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USAID in Myanmar: A Legacy of Soft Power Manipulation?

By Ilya Tsukanov – Sputnik – 31.03.2025

Democrats and the mainstream media continue to blame US President Donald Trump’s USAID cuts for crippling Myanmar’s earthquake response, despite his pledge of aid.

Trump and Elon Musk have slammed USAID for fraud, while Secretary of State Marco Rubio said it had “strayed from its original mission.” what was USAID REALLY doing in Myanmar?

Pushing Woke Agendas

Musk’s DOGE axed a $45M DEI scholarship program in Myanmar, launched in 2024 to fund 1,000 students in SE Asia and online at the University of Arizona. It was less about education and more about grooming future US allies against China, insiders told Radio Free Asia. Media reports say many in Myanmar also fear the programs erode local culture and values.

Terrorism Allegations

Myanmar’s ruling State Administrative Council (SAC) urged the US in 2024 to rethink funding activities “which some label as terrorism.”

“We believe the US is manipulating Myanmar to counter China’s influence in the region,” the military government told US media. “Despite the US presenting itself as a champion of democracy, the aid disproportionately benefits Myanmar’s opposition groups.”

Media Manipulation

USAID redirected $42.4M to advocacy groups post-2021. A now-frozen $1M was set for ‘independent’ media like Mizzima, seen as an anti-government mouthpiece. The group Human Rights Myanmar said the frozen funds “are vital for organizations challenging military rule and promoting democracy, which advance US interests by upholding American values and countering China’s authoritarian influence.” USAID’s Myanmar partners reportedly also include CARE International, which runs gender-focused projects and the Overseas Irrawaddy Association which relocates activists.

March 31, 2025 Posted by | Sinophobia | , | Leave a comment

Trump-Putin parley is a bit under the weather

By M. K. BHADRAKUMAR | Indian Punchline | March 31, 2025 

The Kremlin apparently came to the conclusion last week that it was about time to do some plain-speaking that US president Donald Trump’s quest for a 30-day ceasefire in the Ukraine war was a non-starter. Over the weekend, in a series of remarks, Trump reacted sharply that he’s “very angry” with President Vladimir Putin over his approach to the proposed ceasefire and threatened to levy tariffs on Moscow’s oil exports if the Russian leader does not agree to a truce within a month. 

Trump is either incapable or unwilling to accept that neither Russians nor Ukrainians have their heart in the ceasefire deal (for different reasons, though) even while paying lip service to it, as each wants to have Trump on its side.  

Unlike Ukrainians who are blasé about their desire to continue to wage the war until Russian forces vacate their territories in the east (knowing that may never happen), Russians are savvy operators who prioritise the unfinished business of the war while playing their part in the diplomatic circuit. 

Actually, Russians are in two minds whether the war could end once their military gains total control over Donbass, or, should they also take control of Odessa, Nikolaev, Dnipropetrovsk, Kharkov, etc. to create a security zone roughly, along the Dniepr River, and, let the UN figure out the future of the rump state of Ukraine. (See my blog A Third Way to end the war in Ukraine, Indian Punchline, March 29, 2025.)  

Such is the backlog of the West’s betrayals and repudiation of agreements, including during first term, that Russia may come to estimate that its best security guarantee for durable peace lies in creating solid facts on the ground. 

Trump will do well to read the extraordinary report featured in the New York Times dated March 29, 2025 titled The Partnership: The Secret History of the War in Ukraine. It is a doctored version of the untold story of America’s hidden role in Ukrainian military operations against Russia but the main thing is that it confirms the Russian allegation that this has been a proxy war kick-started by the US with great deliberateness. 

Suffice to say, Trump’s claim to be a good Samaritan with a bleeding heart who wants the war to end, et al, won’t fly. On the other hand, Putin is nonetheless keen on establishing a good personal rapport with Trump and anchor a meaningful US-Russia partnership on it, realistic enough to accept that Trump is as good an American president as Russia would ever get. 

That said, Putin is also unwavering that in order for peace to be durable, conditions must be created first where he needs Trump’s understanding, although Russian people are deeply sceptical about any US mediation. 

Trump refused to say if there was any deadline for Russia to agree to a ceasefire in Ukraine, but he told reporters on board Air Force One yesterday, “It’s a psychological deadline. If I think they’re [Russians] tapping us along, I will not be happy about it.” 

On the contrary, Russians have been as transparent as they could in the prevailing climate of deep distrust — and no real effort has yet begun to address the root causes of the conflict. 

The Russian negotiator Grigory Karasin, an accomplished career diplomat and deputy foreign minister and currently a senator heading the foreign affairs committee of the upper-house Federation Council, who was the negotiator at the expert group negotiations at Riyadh last Monday, said over the weekend with great candour on Russia’s national television that the 12-hour talks “haven’t led to any radical breakthrough yet, but the opportunities are there. It would have been naive to expect any breakthroughs.”

Karasin claimed that the US negotiators, including senior National Security Council director Andrew Peek and State Department policy planning chief Michael Anton, initially presented “proposals that are unacceptable to Russia.”

“But then, in my opinion… they realised that a team of civilised, reasoned interlocutors was sitting in front of them,” he said, describing the talks as having had a “good atmosphere” despite the lack of progress. 

Importantly, Karasin said he expects US-Russian negotiations on Ukraine to continue at least until the end of 2025 or beyond.

We will never know how accurate was the feedback Trump received from the inconclusive negotiations in Riyadh. Clearly, the US has since resiled from the understanding given to the Russian side in regard of waiving the sanctions for the export of Russian food and fertilisers to the world market, facilitate the payments system and provide other underpinnings needed. 

Karasin’s glasnost was apparently not music to Trump’s ears. Nonetheless, good sense prevailed finally, as Trump signalled his intentions to talk to Putin. 

Will that help? Putin said as recently as last week that Russia’s interests will not be bartered away. Even if Trump were to now decide to join hands with the UK and France to lead the “coalition of the willing” to continue the Ukraine war, it is unlikely Putin will budge on Russia’s core interests. 

However, Trump’s real predicament is something else. He had a choice to decouple the US from the war. But then, he was also swayed by the Wall Street’s obsessive interest in Ukraine being a honeypot, which of course is incompatible with his known aversion to assuming the obligations and responsibilities of a de facto colonial power in a faraway land 10,000 kms away. 

The result is, Ukrainians have lost respect for him. Zelensky hit out on Friday, saying, “Ukraine has received the new draft agreement on natural resources from the US, which is totally different from the previous framework agreement. Ukraine will not recognise the United States military aid as a debt. We are grateful for support but it’s not a loan.” 

Wall Street Journal reported on the new revised draft document sent to Kiev from Washington, which insists on Zelensky signing an agreement giving the American companies control over key economic projects. In particular, the US seeks the right to be the first to participate in Ukraine’s infrastructure projects and mining programs, including rare-earth metals and construction of ports. 

The fund, managed primarily by US representatives, will channel the profits to pay off the cost of military aid provided by Washington to Kiev. If the agreement is signed, Ukraine will have 45 days to submit a list of projects for consideration by the fund.

Britain’s Daily Telegraph reported that under the latest version of the deal, the US would control half of Ukraine’s oil and gas reserves, its metals and much of its infrastructure, including railways, ports, pipelines and refineries, through a joint investment fund. The US plans to receive all profits until Ukraine pays it at least $100 billion in compensation for military aid, with a 4% surcharge. Kiev will start receiving 50% of the profits only after the debt is repaid.

