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Netherlands signs $305m deal for arms from Israel’s Elbit Systems

Tested on Palestinians

MEMO | May 18, 2023

Israel and the Netherlands signed a five-year arms’ deal worth $305 million, Israel’s Defence Ministry announced yesterday.

Israel’s Elbit Systems, a company which sells weapons to the Israeli military used in attacks on Palestinians, will supply 20 PULS artillery systems, including ammunition as well as training and support services.

The deal was signed by the International Defence Cooperation Directorate at Israel’s Ministry of Defence (SIBAT) General Yair Kulas in the Netherlands with his Dutch counterpart, Commander of the Royal Netherlands Army General Martin Wijnen.

“It is an honour for me to lead the first government-to-government defence contract with the Netherlands for the PULS long-range precise rocket artillery system,” said Kulas. “This significant event symbolises the strategic relationship between our countries and constitutes an opportunity to strengthen our partnership based on mutual values and morals.”

According to the Times of Israel, there have been previous Israeli arms and defence equipment sales to the Dutch nation, but those were considered to be private deals by various companies and not government-to-government contracts.

Moreover, the arms deal is one of the largest agreements signed between Israel and a European country in recent years.

Bezhalel Machlis, president and CEO of Elbit, added in a statement: “The acquisition of Elbit Systems’ PULS solution will enhance the Royal Netherlands Army’s ability to provide effective indirect fire support. It will also provide interoperability with NATO customers that have acquired these systems.”

May 18, 2023 Posted by | Militarism, War Crimes | , , , | 1 Comment

Ongoing Fascist Repression in Pakistan

By Junaid S. Ahmad | Global Research | May 18, 2023

Confirmed and corroborated by at least two dozen of my former students both inside Pakistan’s military-intelligence apparatus as well as those protesting it. This is the face of fascism, the culmination of a year-long Washington-backed regime change operation against former prime minister Imran Khan.

“Around 7000+ PTI supporters and workers across Pakistan are in illegal custody of multiple LEAs and Police at the moment and not presented in any court after so many days of abduction.

The IG of Punjab himself claimed 3500+ abductions in Punjab. The actual number is around 5000+ for Punjab and 2000+ for KP & Islamabad.

No law permits any custody after 24 hours without presenting the accused in courts. Out of ~5000 abductions in Punjab, only ~200 presented in Punjab’s courts so far.

None of them were not involved in any kind of vandalism at all and arrested just because they are peaceful PTI Supporters/Workers and their families.

It’s the first time in history that political workers’ female family members are also being picked up to pressurise and humiliate them. In one case, an 8 year-old kid was also kidnapped for a few hours.

Hundreds of them are reportedly being tortured and pressurised to give false statements against PTI leadership.”

Prof. Junaid S. Ahmad teaches Religion and Global Politics, and is the Director of the Center for the Study of Islam and Decoloniality, Islamabad, Pakistan. He is a regular contributor to Global Research.

May 18, 2023 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance, Subjugation - Torture | , , | 1 Comment

Ukraine is ‘attacking our sovereignty’ – Hungary

RT | May 18, 2023

Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky’s alleged plans to blow up a Russian pipeline supplying Hungary with oil would be a major blow to the nation’s energy security, Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto told journalists on Wednesday during a visit to Austria.

This is nothing but “a threat against Hungary’s sovereignty,” Szijjarto said, commenting on a recent report by the Washington Post about Zelensky’s alleged plans that cited leaked Pentagon documents. “Security of energy supply is a matter of sovereignty. If someone calls for Hungary’s energy supply to be made impossible, [they] are virtually attacking Hungary’s sovereignty.”

Last week, the Washington Post reported that Zelensky had supposedly suggested hitting targets deep within Russian territory, as well as occupying some Russian border cities to get leverage in talks with Moscow. In February, the president reportedly also said that Ukraine should “blow up” the Russian Druzhba oil pipeline in order to “destroy” the Hungarian energy industry, which is heavily dependent on Russian oil.

Szijjarto also accused Kiev of being “increasingly hostile” towards Budapest, adding that his country would not support any more EU aid to Ukraine until relations became friendlier. The foreign minister also raised a longstanding issue – the rights of ethnic Hungarians inside Ukraine – as Budapest has insisted for years that the rights of Hungarian minorities are being violated.

Most recently, Budapest criticized the way education rights have been limited for ethnic Hungarians, adding that this issue could hamper Kiev’s prospects of ever joining the EU.

“It is obvious that the Ukrainians will only be able to move forward in the European Union accession negotiations if they guarantee that the Hungarian people will get back the rights they already had,” he said.

Budapest has taken a neutral stance in the ongoing conflict between Moscow and Kiev, as it refused to provide military aid to Ukraine or allow Western aid to pass through its territory. Although Hungary had largely taken part in the existing EU sanctions against Russia, it has repeatedly criticized the restrictions and opposed those that might affect its own economy.

On Wednesday, Szijjarto once again asked the EU to reconsider the efficacy of anti-Russian sanctions. “These … proposals do not bring us one centimeter closer to peace,” he said, referring to the 11th sanctions package currently being discussed by the bloc.

May 18, 2023 Posted by | Civil Liberties, War Crimes | , , , | Leave a comment

Who is delusional?

By Gilbert Doctorow | May 18, 2023

Over the past several months, I have seen the word “delusional” applied to those, like myself, who bring nonconformist, non-mainstream news and views about Russia and the Ukraine war to the reading public. Language is constantly evolving, and the shop-worn label “Putin stooge” has now been replaced by this more generalized but similarly derogatory ad hominem labeling.

Allow me then to ask whether it is not the accusers who are truly “delusional” by insisting on a Washington narrative that is daily being ground into the dirt, as are Germany’s Leopard tanks and America’s Patriot air defense systems in Ukraine by technically superior Russian military hardware.

This military come-uppance is a story in itself. I involuntarily think back over a chance meeting I had four years ago with Russian-Americans during a tourist visit I made to a small and picturesque town in the Schwaebisch region of southern Germany with its typical half-timbered houses on the main square. We struck up a conversation while shopping in a souvenir store and this dentist was glowing with pride for his new Fatherland. Somehow the discussion turned to the newly announced strategic weapons systems that the Kremlin claimed had passed testing and were on their way to serial production. The dentist was beside himself with chuckles, insisting that this was all pure fabrication, pure propaganda and that Russia was incapable of designing and manufacturing any weapon system that could pose a threat to the good old USA.

But that ridicule for things Russian is a subject for another day. I will speak here first about the delusional framing and implementation of U.S. foreign policy today that is costing the United States more dearly in prestige and influence globally than anything that Donald Trump and his ‘diamond in the rough’ Secretary of State Pompeo accomplished during his presidency. And I will direct attention to one face in the vast group portrait of world leaders, Kassym-Jomart Tokayev.

