In 2015, the “Defend the Guard Act” was introduced in the West Virginia legislature, aiming to bring sanity to our nation’s foreign policy and the legal abuses foisted upon our servicemen within our state’s National Guard.
This proposed law emerged from long forgotten principles, pieced together into legislation that was committed to the idea that our troops ought to only be sent into foreign wars with a declaration of war by the U.S. Congress—a constitutional mandate forsaken for over eighty years now.
With the Congress renouncing its solemn responsibility, over time, the process of throwing American troops into foreign wars has become a matter of unilateral decree by the president, an office swayed carelessly by the administrative state and impulsive bureaucrats from the Pentagon.
The consequences of this radical departure from our nation’s traditional governance have been predictable: a catastrophic state of “Forever Warfare,” financially and morally bankrupting our country.
The Defend the Guard Act, then, is a last-ditch effort to reassert legislative oversight before it’s too late, and force Washington to confront the neglected ethics long held by the Western “Just War Tradition”—that armed conflict should always be a measure of last resort.
The legislation, however, is more than just a simple procedural check. A crucial aspect is its focus on keeping our Guard units at home, where they’re needed most. A state’s National Guard is essential for handling local emergencies like floods and storms or securing our borders.
Over the years, a troubling trend has emerged: many of the National Guard members who have been cut down on the front lines of Washington’s perpetual foreign wars hail from rural states akin to West Virginia—states like Arkansas, Ohio, and Kentucky, or Montana, Idaho, and Wyoming.
This disproportionate burden of foreign wars borne by our country’s rural regions—areas often dismissed by the elites of this nation as “flyover country”—is not just a tragedy, it’s an outrage. To the ruling coastal elite, our servicemen from such states are seen as expendable.
During the height of the Iraq War, for instance, nearly half of all combat brigades were National Guardsmen, a great many from rural states held in contempt by the managerial ruling class, who don’t think twice about them or their families.
Central to this entire affair has been the incredible efforts of Sgt. Dan McKnight (Ret) and the organization he formed, Bring Our Troops Home. Dan’s leadership and organizational skills have propelled this idea from a meager initiative in West Virginia to a national movement.
Dan’s devotion to the cause, coupled with his talent to articulate its urgency, has galvanized massive support and brought critical attention to the subject—amplifying the voices of combat veterans everywhere and motivating state legislators across the country to take action.
Each year, as we’ve fought to advance this ‘Defend the Guard’ legislation, formidable resistance is encountered, primarily from the Pentagon and their bureaucratic lackeys. The “Brass” and the useful idiots sent to carry out their bidding employ a wide range of sordid tactics; from disingenuous accusations of “failing to support the troops,” to more aggressive methods behind closed doors—like threats of federal-funding cuts and hints of public defamation against those who support the legislation—the hostility has only intensified.
The escalation of these schemes if a sign of their growing desperation. It’s quite common now for uniformed general officers to patrol the halls of state capitols, lobbying state legislators against the bill with Machiavellian tactics.
These blatant measures on behalf of public “servants” attached to the Pentagon pose a direct challenge to the fundamental American principle of civilian authority over the military—raising questions as to who really controls the armed forces of this country anymore.
Despite this ordeal, the Defend the Guard Act has begun to spread like wildfire, thanks again in large part to Dan McKnight’s heroic efforts. This once-regional idea has now found resonance in dozens of state capitols across the nation.
Huge victories have been achieved with the bill’s passage in the Arizona Senate, and—as of four days ago—its success through the New Hampshire House, marking an even bigger milestone. With the potential to reach up to 40 states this coming year, a pivotal turning point is at hand.
The success of this movement underscores a very critical moment for our states to leverage their inherent powers within our country’s federalist framework, compelling the federal government in Washington to adhere to its foundational principles.
Paramount in this endeavor is the protection of our courageous servicemen within the National Guard—along with the prudent treatment of all of our country’s warriors, who honor their sacred oaths they swore to the Almighty when they donned the uniform.
By reviving long-neglected political principles and promoting the classical virtues, true leaders can be encouraged to emerge and drive efforts that can also safeguard our nation as a whole.
Next week, for the tenth consecutive year, I’ll re-introduce the Defend the Guard Act here in West Virginia. As the idea spreads, I’m hopeful a growing resolve to uphold the virtues our country was founded upon will as well.
Pat McGeehan is a member of the West Virginia House of Delegates representing the first district.
January 8, 2024
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Militarism | United States |
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“Endless hysteria will keep you free,” said none of the Founding Fathers. But President Joe Biden missed that message before his absurdly overheated speech last Friday near Valley Forge, Pennsylvania. Biden draped himself in Revolutionary War virtue as he demanded that Americans quiver in fear at the prospect of his reign ending. Biden invoked the third anniversary of the January 6 Capitol clash to effectively call for canceling the 2024 presidential election.
At a minimum, Biden wants to turn the November election into a referendum on Adolf Hitler. Biden boasted, “We are still a nation that gives hate no safe harbor.” A few minutes before that uplifting assertion, Biden accused Donald Trump of “echoing the same exact language used in Nazi Germany.” CNN reported last week that Biden campaign aides plan to go “full Hitler” on Trump, making “a direct comparison to the Nazi leader rather than couching their attacks by saying Trump ‘parroted’ him.” A few weeks ago, the Biden campaign posted a graphic on Twitter comparing Trump and Hitler’s rhetoric.
Biden continually equated democracy with freedom. And whatever is good for democracy is “close enough for government work” to freedom. Biden declared, “Democracy means having the freedom to speak your mind.” Unless Team Biden disapproves of your thoughts, of course.
Biden neglected to explain why his vision of democracy justifies the near-total suppression of freedom of speech for his opponents. On July 4, Federal Judge Terry Doughty condemned the Biden administration for potentially “the most massive attack against free speech in United States history,” and a federal appeals court condemned Team Biden for “suppressing millions of protected free-speech postings by American citizens”—mostly by conservatives and Republicans.
