sceptic Chris Morrison alluded, ironically, to the ‘settled science’ on the subject of climate change. I have recently been reflecting on the oxymorons of our time, and this is one of the most provocative.

An oxymoron is a combination of words which offers us a contradiction. It is a contradiction in terms. The word comes from the Greek, oxus, ‘sharp’ and moros, ‘foolish’: meaning, literally, sharply or pointedly foolish. The reason why it is pointedly foolish is because the words are not vague or confusing: they are clear, but point in two different directions, like crossed swords. Hence what we see is something paradoxical.

So let us note, an oxymoron is not a simple weapon. A sword is a weapon. Crossed swords are something much more beguiling and odd. Anyone who uses an oxymoron in speech is attempting to confuse us by waving two swords around and clashing them together. Recall Sergeant Troy’s wooing of Bathsheba in Far From the Madding Crowd. This is, pretty much, what the authorities are doing to us now: playing soldiers, bent on seduction, using threat as part of that seduction.

There are many oxymorons in modern politics. One of the best is ‘sustainable development’. But that, at least, is obviously flawed: though perhaps it takes some knowledge of economics and history to know why. That is for another time.

‘Settled science’, however, is an affront to not only language, but also to science and to politics.

Let me make this as clear as I can.

Science is a scientific word.

Settlement is not a scientific word, but a political one.

Science seeks exactitude; it seeks truth; but though it attempts exactitude, it is aware that the price of seeking exactitude is tentativeness. We postulate the existence of a solution, but we propose hypotheses, which we test in various ways, through argument or observation or experiment.

Anything which is settled is not solved. But it is also not tentative, not hypothetical. It is actual: it is certain. It does not care about truth or exactitude. It is certain because it has come out of agreement, and this agreement may have involved compromise and cutting corners and concessions to the other side. It is decisive: but it is not decisive because it is true, but because it has been decided. A decision has been made. A settlement has been reached. And it is final. Everything is final and certain in politics – until the next settlement. But nothing is final and certain in science. There are no settlements.

The phrase ‘settled science’ has nothing to do with scientific truth, or scientific hypothesis. What settlement suggests is that a scientific hypothesis has been transposed from one sphere – that of science – to another – that of politics – and therefore its nature has been changed. It is no longer a hypothetical or tentative truth. It is settled, so it appears to be certain. But it is certain not because it is true: it is certain because it is agreed, and then decided. And we are entitled to ask about who is agreeing, and why, and who is deciding and why, and how, and who is paying for it, and what economic and moral and institutional incentives there are.

‘Settled science’ is a phrase which should curdle in the mouth of any scientist. Any ‘scientists’ who use the phrase ‘settled science’ are not making a scientific argument. They are making a political argument: and they are doing so coercively, by appealing to the authority of that exact, truthful, tentative thing, science. They are not arguing as scientists. Perhaps in the mornings they are scientists. But in the afternoons when they speak of ‘settled science’ they are no longer scientists. They are politicians, doing political work, and doing it by misusing the authority which comes to them from the high status of the work they do in the morning.

This of course applies to the IPCC, and all other institutions and individuals who speak of ‘settled science’.

Dr. James Alexander is a professor in the Department of Political Science at Bilkent University in Turkey.

October 15, 2022 Posted by | Deception, Science and Pseudo-Science, Timeless or most popular | Leave a comment

CA DOCTORS FIGHT BACK AGAINST ‘MEDICAL MISINFORMATION’ BILL

The Highwire with Del Bigtree | October 14, 2022

Dr. Jeff Barke, a founding member of America’s Frontline Doctors, joins Del to discuss California’s new law enacted with the passage of AB2098, which effectively makes it illegal for doctors to disagree with politicians.

October 15, 2022 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance, Science and Pseudo-Science, Video | , , , | Leave a comment

Suppress alternative views, say the climate mafia

By Paul Homewood | TCW Defending Freedom | October 14, 2022

Earlier this year four leading Italian scientists published a major review of  historical climate trends titled A critical assessment of extreme events trends in times of global warming, and concluded that declaring a ‘climate emergency’ is not supported by the data. 

The authors do not deny that the world is a little bit warmer than a century ago, nor that the climate has been changing. But after analysing the official data they found no evidence of a climate crisis.

The study looked at various indicators of extreme weather such as temperature extremes, heavy rainfall, hurricanes, floods and droughts. It also reviewed trends in food production and yields. It concluded: ‘None of these response indicators show a clear positive trend of extreme events. In conclusion on the basis of observational data, the climate crisis that according to many sources we are experiencing today is not evident yet.’