Tokayev is the president of Kazakhstan and in recent months was being courted by the U.S. State Department in the hope and expectation that Kazakhstan could be induced to split with Russia and join the American team of countries sanctioning Moscow over its ‘war of aggression’ in Ukraine. Indeed, Secretary of State Blinken paid him a visit to woo or threaten him to follow the U.S. lead and this was reported enthusiastically by American mainstream media.

This U.S. policy can only be described as “delusional” insofar as it takes no cognizance of who is Tokayev and what are the realities of the geopolitical environment of Kazakhstan. The policy is based on willful ignorance of the counselors who formulated it, and that in turn is based on the assumption of America’s superior strength and ability to get its way by hook or by crook wherever in the world and whenever it so wishes.

Russian diplomacy is more discerning.

On 9 May, Tokayev was on the Red Square reviewing stand along with all the other presidents of the Central Asian republics. Together with them and with President Vladimir Putin, he then walked to the Alexander Gardens to place a red carnation before the eternal flame monument to the Unknown Soldier. That may have been picked up accidentally by one or another Western television broadcaster. What was not shown in the West was the side trip arranged for Tokayev to the town of Rzhevsk where he could pay tribute to the memory of his uncle, for whom he is named, Kassym Tokayev, who died in the Battle of Rzhev as a Red Army soldier and is buried there. That visit was broadcast on Russian and on Kazakh state television. Tokayev had no choice but to go, and his people had no choice but to see the historical connection with Moscow in the fight against Nazi Germany.

Last night there was another video of Tokayev on Russian television. He was shown descending from his plane in Beijing, where he is joined by all the other heads of state of Central Asia in a group meeting with the Chinese leadership. We were shown his tête-à-tête meeting with a senior official of the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, conducted in Mandarin, without translators. As anyone can easily learn from his Wikipedia entry, from 1970 Tokayev studied Chinese in his undergraduate years at the prestigious Moscow State Institute of International Relations (MGIMO) and in his final year there underwent training courses at the Soviet embassy in China for six months. He then served in the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and in 1983 continued his language training at the Beijing Language Institute. He was later posted to the Soviet embassy in Beijing and was promoted to successively higher responsibilities there.

My point is that Tokayev knows the map of his region very well. He and his country find themselves between a rock and a hard place.   They do not have much wiggle room.  Somehow these facts of life elude America’s delusional policy makers.

I could go on about how the ignorance and complacency of high officials in the Biden administration result in self-defeating policies elsewhere. One example of what I mean occurred just a couple of days ago when similarly delusional behavior was shown by America’s messenger boy within the European Commission. Josep Borrell succeeded in alienating his hosts in India and humiliating himself by insisting that India curtail its purchases of Russian oil lest the EU ban imports of refined petroleum products, mainly diesel fuel, from India.  The consequence of his ignorant warning that contradicted EU law on the subject was Borrell’s exclusion from the trade talks that the EU delegation was in Delhi to conduct.

©Gilbert Doctorow, 2023

May 18, 2023 Posted by | Aletho News | , , | Leave a comment

NATO Is Panicking After Russia’s Kinzhal Hypersonic Missiles Smashed Kiev’s Patriots

BY ANDREW KORYBKO | MAY 18, 2023

The fake news that circulated earlier this month alleging that Kiev’s Patriots shot down one of Russia’s Kinzhal hypersonic missiles has become even more ridiculous in the days after since they’re now claiming that another six were supposedly downed during a recent strike. The Mainstream Media’s (MSM) laundering of these lies isn’t just due to them taking everything their Ukrainian proxies say at face value, but even includes their own military experts actively contributing to this disinformation campaign.

The US’ Patriots lack the technical capabilities to track and intercept hypersonic projectiles, but that isn’t anything for them to be embarrassed about since there doesn’t presently exist any air defense system in the world that could do this. The West’s problem is therefore one of perceptions, however, since the MSM hyped up their deployment to Ukraine to the point where the public expected that former Soviet Republic to become invulnerable to any Russian strikes.

The Kremlin was aware of the West’s soft power interests in transferring this equipment there, hence why it cleverly decided to include several hypersonic missiles in its latest spree of strikes against military targets, knowing that there was no way that they’d be intercepted and thus discrediting their opponents. Not only that, but they even managed to destroy five launchers and a multifunctional radar on 16 May according to the Russian Ministry of Defense’s report that was shared the day after.

Footage of that night’s strikes subsequently appeared on social media, after which those who shared such were detained by the Ukrainian secret police on the pretext that this could have helped Russia’s military-intelligence services. In reality, Kiev was left flustered after that same footage showed how many millions of dollars’ worth of air defense missiles were wasted in trying to shoot down the Kinzhals. The US also confirmed that the Patriots were indeed damaged but denied that any of them were destroyed.

Nevertheless, the public was able to see for themselves just how desperate Kiev was to intercept those hypersonic projectiles, and many interpreted America’s confirmation that the Patriots were damaged as a limited hangout to deflect from their suspicions that they were actually destroyed. 16 May will therefore be seen in hindsight as a pivotal turning point in popular perceptions since Russia’s claim that its Kinzhals smashed the Patriots is believed by a growing number of people after watching that footage.

This poses a major reputational problem for the West, which claims to be able to defend its people in the event of any contingency, especially the worst-case one of the NATO-Russian proxy war in Ukraine turning into a direct conventional conflict between those two. Nobody who saw Tuesday night’s footage and heard about Russia’s achievement the day after can say with confidence that they still believe in the viability of their side’s air defenses since they’ve now been exposed as worthless by the Kinzhals.

The Kremlin currently wields a monopoly on this game-changing military technology after being the first country in the world to produce these missiles and then use them in battle, which means that it can pierce NATO’s Patriot-centric air defenses with ease in the worst-case scenario described above. The preceding observation about the US’ struggle to compete with Russia in this respect isn’t so-called “propaganda” like skeptics might claim but was confirmed by The Hill two months ago.

In their piece on 14 March explaining “Why the US is going full throttle on hypersonic missiles”, they wrote that “The United States is opening the throttle in its push to develop and procure hypersonic missiles after falling behind key foreign adversaries China and Russia in the race to field a potentially game-changing defense system”, adding that “the Defense Department has not fielded the weapons yet, and there remain challenges in the industrial production base and with testing infrastructure.”