“If only Uncle Joe had known about that abuse,” right? Like hell. Biden’s Justice Department is fighting tooth and nail at the Supreme Court to preserve his power to secretly censor anyone the feds claim is spouting disinformation, perhaps including denying that Biden is God’s gift to America.
Another key to Biden’s vision of democracy is that the president is entitled to imprison peaceful protestors who opposed him. Biden proved the villainy of Trump supporters by touting case numbers from January 6: “Since that day more than 1,200 people have been charged for the assault on the capitol, and nearly 900 of them have been convicted and they have been sentenced to more than 840 years in prison.”
Biden neglected to quote the bombshell Washington Post report today revealing that vast numbers of the January 6 charges have been crap cases. Federal judges have rejected Biden Justice Department sentencing demands in almost 90% of the January 6 cases—an astounding record. If those cases were not being tried by juries overstocked with federal employees and NPR devotees, the prosecutions would have crashed and burned long ago.
The Supreme Court may obliterate many of the cases. More than 320 of the convictions against J-6 protestors hinge on a bizarre contortion of the 2002 Sarbanes-Oxley law enacted after corporations destroyed documents sought by the Securities and Exchange Commission.
“The average sentence for those convicted of obstructing an official proceeding has been 39 months,” the Post reported. Former federal prosecutor Gene Rossi warns that the Supreme Court taking that case is a “red flag and a loud gong” because that law was the “North Star” used by prosecutors. If the Supreme Court strikes down the Biden twist of the 2002 law, that will make the January 6 prosecutions look like one of the worst witch hunts in American history.
Yet, according to Team Biden, the real problem is that not enough lives have been ruined for sinful thoughts on January 6. Last Thursday, Matthew Graves, Biden’s chief prosecutor for the District of Columbia, issued a warning of potentially thousands of more January 6 indictments: “If a person knowingly entered a restricted area [near the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021] without authorization, they already committed a federal crime. Make no mistake: Thousands of people occupied that area that they were not authorized to be present in in the first place.” Talking about hounding people who merely were in the general vicinity of the Capitol confirms that for Team Biden, “Trespassing plus thought crimes equals terrorism.”
Actually, Biden’s FBI already classifies all the people arrested for January 6 Capitol clash offenses as domestic terrorists—even people busted for “parading without a permit.” The FBI presumes that any American suspected of supporting the January 6, 2021 protests forfeited his constitutional rights. An FBI whistleblower revealed in congressional testimony in May 2023 that FBI headquarters pressured FBI agents to treat anyone who attended the January 6 protests as a criminal suspect. Roughly 2,000 pro-Trump protestors (including an unknown number of undercover agents and informants) entered the Capitol that day. But an FBI analyst exploited the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act to unjustifiably conduct warrantless searches on 23,132 Americans citizens suspected of January 6 offenses “to find evidence of possible foreign influence, although the analyst conducting the queries had no indications of foreign influence,” according to FISA Chief Judge Rudolph Contreras.
Biden assured the audience that “we still believe that no one, not even the president, is above the law.” Okay, but what if the president or the vice president uses the names Robert Peters, Robin Ware, and JRB Ware as email aliases to hustle business deals for a family member? Is it OK for them to slip the law then?
The only way to assume that Biden is not “above the law” is to assume that his decrees alone are the law. The Supreme Court struck down his COVID vaccine mandate, his moratorium for evicting deadbeat renters, his $500 billion federal student loan forgiveness scheme, and numerous other Biden policies.
Biden spent half an hour fearmongering and then closed by promising “freedom from fear.” This is the famous Biden two-step—demagoguing to his heart’s content and then closing with a few schmaltzy uplift lines, entitling the media to re-christen him as an idealist.
Biden castigated Trump as the “Election Denier in Chief,” a new offense not yet been codified in the statute book. Biden endlessly warned that Trump posed a deadly threat to both freedom and democracy. Biden campaign masterminds were clever enough to permit an unknown local politician to deliver the “takeaway” from the day’s events. Biden was preceded at the podium by Dauphin County commissioner candidate Justin Douglass, who proclaimed that “Donald Trump represents a clear and present danger” to democracy. Since Trump is the ultimate enemy of the Constitution, anything that Biden and his campaign does to banish Trump from the ballot will be pro-democracy.
Obviously, if Americans value democracy, then the presidential candidate favored by the most voters in recent polls must not be allowed on the ballot. Team Biden favors a version of “Guardian Democracy” where voters are only permitted to cast ballots for candidates that the ruling class approves. This is part and parcel with the Democratic Party’s plan to let all future elections be determined by ballot harvesting and tsunamis of unverified mail-in ballots.
Why should we believe that democracy dies unless Biden gets four more years to violate the Constitution, censor and jail his opponents, and domineer practically every aspect of Americans’ lives (“step away from that gas stove before we have to hurt you”)? As Thomas Jefferson declared long ago, “An elective despotism is not the government we fought for.”
January 8, 2024
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance | FBI, Human rights, United States |
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The line is clear
We are now approximately four years removed from the unleashing of the covid so-called pandemic and the consequential measures adopted and enforced world-wide that created terror in the global populace, imposed unprecedented strictures, subverted foundational principles of medicine and foisted an unnecessary and dangerous inoculation upon a mostly unwitting public.
Some of us, at the very outset, upon hearing the mainstream messages of bat-inspired trans-species migration of a respiratory virus, suspected that things were amiss. The frenzied media, however, with their ‘case’ counts, death counts and fraudulent reporting about the actual lethality of the pathogen, were unstoppable and relentless, and I can forgive the many who began to shudder at this unexpected turn of events and who lined up for the dubious polymerase chain reaction ‘test’ and who, ultimately, placed every hope upon an emergency so-called vaccine, convinced as they were that our world was engulfed by an incomparable threat.