The scientists suggested that rather than burdening our children with anxiety about climate change, we should encourage them to think about issues like energy, food and health with a more ‘objective and constructive spirit’ and not waste limited resources on ‘costly and ineffective solutions’.

There really was little that was controversial in the study. A succession of reports from the IPCC, the UN climate panel, essentially have all come to similar conclusions once the political spin was taken away.

Any changes that have affected the climate have been slight and often undetectable. Moreover many of the changes have undoubtedly been beneficial; for instance drought is now much less common and severe in many parts of the world, such as India, Sahel and the US than it used to be in the past. It always was absurd to maintain that global warming makes everything worse.

No matter that the study was well written by highly respected scientists, factually based and peer-reviewed, its message did not fit the narrative. It therefore did not take long for the climate mafia to demand that the paper should be withdrawn by the European Physical Journal Plus which published it in January this year.

According to Phys.Org:  A fundamentally flawed study claiming that scientific evidence of a climate crisis is lacking should be withdrawn from the peer-reviewed journal in which it was published, top climate scientists have told AFP [the Paris-based news agency Agence France-Presse].

‘Appearing earlier this year in the European Physical Journal Plus, published by Springer Nature, the study purports to review data on possible changes in the frequency or intensity of rainfall, cyclones, tornadoes, droughts and other extreme weather events.

‘Four prominent climate scientists contacted by AFP all said the study – of which they had been unaware – grossly manipulates data, cherry-picking some facts and ignoring others that would contradict their discredited assertions.’

We are of course used to the climate establishment trying to censor heretical views. The Climategate emails a few years ago uncovered many such attempts, some even threatening journal editors. And it is worth noting the use of phrases such as ‘fundamentally flawed’, ‘manipulating data’ and ‘cherry–picking’ in an attempt to destroy the study’s credibility. Yet none of these critics are able to back up any of these claims with actual facts.

Doing science is all about facts. If you disagree with a particular scientific study, you challenge it on a factual basis and point out exactly where it is flawed. There is a well-established method of doing this, which is to ask the journal involved to print a response to the original article. Normally the paper’s authors would of course have a right of reply. That is the way facts are established. Simply to demand that the journal withdraws the paper is the worst sort of censorship.

Perhaps worst of all is the fact that the attack on this study was led by Richard Betts, Head of Climate Impacts Research at the UK Met Office. As an employee of a taxpayer–funded agency, Betts has more obligation than most to be unbiased and open-minded.

He and his supporters may disagree with the European Physical Journal Plus paper: that is their prerogative. But they need to present facts  instead of trying to force the journal into withdrawing the paper.

October 14, 2022 Posted by | Full Spectrum Dominance, Science and Pseudo-Science, Timeless or most popular | | Leave a comment

The Alex Jones verdict is a declaration of war on independent media

By Kit Knightly | OffGuardian | October 14, 2022

A Connecticut court has handed down a 1 billion dollar fine on radio host and independent journalist Alex Jones, for “spreading misinformation” about the 2012 Sandy Hook shooting.

This is a travesty, and that any could call such an absurd penalty “justice” is sickening. Especially when it is so obviously designed as warning to everyone in the independent media.

Indeed, outside of the specifics of this case, the potential fallout for everyone in the alt-media sphere is terrifying, because already the Jones precedent is being used as an argument for “regulation” of the internet.

Forget about Sandy Hook. Maybe it happened or maybe it didn’t, experience teaches us that virtually nothing happens exactly as the media reports, but even if it did – even if every single word Alex Jones ever said about Sandy Hook was a deliberate lie – you cannot “regulate” that, you cannot make it a crime, and you cannot silence people’s future for words they have said in the past.

That is censorship.

People have the right to free speech. And that includes – MUST include – the right to lie and the right to simply be wrong.

If you take away those rights, you put the power to regulate speech in the hands of those with enough influence to create official “truth” or hold the “right” opinions. And that has nothing to do with objective truth, or real facts.

The media, and the establishment it serves, do not care about truth or facts.

To take a recent example, a Pfizer executive recently reported the pharmaceutical giant never did any research to ascertain if their Covid “vaccine” halted transmission of the “disease” commonly called Covid.