Most damning of all, The Hill also informed their audience that “Not even the U.S. currently has an adequate defense system to take down hypersonic missiles. Air defense systems, such as Patriots and Terminal High-Altitude Area Defense, are capable of taking down ballistic missiles that reach hypersonic speeds, but only over small areas.” That “politically inconvenient” fact not only discredits this month’s disinformation campaign, but also reaffirms Russia’s military dominance in the hypersonic domain.

Simply put, the Kremlin has full confidence that its Kinzhals would successfully reach all their targets in the worst-case scenario of a conventional NATO-Russian war, thus meaning that Moscow could in theory destroy the West’s nuclear second-strike capabilities if it carried out a first strike to preempt its enemies’. Its achievement the other day in Kiev where it destroyed five Patriot launchers and a multifunctional radar sent shivers down the spines of NATO’s warmongers and sobered them up to what they’re facing.

Any thoughts they might have had of trying to “Balkanize” Russia by conventional military means as a last resort upon the failure of their Ukrainian-fronted Hybrid War to this end instantly evaporated since they realized that it could provoke the Kremlin into destroying the West out of self-defense. To be sure, some of their second-strike capabilities would likely remain intact and thus be used against Russia, but the point is that Moscow could first inflict unacceptable damage to them if it’s pushed to do so.

Despite popular claims to the contrary from many of the Alt-Media Community’s top influencers, NATO isn’t “insane” in the sense of its leaders being willing to sacrifice themselves as long as their deaths resulted in dismembering Russia. Like all elites, they want to live as long as possible, hence why they’ll now think twice about indulging in the neoconservative fantasy of resorting to conventional means to “Balkanize” that targeted Great Power upon the failure of their proxy war on it through Ukraine to that end.

In practical terms, this suggests that they might be more amenable to a ceasefire once Kiev’s NATO-backed counteroffensive ends by this winter, thus raising the prospects that the upcoming African-led peace mission to Russia and Ukraine could earn their approval and lead to Kiev agreeing to these terms. The leading Anglo-American Axis within NATO could never endorse the parallel Chinese-led initiative so it therefore follows that the African-led one could give them a “face-saving” way to support a ceasefire.

It’s premature to predict this latest initiative’s success or lack therefore, but the relevance of this development to the present piece is that it can help give NATO an “exit strategy” from this proxy war after its leaders just realized how suicidal it would be to escalate it to a conventional one. Russia’s Kinzhals smashed their Patriots in Kiev, which proved that the Kremlin can pierce the West’s air defenses with ease, thus representing both a military game-changer and possibly even a diplomatic one soon too.

May 18, 2023 Posted by | Fake News, Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Militarism | , | Leave a comment

The Putrid Underbelly of Woke Capitalism

By Michael Rectenwald – Mises Wire – 05/16/2023

Corporate intrigue reached a fevered pitch on May 6, 2023, in Omaha, Nebraska, when a shareholder was arrested during the annual shareholder meeting of Berkshire Hathaway. The shareholder challenged the affiliation of Warren Buffett with the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and Bill Gates’s association with Jeffrey Epstein, who was convicted in Florida for procuring a child for prostitution and soliciting a prostitute, and who reportedly committed suicide in a New York jail while facing charges for sex trafficking and conspiracy to engage in sex trafficking.

Peter Flaherty, the chairman of the National Legal and Policy Center (NLPC), stood to offer proposal number eight, which called for the roles of Berkshire CEO and chair to be separated and held by two persons. Flaherty argued that the separation of roles was necessary so that Berkshire “would be less identified with Mr. Buffett’s personal political activities.” Speaking of Buffett, Flaherty stated:

He’s donated tens of billions to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. As Bill Gates explained when the couple was still together, “although the foundation bears our names, basically half our resources have come from Warren Buffett.”

If “woke” culture is a disease, then philanthropy is the virus.

The Gates Foundation bankrolls the teaching of Critical Race Theory around the country, including that math is inherently racist.

The Gates Foundation offers a Gender Identity Toolbox which asserts that gender is the result of “socially and culturally constructed ideas.”

This is a lie. Gender is not a cultural construct. It is a genetic and biological fact. (emphasis mine)

Flaherty was interrupted by a Berkshire representative and pleaded to the chair (Buffett) to be allowed to continue. Buffett agreed that Flaherty could continue but warned him of the three-minute time limit for shareholder proposals. Flaherty then proceeded to throw down the gauntlet, until his microphone was shut off:

We know how much Bill Gates cares about children. He met and traveled with Jeffrey Epstein many times after Epstein was convicted of sex crimes.

The Gates Foundation had a huge influence over the COVID response fiasco.

Bill Gates defended China’s COVID policies and still discounts the possibility that the virus originated from a lab, even though U.S. intelligence agencies disagree. The Gates Foundation may be the largest single donor to the “dark money” machine known as Arabella Associates. . . .

It funds causes like defunding the police that are making American cities unlivable.

Money goes, too, to groups conducting—

At this point, Buffett declared from the stage: “You crossed the boundary.” Two security guards grabbed Flaherty by either arm and escorted him from the room. Flaherty was arrested and charged with trespassing.

The arrest of the Berkshire shareholder, apparently for merely mentioning Jeffrey Epstein in connection with Bill Gates and Warren Buffett, coincided with a series of Wall Street Journal articles exploring Epstein’s calendar and a trove of Epstein emails and other documents. The Wall Street Journal revealed numerous Epstein meetings with high-profile contacts, long after Epstein served time for soliciting a child prostitute and was registered as a sex offender. Represented in Epstein’s calendar and emails are such notables as William Burns, director of the Central Intelligence Agency since 2021; Bill Gates, Microsoft founder and philanthropist; Jess Staley, former Barclay’s CEO; Reid Hoffman, cofounder of LinkedIn; Larry Summers, professor and former Harvard University president; Woody Allen, filmmaker; and Noam Chomsky, leftist MIT linguistics professor, among others. These and other meetings may reveal that many businesspersons and woke philanthropists were ensnared by a child sex trafficker.

The scene at the Berkshire annual meeting also followed on the heels of the lawsuit filed against JPMorgan Chase by the US Virgin Islands. Attorneys for the US Virgin Islands claim that the bank materially aided Epstein in his child sex trafficking scheme and is seeking damages for their clients. Four billionaires have been subpoenaed in the case so far, including Google cofounder Sergey Brin; Hyatt Hotels CEO Thomas Pritzker; real estate tycoon and owner of U.S. News and World Report Mortimer Zuckerman; and venture capitalist and Hollywood agent Michael Ovitz. Curiously, the US Virgin Islands has also attempted, without success, to serve a subpoena to Google’s other cofounder, Larry Page, whose whereabouts remain unknown and who obviously does not want to be found.