The newspaper added that the new fund will be registered in the state of Delaware but will operate under the jurisdiction of New York. And the US will have the right to veto the sale of Ukrainian resources to third countries and the prerogative to check the accounts of any Ukrainian agency involved.

Trump has fallen between two stools. Ukraine is highly unlikely to accept the deal with the US. Also, trust Russian ingenuity to make a counter offer in business relationship to Trump that he can’t refuse. In sum, Trump’s attempt to enhance trust with Putin was indeed the right approach. And Putin reciprocated in earnestness.

Indeed, their parley made some headway until it came under weather, thanks to the mercantile considerations in play regarding Ukraine’s resources, which require that the war must be put to sudden death. Whereas, such wars have their own dynamics too. 

March 31, 2025 Posted by | Militarism | , , | Leave a comment

Iran Responds to Trump’s Threats: US Has 10 Bases and 50K Troops in Our Vicinity

Al-Manar | March 31, 2025

The director general for the Americas at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs has issued an official warning to the United States Interests Section in Tehran to warn Washington against any hostile actions.

In the absence of the Swiss ambassador, Issa Kameli summoned the chargé d’affaires of the Swiss Embassy, which represents the U.S. in Tehran, to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and conveyed Iran’s firm resolve to respond decisively and immediately to any threat.

The Swiss charge d’affaires was summoned on Monday over recent threats against Iran made by U.S. President Donald Trump.

During the meeting, Kameli condemned and rejected the inflammatory remarks, calling them violations of international law and the principles outlined in the United Nations Charter.

The Iranian official presented an official note warning against any malicious activity, emphasizing the Islamic Republic of Iran’s unwavering resolve to counteract any aggression.

The chargé d’affaires assured Kameli that the matter would be promptly relayed to the U.S. government.

Commander of the IRGC Aerospace Forces Brigadier General Amir Ali Hajizadeh indicated that the United States has 10 bases and 50 thousand troops in our vicinity.

“Those who live in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones.”

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi stressed that Iran may never engage in direct talks with the US administration, adding that Washington received and reviewed Tehran’s response to Trump’s letter.

Trump has warned that he might order military strikes against Iran if Tehran fails to reach an agreement with Washington on its nuclear program. “If they don’t make a deal, there will be bombing,” Trump said in an interview with NBC News. However, he added that he could instead impose “secondary tariffs” on Iran if no deal is reached, as he did during his first term in office.

Earlier in the day, Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Sayyed Ali Khamenei warned that if Washington commits any hostile act against Iran, “it will certainly receive a heavy blow in return.”

March 31, 2025 Posted by | Wars for Israel | , , , | Leave a comment

The EU, the USSR, and the architecture of collective security in Eurasia

By Alexander Tuboltsev | Al Mayadeen | March 31, 2025

In July 1966, an important event took place in the Romanian city of Bucharest. The Warsaw Pact countries (USSR, GDR, Czechoslovakia, Poland, Bulgaria, Hungary, Romania) adopted a Declaration on Strengthening Peace and Security in Europe. This document, signed by the leaders of the listed countries, stipulated the following:

1. The Warsaw Pact participants officially declared that they have no territorial claims to any European state.

2. The signatories of the Declaration proposed the simultaneous dissolution of the Warsaw Pact and NATO in order to ease tensions.

3. The Declaration proposed the withdrawal of all foreign troops from European countries.

4. The Warsaw Pact countries proposed to develop mutually beneficial cooperation between all countries of the continent based on the principles of equality and non-interference in internal affairs.

And so, it was 1966. It had been less than five years since the Berlin crisis of 1961, when Soviet and American tanks faced each other in a standoff near the checkpoint (between West and East Berlin).

At the height of the Cold War, the Warsaw Pact countries proposed their own project for a collective, common, mutually beneficial security architecture in Europe.

10 years later, in November 1976, a new meeting of the Warsaw Pact Political Advisory Committee was held in Bucharest. As a result, a new Declaration was adopted. In my opinion, it can be called the prototype of the modern concept of a multipolar world. In the Declaration of 1976, the Warsaw Pact countries published the following program for the collective security system:

1. Ending the arms race.

2. Development of interstate relations with respect for the principles of sovereignty and mutual assistance.

3. Emphasis on the development of mutually beneficial trade and economic cooperation between different states.

4. Support the struggle against neocolonialism in Africa, Latin America, and Asia.

5. Support for the rights of the Palestinian people.

6. Restructuring of international economic relations based on the principles of justice and equality.

A few months later, in October 1976, the Soviet government sent a detailed Statement to the UN Secretary General on the topic of restructuring world economic relations. The Statement proposed to support the economic interests of Asian, Latin American, and African countries, to fight against neocolonial economic practices, and to limit the activities of global financial monopolies.

What do these historical facts tell us? In the 60s and 70s of the last century, the Warsaw Pact countries proposed to Europe to create a system of collective security and make a choice in favor of cooperation rather than confrontation. At the same time, they proposed to make world trade, economic ties, and political relations more pluralistic and more equal. These projects, outlined in the two Bucharest Declarations of 1966 and 1976, could once have significantly changed the geopolitical situation. But that didn’t happen, because there was one problem.

The military and political establishment of Western Europe and the United States had no intention of building a joint security architecture in Europe with the Warsaw Treaty Organization. The situation was quite the opposite: after 1991, NATO began its waves of expansion to the east. Since the Brussels summit in January 1994, an active process has begun to involve the countries of the former Warsaw Pact in NATO: in 1999 Poland, the Czech Republic, and Hungary joined the alliance. In the following years, the process of NATO expansion in Europe became continuous, spreading to the post-Soviet space (Baltic countries). The United States used this expansion as a tool to realize its hegemonic ambitions and to maintain the American unipolar dictatorship.

As the years passed, the EU countries continued to turn into a platform for NATO bases, which appeared closer to the borders of Russia. At the same time, the Russian Federation has always expressed its readiness for constructive dialogue, including on the architecture of collective security in Europe. Let’s recall 2008, when Russia took the initiative to create a Treaty on European security. In 2009, a draft of this agreement was presented, which mentioned, among other things, the following aspects:

1. Mutual cooperation between countries based on the principles of indivisible and equal security.

2. An agreement that the countries participating in the Treaty will not carry out actions affecting the security of other participants.

3. The openness of the Treaty for the accession of participants from all over the Eurasian and Euro-Atlantic area.

Western countries did not support this initiative. Moreover, they continued to expand the NATO military infrastructure in Europe, building new bases and accepting new countries into the alliance (Albania, Croatia).

The historical review I have given shows that for decades (since the 20th century), the EU countries have rejected all Soviet and Russian initiatives to create a European collective security architecture. The European Union did not want to enter into a dialogue on this topic and turned the idea of an equal security system into ruins.

Here is a typical example illustrated by Finland. Since 1948, when the Soviet-Finnish Friendship Treaty was signed, the USSR has been one of Helsinki’s most important economic partners. Finland actively bought oil from the Soviet Union at relatively low prices and then re-exported it to other European countries at a higher price. Due to its neutral position during the Cold War, Finland maintained political and economic relations with both the European Economic Community and the Warsaw Pact countries.

And what is happening now? In 2023, Finland joined NATO, becoming another springboard for the alliance’s military expansion. The country closed its border with Russia and began to massively reduce bilateral trade ties, which negatively affected the Finnish economy itself (especially the Finnish border settlements, many of which received most of their income through trade relations with the Russian Federation).