There was never any trial data showing the “vaccines” prevented transmission of “covid”, and that means every outlet, channel or pundit who claimed the vaccine “stopped the spread” was actively “spreading misinformation”.

What’s more this misinformation has likely led to literally thousands of deaths. That is far more harmful than anything anyone could say about a ten-year-old school shooting, real or not.

Will CNN or The Guardian or the NYT face a billion-dollar fine?

Of course they won’t. Because this is not about “misinformation”, this is about uncontrolled information. It is about regulating – even criminalising – the free flow of ideas and opinions.

Even if this kind of rule were equally applied to all media on every topic, it would be still awful… and we all know it won’t be.

Instead, it will be applied to the independent media, to alternative and anti-establishment voices, and to the internet.

If you doubt that, check the media reaction.

One argument against the need for any new regulation of free speech is that we already have legal systems in place to protect people from “harmful speech” – threats, libel and defamation.

Indeed, Jones’ fate here could be held up as a prime example of “the system working”.

But that is not enough, according to this article on NPR which bemoans the “limits” of de-platforming and defamation suits.

That opinion is shared by this article on NBC, which headlines “Alex Jones’ lawsuit losses are not enough”, and concludes:

Defamation lawsuits are an important tool in the quest to reduce harm from harassment and abuse. But they are not a solution to the lie machines built by incredibly savvy, incredibly cynical pundits like Alex Jones. This week’s verdict, coupled with whatever else happens next, will certainly make conspiracy theorists think twice before they inflict pain on private individuals in the future. But it will not solve the bigger problem, which is our world’s dangerous, pervasive flood of misinformation.

That line about “making conspiracy theorists think twice” is the most honest sentence in the article, and confirms one of the major aims of the Jones trial narrative is to set an example.

But while the point of the article could not be clearer, the author never actually uses the words “regulation”, “legislation” or “censorship”. He chooses to play a more subtle game than that.

The same cannot be said for Simon Jenkins in yesterday’s Guardian, who eschews subtlety completely:

Only proper online regulation can stop poisonous conspiracists like Alex Jones

“Proper online regulation”. We all know what that means, it means censorship. He’s not even hiding it in coy language, but openly arguing for a global censorship programme.

He begins by pining for the days when nobody could get a scrap of the public’s attention without going through approved channels:

There have always been Alex Joneses spreading poison from the world’s soap boxes and pavements. As a boy I used to listen to them at Speakers’ Corner in Hyde Park […] Their lies never made it into newspapers or on to the airwaves. Free speech went only as far as the human voice could carry. Beyond that, “news” was mediated behind a wall of editors, censors and regulators, to keep it from gullible and dangerous ears.

Imagine the kind of mind that is nostalgic for an age when “News” – he is right to use quotes – had to pass through a “wall of editors, censors and regulators”. Imagine being able to simply dismiss the multitude of the public as “gullible and dangerous”.

From there he moves on to praise the verdict against Jones, and the state-backed censorship exhibited by the major social media platforms, but laments it does not go far enough, even hinting that people should have their own private websites confiscated:

The main social media outlets have accepted a modicum of responsibility to monitor content […] attempts are made to keep up with a deluge of often biased and mendacious material, but […] by the time it is taken down it re-emerges elsewhere. Jones has been banned by Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, but he can still reach audiences on his own website […] Justice is meaningless without enforcement or prevention.

Next, he tells us who exactly will be in the crosshairs of this suggested global censor. It’s a predictable list:

victims may have the rule of law on their side, but that does not curb the climate deniers, anti-vaxxers, trolls and QAnon followers or the appalling and anonymous abuse that now greets the expression online of any liberal – I might say reasonable – point of view.

Alongside a “no true Scotsman” fallacy altering the definition of free speech:

No one seriously believes free speech is an absolute right.

Like all censors before them, modern censors such as Jenkins seek to codify their desire for control in the language of concern. Proselytizing about the need to “protect people” and “the greater good”. They would, they claim, only censor harmful lies.

Such is the call of the censor through the ages. We’re only censoring heresy, we’re only censoring blasphemy, we’re only censoring treason.

Jenkins is aware of this, even as he uses special pleading to argue his version of censorship would be different:

Historians of the news media can chart a progress from early censorship by the church and crown to state licensing and legal regulation. This control was initially employed to enforce conformity, but over the past century it has also sought to sustain diversity and suppress blatant falsity.

The hypocrisy is rank. “Maybe they used to enforce conformity, but of course we would never do that…we just want to silence people who disagree, for society’s sake.”