It should be remembered here that Google has represented the leading edge of woke capitalism, with its leftist ranking algorithms and its employment of “machine learning fairness” that corrects for so-called algorithmic unfairness by misrepresenting reality with affirmative action results. Clearly, Google’s founders did not rely on algorithms to identify and eliminate pedophiles from their list of business contacts.

While the US Virgin Islands asserts that JP Morgan Chase facilitated and possibly bankrolled Epstein’s pedophilia ring, US Republican lawmakers have claimed that the US’s largest bank has a penchant for cancelling the accounts of conservative and religious groups. The bank maintained its financial relationship with Epstein until 2013, long after he was convicted of sex crimes, yet recently cancelled the accounts of such groups as the National Committee for Religious Freedom. The bank’s touted “diversity and inclusion” policy has apparently included pedophiles but excluded avowedly Christian groups.

Much more has and could be said about why high-profile businesspersons, philanthropists, academics, and even intelligence officers had relationships with Jeffrey Epstein. For example, some have claimed that Epstein and his partner Ghislaine Maxwell were Israeli spies who ran a honey-trap operation to steer US policies in Israel’s favor and against US interests.

As the Wall Street Journal asked:

Epstein was a former schoolteacher. How did he become a billionaire? What was the source of his wealth? Was he paid for providing women or girls to his friends? Was he a blackmailer? Were women or girls an enticement to invest in his projects?

Finally, there’s the ridiculous, implausible matter of Epstein’s death in federal custody on Aug. 10, 2019, which 3½ years later remains under investigation by the Justice Department inspector general, only feeding conspiracy theories.

But the main question for our purposes is: How is that nearly all major corporate heads and influential members of society have simultaneously gone woke? Could it be that whoever controlled Jeffrey Epstein sets the agenda through the use of blackmail, directing these corporate heads and other leaders to convert to wokeness, while steering their philanthropy to designated ends, including the funding of critical race theory and the LGBTQIA+ agenda? In other words, is our capitalist class controlled by whoever oversaw Epstein’s thirty-year entrapment operation?

In addition to revealing the moral rot that has permeated the US establishment, the Epstein connections also show that those who claim the woke moral high ground, and impose woke policies on the rest of us, are perhaps the most corrupted people on the face of the earth.

Michael Rectenwald is the author of twelve books, including The Great Reset and the Struggle for Liberty: Unraveling the Global AgendaThought CriminalBeyond WokeGoogle Archipelago, and Springtime for Snowflakes.

May 18, 2023 Posted by | Corruption | , | 1 Comment

Yet another high-profile corruption scandal shakes up Kiev regime

By Drago Bosnic | May 18, 2023

Whenever a large-scale corruption scandal hits the Kiev regime, its Western supporters are suddenly “shocked” by the level of embezzlement and outright theft of state funds in the country they’re financing with hundreds of billions of their own taxpayers’ money. Prior to the start of Russia’s special military operation (SMO), this was essentially common knowledge in the political West, with even the mainstream propaganda machine acknowledging it on a virtually daily basis. However, after the SMO started, any news coverage about this effectively became “heresy” as various state-run networks were only allowed to report on the mythical “battlefield dominance” of the Neo-Nazi junta forces and how “Ukrainians are giving everyone a lesson in freedom and democracy.”

Thus, the most corrupt country in Europe suddenly “became Switzerland”. However, as corruption scandals never stopped shaking up the Kiev regime, news about high-profile cases was simply bound to reach Western audiences, significantly complicating efforts to present the Neo-Nazi junta as the “beacon of hope for the free world.” In the latest of such controversies, the Neo-Nazi junta’s National Anti-Corruption Bureau (NABU) and the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office (SAP) have announced that “action has been taken” against the highest judicial authority of the Kiev regime. According to the official announcements of these “anti-corruption bodies”, posted on their official social media accounts and channels on May 16:

“NABU and SAP have exposed large-scale corruption in the Supreme Court, in particular a scheme to obtain undue advantages by the leadership and judges of the Supreme Court.”

Taking into account the fact that this is the top legal institution in the country, the scandal is yet another huge embarrassment for the Neo-Nazi junta, particularly as the head of the Supreme Court himself was arrested in connection to taking bribes to the tune of several million dollars. This means that the highest authority responsible for upholding the law is breaking it in the most blatant way imaginable. NABU and SAP officially announced they have conclusive evidence proving that the Chairman of the Supreme Court received a $2.7 million bribe. During a national press briefing, an unnamed Kiev regime “anticorruption” official revealed that Vsevolod Knyazev, the head of the Supreme Court, has been arrested for accepting bribes, with the aforementioned $2.7 million seized in Knyazev’s home.

“At this time, the [Chairman] of the Supreme Court has been detained and measures are being taken to check other individuals for their involvement in criminal activities,” the official stated during the briefing.

Vsevolod Knyazev was elected as the Chairman of the Supreme Court back in October 2021 and has officially held the position up until May 16, when he was removed during a special session by other judges, who ousted him after a “no confidence” vote. Worse yet, various reports in local media outlets indicate this is just the beginning, as several more judges are under investigation for taking bribes and are most likely scheduled to be removed from their posts and then raided and arrested in the same manner. However, while additional information is yet to be revealed, various local sources are reporting that this is certainly not the end of the scandal, as more details are being revealed by multiple media, meaning that the ongoing case may well be just the tip of the iceberg. According to the Ukrainian edition of Forbes magazine:

“NABU Director Semen Kryvonos revealed that his bureau has documented a series of contacts between the owner of Finances and Credit Group, Kostyantyn Zhevago, and one of the owners of an attorney group used to conceal criminal activities. These contacts involved an agreement regarding unlawful benefits in favor of high-ranking court officials for ‘rendering the necessary decision’ in favor of the entrepreneur.

Businessman Zhevago denies his involvement in the multimillion-dollar bribe, as stated in a press release issued by his spokesperson to Forbes.

‘This is the most high-profile case during the tenure of NABU and SAP and the biggest exposure of a top-ranking official in the judicial branch of power,’ said Kryvonos.

He said the suspects in the case also attempted to influence the appointment of members of the Higher Qualification Commission of Judges (VKKS), the body responsible for career-related matters within the judicial branch of power.”

This is the second high-profile corruption scandal in the country since late January, when nearly a dozen top-ranking Kiev regime officials were arrested for the embezzlement and “mismanagement” of state funds, the bulk of which were provided by the political West. At the time, a top adviser to the Neo-Nazi junta frontman Volodymyr Zelensky, four deputy ministers, two high-ranking Defense Ministry officials, as well as the governors of at least five oblasts (regions) were sacked. Worse yet, Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov himself was accused of being directly involved in the scandal, although the key position he holds prevented his ouster and highly probable arrest. All this comes at a time when the political West is pressuring the Kiev regime to tighten control over the funds being sent to its favorite puppets.