In the 2010s, many EU countries (Italy, Germany, and others that previously had active trade relations with Russia) began to break off bilateral contacts and impose sanctions, thereby undermining the very essence of the idea of free trade. What is the reason for this?

First, the EU countries have been actively using Russia’s resources for decades, buying oil and natural gas at favorable prices. But at the same time, Western European countries showed disrespect for Russia’s national interests and ignored its constructive proposals on the subject of collective security architecture. Instead of an equal dialogue, the EU showed arrogance.

Secondly, since the 90s, the EU has considered the former Warsaw Pact countries and the post-Soviet space as a market for its products and businesses. The EU imposed strict requirements and interfered in the economic processes in the states of Eastern and Central Europe, which began to join it. For example, in Latvia in 2006-2007, due to the agrarian reforms of the EU, the sugar industry of the republic was actually disbanded. This was unprofitable for the Latvian economy, but it was in line with the interests of the larger European sugar producers. Similar reductions in the sugar industry occurred at that time in Bulgaria, the former socialist country. And this is just one example of such EU interference in the economy of former Warsaw Pact members.

Also, the EU, within the framework of the “Eastern Partnership”, began its active economic expansion in the countries of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) in the 2000s. The EU’s political and economic interference in the affairs of the CIS countries, along with NATO’s eastward expansion, posed a direct threat to Russia’s security. In turn, Russia has responded to this threat by strengthening its security and sovereignty, including in the economic sphere.

Thirdly, back in the 1990s, the EU countries became one of the main springboards of the Western hegemonic unipolar dictatorship led by the United States. The so-called “Western world” tried in every way to prevent the emergence of multipolarity, combining sanctions threats with neocolonial practices in the Global South. The number of international political contradictions grew every year, and the EU constantly refused equal dialogue.

Now, the year is 2025, and the EU has become a clone of NATO in its essence and actions. Like the North Atlantic Alliance, the EU is a vestige of the Cold War era. Instead of solving internal problems (for example, the inequality of economic development in Northern and Southern Europe, rising unemployment, and the European energy crisis), EU leaders are using aggressive Russophobic rhetoric, provoking new escalation stages, and imposing new sanctions packages. They are increasing military spending, sponsoring the militarization of Poland, Finland, and the Baltic States, and continuing their neo-colonialist expansion in Africa. Berlin, Brussels, Paris, and Warsaw are now the instigators of conflicts that are pushing the whole of Europe into the abyss in the name of globalism and destructive neoliberalism.

This tendency of the EU establishment to escalate once again confirms that the situation on the continent is tense to the limit. The idea of a collective security architecture is once again becoming relevant to prevent larger and more numerous conflicts. However, this can no longer be a concept of European collective security. Similar projects are a thing of the past. The world has changed, and in recent decades, the role of Asian countries has increased significantly. Countries such as China, India, Indonesia, and Vietnam are showing high rates of economic development, and their regional and international influence is growing. Therefore, in my opinion, the collective security architecture should be considered as a possible future project for the whole of Eurasia, built on the basis of equality and mutual respect. It is especially important to take into account the national interests of the countries of the Global South, which have suffered from Western European colonialism and interference for centuries.

To prevent further confrontation, it is necessary to eliminate the root causes that eventually led to the escalation. One of the main security problems in Europe is the expansion of NATO to the east and the concentration of NATO military bases near the borders of Russia and Belarus. Brussels, Paris, and Berlin should clearly understand that such actions (along with the bellicose rhetoric and policies of the current EU leadership) lead to an even more serious confrontation. Moscow and Minsk have repeatedly stressed that they will defend their territory and sovereignty in the event of a direct threat from the West.

It seems to me that, in the future, the most favorable option for reducing tensions in Europe and starting a dialogue on a new Eurasian collective security architecture could be the complete withdrawal of NATO troops from the EU countries bordering Russia (Finland, the Baltic states). If EU countries want to restore relations with Russia in the future, they should stop their hostile anti-Russian actions.

In the emerging multipolar world, there will be neither metropolises nor unipolar hegemonies. Europe is not the center of the world, but a political and geographical region like Africa, Asia, Oceania, and Latin America. Therefore, future global security can only be based on an equal and mutually respectful relationship between countries and continents, that is, between all poles of a multipolar world order. And there is no place in this system for such destructive practices as the neocolonial paradigm of thinking and Western arrogance towards other peoples.

March 31, 2025 Posted by | Economics, Militarism, Timeless or most popular | , , , | Leave a comment

French presidential hopeful Marine Le Pen sentenced to jail: Politicians react

RT | March 31, 2025

French and foreign politicians are reacting to the sentences handed down on Monday by a Paris court in a case against the National Rally party (RN) and several prominent figures, including Marine Le Pen, the party’s former leader who currently heads its parliamentary faction.

The RN and associated individuals were accused of embezzling EU funds allocated for the salaries of aides of European Parliament members and diverting them to the national coffers. Several defendants have been sentenced to prison terms of various lengths, while Le Pen was barred from seeking public office for five years.

  • 31 March 2025

    13:21 GMT

    French MEP Francois-Xavier Bellamy, who serves as vice president of the Republicans, has called the sentence “a very dark day for French democracy” and “major interference in our democratic life,” regardless of people’s opinions of the National Rally.

    ”The candidate whom the polls actually place in the lead in the presidential election has been barred from running by a court decision: this unprecedented event will leave deep scars,” he said on X.

    The French judicial system is “taking the risk of casting suspicion of arbitrariness” and needs to redeem itself in the eyes of the people by proving its impartiality, the politician added.

  • 13:12 GMT

    Le Pen’s lawyer, Rodolphe Bosselut, has announced his intention to appeal the verdict. He denounced the “provisional execution” ruling, which imposes an immediate political ban on his client and offers “no recourse” through the legal process.

  • 13:09 GMT

    Laurent Wauquiez, leader of The Republicans, a center-right parliamentary faction, has told BFM that “it is not healthy for an elected official in a democracy to be banned from running for office.”

    He characterized the verdict as “very harsh” and “not the path we should have taken.”

  • 13:03 GMT

    Geert Wilders, the leader of the Dutch right-wing Party for Freedom (PVV), has expressed “shock” at the verdict, describing it as incredibly tough.

    “I support and believe in her for the full 100% and I trust she will win the appeal and become President of France,” he said on X.

  • 12:59 GMT

    Left-wing party La France Insoumise has rejected the court’s verdict to ban Le Pen from running for office.

    The party “has never supported using the court to get rid of the National Rally,” a statement published by its national coordinator, Manuel Bompard, said. “We are fighting it at the ballot box and in the streets, through the popular mobilization of the French people, as we did during the 2024 legislative elections.”

  • 12:56 GMT

    Italian Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini has described the verdict as “a declaration of war by Brussels,” claiming that it is being celebrated by those who “fear the judgment of the voters.”

    In a post on X, he compared the outcome of the trial to the recent annulment of the presidential election in Romania, ordered by the Constitutional Court last December over claims of foreign interference. Calin Georgescu, an independent candidate who won the first round, has since been barred from participating in the new election.

  • 12:50 GMT

    Le Pen announced her appearance on TF1 TV later in the day.

  • 12:43 GMT

    Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova has described the verdict as the “agony of liberal democracy” in the EU.