Of course, none of those who seek to control the speech of their fellow humans ever claim to want to censor the truth. They call it “sedition” or “propaganda”, and claim to be safeguarding “the truth” even as they pull out tongues or break their victims on the rack.

Now they call it “Misinformation”. It’s all the same in the end.

One more time, for the people at the back.

  • Free speech is NOT reserved for people who are “right”.
  • Free speech is NOT only for people who tell “the truth”.
  • Free speech is NOT to be moderated by “a wall of editors and regulators”.

Free speech is not a privilege in the gift of the state, a commodity to be regulated by the government or a child’s toy to be punitively confiscated by grown-ups who know better.

It is a right. For everyone. Everywhere. Always.

And if it is removed from one of us, it is removed from all of us.

October 14, 2022 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance, Mainstream Media, Warmongering | | Leave a comment

Sweden explains rejection of joint Nord Stream probe

Samizdat | October 14, 2022

Stockholm has rejected a plan to set up an official joint investigation team together with Germany and Denmark to look into the explosions that damaged the Nord Stream 1 and 2 gas pipelines in late September, Reuters reported, citing a Swedish investigator. Sweden reportedly argued that its own findings are too sensitive to share even with other EU nations.

The EU’s agency for criminal justice cooperation, Eurojust, recently came up with a proposal to establish a Joint Investigation Team (JIT) to launch a probe into the Nord Stream explosions, Reuters said, adding that Sweden blocked the initiative. On Friday, Mats Ljungqvist, a Swedish prosecutor involved in the nation’s probe into the incident, told the news agency that this development would impose unwanted obligations on his nation.

“This is because there is information in our investigation that is subject to confidentiality directly linked to national security,” Ljungqvist said, adding that his nation is already cooperating with Germany and Denmark on the matter anyway.

According to the prosecutor, establishing a JIT would involve signing a legally binding information-sharing agreement. Eurojust says on its website that a JIT mechanism indeed includes a legal agreement between the involved parties for the purposes of conducting criminal investigations.

Earlier, citing “security circles,” Germany’s Der Spiegel magazine said that Sweden considered the sensitivity level of its own probe’s findings to be “too high to share them with other countries.” News portal Tagesschau, owned by the German ARD broadcaster, also reported on Friday that Germany, Sweden, and Denmark initially wanted to investigate the incident together but “that’s not the case now.”

According to Tagesschau, Denmark also eventually opposed the idea of a joint probe. Now, all three nations will conduct their own separate investigations, it added. Swedish Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson denied the reports, however, adding that “we are working together with Germany and Denmark on this issue.”

Earlier, all three nations refused to grant Russia access to the probe, prompting Moscow to summon their ambassadors. Russia also said it would not recognize the results of any probe unless its specialists were allowed to participate. Andersson said on Monday that Stockholm would not share its investigation results with Moscow.

The Nord Stream 1 and 2 pipelines were damaged and rendered inoperable following a series of powerful underwater explosions off the Danish island of Bornholm. No nation conducting a probe into the incident has officially named any suspects that could have been involved in the alleged attacks on the pipelines.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has previously hinted at a potential “beneficiary.”

“One can now force the liquefied natural gas from the US on to European countries on a much larger scale,” he said earlier this week. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken called the incidents a “tremendous opportunity” for Europe “to once and for all remove dependence on Russian energy.”

October 14, 2022 Posted by | Deception, False Flag Terrorism, War Crimes | , , | Leave a comment

A Look Back at the Demonization of the Unvaccinated

By Michael P Senger  | The New Normal | October 13, 2022

Social media has been in an uproar since a member of European Parliament posted a video of a hearing in which a Pfizer director admitted the company never tested whether its Covid mRNA vaccine prevents transmission prior to its approval for emergency use.

Though the fact that Covid mRNA vaccines do not prevent transmission was, of course, abundantly clear from the data soon after their implementation, this myth was a primary justification for vaccine passes and a primary cause of the unprecedented venom launched at those who refused Covid vaccines throughout 2021 and continuing through today.

Not only did governments exert this pressure through policy, but in many cases politicians and officials used their office to deliberately stoke the social stigmatization of the unvaccinated. Here’s a look back at some of the unprecedented vitriol that was launched at those who refused Covid vaccines from 2021 and beyond.

Officials in many jurisdictions proposed making the unvaccinated pay more for healthcare.