While the political West keeps getting “shocked” by the level of corruption in Kiev, what’s truly shocking is the fact that anyone is actually surprised by this. The Neo-Nazi junta is openly promoting the sell-off (although sellout would be more appropriate) of Ukrainian land and state assets to a multitude of global corporations that would be given near absolute control over the areas they would be “investing” in.

Drago Bosnic is an independent geopolitical and military analyst.

May 18, 2023 Posted by | Corruption | | 1 Comment

Kiev’s air defense capability threatened

By Lucas Leiroz | May 18, 2023

The recent successful Russian attacks against strategic Ukrainian targets made clear the reality that was already reported by many military experts: the Ukrainian air defense is  vulnerable. Despite all the Western aid and the incessant delivery of weapons, Kiev seems unable to improve its defense system, continuing to be an easy target for Russia’s incisive combat actions. Tracking and shooting down Russian missiles and drones has become difficult work for Ukrainian forces, which are still failing to stop Russian weapons from reaching their targets.

However, this news coexists with Western-Ukrainian propaganda that Russian hypersonic missiles are being shot down by Kiev. Although mainstream media outlets support the Ukrainian narrative, in recent months these same newspapers have reported the weakness of the regime’s armed forces on several occasions, therefore there is a contradiction in data.

For example, in March, experts pointed out in an article published in The Washington Post that Kiev was suffering from a severe shortage of ammunition for its air defense systems. At the time, analysts said that Ukrainian forces could become absolutely unable to protect their airspace against Russian missiles and UAVs, leaving military facilities “open” to enemy attacks. Experts also warned at the time of the serious lack of qualified military personnel, stating that most of the experienced Ukrainian military had already been neutralized in the first year of the operation, leaving now few able soldiers to manage the country’s defense systems.

Even more pessimistic forecasts were exposed by the Financial Times, which also commented on the critical situation of the Ukrainian air defense. Experts have warned that the number of anti-missiles launched to intercept a Russian attack is usually double the number of Russian missiles or drones, in order to increase the chances of success. A side effect of this is to overspend artillery ammunition, accelerating depletion.

“[…] Officials said the continuing need to defend against Russian missile and drone attacks had systematically depleted Ukraine’s stockpiles — a warning backed up by US intelligence documents leaked online this spring that suggested Kyiv might run out of ammunition for five critical air defence systems. According to documents reviewed by the Financial Times, the US assessed in late February that Ukraine’s ability to protect its troops on the front lines would be ‘completely reduced’ by May 23″, the Financial Times article reads.

Forbes also reported on the Ukrainian situation. In an article published on the site in April, experts said the imminent shortage of missiles was the main problem for Ukraine’s air defense. At the time, it was warned that, in addition to having dozens of their systems destroyed by Russian attacks, the Ukrainians would also be suffering from the absence of 9M38 Buk missiles. This equipment is produced in Russia, with Ukrainian stocks remaining from Soviet times. The depletion of these missiles, therefore, becomes an even more worrying issue because Kiev’s sponsors do not manufacture this weapon, which is compatible with the Soviet-era Buk systems that Ukraine has.

One solution found was the American supply of Raytheon RIM-7 Sea Sparrows, which, although different, use the same radar guidance as the 9M38. With proper technical adaptations, these American weapons could be launched using Soviet Buk systems. However, despite promises started in January, so far Washington has not been able to organize a program of constant supply of Raytheon RIM-7 Sea Sparrow missiles, thus preventing Kiev’s air defense from being re-established. Furthermore, the need for technical handling and adaptation of these weapons to Soviet systems could be a problem, considering the lack of qualified military personnel, as pointed out by the Post. With that, Ukraine’s hopes for recovery become even more complicated.

Another big outlet commenting on this problem was Deutsche Welle, which in an article published on April 22 made it clear that Ukraine is not capable of shooting down Russian guided bombs, being vulnerable to the air operations of Moscow’s forces. The newspaper at the time interviewed the representative of the Air Force of Ukraine, Yuri Ignat, who said that the systems used by his troops were not able to shoot down Russian equipment, with the need to receive new, more modern and efficient systems from the West.

As is well known, most of the Western media is extremely biased and propagandistic in its narrative of the conflict, always trying to make it seem like Kiev has the advantage over the Russians. When something negative for the regime is communicated, it is because there really is no way to ignore the situation and it becomes more convenient to report it in order to seek improvements – perhaps trying to pressure western authorities to send more help to change the scenario. This seems to have been the case in recent months regarding the Ukrainian air defense.

However, now the media work has again been “optimistic” about the Ukrainian defense. Media outlets repeated the regime’s propaganda that several Russian “Kinzhal” hypersonic missiles were shot down by Ukrainian troops. In addition to no evidence of this being given, the narrative also contradicts everything that had been reported by the Western media (citing Ukrainian sources) in recent months, that the country’s air defenses were close to being disabled.

This contradictory information shows once again how the western media has been spreading lies about the conflict. Either the Ukrainian air defense is close to collapse, or it is able to shoot down “Kinzhal” missiles – there is no way to join both narratives. And the recent successful Russian air strikes across the conflict zone, neutralizing several strategic targets, already makes clear what is the correct information.

Lucas Leiroz is a journalist, researcher at the Center for Geostrategic Studies, geopolitical consultant.

You can follow Lucas on Twitter and Telegram.

May 18, 2023 Posted by | Fake News, Mainstream Media, Warmongering | | Leave a comment

Increased Blindness Associated with mRNA Vaccines

Dr. Mobeen Syed | May 15, 2023

Blindness HR 2.19 Associated with mRNA Vaccines

This study by Taiwanese and Stanford researchers on the US vaccinated and unvaccinated individuals shows an alarming statistical increase in the retinal vascular occlusion. Let’s review.

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Disclaimer:
This video is not intended to provide assessment, diagnosis, treatment, or medical advice; it also does not constitute provision of healthcare services. The content provided in this video is for informational and educational purposes only.
Please consult with a physician or healthcare professional regarding any medical or mental health related diagnosis or treatment. No information in this video should ever be considered as a substitute for advice from a healthcare professional.