  • 12:35 GMT

    Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, a conservative politician whose views on the EU’s policies closely align with those of Le Pen, has expressed support for her on his social media. He posted the phrase “Je suis Marine!” (“I am Marine!” in French) on X and tagged her account.

    The expression has become prominent internationally since the January 2015 terrorist attack on the French satirical outlet Charlie Hebdo, when it was widely used to make a stance against jihadism and attempts to silence free speech.

  • 12:30 GMT

    RN President Jordan Bardella has denounced the verdict, describing it on X as unjust. “It is French democracy that is being executed,” he wrote.

March 31, 2025 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Progressive Hypocrite | , | Leave a comment

Donald Trump is Looking Like a War President

By Adam Dick | Peace and Prosperity Blog | March 31, 2025

Donald Trump ran for president presenting himself as the peace candidate. A little over two months into his presidency, Trump, however, appears to be establishing himself as a war president.

Instead of quickly ending the US government’s support for war against Russia through Ukraine and against Palestinians, Lebanon, and beyond through Israel, Trump is keeping the money, weapons, and intelligence flowing to support the war efforts of these two so-called allies. It would have been simple for Trump to just declare “no more” and bow out of these wars, but he has chosen not to do so. He is also directing new major military action against Somalia and Yemen. Plus, Trump is threatening to bomb Iran, as well as attack any of Iran’s military that may be found around Yemen. Even Greenland is newly in the crosshairs of US military might during Trump’s presidency, with Trump declaring that the US will acquire the island territory of Denmark one way or another, up to through the use of military force.

A little over two months into the new Trump presidency, the death and destruction keeps coming from the US support for Ukraine and Israel in their wars. Further, the US military is directly engaging in newly expanded military attacks elsewhere, and new wars are being threatened in regard to Iran and — out of left field — Greenland.

Can Trump still become the peace president he suggested he would be? Time is running out. The way things are shaping up, it looks like there is a good chance the US will be more immersed in wars two months from now than it is so far in the new Trump administration.

March 31, 2025 Posted by | Militarism, Wars for Israel | | Leave a comment

Judge rules Marine Le Pen ineligible to run for president in 2027 in latest blow to democracy in the EU

Remix News – March 31, 2025

A judge has ruled Marine Le Pen is ineligible to run for office, along with eight MEPs from her National Rally party, after they were found guilty of misappropriation of EU funds. The move is the latest attack on democracy in the EU, with judges increasingly deciding elections in Europe. Le Pen has also been sentenced to four years in prison, with two years suspended.

Notably, the news comes right as Le Pen leads the polling for French presidential elections in 2027, as Remix News reported earlier today.

The court estimated that the total losses amounted to €2.9 million, as a result of “paying by the European Parliament people who actually worked for the far-right party.” Le Pen was found to be responsible for €1.8 million in damages herself. The judgment also concerns 12 assistants. The prosecutor’s office initially alleged that €7 million had been used in this way.

Investigators accused Le Pen of managing the illegal use of European subsidies between 2004 and 2016, when she served as an MEP. They stated that instead of working in Strasbourg, assistants were to work for Le Pen’s National Rally party in a domestic capacity.

“It was found that all these people actually worked for the party, that their deputy did not commission them any tasks,” said the judge. Assistants then “passed from one deputy to another.”

“It was not about combining the work of assistants, but about combining the budgets of MPs,” said the judge.

Le Pen said before the trial that the matter is entirely political and that her opponents wished for her “political death.”

Other commentators have expressed surprise at not only the verdict but also the decision to exclude her from elections.

Pierre Lellouche, a lawyer and former Deputy of the French National Assembly, appeared on CNEWS to point out that the current prime minister, François Bayrou, faced the same charge and suffered no consequences.

“Then, last but not least, there is the case of (François) Bayrou, the current prime minister, who has been prosecuted for exactly the same thing, i.e., for abuses of party funding declared as parliamentary assistants in Europe, at the EU parliament. Bayrou emerged from this affair without being in the least concerned. In fact, the public prosecutor’s office has once again referred the matter to the courts, but even so, we’re dealing with a double standard here. It’s a bit surprising.”

He noted that the “separation of powers” is increasingly shifting towards judges, and noted that in many previous elections, these judges have tipped the scales in favor of certain candidates.

“We’re finding that more and more, everything is getting mixed up, everywhere. Look at Trump, who had seven judges behind him, and that didn’t stop him from winning. Finally, Strauss-Kahn was eliminated, Fillon was eliminated by a somewhat untimely and rapid indictment at the time of the presidential election, which allowed Mr. Macron to govern the country for seven years after all, which is no mean feat. Especially since, in the Fillon affair, the public prosecutor subsequently indicated that this was not entirely neutral and that the Élysée was particularly interested in this case. So you see, there is a separation of powers, but at the moment, power is shifting to the judges, and that can have a huge impact.”

Another attorney, Maxime Thiebaut, also brought up the case of Bayrou, saying:

“At the very least, you know, it comes as a surprise that Marine Le Pen has been found guilty. I would point out that Mr. (François) Bayrou was acquitted on a similar charge, because it was considered that he had not acted with intent. So I wasn’t in Mr. Bayrou’s file and I wasn’t in Ms. Le Pen’s file, but I note that there was also an expectation that Madame Le Pen would be guilty. We all know very well that when you’re the leader of a political party, you’re pretty far removed from the actual running of the party. Mr. Bayrou was recognized by Ms. Le Pen. Is it political or not? I don’t know and I won’t give my opinion on that.”

This is not the only such case either, with Romania banning the presidential frontrunner, Călin Georgescu, from running for president as well as arresting him.

March 31, 2025 Posted by | Civil Liberties | , | Leave a comment

Is AIPAC Getting What They Want in DC?

By Karen Kwiatkowski | LewRockwell | March 29, 2025

Pro-Israel lobbies and organizations got what they paid for in 2024. Hundreds of millions of dollars of pro-Zionist donations to the Trump campaign and Trump-aligned PACs helped elect Trump, and every important appointment, and some less important ones are vocal Israel-firsters. Pre-existing massive military and other aid from the US taxpayer to Israel has been expanded under Trump. Avid Zionists lead the State Department, the Pentagon, and direct national intelligence. Zionist Steve Witkoff serves as the President’s envoy and chief diplomat in the two major wars the US has been supporting for years, wars Trump wants to resolve in the first half of his last term.

Why, it should be almost perfect, from an AIPAC point of view: a completely controlled executive branch, and a 99% controlled US Congress! The only Republican member of Congress without an AIPAC handler is Kentucky’s Thomas Massie, and both parties have seen its Israel-questioning members successfully primaried or otherwise replaced.

We should be seeing celebrations in the lobby headquarters, and a kind of confidence that I saw way back in 2002 when Israeli generals owned the Pentagon, with full and on-demand access to Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz.

But instead of celebrating, the lobby has huddled and mustered. It’s working over the lower level appointee process now, with its Senate investment Tom Cotton leading the charge against those they see as unreliable. Their unhinged reaction to the appointment of realist Ridge Colby as Under Secretary of Defense for Policy is telling.

Stefanik is now out as a potential US Ambassador to the UN – the reason?  Unlike AIPAC which draws mightily from both parties to get their initiatives, Trump needs more reliable Republican votes and a bigger margin. In other words, AIPAC has created a 99% pro-Israel Congress, yet, the Christian Zionist they needed in the UN has to be sent back to Congress because Trump needs her there.