I have a harder time forgiving doctors who threw their senses and duties out the window, were unperturbed by the omission and suppression of attempts to treat and prevent the pathogen before hospitalization was required, abandoned informed consent, pushed the covid jab and regarded those who preferred to keep their minds and bodies and general health intact by not receiving the jab as a dangerous entity.
I frankly cannot forgive those physicians who, wielding considerable influence in establishment media, used this influence to sway their followers to accept something that has now been shown demonstrably and repetitively to be a health disaster
Perhaps, however, under the unnerving full-court press of a rabid and unchecked propaganda campaign waged by once highly-regarded journalistic authorities, everyone can be forgiven for having, essentially, lost their wits. Perhaps.
But now, four years hence, as the general picture has clarified itself, anyone with a sentient eye or ear not wedded to mainstream pulp can conclude that there never was a genuine pandemic, there never was a need to lock and shut down the entire world, and there never was or will be a need to inject billions with a gene-altering concoction that has hurt and killed too many to pass muster as a real and viable vaccine. We can further conclude that the preposterously tremendous control over people exhibited by the roll-out of the covid campaign, and the submission of people to the evisceration of their unalienable rights — these were not organically evolved developments, but consequences of a highly orchestrated deployment of power.
In short, all things covid was a strategically planned operation — a war-crime — the likes of which are unprecedented, and the consequence of which is to move the world towards some kind of autocratic fiefdom wherein we ‘little people’ surviving the first waves of the onslaught will be subjugated to the whims and directives of The Few.
I don’t care how many X followers one may have, or how many Sierpinski triangles one may conjure, how many high-profile interviews one has done, how many conferences one has attended, how many grants one has received, or how many plaudits one has obtained from our freedom-loving community: unless one can see the line and step across it, I regard you as an Enemy.
What line? The line that separates those who understand the concerted efforts of a Global Cabal to inflict the covid mess upon us for purposes of control, versus those who assert that this mess was essentially the result of unfortunate circumstances complicated by greed, incompetence, opportunism, corruption, human error and the like. To espouse the latter is untruthful and enervating: it takes the life out of our tenuously cobbled opposition and plays into our opposition’s hands.
Pick a side. To deny that the genocide visited upon us has been deliberately perpetrated, regardless of what you may invoke in the way of prudence, reason and thoughtful consideration, is to join the ranks of its perpetrators.
Pick a side, the line is clear, and time is short.
Emanuel E. Garcia, M.D.
January 2024
January 7, 2024
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Deception, Science and Pseudo-Science, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | Covid-19, COVID-19 Vaccine, Human rights |
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In words often wrongly attributed to Voltaire, Kevin Alfred Strom asserted that ‘to learn who rules over you, simply find out who you are not allowed to criticise’.
Since the Hamas attack on 7th October, this has been made very clear. Influential Zionist activists, who exert phenomenal influence on western politics, governments, and media, have ensured that only the one version of events, the Israeli version, is socially acceptable. This political reality was demonstrated in grave detail in Al Jazeera’s multi-part investigative documentary, The Lobby -Britain and The Lobby – USA. Of course, a different truth is known by any objective observer, especially millions of Palestinian people, and also by the millions who march worldwide against the brutal military bombardment and massacre of civilians in Gaza. But the BBC and The Daily Mail still refuse to broadcast or publish the widespread and justified disgust at the actions of the Israeli government.
Disturbingly, the British mainstream media have been actively shilling for the Israeli government, as their Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu insists on continuing the annihilation of Gaza. A prime asset of the campaign to cast Israelis as the oppressed, and the Palestinians as the oppressor is British media pundit Douglas Murray. Writing in the Spectator, Why I’m considering a life of crime, Murray denounced posters at Heathrow Airport inviting travellers from the ‘Israel/Palestinian territories’ who have ‘witnessed or been a victim of terrorism, war crimes or crimes against humanity’ to report to it police, in potential pursuance of a case by the International Criminal Court. This call for international justice deeply offends Murray, who asserts that ‘there is no country called Palestine’. Why not, Douglas? My old atlas from the 1930s clearly shows a land of this name, on the eastern edge of the Mediterranean Sea and bordering on Trans-Jordan.
Curiously, Murray is not sure what status to give the remaining Palestinian area. As he explains, ‘there is the disputed territory of the West Bank and there is Gaza, which was handed over to the Palestinians in 2005 and which promptly became a ‘terror state’. Hold on, Douglas, don’t you deny such statehood? It seems that Murray wants Gaza to have responsibility without any sovereign recognition or power, and the inverse for Israel.
But their journalists and commentators are not only concerned with what’s happening in a narrow strip of land invaded by Israeli troops. They portray all Jews living in Britain as victims of hate, because supporters of the Palestinian cause are railing against the murderous exploits of a state that claims to represent Jewish people worldwide. Meanwhile our police and judiciary appear bent on protecting a foreign jurisdiction two thousand miles away; for example, arresting UK protestors with placards likening the Knesset to the Third Reich.
INFOGRAPHIC: Latest number in Israel’s ongoing genocide of the native Palestinian population in Gaza (Source: EuroMed)
The lead opinion piece in the Daily Express (4th January 2024), by the chairman of Glasgow Friends of Israel, shows the way that the wind is blowing. According to Sammy Stein, anti-Zionism is nothing but rebranded anti-Semitism. Although Stein acknowledges the right to criticise Israel and its leaders (as do many Israelis), he smears the regular large pro-Palestinian rallies in Glasgow as “anti-Semitic,” based on his experience in running a market stall in the city centre adorned with Israeli flags. He believes that flying a national flag (of a country that is clearly committing crimes against humanity) is somehow defending the rights of Jews. Within reasonable limits, criticism of his stall is an expected and justifiable act of free speech, a fundamental right in a free society.