URL list from Monday, May. 15 2023
YouTube Special | DrBeen
https://www.drbeen.com/yt-special-p/

Course Modules | DrBeen
https://members.drbeen.com/courses/

Risk assessment of retinal vascular occlusion after COVID-19 vaccination | npj Vaccines
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41541-023-00661-7/#Abs1

Hazard Ratio: Interpretation & Definition – Statistics By Jim
https://statisticsbyjim.com/probability/hazard-ratio/

Antibody‐mediated platelet activation in COVID‐19: A coincidence or a new mechanism of the dysregulated coagulation system? – Journal of Thrombosis and Haemostasis
https://www.jthjournal.org/article/S1538-7836%2822%2900753-X/fulltext

Central Retinal Vein Occlusion – Prevent Blindness North Carolina
https://nc.preventblindness.org/central-retinal-vein-occlusion/

Platelet factor 4 – Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Platelet_factor_4

Vision improvement is long-lasting with treatment for blinding blood vessel condition | National Institutes of Health (NIH)
https://www.nih.gov/news-events/news-releases/vision-improvement-long-lasting-treatment-blinding-blood-vessel-condition#:~:text=Retinal%20vein%20occlusion%20is%20one,significant%20and%20permanent%20vision%20loss.

May 18, 2023 Posted by | Science and Pseudo-Science, Timeless or most popular, Video | | 1 Comment

FDA not fit for purpose – the Makena® fiasco

For years, the FDA allowed a drug to be injected into pregnant women that was neither safe, nor effective. Finally, it has been withdrawn.

BY MARYANNE DEMASI, PHD | MAY 15, 2023

Previously, I wrote about Makena, a synthetic hormone given to millions of pregnant woman, to prevent premature birth. It was highly controversial because there was no robust proof that it was safe or effective, despite having FDA-approval.

Last month, after many years of use, the FDA finally decided to withdraw Makena from the market.

Adam Urato, a maternal-foetal medicine specialist at MetroWest Medical Centre, Massachusetts welcomed the decision, but said it took the FDA far too long.

“I cannot believe we’ve been injecting this hormone into pregnant women for 20 years, all the leading medical organisations recommended it, the FDA approved it – and it took this long to finally acknowledge the drug did not work,” he said.

Urato opposed the use of Makena from the start. He testified before the FDA, he wrote in the media and in medical journals, and helped petition the FDA to withdraw the drug from the market.

Adam Urato, maternal-foetal medicine specialist, MetroWest Medical Centre, Massachusetts.

Preterm birth is a major issue in obstetrics. In the US, one in 10 babies are born prematurely, and accounts for most of the neonatal morbidity and mortality.

Physicians were desperate for a solution, and Makena seemed to hold promise.

It wasn’t cheap though. Makena was 5,200% more expensive than generic versions of the same medication.

Large amounts of public money in the Medicaid program and other health insurance dollars were used to pay for the weekly shots at a total cost of $30,000 per pregnancy.

How it began

The drug maker sought fast-track approval of Makena, citing a 2003 study that was so flawed, the FDA’s own statistical reviewer commented that the drug was not worth approving.

The FDA approved it anyway on the basis that the drugmaker conduct more in-depth research into the medication’s effectiveness.

Then, in 2019 a confirmatory trial found the drug did not work. And by this stage, there were documented harms including gestational diabetes, depression, blood clots and a non-statistical doubling in stillbirths.

But instead of pulling the drug off the market, the FDA allowed Makena to be licensed for another four years.

“It should’ve been pulled immediately,” said Urato. “There were substantial profits for the drug company even after a confirmatory trial found it did not work, so it’s no wonder it was dragging its feet.”

It begs the question…

How is it even possible that a drug, which was neither safe nor effective for pregnant women, was allowed to be on the market for so long?

Urato says it’s a direct symptom of the medical-industrial complex – an entanglement of big pharma, medical organisations, and regulatory agencies – that creates an underlying motive to bolster profits, over health.

“For two decades the drug brought in billions in profits, and that money was used to fund physicians, researchers, professional medical societies, and academic institutions,” said Urato.

This makes it exceedingly difficult, if not impossible, for patients to navigate the healthcare system and know who to trust.

“We need elected officials that are going to put the interests of patients and the public first, and not be tainted, or corrupted by industry. We need to separate our politics and our regulatory bodies from industry funding,” he added.

Lesson learned?

Urato feels vindicated for his work, but says it’s no time for a victory lap. Instead, the Makena fiasco should provide us with tangible lessons to safeguard us against such scientific transgressions in the future.

“We must ‘first do no harm’ and follow the precautionary principle,” insisted Urato.

“When you’re exposing developing babies to synthetic chemical compounds, you can’t just assume it’s safe, until harm is proven. You must assume that the chemicals are having chemical effects on the foetus, because that’s what chemicals do.”

The Diethylstilbestrol (DES) disaster should have been a reminder to all obstetricians about the harms of giving synthetic hormones to pregnant women without sufficient data. But once Makena was rolled out, Urato said, “it was like everyone forgot the past.”

“I counselled my patients on my concerns about exposing them and their babies to a synthetic hormone with unknown short and long-term effects, so I guess I could have been accused of peddling ‘misinformation’,” said Urato cognisant that he was going against medical consensus.

“But what is considered misinformation today, may be scientific fact tomorrow. I helped to prevent a generation of mums and babies in my community from being exposed to a useless drug. That’s why it’s so important that doctors have freedom of speech to express their views,” said Urato.

It’s estimated that hundreds of thousands of pregnant mothers and babies were exposed to the ineffective and risky synthetic hormone over the past 2 decades.

“Time and time again, drugs and devices are pulled off the market for safety issues. If the FDA approves a drug, it does not mean that it will be proven to be safe and effective over time. The FDA has lost the public’s trust,” Urato said.

May 17, 2023 Posted by | Corruption, Full Spectrum Dominance, Science and Pseudo-Science | , | Leave a comment

Missed Bacterial Pneumonia Cases Left Untreated Were the Majority of COVID-19 Hospital Deaths

In April 2020, I warned about that the false positive-prone non-quantitative RT-PCR was deadly. Now we know, again, I was (sadly) correct.

By James Lyons-Weiler | Popular Rationalism | May 17, 2023

Hospital protocolists sticking to the strict hand-me-down highly profitable “COVID protocol” may have doomed a majority of admitted COVID-19 patients to death due to a perfect storm of institutional failure.

I first warned FDA in early 2020 that because the commercial kits did not use internal negative controls there would be arbitrarily high COVID-19 false positive rates due to the abuse of non-quantitative PCR. The majority of “cases”, I pointed out, would be false because the test was to be used as a screening device – and when you screen with an imperfect test when prevalence is low, you end up with more false positives than negatives in the set of positives.

Knowing that people who were symptomatic for respiratory infections would be among the most tested population and that Fauci’s medical approach to COVID-19 was to tell people to go home and get as sick as possible, it was readily clear that people would be dying due to lack of treatment for treatable conditions, like bacterial pneumonia and fungal infections in the lung.

Now a study from NIH-funded researchers in Chicago, IL has found that unresolved respiratory infections – not necessarily those involved in SARS-CoV-2 – were present in people who failed to “respond” to mechanical ventilation.