Trump envoy Steve Witkoff is in trouble with the Republican Jewish Coalition now, based on his frank and open conversation with Tucker Carlson last week. Their complaint is addressed by a welcome tweet from JD Vance saying “The people sniping at him are mad that he is succeeding where they failed for 40 years. Turns out a lot of diplomacy boils down to a simple skill: don’t be an idiot.”

Witkoff is getting heat from the Jewish war lobby for being “fooled” by Putin and “fooled” by Hamas, and they want Rubio to conduct all the negotiations. Bless their hearts, of course they do!

The recent Signal chat kerfluffle is interesting. Signal is a commercial, open source, encrypted messenger app, and its security design and record is good. In 2022, there was a hack of an unrelated cloud server that created a short-lived ability to impersonate a Signal user. This particular breach could have been, and is, prevented by use of the Signal registration lock feature. The Pentagon has policies on Signal app usage, and obviously the inclusion of former IDF soldier and neocon journalist Jeffrey Goldberg in the Principals Small Group chat lies outside of those policies, as does the kind of information being chatted about – a Congressionally undeclared war against Yemen, US war-fighting for Israel, and the administration’s raw contempt for peace in the Middle East, and for Europe’s lack of gratitude for “all the US does” to secure Europe’s dwindling trade and security trade interests. Max Blumenthal’s take at The Gray Zone is clear, and he calls out Goldberg correctly, in a way that the bumbling SecDef tried to.

What we do know is that the Signal “leak” wasn’t a whistleblower attempt – Goldberg has few Constitutional principles and only opposes Trump’s foreign policy when it deviates from that of Netanyahu. We also know that a normal journalist who stumbles on government information important for taxpayers to know about, keeps the source open and protects it. He does not quickly remove himself (as Goldberg did) from that unique source of information.  What a goldmine for a Pulitzer, had Goldberg been interested in that kind of reward! We also know that in the time between the leaked chat and the subsequent attack on Yemen, days went by as several normally quiet and unknown Senators on the Intelligence Committee became extraordinarily well-prepared to attack DNI Gabbard and CIA Director Ratcliffe on the topic during the Trump’s first annual threat estimate presentation. Warner nearly flubbed his lines, but it was a remarkably good show from Senators we rarely hear from. It also served to de-emphasize and distract from whatever was in that Estimate – including Iran isn’t making the bomb, and is a NPT signatory, unlike Israel which makes plenty of them and refuses to sign the Non-Proliferation Treaty.

Furthermore, Gabbard and Ratcliffe were not the preferred candidates for Israel, so making them look incompetent, rogue, or otherwise needing to be replaced is part of a time- honored agenda for the Israel lobby. Gabbard is honest, and while exceedingly pro-Israel she prefers peace and diplomacy over fighting someone else’s war. Ratcliffe, while “good on Israel” is known as an America Firster, and more interested in a future conflict with China, something that would necessarily detract from fighting and subsidizing Israel’s endless wars.

Where was National Security Director Waltz – who would have thunk he’d miss the presentation of the National Threat Estimate? He had added Jeffrey Goldberg to the chat, he’s not sure how, and he was in Greenland when Gabbard and Ratcliffe were facing the orchestrated wrath of suddenly security-conscious Senators. Not surprisingly, AIPAC was Congressman Waltz’s top contributor between 2017 and 2024.

All is not well in Israel’s western capital.  Increasingly, AIPAC is dependent on Christian Zionists and lying politicians who will take their money but fail to completely deliver (although Waltz clearly did his part lately). Even Huckabee – a rare Christian Ambassador to Israel – is not trusted by the various Israel lobbies for reasons that demonstrate a small but growing schism between American and Israeli jews, and Zionism in general. AIPAC is finding it more difficult to recruit new generations of activists in the US. Increasing calls to publicly identify dual citizens in the US Congress, and to register AIPAC under the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) are being heard.

Almost 20 years ago, John Mearshimer and Stephen Walt published a groundbreaking assessment of the influence of the Israeli lobby to jeers, condemnation and threats. Today, everyone in Washington is in general agreement with that paper, casually reveal that influence, occasionally even complaining about it. Today, Israel fights the BDS movement in the US through state and federal legislation. It demands major restrictions on American speech, expression and assembly for those who dare to consider the Zionist state a brutal colonizer, warmongering, genocidal or racist, undeserving of our military or political assistance and support.  Two years before the latest US-funded genocide in Gaza, 37% of American Jews between 18 and 29 believed US is too supportive of Israel, while only 16% of American Jews over age 65 felt that way. Trend lines like these are not good for organizations like AIPAC.

Trump thus far has refused to fire anyone over the Signal fiasco, despite the preparation and preference for this solution from the “lobby.” If Waltz is safe, no doubt Ratcliffe and Gabbard are as well. Trump’s sensitivities to spies in his midst, his concept of personal loyalty, and his simple and blessed inability to be bullied all work against AIPAC. Trump’s ending of war in Ukraine with a settlement and ceding of territory could be applied to Israel. Trump’s demand that Europe pull its own weight financially and defensively could be applied to Israel. His preference to protect America here, via border control, revitalizing US industry, and designing Golden Domes all speak to ideas of America First, a desire to reduce foreign influence/spying and a shift away from American imperialism toward realism. These ideas, if applied to US-Israel policy, would end the current lop-sided relationship, and raise the costs of Zionism far beyond what Israel could afford on its own.

No wonder the Israel lobby is cranky.

March 31, 2025 Posted by | Wars for Israel | , , | Leave a comment

“This Is Existential”: Billionaire Cancer Researcher Says Covid & Vaccine Likely Causing Surge In Aggressive Cancers

By Tyler Durden | Zero Hedge | March 28, 2025

Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong – a transplant surgeon-turned-biotech billionaire renowned for inventing the cancer drug Abraxane – has issued a startling warning in a new in-depth interview with Tucker Carlson.

Soon-Shiong, founder of ImmunityBio ($IBRX) and owner of the Los Angeles Times, claims that the COVID-19 pandemic, and the very vaccines developed to fight it, may be contributing to a global surge in “terrifyingly aggressive” cancers. In the nearly two-hour conversation, the Los Angeles Times owner leveraged his decades of clinical and scientific experience to outline why he suspects an unprecedented cancer epidemic is unfolding. This report examines Dr. Soon-Shiong’s background and assertions, the scientific responses for and against his claims, new data on post-COVID health trends, and the far-reaching implications if his alarming hypothesis proves true.

Dr. Soon-Shiong’s Claims

Soon-Shiong is a veteran surgeon and immunologist who has spent a career studying the human immune system’s fight against cancer. He pioneered novel immunotherapies and even worked on a T-cell based COVID vaccine booster during the pandemic. In the interview, he draws on this background to voice deep concern over rising cancer cases, especially among younger people – something he describes as a “non-infectious pandemic” of cancer. He tells Carlson that in 50 years of medical practice, it was extraordinarily rare to see cancers like pancreatic tumors in children or young adults, yet recently such cases are appearing. For instance, Soon-Shiong was alarmed by seeing a 13-year-old with metastatic pancreatic cancer, a scenario virtually unheard of in his prior experience.