Stein confines the concept of anti-Semitism to dislike of Jews, despite the broader meaning of Semitic peoples (including the Semitic Palestinian people, the targets of Israeli bombs and bullets). He claims that this ‘is a term established specifically for the hatred of the Jewish people and not, as some believe, hatred against people who can be described as Semites, such as Muslims’. The expanding scope of anti-Semitism, as determined by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA), is now sufficiently wide enough to quell any opprobrium towards Israel, while there is no equivalent protection for the native Palestinian people and their diaspora. Shamefully, nearly all major Western political parties have signed up to this blatantly one-sided censorship.
Despite the efforts of these Western institutions to impose an arbitrary definition of what constitutes a ‘hate crime,’ the fact remains that Jews are not the same as the state of Israel, and both of which is not the same as the ideology known as Zionism. But the distinction between Zionists and the Israeli leadership is becoming blurred. As the Palestinians and their supporters chant of ‘From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free’, treated by many Western authorities as a potentially hateful message, Netanyahu’s administration seems to be aiming for that very same outcome – capturing the whole land for Israel and evicting the Palestinians from their homeland. Stein notes that ‘today, Zionism refers to support for the continued existence of Israel, in the face of regular calls for its dissolution’. The Israelis have a right to self-determination, Stein believes, but not the Palestinian inmates trapped in the world’s largest concentration camp.
Stein also reminds us that ‘Jesus was a Jew,’ who, ironically, was persecuted by the Jews, leading to his crucifixion under the aegis of Roman authority at the time. But for Stein and Zionists, the land of historic Palestine belongs to the Jews because some Jews have continuously inhabited the area for thousands of years, after having first established their presence thousands of years ago. Also, they believe that this homeland was supposedly promised to them as a fulfilment of God’s covenant with Abraham. This is a simplistic and convenient reading of history. There is no straightforward link between Judah of the Bible and present-day Zionists. Regardless, should Israel really be allowed to run an exclusionary ethno-nationalist and inhumane Apartheid state (as Western societies simultaneously promote multiculturalism, diversity, equity and inclusion)?
Stein regards anti-Zionism as ‘unique in demanding the dismantling of an existing state after over seventy years of independence.’ Palestinians would splutter over such hypocrisy. For Stein, anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism are now the same thing, being slightly different ‘ways of saying that Jews have no right to exist collectively as Jews with the same rights as other humans’. Perhaps Stein should spend a few days on the Gaza strip to learn whose hate is most powerful – that of desperate, bombed-out Palestinians or that of the American-backed Israeli branch of the military-industrial complex.
***
Niall McCrae is a researcher and educator, and author of ‘The Moon and Madness’ (Imprint Academic, 2011), and ‘Moralitis: a Cultural Virus’ (Bruges Group, 2018).
January 7, 2024
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Full Spectrum Dominance | Human rights, Israel, Palestine, UK, Zionism |
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January 6th WAS an insurrection.
But it was not Trump supporters who overthrew the United States. It was intelligence assets who entrapped Trump supporters in a planned false flag event, to justify certifying a stolen election without hearing evidence of fraud in Congress.
Pence promised electors they would have their day in court in Congress to air the widespread evidence of voter fraud. Those grievances were never heard, because Pence decided to certify the election the next day, and stated he did not need to give electors their day in Congress, because the actions of Trump supporters were so heinous on January 6th.
Then they intentionally withheld the footage from you, only showing the negative optics, so they could shape the perception of the event, and use it to prevent Trump from becoming POTUS in 2020 AND in 2024.
Then they used the “insurrection” as justification to purge virtually all Trump supporters from all social media, and censor ANY talk of election fraud.
You witnessed an insurrection that day, but it was the Deep State who undermined, conspired against, and overthrew the duly elected President of the United States, Donald J. Trump.
Our country was stolen from us, but we are about to take it back. And swift retribution is the first thing on the agenda.
TREASON!
January 7, 2024
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Deception | United States |
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Democrats have resorted to nothing short of “ballot cleansing” as they try to bar Republican candidates for Congress under the 14th Amendment theory, writes renowned American legal expert Jonathan Turley, warning against placing the US on a slippery slope to political chaos.
Several US voters in Illinois and Massachusetts have filed motions seeking to remove former President Donald Trump from each state’s primary ballot for the 2024 election. Earlier, Colorado and Maine moved to disqualify the ex-president.
Jonathan Turley, a renowned US legal scholar, raised the red flag over Colorado’s Supreme Court decision to bar Trump from the 2024 election last month, stressing that the state’s justices “put this country on one of the most dangerous paths in its history.”
The unusual initiative is driven by Democrat politicians who decided to utilize Section 3 of the 14th Amendment, which says that any candidates who have engaged in acts of insurrection after vowing to defend the US Constitution should be barred from holding political office. The amendment was ratified in 1868. Now, the Dems are arguing that the January 6 riots were a full-fledged “insurrection” and that the law could be applied to the former president.
“In December 1865 many in Washington were shocked to see Alexander Stephens, the Confederacy’s onetime vice president, waiting to take the same oath that he took before joining the Southern rebellion,” Turley wrote on December 22. “So Congress declared that it could bar those ‘who have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof.’”
According to the legal expert, the January 6 events – no matter how bad they were – cannot be compared to the US Civil War (1861-1865) and qualified as an “insurrection.”
“It was a protest that became a riot, not a rebellion,” Turley highlighted, arguing that the Civil War-era amendment should not be used in this case.
He warned that the Colorado court’s undemocratic decision and clear defiance of the First Amendment could result in a domino effect “where red and blue states could now engage in tit-for-tat disqualifications.”
Turley’s concerns aren’t unjustified given that Democrats have decided to bar not only Trump, but all Republican candidates for Congress who have dared to question the fairness of the 2020 elections. Some Democratic lawmakers have called for the disqualification of up to 126 Republican colleagues as “insurrectionists.” What is especially chilling is that many have supported them.