 

In Victoria, Australia — where lockdowns were longer than in perhaps any other city in the world—one politician proposed cutting the unvaccinated out of the national health system entirely.

 

A particularly disturbing idea that began to gain serious traction among the elite commentariat was to have hospitals triage emergency care to serve the unvaccinated last, or even deny healthcare to the unvaccinated entirely—a fairly clear-cut crime against humanity.

 

One vocal proponent of the idea of triaging emergency care to disfavor the unvaccinated was David Frum, Senior Editor of the Atlantic, most famous for his outspoken support for the invasion of Iraq. When his infamous tweet on the subject sparked an uproar, Frum doubled down.

Piers Morgan agreed that the unvaccinated should be denied emergency care.

 

Shockingly, this appalling idea of triaging emergency care based on vaccination status is still being proposed to this day.

 

The demonization of the unvaccinated was, of course, far from limited to healthcare. Vilifying the unvaccinated became a kind of illiberal fad among the elite commentariat. The US CDC even paid screen writers and comedians to promote Covid vaccines, which in some cases involved paying them to mock the unvaccinated.

In a bout of recidivism to the early 20th century, Austria and Germany introduced the chilling concept of “lockdown for the unvaccinated.”

“Lockdown for the unvaccinated” gained traction in the English-speaking world as well.

Most countries, cities, and states across the western world introduced vaccine passes that their own citizens had to show in order to partake in daily life. The World Health Organization published an extensive document on implementing a digital vaccine-pass system, including an international vaccine status registry and instructions on how to later revoke someone’s vaccine pass.

 

The most dystopian of these vaccine pass systems was in Lithuania, where the unvaccinated were banned from nearly all public spaces and employment outside their homes; the few shops where they could purchase essentials had to post large red signs on their doors indicating that unvaccinated persons could be present.

And of course, who could forget Justin Trudeau’s classic fuhrer-style rant about having to share public transportation with the unvaccinated, despite government documents later revealing that he had no science to back any of these claims.

Like so much of the response to Covid, these vaccine passes and the illiberal fad of stigmatizing the unvaccinated were unscientific, unprecedented, ineffective, totalitarian, brutal, and dumb.

It was never remotely realistic for any government to expect every single person to get vaccinated, especially when the vaccine in question involved a novel genetic-based therapy. Thus, these proposals to impose draconian hardships on those who refused Covid vaccines would inevitably involve the state imposing draconian hardships on a sizable portion of the population.

According to Harvard epidemiologist Martin Kulldorff, one of the most credible voices on the subject, Covid vaccines likely yielded benefits for the elderly and vulnerable, but it remains entirely unclear whether Covid vaccines have yielded any benefit at all for healthy adults and especially for children. Coupled with the still-unknown risks associated with mRNA technology and the now well-documented cases of death and serious injury from these vaccines, for governments across the world to have exerted extreme pressure on children and healthy adults to get these vaccines is absolutely sickening.

That some healthy young people were surely coerced into receiving an injection that led to their death or serious injury, when the data showed that the benefits did not outweigh the risks, is an unconscionable tragedy.

October 14, 2022 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Deception, Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Science and Pseudo-Science, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | , , , , | Leave a comment

Pfizer and the FDA NEVER Claimed Their COVID-19 Vaccine Stopped Transmission – This is NOT News Today!

By Brian Shilhavy | Health Impact News | October 11, 2022

My news feed and my inbox in my email program have been flooded with links to stories reporting what so many in the Alternative Media today are claiming is BREAKING NEWS: Pfizer’s COVID Vaccine was Never Tested on Preventing Transmission!

The source of this “Breaking News” is apparently a Dutch Member of the European Parliament, Rob Roos.

Well I have some news for all of you emailing me this story: This is NOT news!

Pfizer and the FDA have NEVER claimed that their COVID-19 stopped transmission of COVID, and this information has been readily available to the public since the beginning when the shot was first given an EUA.

It has ALWAYS been a lie propagated by the Corporate Media and the criminal CDC, and we have exposed this lie many times in the past.

In January of 2021, just about a month after the shots were given emergency use authorization, I published an article titled:

Why Would Anyone Choose to Receive an Experimental COVID mRNA Injection?

In this article, I quoted exactly what the FDA was publishing in their Fact Sheet for Healthcare Providers Administering Vaccine and the Fact Sheet for Recipients and Caregivers on the FDA website.

Not only did they NOT claim that the shots stopped transmission, they didn’t even claim it would prevent the one receiving the vaccine from getting COVID!