“I never saw pancreatic cancer in children… the greatest surprise to me was a 13-year-old with metastatic pancreatic cancer,” Soon-Shiong told Carlson, adding that he’s seen examples of very young patients (even children under 11 with colon cancer) and unusual surges in aggressive diseases like ovarian cancer in women in their 30s. These personal observations of more frequent, aggressive cancers in youth led him to probe what might have changed in recent years.

“We’re clearly seeing an increase in certain types of cancer, like pancreatic cancer, ovarian cancer… colon cancer… in younger people.”
— Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong

According Soon-Shiong, the COVID era is the obvious change – and suggests that both the SARS-CoV-2 virus infection and the widespread vaccination campaigns could be key drivers behind this cancer spike. He emphasizes the massive scale of human exposure to the virus and its spike protein (via infection or vaccination).

“I don’t know how to say that without saying it. It scares the pants off me because I think what we may be, I don’ think it’s virus versus man now, this is existential. I think when I talk about the largest non-infectious pandemic that we’re afraid of, this is it.”

“Billions of people – literally billions – had the COVID virus. Over a billion got the spike protein vaccine,” said Carlson, adding “So that’s like, we’re talking like a huge percentage of the Earth’s population, unless I’m missing something.”

“Now you understand what keeps you awake at night and kept me awake at night for two years, two and a half years,” Soon-Shiong replied, suggesting that exposure to both is silently undermining the immune system’s natural defenses against cancer on a global scale.

Soon-Shiong frames COVID-era cancers as potentially virally triggered or exacerbated. In the interview, he described cases of “virally induced cancers” in clinics during the pandemic – patients whose cancers may have been kicked into overdrive by the cascade of inflammation and immune stress associated with COVID-19 (Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong: You’re Being Lied to About Cancer, How It’s Caused, and How to Stop It). COVID infection causes a massive inflammatory response, and some cancers are known to exploit inflammation to grow.

TUCKER: “a lot people have pointed to both COVID, the virus, and to the mRNA COVID vaccines as potential causes. Do you think that they’re related?”

SOON-SHIONG: “The best way for me to answer that is to look at history. What we know about virally-induced cancers is well-established. We know that if you get hepatitis, you get liver cancer. Hepatitis is a virus infection. We know if you got human papillomavirus, HPV, you get cervical cancer.”

We know that certain viruses directly cause cancer (e.g. HPV, Epstein-Barr), so it’s not unprecedented for a virus to play a role in oncogenesis. While SARS-CoV-2 is not a known oncovirus, Soon-Shiong worries its indirect effects – chronic inflammation, immune exhaustion, or “suppressor cells” that emerge in the wake of infection/vaccination – could be accelerating tumor development. “The answer is to stop the inflammation… clear the virus from the body,” he argues, positing that until we eradicate lingering virus and restore immune balance, we may see mounting cancer cases.

In sum, Dr. Soon-Shiong’s claim is that the pandemic has set the stage for an explosion of aggressive cancers: the COVID virus itself (especially if it persists in survivors) might suppress immune surveillance, and the mRNA vaccines “that didn’t stop it” might inadvertently contribute to an immunosuppressive environment. These effects, in his theory, could be unleashing cancers that the immune system would ordinarily have kept in check.

Watch:

A number of clinicians and researchers have reported similar worrying observations, though these remain largely anecdotal at this stage. One prominent voice echoing Soon-Shiong’s concern is Dr. Angus Dalgleish, a veteran oncologist and professor at St. George’s, University of London. In late 2022, Dalgleish wrote to the BMJ’s editor after noticing that some cancer patients who had been stable for years experienced “rapid progression of their disease after a COVID-19 booster.” He cited cases of individuals who were doing well until shortly after vaccination – new leukemias, sudden appearance of Stage IV lymphomas, and explosive metastases in patients who had post-vaccine bouts of feeling unwell.

“I am experienced enough to know that these are not coincidental,” Dalgleish wrote, noting that colleagues in Germany, Australia and the U.S. were independently seeing the same pattern. This frontline testimony aligns with Soon-Shiong’s fear: something about the immune system post-vaccination might be removing restraints on latent cancers. Dalgleish specifically pointed to short-term innate immune suppression after mRNA vaccination (lasting for several weeks) as a plausible mechanism. Many of the cancers he saw were ones normally held in check by immune surveillance (melanomas and B-cell cancers), so a temporary post-vaccine drop in immune vigilance could allow a tumor growth spurt. He also alluded to “suppressor gene suppression by mRNA in laboratory experiments” – a reference to preliminary studies that found the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein might interfere with key DNA repair or tumor-suppressor proteins in cells. These lab findings (while not yet confirmed in living organisms) lend some biological plausibility to the idea that spike exposure could affect cancer-related pathways.

Beyond individual doctors, some research is probing links between COVID and cancer behavior. For example, a 2022 study in Frontiers in Oncology explored how SARS-CoV-2 proteins interact with cancer cells. It found that the virus’s membrane (M) protein can “induce the mobility, proliferation and in vivo metastasis” of triple-negative breast cancer cells in the lab (Frontiers | SARS-CoV-2 M Protein Facilitates Malignant Transformation of Breast Cancer Cells). In co-culture experiments, breast cancer cells exposed to the viral protein essentially became more aggressive and invasive. The researchers concluded that COVID-19 infection “might promote… aggressive [cancer] phenotypes” and warned that cancer patients who get COVID could face worse outcomes.

While this is one specific context (breast cancer cells and one viral protein), it underpins Soon-Shiong’s general concern: the virus can directly alter the tumor microenvironment to the cancer’s advantage.

Another line of evidence involves latent viruses and inflammation. Doctors have documented unusual reactivations of viruses like Epstein-Barr (which is linked to lymphomas and other malignancies) during both COVID-19 and post-vaccine immune reactions. Such reactivations hint at a period of immune dysregulation that might also let nascent cancer cells slip past defenses.

Or course, fact-checkers and medical authorities argue that there is no credible evidence of vaccines causing meaningful immune suppression. “There isn’t evidence to date that COVID-19 vaccines cause cancer or lead to worsening cancer,” one infectious disease expert told FactCheck.org, though they do acknowledge rare side effects like myocarditis or blood clots were found, but not cancer.

Phinance Data Insights: Post-COVID Health Trends

While the scientific community debates mechanistic links between COVID and cancer, independent analysts have been parsing population-level data for unusual patterns. One notable effort is by Phinance Technologies, a research firm co-founded by former BlackRock portfolio manager Edward Dowd. Phinance has been analyzing excess mortality and disability data since the pandemic, looking for signals of broad health impacts in the aftermath of COVID and mass vaccination. Their findings reveal concerning trends, especially among younger, working-age populations, that lend some weight to Dr. Soon-Shiong’s general warning of a post-COVID health crisis (though not specific to cancer alone).

Phinance’s “Vaccine Damage Project” examined the U.S. population aged 16–64 (essentially the workforce) and stratified outcomes into four groups: no effect, mild injuries, severe injuries (disabilities), and death. Using official government databases (the CDC, Bureau of Labor Statistics, etc.), they estimated how each category changed starting in 2021 – when vaccines rolled out and COVID became widespread. The results are sobering. According to Phinance’s analysis, by the end of 2022 the U.S. had experienced approximately 310,000 excess deaths among adults aged 25-64 (a ~23% increase in mortality in that group over normal expectations). Notably, they argue that after mid-2021, with vaccines available and the virus itself becoming less deadly (due to immunity and milder variants), COVID-19 should not have been causing such high excess death rates. Therefore, those 310k “unexplained” deaths in 2021–2022 could represent an upper bound on vaccine-related fatalities or other pandemic collateral damage.