Thus, on December 11, US Rep. Bill Pascrell, Jr. (D-NJ) called on House leaders to remove congressional lawmakers who were “supporting Donald Trump’s efforts to invalidate the 2020 presidential election.”
“Stated simply, men and women who would act to tear the United States government apart cannot serve as Members of the Congress. These lawsuits seeking to obliterate public confidence in our democratic system by invalidating the clear results of the 2020 presidential election undoubtedly attack the text and spirit of the Constitution, which each Member swears to support and defend,” claimed Pascrell, citing Section 3 of the 14th Amendment.
Rep. Cori Bush (D-Mo.) introduced a similar initiative which was supported by 63 Democratic co-sponsors, including Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Jamaal Bowman, Ritchie Torres, Ilhan Omar, and Rashida Tlaib.
Meanwhile, Turley drew attention to an obvious double-standard approach exercised by Democrats: previously, some of them have openly challenged and even sought to block certification of election results.
“Former Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) praised the effort then-Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) organized to challenge the certification of President George W. Bush’s 2004 re-election,” the legal scholar recalled on January 5, adding that Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) sought to block certification of the 2016 election result.
According to Turley, Democrats are increasingly using labels of “insurrectionists” and “Putin lovers” to cancel their political rivals, opponents, and even journalists. However, if the trend turns into some sort of a legal precedent, nothing would stop overzealous lawmakers from expanding this cancellation spree, according to the expert.
“That is why the [US] Supreme Court needs to take up this issue and put this pernicious theory to bed once and for all,” Turley concluded.
January 7, 2024
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance, Progressive Hypocrite | United States |
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When I read an article yesterday by a man named Edwin Rubis, I sat there, shook my head, and asked myself how any government could do such a thing to anyone.
The reason that Rubis’s article caught my attention is captured in the title of his article: “I’m Serving 40 Years in Federal Prison. Here’s a Glimpse Into My World.” That title intrigued me because I have often wondered what daily life is like for prison inmates. Do they sit around all day reading books? Do they work out? Do they have jobs inside the prison? What type of food do they eat? Are they constantly getting harassed by prison guards? Are they raped or beaten up by other inmates?
That “40 Years” in the title of the article also caught my attention. Imagine: 40 years in jail! As a former criminal-defense attorney, I figured that Rubis had most likely been convicted of a serious federal offense, such as bank robbery or kidnapping, perhaps even felony-murder.
Not so. After describing what his daily life in prison is like, Rubis included a tagline at the bottom of his article that stated that he was serving a 40-year jail sentence for a non-violent marijuana offense.
Yes, you read that right! 40 years! For … a … non-violent .. marijuana … offense.
That’s incredible. After all, we’re not talking Turkey or North Korea. We are talking about the United States.
40 years for a non-violent marijuana offense. Just let that sink in. Not heroin. Not cocaine. Not fentanyl. Not opioids. Just marijuana.
What would motivate any federal judge to issue such a horrific jail sentence for a non-violent marijuana offense? I did some online research but I could not find the name of the federal judge who issued that sentence. But whoever he is, he ought to hang his head in shame. In fact, if he’s still serving as a federal judge, he ought to resign his position and return to practicing law. It would be the right thing to do.
My research did reveal that Rubis was convicted in Houston of distribution of marijuana rather than possession.
Ever since the start of the war on drugs, possession of drugs has been considered less grave than distribution of drugs. But that always has been a ridiculous distinction. Both possession and distribution are entirely peaceful acts. Unless one is growing his own marijuana, in order to possess a drug, one must receive it. So, why should the one who is selling or delivering the drug be treated more harshly than one who receives or possesses the drug?
The purpose of meting out high jail sentences to marijuana distributors is to dissuade people from distributing drugs. If people are deterred from distributing drugs, the argument goes, then people won’t be able to consume or possess them.
How’s that working out for you drug warriors, including you federal judges who are convinced that you have the responsibility of helping “win” the war on drugs? I’m sure that that federal judge who meted out that 40-year jail sentence to Rubis figured that he was doing his part to “win” the war on drugs. That’s certainly what federal judges were doing back when I was practicing law on the U.S. Mexico Border back in the 1970s. It’s one thing for a judge in the 1970s to have such a mindset. But how in the world could later judges — and judges today — have that same mindset? Their obtuseness boggles the mind.
Edwin Rubin began serving his jail sentence in 1998. He’s been in jail for some 25 years. For a non-violent marijuana offense. He is set to be released in 2032.
How in the world can the American people permit this drug-war madness to continue? How many more lives must be destroyed before a nationwide crisis of conscience forces federal officials to bring it to an end?
January 5, 2024
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Subjugation - Torture | Human rights, United States |
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WASHINGTON – New York Attorney General Letitia James wants to make former president Donald Trump and his fellow defendants pay nearly $370 million for their alleged financial fraud, court documents filed on Friday showed.
“Defendants reaped hundreds of millions of dollars in ill-gotten gains through their unlawful conduct. Record evidence, including the substantively unrebutted testimony of Plaintiff’s banking expert Michiel McCarty, supports disgorgement of $370 million, plus pre-judgment interest,” New York Attorney General Letitia James argued in the filing.
Additionally, the attorney general asked for Trump and his co-defendants, including Allen Weisselberg and Jeffrey McConney, to be barred permanently from serving as officers or directors of any New York corporation.
“Lifetime injunctions barring Trump, Weisselberg and McConney from participating in the real estate industry in New York State or from serving as an officer or director of any New York corporation or other legal entity are necessary and appropriate,” the documents read.
Two of Trump’s sons, however, were offered a less stringent outcome, with the AG’s office asking for a five-year ban on participating in the real estate industry in the state of New York or serving as an officer or director of any New York corporation or legal entity.