The authors wrote:

“Recent data suggest that secondary pneumonia is present in up to 40% and pneumonia or diffuse alveolar damage is present in over 90% of autopsy specimens obtained from patients with acute SARS-CoV-2 infection (18). Consistent with these observations, we and others found high rates of ventilator-associated pneumonia (VAP) in patients with SARS-CoV-2 pneumonia requiring mechanical ventilation, suggesting that bacterial superinfections such as VAP may contribute to mortality in patients with COVID-19 (7, 19–22). These findings prompt an alternative hypothesis that a relatively low mortality rate directly attributable to primary SARS-CoV-2 infection is offset by a greater risk of death attributable to unresolving VAP (23).”

They concluded:

“These data suggest mortality associated with severe SARS-CoV-2 pneumonia is more often associated with respiratory failure that increases the risk of unresolving VAP and is less frequently associated with multiple-organ dysfunction.”

Unsurprisingly, the study found that people with bacterial pneumonia who were on ventilators had the highest mortality. Although their analysis restricted consideration to bacterial pneumonia cases detected 48 hours after ventilation, they did not distinguish between undiagnosed cases of bacterial pneumonia upon admission and those acquired in-hospital (nosocomial infection). The rate of co-infection is not clear either, due to insufficient testing for bacterial pneumonia in patients once diagnosed with COVID-19.

The study leads to the stunning potential that perhaps 58% of “COVID” cases were respiratory issues other than COVID (43% bacterial pneumonia, 16% non-pathogen causes of respiratory failure). Treated as “COVID”, these patients were doomed to a fate of non-treatment due to mis- or under-diagnosis.

It is unclear what percentage of deaths attributed to COVID-19 could have been prevented via a standard therapy for bacterial pneumonia, but it is potentially very high. Fauci’s prescription – sending patients home to do nothing – no corticosteroids, no antibiotics just in case it was bacterial – drove the COVID-19 death rate up far higher than it had to be.

Gao et al., 2023. Machine learning links unresolving secondary pneumonia to mortality in patients with severe pneumonia, including COVID-19, Journal of Clinical Investigation (2023). DOI: 10.1172/JCI170682

https://www.jci.org/articles/view/170682/pdf

May 17, 2023 Posted by | Corruption, Science and Pseudo-Science, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | , | 1 Comment

Hang All the Members of the Liars’ Club?

By Victor Davis Hanson | American Greatness | May 15, 2023

Federal prosecutors last week announced the indictment of U.S. Representative George Santos (R-N.Y.) on a host of charges, including misuse of federal campaign funds and wire fraud, almost all of them resulting from his pathological lies.

Certainly, Santos deserved the attention of prosecutors for lying on federal documents and affidavits that may have helped him win a congressional seat as well as personal lucre.

But if that’s the case, why haven’t federal prosecutors also gone after Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.)? She clearly lied her way into a Harvard Law School professorship and an erstwhile presidential candidacy by claiming, in part, quite falsely she was a Native American, supposedly Harvard’s first indigenous law professor.

Her Senate colleague, Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), flatly lied (he said “misspoke”) about being a Vietnam War veteran. He never confessed to “misspeaking” about his résumé until caught. Both senators, apparently like Santos, gained political traction in their various campaigns from such lies, but the two apparently never put them in writing, or at least not as blatantly as did Santos.

New Federal Standards?

Are federal and states prosecutors now setting a new moral and legal standard by criminalizing Santos’ lies? If true, congratulations—it is long overdue.

Now can we please extend the long arm of the law to reach far beyond a bit player like Santos?

Why not reboot with the really big liars? Their lies far more undermined the integrity of our key agencies and indeed our national security.

So let us start with John Brennan, the former CIA director. He lied on two separate occasions, in one case while under oath before the U.S. Senate. His untruths were not mere campaign finance fabrications. They involved falsely swearing that the CIA did not spy on the computers of Senate staffers (“Let me assure you the CIA was in no way spying on [the committee] or the Senate.”). He also lied that U.S. drone missions in prior years had not killed innocent bystanders (“There hasn’t been a single collateral death because of the exceptional proficiency, precision of the capabilities that we’ve been able to develop.”).

Brennan, only when caught, admitted to both lies. But he faced zero consequences and, in fact, was soon rewarded with an on-air analyst job at MSNBC.

Then we come to James Clapper, the former director of the Office of National Intelligence. Like Santos, he lied. But unlike Santos, Clapper was under oath to Congress. And further unlike Santos, Clapper was not a small fish, but a whale in charge of coordinating the nation’s intelligence bureaus.

Clapper’s lies mattered a great deal, especially when he swore to Congress that the National Security Agency did not spy on Americans. (“No, sir. Not wittingly.”) When caught, Clapper confessed that he gave “the least untruthful answer.” (“I responded in what I thought was the most truthful, or least untruthful, manner by saying ‘no.’”). He faced zero consequences for his perjury. And like Brennan, he marketed his anti-Trump phobias into a comfortable cable news gig.

Note well that both Clapper and Brennan likely lied again when they signed the infamous Hunter Biden laptop letter, with a wink and nod suggesting it was a hallmark example of “Russian disinformation.”

Then we come to the former interim FBI Director Andrew McCabe. He is also currently working as a cable news commentator. McCabe admitted to lying—according to the inspector general, “done knowingly and intentionally”—four separate times to federal investigators, three times under oath. McCabe misled the country in matters that concerned a national election, more specifically lying that he had not leaked to the media to massage media narratives about the FBI’s investigation of the Clinton Foundation.

Then there is James Comey, another former FBI head, who confirmed McCabe had lied. He simply claimed on 245 occasions to House investigators and members that he either had no memory or had no knowledge, when asked under oath to explain some of the wrongdoing of the FBI during his directorship. Remember, Comey and the FBI signed off on the authenticity of Steele document material to obtain a FISA warrant, when they knew it was unreliable and Steele was not credible. Comey also likely leaked to the media a confidential memo officially memorializing a private conversation with the president of the United States.

Should we include yet another former FBI director? Robert Mueller swore under oath to Congress that he knew little about Fusion GPS (“I’m not familiar with that”) and more or less had ignored the Steele dossier. (“It’s not my purview.”) Mueller’s claims cannot be true because revelations about both were the very catalysts that prompted his own special counsel appointment.

Will the Santos prosecutors go after Anthony Fauci, the recently retired head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases?