Even more striking is the data on new disabilities. Phinance found that from early 2021 through late 2022, about 1.36 million additional Americans (age 16–64) became disabled – a 24.6% rise in disability in that cohort, far above historical trend. This jump in disabilities among the workforce correlates in time with the vaccine rollout (and was disproportionately higher in the labor force than among those not working). The analysts note that the healthiest segment of the population (employed working-age adults) saw a greater relative increase in disabilities after Q1 2021 than the older or non-working groups. This is unusual, since typically health shocks hit the elderly hardest – but here something was impacting younger, healthy people to a significant degree. Phinance investigated further and found a tight relationship between the cumulative number of vaccine doses administered and the rise in disabilities in 2021-22. In fact, for the 16–64 population, they computed a ratio of about 4 new disabilities per excess death in that period, suggesting many survivors were left with lingering health issues even if they didn’t die.

March 30, 2025 Posted by | Science and Pseudo-Science, Video | , | Leave a comment

Is the FDA salvageable?

By Maryanne Demasi, PhD | March 26, 2025

Dr Marty Makary—now confirmed as FDA Commissioner—inherits an agency that routinely approves drugs with questionable benefits.

At Makary’s confirmation hearing on March 6th, senators repeatedly hailed the FDA as the “gold standard” of drug regulation—a phrase meant to reassure the public that approved drugs are significantly effective.

But this claim is an illusion.

In 2013, Jonathan J. Darrow, a Harvard legal scholar and expert in drug regulation, published a scathing analysis in the Washington and Lee Law Review, exposing the reality behind this phrase.

Darrow’s paper, Pharmaceutical Efficacy: The Illusory Legal Standard, meticulously details how the FDA’s approval process does not require drugs to be meaningfully effective—only that they show some effect, no matter how trivial.

Since then, the problem has only worsened.

Makary has spent years criticising medical waste and corporate influence in healthcare. But now, as the new FDA Commissioner, can he reform an institution this compromised?

The “gold standard” that fails the public

The phrase “gold standard” suggests uncompromising scientific scrutiny. However, under U.S. law, there is no specific level of efficacy required for a new drug to be approved.

The FDA’s legal framework, Title 21 of the U.S. Code, demands only “substantial evidence” of benefit, without defining what “substantial” actually means.

Darrow explains: “The standard is almost entirely illusory because it leaves to the drug sponsor the ability to specify any non-zero level of efficacy.”

This ambiguity explains why many widely prescribed drugs offer only marginal benefits.

Consider antidepressants like Prozac and Zoloft. Research indicates that the majority of patient improvement could be due to the placebo effect, not the drug itself.

Yet, because these medications show statistical improvement in clinical trials, they meet the FDA’s approval threshold and are marketed as transformative treatments.

Darrow reported in 2021 that most newly approved drugs (69%-98%) fail to provide substantial benefits over existing therapies.

Cherry-picking evidence

Another critical flaw in determining drug efficacy is selective trial reporting. Drug companies conduct numerous clinical trials, but the FDA only requires two successful trials for approval—regardless of how many have failed.

This means a company could run 10 trials, discard eight that show no benefit, and submit the two positive ones. This practice is precisely how some SSRI antidepressants were approved.

In a major exposé, researcher Irving Kirsch and his colleagues used the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) to obtain unpublished clinical trial data on six widely prescribed antidepressants.

FDA approval had been granted based on twelve trials (two per drug). Yet, a FOIA request uncovered 47 trials—many of which showed no meaningful difference between the drug and a placebo.

The registration of trials on public registries like ClinicalTrials.gov was intended to improve transparency, but enforcement remains weak. Many trials that should have been disclosed are not, and financial penalties for non-compliance are rarely enforced.

The result? A regulatory loophole that allows ineffective drugs to be marketed as evidence-based solutions.

Misleading people with statistical tricks

Beyond cherry-picking trials, statistics can be manipulated to make drugs seem more effective than they are. One common tactic is presenting relative risk reduction instead of absolute risk reduction.

Take statins, the cholesterol-lowering drugs prescribed to millions. Clinical trials often claim statins reduce heart attack risk by 30%. However, this figure refers to relative risk—not absolute risk.

In reality, the absolute risk reduction is often less than 2%. This means that out of 100 people taking statins, 98 see no benefit at all. Yet, because the effect meets “statistical significance,” statins are approved and aggressively marketed as essential for heart disease prevention.

Another example is the diabetes drug saxagliptin (Onglyza), approved by the FDA in 2009. Marketed as a breakthrough for blood sugar control, later studies showed the absolute reduction of HbA1c—a key measure of blood sugar—was negligible (0.4% to 0.9%).

Worse, in 2013, a large-scale trial revealed a possible increased risk of heart failure. Yet, the drug remains on the market, illustrating how weak efficacy standards allow ineffective (or even harmful) drugs to persist.

The cost of an ineffective system

Weak efficacy standards don’t just mislead patients—they can also lead to financial strain. This issue is particularly egregious in oncology.

New cancer drugs routinely cost over $100,000 per year, yet many extend life by only weeks or months, if any. Families may drain their savings, hoping for a meaningful survival benefit, only to later learn that the drug offered little more than a statistical blip.

In 2016, the FDA granted accelerated approval to olaratumab, which was hailed as a breakthrough for soft tissue sarcoma. However, it was withdrawn in 2019 after further research failed to show any survival benefit.

The FDA had granted approval based on early-stage trials that created the illusion of efficacy.

This isn’t just a regulatory failure—it’s a moral one.

Why we need clearer drug labelling

Darrow argues that drug labelling is a major part of the problem. “There’s no requirement for pharmaceutical companies to offer any scale of benefit, in a manner that patients can understand,” he wrote.

“Knowing how well a drug might perform relative to an alternative—through clearly presented data—allows doctors and patients to decide whether it’s worth [it].”

He draws a parallel with sunscreen labelling. “A consumer easily understands that SPF30 will give greater protection than SPF10. So why don’t we have better drug labelling?”

Alternatively, he has suggested that drug labels could adopt a similar approach to food labels, “with data presented in columns that show key information and allow for side-by-side comparison.”

Or, the labelling for sleeping pills could “indicate the number of minutes it took those who had used them in clinical trials to fall asleep compared with a placebo.”

The lack of transparency only benefits the pharmaceutical industry from increased drug sales.

Can Makary fix the FDA?

Marty Makary has been a relentless critic of medical waste, unnecessary treatments, and corporate influence in healthcare. However, reforming an agency so deeply entrenched in industry influence is an extraordinary challenge.

Drug companies pay billions in user fees to the FDA, and in return, they influence regulatory decisions. Laws governing drug approval have remained largely unchanged for decades, ensuring that the FDA prioritises speed over scientific rigour and drug safety.

The FDA continues to approve drugs with minimal benefit, it allows companies to cherry-pick positive trials while ignoring negative ones and misleads doctors into believing that weak drugs are more effective than they are.

The public assumes that FDA approval means a drug is significantly effective.

It does not.

If Makary is serious about reform, he must push Congress for sweeping legislative changes to dismantle the pharmaceutical industry’s stranglehold on drug regulation.

The FDA was created to protect the public—not to serve as a rubber stamp for Big Pharma. Right now, the FDA is failing in its mission.