Then in May of 2021, just a few months after the shots were authorized by the FDA, Barbara Loe Fisher, the co-founder of The National Vaccine Information Center, which is the leading vaccine consumer advocacy group in the world and has been in existence for over 30 years, wrote what was by far the most comprehensive review of these new shots where she warned the public, among other things, that these vaccines were never even intended to stop transmission!

Barbara Loe Fisher: Seeing Through the COVID-19 Spin – How Big Pharma and Government are Spending $BILLIONS to Deceive the Public with Misinformation on COVID “Vaccines”

Quote:

Myth: Pfizer and Moderna mRNA Vaccines Have Been Proven to Prevent Infection and Transmission of SARS-CoV-2

What are the two biggest myths that have been generated by the advertising campaign being conducted with Pharma and taxpayer dollars?

The first big myth is that if you get two doses of the mRNA COVID vaccine, you will get artificial immunity and cannot be asymptomatically or symptomatically infected with the SARS-CoV-2 virus and you will not be able to infect others who come in physical contact with you: you dutifully got vaccinated and now you are immune.

That is a normal assumption because that is what vaccines are supposed to do, but it is a false assumption.

The Emergency Use Authorization the FDA gave to Pfizer and Moderna was not granted based on scientific evidence that the product prevented infection and transmission of SARS-Cov-2.

In fact, the FDA directed manufacturers in the summer of 2020 to make a product that had at least a 50 percent efficacy rate in either preventing or reducing severity of COVID-19 disease.

The companies chose to apply for an EUA based on nine months of clinical trial data that the product prevents people from developing severe symptoms of COVID-19 disease and reduces the likelihood they will have serious complications leading to hospitalization and death – not that it prevents infection and transmission.

There is a difference. (Full article.)

See Also:

Brazilian President tells WHO Director “People are Dying” After COVID Shots – Pleads with WHO to Publicly NOT Recommend it for Children

In November of 2021, we reported that even the director of WHO told the Brazilian President that the COVID shots were not designed to stop transmission.

So with all due respect to Mr. Roos, this is OLD NEWS, and is certainly not a “smoking gun.”

The fact that so many people are getting worked up into a frenzy over this today just proves that people in the beginning did not do their homework and research for themselves the public information that was available about these shots, and sadly, that included MANY in the medical field who were recommending them!!

As I have written many times over the years, people spend more time researching information before purchasing a home or a car, than they do before taking someone’s word about an experimental medical procedure that could kill them, or maim them for life.

And that is exactly what happened in the beginning with these COVID shots, and now that the truth is coming out, everyone wants to jump on the bandwagon regarding the now obvious criminal activities that brought these vaccines to the public.

And yet there are those of us who have been warning the public about the criminal activities of the FDA, CDC, and Big Pharma in the vaccine industry for decades, when almost nobody wanted to listen to us, until they ended up with a vaccine-damaged child, or were themselves injured by the flu shot or some other bogus vaccine that nobody has ever needed, because the science has NEVER proven that any single vaccine has ever been safe, nor effective.

October 14, 2022 Posted by | Deception, Timeless or most popular | , , | Leave a comment

Pfizer Exec Admits COVID-19 Vaccine Never Tested to Prevent Transmission, Media Silent

By Matt Agorist | The Free Thought Project | October 12, 2022

In early 2021, CDC director Rochelle Walensky had no problem going on national television and declaring to the world that if you took the covid-19 vaccine “you will not get or spread covid.” Within weeks, this was found to be entirely untrue.

Dr. Anthony Fauci also spread the exact same misinformation, telling Americans that they had nothing to worry about once they took the shots. Yet hundreds of thousands of people who took the shots, got sick and died.

Joe Biden, Bill Gates, and countless other Pfizer shills in the media waged a massive campaign to convince Americans and the world at large that taking the vaccine meant that you could not get or transmit COVID-19. And they were all dead wrong.

Instead of apologizing and admitting they were wrong, team Pfizer doubled down and claimed that getting “boosted” was the real protection. Again, this was proven wrong.

Now that tens of billions of taxpayer dollars have flowed into their coffers, Pfizer is admitting that they never even tested whether or not the vaccine prevented transmission before they released it. Read that again—Pfizer admitted that they never tested their vaccine’s ability to prevent the transmission of COVID-19 before its release.

During a hearing this week on the European Union’s COVID-19 response, Pfizer’s president of international developed markets, Janine Small, made this bombshell admission.