Fauci seemingly lied under oath to the Senate when he preposterously claimed the money he channeled through a third party to the Wuhan virology lab did not entail support for gain-of-function virology research. (“The NIH has not ever and does not now fund gain-of-function research in the Wuhan Institute of Virology.”) Many virologists were aghast at Fauci’s claims, since they knew gain-of-function research conducted in China—the point being to skirt U.S. laws—was precisely what the U.S.-subsidized researchers in China were doing.

The Bidens

Prosecutors are currently looking at the various shenanigans of Hunter Biden, whose lies may even be a match for those of George Santos. Joe Biden’s son apparently lied on his firearms background check affidavit when applying for a handgun purchase—so far, with impunity.

When asked point blank on national television whether his lost laptop was his own—he had signed a receipt for it at the repair shop—Biden refused to give a yes or no answer.

Hunter Biden has apparently de facto lied for years when he purportedly did not report either his entire income or his real business expenses accurately, or that he was the father of a child he conceived with an ex-stripper in Arkansas.

If Hunter’s lies do not match the number of Santos’ prevarications, his were at least far more significant. His lie that the laptop was not his prompted current Secretary of State Antony Blinken, a former top Biden 2020 campaign aide, to call up Mike Morell, former interim CIA director. Morell’s mission was to round up as many intelligence authorities as he could to lie on the eve of a presidential election that the laptop had “all the hallmarks” of “Russian disinformation.” He found 51, including himself. Apparently, some active members of the CIA pitched in as well to lend the letter additional authenticity.

Note that Morell swears Blinken called him to solicit signers of the bogus letter, while Blinken claims he did not. So either the current secretary of state or the former interim director of the CIA is lying—or they both are. Again, among the first to sign the fraudulent intelligence letter were Brennan and Clapper. They apparently had earned a reputation as team players, given that both men had been willing to lie under oath to Congress. Misleading the nation again about the laptop to aid Joe Biden’s campaign was small potatoes.

Biden, on spec, promulgated the lie when he said in his second debate with Trump, “There are 50 former national intelligence folks who said that what he’s accusing me of is a Russian plant. Five former heads of the CIA, both parties, say what he’s saying is a bunch of garbage. Nobody believes it, except his good friend Rudy Giuliani.”

A subsequent poll suggested the Bidens’ concocted laptop lies may have influenced voters to side with Biden in the election. If true, that was a lie that should be of far more interest to current federal prosecutors than Santos’ crazy fairy tales.

The Lies of the “Big Guy”

So we come to the greatest prevaricator of all.

Joe Biden flat-out lied on numerous occasions, such as when he claimed that he never discussed the family shake-down business with Hunter Biden.

Joe Biden, in fact, turns up on the laptop as someone deeply connected to Hunter Biden’s quid pro quo companies (“10 [percent] for the Big Guy”). Tony Bobulinksi, a former business associate of Hunter’s, has sworn that Joe and his brother Jim Biden were deeply involved in their foreign leveraging efforts.

A photo shows Joe Biden with Hunter’s “business” associates. Will the current Santos prosecutors turn their attention to the Oval Office occupant’s financial records to determine whether his lavish private homes and lifestyle were viable under his reported stated income?

Biden lied to Americans dozens of times to get elected. The tragic death of his wife in a car accident was not due to the drunkenness and fault of a truck driver. That was a horrific smear designed to shift blame onto an innocent man and gain sympathy for himself.

He lied that his son, Beau, died while serving in Iraq.

Biden dropped out of the 1988 presidential race after he was caught lying about his college records and plagiarizing a speech from a British politician.

So we know that in the past, Joe Biden’s lies have left a mark on history in a fashion that Santos’ never will.

When Biden prefaces his whoppers with “No joke!” or “This is the God’s honest truth!” and especially when he swears, “My word as a Biden!” then it is a fair bet that he is lying.

When Biden entered office, he lied about the number of Americans previously vaccinated under the Trump Administration and preposterously claimed there had been no COVID vaccine available.

He lied that his loan forgiveness amnesty passed Congress by two votes. In fact, Biden simply declared amnesty by fiat and never submitted the request to Congress at all.

He repeatedly lies that billionaires pay only three percent of their income in taxes on average. He lies about minor details, from giving his Uncle Frank a purple heart to matters of national concern, such as the price of gas when he entered office. It was most certainly not $5 a gallon!

Biden constantly lies about his résumé. He was never a long-haul truck driver. Nor was he a star athlete almost headed for the Naval Academy on a sports scholarship if only Dallas Cowboys legend Roger Staubach had not beat him out. “I was appointed to the academy in 1965 by a senator who I was running against in 1972. I didn’t come to the academy because I wanted to be a football star. And you had a guy named Staubach and Bellino here. So I went to Delaware.”

His house was never almost destroyed by a fire. He was never raised “politically” as a Puerto Rican. Biden never pinned the Silver Star on a Navy Afghanistan war hero for bringing back the body of a fellow soldier from a deep ravine. He was never arrested, either in South Africa or in Atlanta, for demonstrating on behalf of civil rights.

No foreign leader can believe Biden. He never traveled 17,000 miles with Chinese President Xi Jinping. He lied about his own Amtrak travel. He lied about his record on inflation and economic growth. He lied about upping Social Security payments. (It was a larger-than-usual automatic cost-of-living increase spurred by his inflationary policies.) He lied about the nature of the Trump tax cuts.

Biden keeps lying that the southern border is “secure” even as nearly 2 million people have crossed illegally on his watch and tens of thousands more are massed to enter the country as Title 42 restrictions are lifted.

He insists that five police officers died at the hands of protestors on January 6, 2021. In truth, the one person we know for certain who died violently that day was Ashli Babbitt, an unarmed protester who was shot and killed by a Capitol Police lieutenant with a checkered record, whose identity was suppressed for months while Babbitt’s past was sullied by the press.

Biden’s defenders hint that either he is cognitively compromised and thus not responsible—as if he has told the truth the last 40 years when he was hale!—or his lies are mere “exaggerations” unlike the “lies” of Trump—as if lying about the death of one’s spouse or son or school record or resume or major legislation or his presidency is a mere “exaggeration.”

As a general rule, since 2015, if any federal bureaucrat or elected official lied in service of opposing Donald Trump, he was exempted from consequences. If not, he was properly held responsible for his lying. So the more that the fake Steele dossier, the Russian collusion hoax, and the Russian disinformation laptop lie warped the 2016 and 2020 presidential elections, the more the promulgators of those falsehoods never faced any consequences for their untruths.

So, yes, let federal prosecutors go after the lying George Santos to set a precedent that the lying of government officials has consequences.

But in the great scheme of lying things, Santos is a prevaricating minnow who was snagged to great acclaim because the lying sharks swim and circle with impunity.

May 17, 2023 Posted by | Corruption, Deception, Progressive Hypocrite | , , | Leave a comment