The document, which spans almost 100 pages, proceeds to summarize evidence from court, including incidences when both Trump and his associates testified during trial.
James brought the civil fraud case against Trump and his associates for allegedly lying about the value of Trump properties.
Trump has consistently denied wrongdoing, characterizing the case as a political witch hunt to prevent his re-election. His attorneys have also argued in separate briefs that no fraud has occurred, instead blaming misstatements on accidental accounting errors.
The filing comes less than a week before closing arguments in the ongoing civil fraud trial are set to begin on January 11. Penalties are expected to be decided by the presiding judge some time afterward.
January 5, 2024
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties | United States |
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The time for tyranny has arrived, and this time, it’s unfortunately real. No government in Poland since 1989 has come as close to sliding into actual tyranny as the current one, nor has any other given itself such broad permission to become tyrannical. Moreover, none have been as effective in practically eliminating the safeguards that constrain them.
Let us start with a few questions.
Firstly, if the Law and Justice (PiS) party governed recklessly, what do we call the actions of their successors? Super-reckless? Turbo-reckless? Mega-turbo-reckless? Secondly, if PiS disregarded all “safeguards” or “minority rights,” where do ministers like Culture Minister Bartłomiej Sienkiewicz, responsible for the attack on public media, and Justice Minister Adam Bodnar stand on these issues? Serious suggestions only, please.
Thirdly, the previous regime was accused daily, both domestically and internationally, for eight long years of harboring an “authoritarian gene.” It was said that PiS would never relinquish power once gained, that they would not respect the election results, that they would imprison opponents, and strip the opposition of its last media strongholds. Those who do not remember should remind themselves, read up, watch again. How then, against the backdrop of these accusations, should we describe those who govern now?
How can we even comment on declarations like: “We are restoring constitutionality and looking for a legal basis to do it,” by Adam Bodnar? Or “Lawful is what we understand as lawful” by Donald Tusk? Or “The constitution is a trap that PiS sets for democracy,” as the academic lawyer and staunch PiS critic Wojciech Sadurski was kind enough to comment?
How can the constitution, the anchor of democracy, especially in its liberal interpretation as advocated by Sadurski, become a trap for democracy? It would be different if PiS had changed the constitution, stripping it of its power, sanctity, and authority.
But that didn’t happen. It’s the same fundamental law that Sadurski himself cited just a few months ago in his fight against PiS. Yesterday, it was his shield in the battle against democracy’s enemies. Today, it evidently chafes him (and the entire ruling camp). So, politicians circumvent it, and lawyer Sadurski loudly applauds them for it.
There are two options to consider: Are these people truly “democrats” as they have long pretended to be? Or did they only invoke democracy when it suited them? If so, who are they really?
The good news is that time will answer this last question. In the next few years, we will learn the true stance of the aforementioned individuals on democracy, rule of law, human rights, and freedom of speech. We will know them by their fruits. That is for sure.
Now, there are, broadly speaking, two potential scenarios. The first is an optimistic one. In this scenario, disenchanted sympathizers of the so-called democratic camp console themselves with the thought that this is just political theater — a reaction to years of humiliation. They hope that eventually, reason will prevail. The public television TVP, the Constitutional Tribunal and other PiS institutions will be cleansed, and all will be well. Right now, it might not look pretty, but peace will return to our land. And the current situation? At worst, Sienkiewicz, Bodnar, and the unfortunate liquidators of public media will serve as scapegoats, to be replaced by newer models.
Unfortunately, there’s also a second, more likely possibility. I hope I’m wrong, but I fear that the current rulers won’t be able to stop their anti-PiS crusade. The path of force, revenge and reckoning will be too easy, and the conviction of their moral righteousness too intoxicating. Then, it will be too late. There is no turning back from a web of lies, as one falsehood leads to another, creating increasingly complex structures where removing one element then threatens a collapse and loss of credibility. They must keep going and certainly not back down. On the contrary, full steam ahead.
This is already evident. Doubts about their media policy within their own camp are covered up with bold offensives on other fronts: the war against a president signaling readiness to compromise, or intrigues against the National Bank of Poland President Adam Glapiński. It’s an old and tested method, especially characteristic of authoritarian environments. There’s always some “last unconquered village of Gauls” to conquer before laying down their arms. But not before, oh no! There’s always some PiS remnant threatening a resurgence of PiS-ism. And so, the cycle continues.
Until the end.
This second path is all the more likely because the new power faces almost no oversight. PiS had powerful foreign adversaries: the European Union, liberal Western media, Soros’s network. At home, they faced a strong opposition, media friendly to it, and opinion-forming elites. Paradoxically, this served PiS. It kept them in check, ensuring that even if they had an authoritarian gene, it would be constantly fought against, never taking full control.
The anti-PiS doesn’t have any of these checks on its power. They won’t be watched by foreign powers or liberal media in conjunction with filmmaker Agnieszka Holland. And after taking over public media from PiS, there will be even fewer safeguards.
This is the tragedy of our new rulers. This is their curse. It already makes them tyrants — real tyrants and not the imagined ones they projected onto PiS. It also makes them extremely dangerous.
January 5, 2024
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance | European Union, Human rights, Poland |
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Governments and corporations around the world are showing great enthusiasm in either already implementing, or planning to implement some form of digital IDs.
As it turns out ironically, these efforts are presented to citizens as not only making their lives easier through convenience, but also making sure their personal data contained within these digital IDs is safer in a world teeming with malicious actors.
Opponents have been warning about serious privacy implications, but also argue against the claim that data security actually gets improved.
It would appear they are right – at least according to a report by a cybersecurity firm issued after the hacker attacks happening around the Christmas holiday, something that’s now been dubbed “Leaksmas.”
Not only governments, but hackers as well love digital IDs and huge amounts of personal information all neatly gathered in one place, and, judging by what’s been happening recently, in many instances, sitting there pretty much easily available to them.