Member of the European Parliament (MEP) Robert “Rob” Roos asked Small if Pfizer tested whether or not the vaccine prevented transmission. Her answer was a resounding “no.”

“Regarding the question around did we know about stopping immunization before it entered the market…No.,” Small said.

Given this telling admission that the vaccine was never tested in this manner, it raises the question as to where all the blowhards in the video above received this information. Who was telling them that the vaccine prevented transmission if the manufacturer never tested it?

Where did Walensky, Biden, Fauci, Gates, Maddow and others get this information from when they launched their concerted effort to spread this misinformation? This is a question we must all be demanding an answer to immediately.

We should also be asking why not a single mainstream outlet is reporting on this admission. Literally, no one in corporate media has touched this new information despite its bombshell nature. Americans would probably like to know that they were forced to take a vaccine that was never tested for prevention of transmission despite the entirety of the establishment telling them otherwise. Yet corporate media, largely funded by Pfizer, is silent.

We must never forget that politicians—all claiming to “follow the science”—locked us down, destroyed the economy, decimated the middle class through inflation, forcibly medicated us, and muzzled our children over the last 2 years. All the while we were told that our only way out of this was to take the jab.

We have been constantly reminded that if you don’t follow “The Science,” you are a science-denying buffoon who wants grandma to die, doesn’t care about the children, were an alt-right Nazi, a white supremacist, extremist, and most likely a domestic terrorist.

Those who stood against unconstitutional vaccine mandates were scorned by the mainstream, labeled as “anti-vaxxers” and had people wishing for their deaths. Even people who took the jab but stood against mandates were labeled anti-vaxxers as definitions were altered to fit the narrative.

We the people were pitted against each other in one of the most divisive propaganda campaigns in human history. The middle ground was eliminated and logic and reason burned to the ground alongside the economy. And all of it was based on lies.

October 14, 2022 Posted by | Deception, Science and Pseudo-Science, Timeless or most popular, Video, War Crimes | | Leave a comment

The Biden Regime reveals its new National Security Strategy: climate change, diversity, equity and inclusion

By Jordan Schachtel | The Dossier | October 12, 2022

The Biden Administration released its first National Security Strategy (NSS) document Wednesday, and it is exponentially more unhinged than any of its predecessors. The NSS was once understood as a serious document compiling a list of *actual* threats to the nation. It now resembles a hyper-political Blue Anon fundraising mailer.

Most of the items discussed in the supposed threat assessment have nothing to do with national security at all. And the things that are related to national security matters have major prioritization and politicization issues.

Biden Harris Administrations National Security Strategy 10
562KB ∙ PDF File

Download

Prior to launching The Dossier, your humble correspondent was a somewhat seasoned national security correspondent. As a periodic consumer of these strategy documents, I can assure you that not even the Obama Administration inserted its political agenda as aggressively as the Biden regime is choosing to do this year.

A simple word search gives the reader a sense of the White House’s priorities.

Russia takes top billing. It is referred to 71 times, in the most hysterical way imaginable. According to Team Biden, Putin is a war criminal, whose armies entered Ukraine for no reason whatsoever other than to impose carnage upon Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Speaking of Ukraine, the memo discusses Ukraine 33 times.

China, on the other hand, only gets 14 mentions, and the CCP is likened to a friendly competitor, like a mere player on the other side of a chess game. Here’s a graph from the China section:

“While we have profound differences with the Chinese Communist Party and the Chinese Government, those differences are between governments and systems – not between our people. Ties of family and friendship continue to connect the American and the Chinese people. We deeply respect their achievements, their history, and their culture. Racism and hate have no place in a nation built by generations of immigrants to fulfill the promise of opportunity for all. And we intend to work together to solve issues that matter most to the people of both countries.”

Other than Putin, the number one “national security” priority of this administration is Climate Change, which is referenced 63 times in the National Security Strategy.Moreover, the importance of the energy “transition” away from reliable energy resources is referred to 11 times in the document.

Now, a progressive neoliberal administration’s threat assessment wouldn’t be complete without discussing “diversity” (16 mentions), “equity” (14 hits), and “inclusion,” (24 times) or what the wokes refer to as DEI.

The document concludes that the United States is “making meaningful progress on issues like climate change, global health, and food security to improve the lives not just of Americans but of people around the world.”