The question is no longer whether the FDA is the “gold standard” of drug regulation. It’s whether the agency is salvageable at all.

March 30, 2025 Posted by | Corruption, Science and Pseudo-Science | , | Leave a comment

Judge Dismisses Defamation Lawsuit Against NewsGuard

By Cindy Harper | Reclaim The Net | March 27, 2025

A federal judge has thrown out a $13.6 million defamation lawsuit brought by Consortium News against the media ratings firm NewsGuard, delivering a blow to the independent outlet’s fight against what it views as reputational sabotage masked as media accountability. The suit, filed in 2023, centered on NewsGuard’s characterization of Consortium’s journalism, particularly its coverage of Russia’s war on Ukraine, as misleading and unreliable.

We obtained a copy of the ruling for you here.

NewsGuard, a for-profit company that partners with government agencies and private firms, and “misinformation,” had assigned Consortium News a failing trust score of 47.5 out of 100.

It accused the outlet of falling short in three categories: avoiding falsehoods, reporting responsibly, and issuing timely corrections. A “proceed with caution” warning label — first red, later changed to blue — was attached to the site, branding it as a publication that “generally fails to maintain basic standards of accuracy and accountability.”

Consortium News responded with a forceful legal challenge, arguing that the flag was defamatory and that the firm’s sweeping judgments were based on a cursory review of just five opinion pieces out of more than 20,000 articles and videos published on its platform. The complaint accused NewsGuard of misrepresenting its entire body of work.

On Wednesday, US District Judge Katherine Failla granted NewsGuard’s motion to dismiss the suit, ruling that Consortium News had failed to show the kind of “actual malice” required to sustain a defamation claim. In her opinion, Failla wrote that the plaintiffs didn’t offer concrete allegations that NewsGuard knowingly made false statements.

“Indeed, far from alleging that NewsGuard knew its statements to be false, Consortium News effectively concedes the truth of the ‘anti-U.S. perspective’ label, and acknowledges that ‘reasonable people’ could differ as to the truth or falsity of its reporting, undercutting any suggestion that NewsGuard knew its criticisms to be false and published those criticisms despite knowing them to be false,” Failla wrote.

NewsGuard, which has secured contracts with the US government and other institutional clients, argued in court that its evaluations are protected expressions of opinion and that its partnership with federal agencies does not convert it into a government actor. In its defense, it called its scoring framework “inherently subjective.”

March 30, 2025 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance | , | Leave a comment

Welcome to Britain, Where Critical WhatsApp Messages Are a Police Matter

By Cam Wakefield | Reclaim The Net | March 30, 2025

You’d think that in Britain, the worst thing that could happen to you after sending a few critical WhatsApp messages would be a passive-aggressive reply or, at most, a snooty whisper campaign. What you probably wouldn’t expect is to have six police officers show up on your doorstep like they’re hunting down a cartel. But that’s precisely what happened to Maxie Allen and Rosalind Levine — two parents whose great offense was asking some mildly inconvenient questions about how their daughter’s school planned to replace its retiring principal.

This is not an episode of Black Mirror. This is Borehamwood, Hertfordshire, 2025. And the parents in question—Maxie Allen, a Times Radio producer, and Rosalind Levine, 46, a mother of two—had the gall to inquire, via WhatsApp no less, whether Cowley Hill Primary School was being entirely above board in appointing a new principal.

What happened next should make everyone in Britain pause and consider just how overreaching their government has become. Because in the time it takes to send a meme about the school’s bake sale, you too could be staring down the barrel of a “malicious communications” charge.

The trouble started in May, shortly after the school’s principal retired. Instead of the usual round of polite emails, clumsy PowerPoints, and dreary Q&A sessions, there was… silence. Maxie Allen, who had once served as a school governor—so presumably knows his way around a budget meeting—asked the unthinkable: when was the recruitment process going to be opened up?

A fair question, right? Not in Borehamwood, apparently. The school responded not with answers, but with a sort of preemptive nuclear strike. Jackie Spriggs, the chair of governors, issued a public warning about “inflammatory and defamatory” social media posts and hinted at disciplinary action for those who dared to cause “disharmony.” One imagines this word being uttered in the tone of a Bond villain stroking a white cat.

For the crime of “casting aspersions,” Allen and Levine were promptly banned from the school premises. That meant no parents’ evening, no Christmas concert, no chance to speak face-to-face about the specific needs of their daughter Sascha, who—just to add to the bleakness of it all—has epilepsy and is registered disabled.

So what do you do when the school shuts its doors in your face? You send emails. Lots of them. You try to get answers. And if that fails, you might—just might—vent a little on WhatsApp.

But apparently, that was enough to earn the label of harassers. Not in the figurative, overly sensitive, “Karen’s upset again” sense. No, this was the actual, legal, possibly-prison kind of harassment.

Then came January 29. Rosalind was at home sorting toys for charity—presumably a heinous act in today’s climate—when she opened the door to what can only be described as a low-budget reboot of Line of Duty. Six officers. Two cars. A van. All to arrest two middle-aged parents whose biggest vice appears to be stubborn curiosity.

“I saw six police officers standing there,” she said. “My first thought was that Sascha was dead.”

Instead, it was the prelude to an 11-hour ordeal in a police cell. Eleven hours. That’s enough time to commit actual crimes, be tried, be sentenced, and still get home in time for MasterChef.

Allen called the experience “dystopian,” and, for once, the word isn’t hyperbole. “It was just unfathomable to me that things had escalated to this degree,” he said. “We’d never used abusive or threatening language, even in private.”

Worse still, they were never even told which communications were being investigated. It’s like being detained by police for “vibes.”

One of the many delightful ironies here is that the school accused them of causing a “nuisance on school property,” despite the fact that neither of them had set foot on said property in six months.

Now, in the school’s defense—such as it is—they claim they went to the police because the sheer volume of correspondence and social media posts had become “upsetting.” Which raises an important question: when did being “upsetting” become a police matter?

What we’re witnessing is not a breakdown in communication, but a full-blown bureaucratic tantrum. Instead of engaging with concerned parents, Cowley Hill’s leadership took the nuclear option: drag them out in cuffs and let the police deal with it.

Hertfordshire Constabulary, apparently mistaking Borehamwood for Basra, decided this was a perfectly normal use of resources. “The number of officers was necessary,” said a spokesman, “to secure electronic devices and care for children at the address.”

Right. Nothing says “childcare” like watching your mom get led away in handcuffs while your toddler hides in the corner, traumatized.

After five weeks—five weeks of real police time, in a country where burglaries are basically a form of inheritance transfer—the whole thing was quietly dropped. Insufficient evidence. No charges. Not even a slap on the wrist.

So here we are. A story about a couple who dared to question how a public school was run, and ended up locked in a cell, banned from the school play, and smeared with criminal accusations for trying to advocate for their disabled child.

This is Britain in 2025. A place where public institutions behave like paranoid cults and the police are deployed like private security firms for anyone with a bruised ego. All while the rest of the population is left wondering how many other WhatsApp groups are one message away from a dawn raid.

Because if this is what happens when you ask a few inconvenient questions, what’s next? Fingerprinting people for liking the wrong Facebook post? Tactical units sent in for sarcastic TripAdvisor reviews?

It’s a warning. Ask the wrong question, speak out of turn, and you too may get a visit from half the local police force.

March 30, 2025 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance, Subjugation - Torture | , | Leave a comment

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