And hackers have expressed this love by making digital ID data their primary focus, the firm, Resecurity, said in its report. Resecurity claims that this is a clear fact, and that it was able to discern it by analyzing data dumps once they started appearing on the dark web after the Christmas-time “digital smash-and-grabs.”
In numbers, a staggering 50 million records containing personally identifiable information have surfaced on the dark web. The reason so many stolen datasets have made it to the black digital market all at once appear to be “technicalities” related to the time window during which most of it will be “sellable”.
Breaking down that 50 million number, Resecurity said that 22 million records were stolen from a telecommunications company in Peru, which include what’s known there as DNIs – national IDs.
According to reports, it is hard to overestimate how devastating this event could be, if the DNIs end up in the wrong hands. It is the sole ID document recognized by the authorities in Peru for a range of things fundamental to people’s everyday life: “judicial, administrative, commercial and civil transactions,” as one article put it.
After Peru, other countries most affected are the Philippines, the US, France, and Vietnam.
January 4, 2024
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance | France, Human rights, United States |
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A US federal institution is getting dangerously close to advocating for restrictions on speech. We have learned a lot about this from the Twitter and Facebook Files, but this time pressure is expressed openly, albeit in a careful and subtle way.
The United States Institute of Peace (USIP), funded by Congress and promoting the country’s interests worldwide on the declared premise of opposing violent conflict, is now taking on the task of helping preserve election integrity by censoring speech.
In its post, USIP is careful not to talk about the elephant in the room, the US election, instead mentioning a number of other votes about to take place in 2024 across the planet.
But it’s easy to see how “recommendations” here – for public and private sector and think tanks to come together in fighting “election disinformation” – once having taken shape and once put in practice in, say, Taiwan or India, can easily be replicated at home.
We have heard this same narrative many times these last months, from many “disinformation warriors” from the ranks of US Democrats and aligned legacy media and NGOs – the year is supposed to be more important than any other around the world when it comes to elections, and, “disinformation,” “AI,” and technology in general (such as messaging apps and social sites) could represent serious threat vectors.
USIP calls this “unmanaged technology” – an interesting euphemism for technology that is not fully controlled. In order to “manage” technology, USIP wants to see “strong collaboration and planning” not only from civil society and what it refers as “peacebuilders” (highly likely counting itself among those) – but also tech companies, and governments.
USIP at the same time doesn’t exactly treat voters as adults capable of critical thinking, but instead says that if its warnings are not heeded and the said players don’t spring to action, election integrity will suffer from (the voters’) “increasing inability to discern fact from fiction.”
USIP mentions, as one of the ways to “address” election misinformation, what a nonprofit called Digital Action is doing – apparently an umbrella organization for as many as 180 civil society groups around the world.
“Digital Action seeks to hold social media companies and governments accountable to protect the integrity of elections,” writes USIP.
Maybe free speech advocates should keep an eye on Digital Action, and if necessary, hold it accountable.
January 4, 2024
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Deception | United States |
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Israel is the catalyst for a major loss of freedom
There is little appreciation inside the United States for the grave damage being inflicted on our country by President Joe Biden’s foreign policy being conducted through the mechanism of starting or sustaining a new war every year. The justifications provided by the White House, State Department and Pentagon are so vacuous that they have succeeded in creating a new low standard for the art of government lying. The country is burdened by unsustainable debt yet we have the so-called Secretary of the Treasury Janice Yellen declaring in October that another war beyond Ukraine, presumably to directly intervene supporting Israel in destroying Gaza, can “certainly” be afforded. And with the current US military build-ups near China and in the Middle East to confront Iran there presumably is enough gas in the tank to pick up on another conflict or two before Genocide Joe stands for reelection later this year.
But in spite of the damage to our economy, which is quite real, some of the gravest threats come from within, from the attacks delivered by special interest groups directed against our fundamental liberties. The most significant assaults have of late been directed against the First Amendment, freedom of speech, which is the bedrock of all the rights and which is currently being assailed continuously by that most protected of all protected groups, America’s Jewish and Israeli Lobby.
Hardly a minute of the day passes without a new article in the mainstream media about “surging antisemitism.” The journalists involved, most of whom are Jewish, hardly ever observe that Israel’s slaughtering of 30,000 Gazans, mostly women and children, just might have something to do with how the public is beginning to regard the behavior of the Jewish state and its leaders. What actually fuels public outrage that groups like the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) choose to regard as antisemitism is Israel slaughtering ten thousand children under a flag displaying the Star of David and stating its intention to continue the massacre until all the Palestinians have fled to other countries or been killed. We are talking of 2 million plus people but Israel’s friends in the US regard them as little more than “sub-humans” or “terrorists.”
The Jewish/Israel lobby in America does not forgive and forget. Witness the continuing attacks on America’s universities for not rolling over and purging all suspected antisemites among faculty and students. Liz Magill, the President of the University of Pennsylvania, resigned almost immediately after being interrogated by the US Congress and the multiple attacks began. Poor Claudine Gay, president of Harvard, hung on but eventually also resigned after she was subjected to near continuous harassment by Israel’s friends, including in the US Congress, because she, like her presidential colleagues, had not accepted that nearly all criticism of Israel in the context of Gaza is based on Jew-hatred, which she was apparently expected to assert. To no one’s surprise, in her resignation letter she was not even honest about who had brought her down, blaming it instead mostly on racism. The letter did not even include the words “Congress” or “Gaza” or “antisemitism” or even “Israel.” To be sure, Gay is not a top level academic and probably was an affirmative action hire but has anyone ever heard of a Congressional committee going after an academic for the sin of plagiarism before? The involvement of the phony claims of antisemitism and the desire to protect Israel are what has made the difference in this case and led to the intensity and persistence of the attacks.