The NSS has been prepared periodically by the executive branch since the Reagan Administration, upon the passage of the Goldwater-Nichols act of 1986. The document is purposed with informing Congress and the public on the administration’s chief national security priorities, and how the White House intends to deal with them.

For this White House, the NSS reveals that its top priorities involve blaming Russia for everything, advancing the climate hoax, and facilitating the woke agenda globally through the U.S. military’s bloated bureaucracy and budget.

October 14, 2022 Posted by | Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Militarism, Russophobia, Science and Pseudo-Science | | Leave a comment

EU’s LNG storage space runs out as Brussels braces for winter without Russian gas

By Drago Bosnic | October 14, 2022

The European Union’s self-imposed energy crisis is taking a turn for the worse. The political elites in Brussels and their suicidal subservience to Washington DC is breaking records day by day. The latest energy hurdle the bloc is facing is a chronic lack of transport ships carrying liquefied natural gas (LNG) from the United States to EU countries. According to Bloomberg, as the bloc is trying to prepare for a winter without Russian natural gas and other crucial commodities, LNG shipping rates are surging, but this will not be enough to meet the EU’s energy needs this season. The report states that European countries are now paying to keep the LNG transport ships loaded with natural gas in ports as onshore LNG storage facilities are full.

As companies are racing to charter entire fleets of LNG transport ships, there is a growing fear that there will not be enough vessels capable of transporting natural gas from the US. This problem is further exacerbated by those ready to pay for the already-loaded ships to stay in ports. Gas Market Report by the International Energy Agency (IEA), released on October 3, states that the demand for LNG in EU member states surged by 65% for the first three quarters of 2022 when compared to the same period last year.

In the aftermath of anti-Russian sanctions, the EU was forced to import less from Russia. According to OilPrice.com, in June, the bloc imported more natural gas from the US than from Russia for the first time in its history. A Reuters report claims that up to 70% of US LNG exports were sent to the EU in September, which was a 7% increase in comparison to August. In the meantime, countries in East Asia and South America are also trying to acquire more natural gas in preparation for the winter season, which is adding even more pressure on shipping companies. Worse yet, US states in New England, which are dependent on LNG imports, are now forced to compete with EU buyers, which further drives up prices, according to Seeking Alpha.

The October 11 report published by Bloomberg states that the cost to charter a transport ship loaded with LNG and set to sail across the Atlantic Ocean rose to $397,500 per day. This new record for Atlantic LNG shipping rates represents an increase of over 6% in less than a week, as the previous record of $374,000 per day was set on October 3. However, to better understand just how mind-boggling the shipping prices are now, it’s better to compare on a yearly basis. In 2021, the Atlantic LNG freight rate was $91,000 per day. With the newest record, which has very likely already been topped, this is an increase of over $306,500 per day, or 337%, and an approximately 500% increase since January 2022, according to Spark Commodities.

The LNG shipping price assessor reports that this broke the 2021 all-time record high for the Pacific Ocean freight rates which happened at the height of the supply chain crisis. The price is expected to surge further as traders are hoarding even more natural gas. The scramble to buy more LNG and charter additional transport ships to carry it is very likely to create the next big shortage in the energy market, experts and traders agree.

The shortage has become so severe that LNG exporters in Asia are now selling natural gas directly from their ports instead of offering to ship it to buyers. However, many buyers lack LNG shipping vessels of their own and are forced to pay exorbitant prices to get natural gas to their own ports, while in some cases they can’t even find a way to transport the LNG they already paid for. According to LNG traders, there are very few transport ships left to charter for the rest of 2022 and they are charging astronomical rates.

The shipping issues for LNG are a clear indicator that pipelines have no viable alternatives. However, with NATO countries and satellite states being involved in sabotage operations against Russia-EU pipelines, be it through sanctions or terrorist acts such as the Nord Stream 1 and 2 explosions, Brussels is now forced to contend with both US LNG producers and freight companies and their exorbitant prices.

There’s growing frustration in the EU as it is painfully obvious that the US is making astronomical profits thanks to the escalation of tensions between Brussels and Moscow. Global demand for LNG transport vessels is driving freight rates even higher, which will make pipelines even more important. The EU will have a clear choice – either come to an agreement with Russia and stop acts of sabotage or continue paying several times more for LNG and brace for certain shortages as storage space runs out.

Drago Bosnic is an independent geopolitical and military analyst.

October 14, 2022 Posted by | Economics, Malthusian Ideology, Phony Scarcity, Russophobia | | Leave a comment

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