Indeed, the ADL’s revolting director Jonathan Greenblatt is demanding that there be more “consequences” for “antisemites on campus” and the media is hot on the story. Sally Kornbluth, President of Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), who has not resigned after the ridiculous encounter of the three presidents with Congress is still being hotly pursued by that body. Also engaged in the hunt are the many US Government entities whose sole task is to root out antisemites and holocaust deniers. The Department of Justice, headed of course by Jewish Attorney General Merrick Garland nee Garfinkel, is reportedly investigating a number of leading universities including Tulane and Rutgers for failure to “protect the civil rights of Jewish students.” It is a typical pattern where Jewish officials investigate alleged crimes against other Jews and come up with a predictable conclusion.
The universities are scrambling to comply with the government demands to get tough with alleged antisemites. At Columbia University, for example, certain slogans and chants used by Palestinian students have been banned and blocked, but there is no corresponding interference with Jewish student activities. Professor Rashid Khalidi has written a response to the university administration saying:
“Our deans state that the Columbia community should acknowledge ‘that hearing chanted phrases such as ‘by any means necessary,’ ‘from the river to the sea,’ or calls for an ‘intifada’—irrespective of intentions and provenance—is experienced by many Jewish, Israeli, and other members of our community as antisemitic and deeply hurtful. They have thus unilaterally decided that no one should rise up [the actual meaning of ‘intifada’] against 56 years of illegal military occupation; that Palestine should remain unfree from the river to the sea; and that the oppressed should take permission from the oppressor as to the means to relieve their oppression. They have come to this decision because hearing otherwise is ‘antisemitic and deeply hurtful’ to some. This statement amounts to a new norm that prohibits using or learning about these terms and their histories, in favor of the privileging of a politics of feeling. While perhaps appropriate to a kindergarten, it is hard to imagine an approach more contrary to the most basic idea of a university. This statement is characteristic of a university that picks a task force nearly devoid of expertise on antisemitism and on Palestine/Israel (much of which exists among the faculty), but packed with outspoken advocates for Israel, a university that has decided that faculty expertise on freedom of speech or on language to be proscribed should be rigorously excluded from deliberations on such issues. With complete disregard for the principle of faculty governance, crucial matters like these are being decided upon by administrators, presumably with hefty input from trustees, donors and politicians, who have negligible expertise, but robust and one-sided opinions.”
Khalidi might also have observed how pro-Israel groups at colleges are compiling and blacklisting names of student-critics of the Gaza situation so they can be denied jobs after they graduate. And beyond the damage done to freedom of speech and critical thinking at the universities there are already plenty of other possible consequences for those who are choosing to speak up about the atrocities that are underway but they only appear to apply to Palestinian and antiwar groups that are demonstrating against Israel’s ethnic cleansing of the Gazans. Ambitious politician wannabe Ron DeSantis, governor of Florida was one of the first to respond, banning Palestinian groups at all state universities due to their alleged “antisemitism.” He did not ban or even criticize a single Jewish group for cheerleading the slaughter of the Palestinians. And this has been the pattern elsewhere with the banning or denying of facilities to Palestinian and antiwar groups, but leaving Hillel and other Jewish groups alone no matter what they do. Is that freedom of speech? Of course not, but it is a measure of who has power in the United States and who does not. Speak ill of whomever you choose but leave Israel alone or you will be in real trouble!
And protecting Israel also extends to the punishing of supporters of completely nonviolent action, like boycotting or divesting from Israeli products to put pressure on the Benjamin Netanyahu regime. If you belong to a group that opposes Israeli policies you could be denied goods and services for that fact alone. In more than thirty states one can be compelled, for example, to sign an agreement not to support any action against Israel if one wants a job or government services. This special arrangement is unique to Israel and there are also special trade missions often manned by American Jews or Israelis, including in my state Virginia, which create special investment opportunities for Israel that do not exist for any other country.
But perhaps the most insidious attempt to complete America’s falling under the control of Israel-thinks is what is taking place in lower-to-mid level public education. Many school districts and even state educational boards require courses in the horrors of antisemitism and the so-called holocaust. The courses are, of course, being pushed most ardently by Jews and by select Evangelicals who are sitting around waiting for the Second Coming, a prophecy that involves in their minds the return of Jews to the Holy Land as a prerequisite. Senator Jacky Rosen of Nevada, who is, of course, Jewish, has just introduced legislation called the “Never Again Education Act,” which has an impact nationwide. The “Never Again Education Act” was first introduced in July of 2019 before passing in the House in January 2020 with 300 co-sponsors and in the Senate in May 2020. As it is set to expire in 2025, Senator Rosen is looking to have the Act reapproved to extend it to 2030 to “provide funding for training and lessons on the ethnic cleansing of Jews.”
The problem with the Act is that it rests on a contrived narrative that is essentially political in nature, including as it does many non-historical and even fabricated assertions about what took place in the 1930s and 1940s. The Act is intended to bestow on Jews a special victimhood that in turn conveys on them and on Israel exemption from normal rules regarding their behavior. It, of course, is part of the narrative that is giving Netanyahu and his rogues a more-or-less free pass from the US for their crimes against humanity against the Palestinians.
So the America we once knew is under siege. Free speech is being eroded and will soon be subject to criminal penalties if one says the wrong thing about Israel. This is intolerable and one prays that the American people will have its own “intifada” and wake up to the new infamy and put an end to it.
Philip M. Giraldi, Ph.D., is Executive Director of the Council for the National Interest, a 501(c)3 tax deductible educational foundation (Federal ID Number #52-1739023) that seeks a more interests-based U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East. Website is councilforthenationalinterest.org, address is P.O. Box 2157, Purcellville VA 20134 and its email is inform@cnionline.org.
January 4, 2024
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Full Spectrum Dominance | Human rights, Israel, Palestine, United States, Zionism |
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