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No US Presidential Election in 2024

The Automatic Earth | August 11, 2023

In January 2023, US special counsel Jack Smith applied for -and received- a subpoena for Twitter, specifically for all of Donald Trump’s utterances at the site through the years, including the ones he may have never published. Note: the subpoena came long after Trump left Twitter. And no, it wasn’t X then, and therefore it is not now. He wrote it when it was Twitter. Important. Trump left Twitter (was cancelled) on Jan 8 2021, Elon Musk bought it on October 27 2022, and renamed it “X” in late July 2023. Just so we get our horses and dogs in line.

Special counsel Jack Smith received his Twitter/Trump subpoena with the added provision that it had to be entirely secret, not even Twitter or Trump could know. US District Court Judge Beryll Howell gave Smith what he wanted, agreeing that if Trump’s years-old Twitter past was known, he would become a flight risk. But both Smith and Howell knew this was absolute nonsense. Not only is Twitter the last place you turn to when you have nefarious secrets to hide (it’s the opposite!), but the man is running for President, for God’s sake! And because of some 5 year old -or so- tweets he would pack in the family and disappear to an -underground- bungalow on Vanatua, never to be heard from again?

I would put this down as the moment when it became impossible for the US to have a presidential election in 2024. We’ve had some 8 years of this anti-Trump circus now, non-stop, Hillary, Pelosi, Adam Schiff and Robert Mueller, yada yada yada, but I don’t think we’ve reached the point before where the elections might as well be cancelled. We’re there now though. And that is a BIG point. We’ve let it come far too far. We’re in slapstick territory.

Think of it as a boxing match. In the one corner, we have the former champion/president, wearing the slightly widened red trunks. At age 77, he looks somewhat bruised and battered, but he doesn’t look beaten- yet. What’s noticeable though is that his corner is empty, except for Melania cleaning his brow, not even his own party is there to support him. There are some 90 million Americans behind him, but they are at home.

In the other corner, the defending champion, in blue trunks, weighing in at about 25 pounds and falling, looks a little lost. But behind him in his corner he has thousands of operatives: his entire party, plus the CIA and NSA and FBI and DOJ. And all the newspapers and TV channels and social media in the country. And all the judges and prosecutors, the DAs and GAs, it’s a veritable love-in. The guy in the blue trunks could be braindead and he’d still win. And I wish I was a cartoonist, and could capture the entire image in one frame. I can see it in front of my eyes, but I can’t draw it.

Where the boxing analogy goes astray is that in this case the blue side is allowed to harass the red side before, during and after the (preparations for) the fight, and during the fight itself. You can’t a have a free and fair fight, and a level playing field, if some “blue operatives” can put shackles on the ankles and wrists of the red candidate, or even lock him up while he’s preparing for the bell to ring. If the system allows him to be a candidate, it must also allow him to prepare for his candidacy, in the same way that his opponent can. That is not happening.

US special counsel Jack Smith has announced that the US plans to drag Trump before court after court starting January 2 2024. At least 3 major indictments (will be a dozen) , likely many more, and at my last count, 82 charges (it’s impossible to keep up). Smith can then finger pick any of these charges to put Trump in custody, whenever he feels like it. The judges are almost all “blue”, and so are the jury pools: New York and DC. And this is while he’s supposed to be campaigning!

And also: Trump allegedly already spent $40 million on legal expenses. But what if Trump doesn’t have $40 million? We could argue the $40 million should be spent on his campaign. Look at Imran Khan, guys, who was just convicted to a 3-year prison term in Pakistan on US directives. Like Trump, he is the most popular political candidate in his nation, and they got him on selling necklaces when he was PM.

That is Trump’s future too. And hence, the end of American democracy. He doesn’t stand a chance. And if he doesn’t, the system doesn’t, and you don’t. You’re fine as long as you agree with the boot stomping on your neck, and you maybe even enjoy it. But if you don’t, Jack Smith and his ilk – and Obama, Hillary, Adam Schiff, Pelosi, the whole gang, will come with charges and indictments directed at you.

You’re on the verge of the abyss. if you want to take your chances with what you might find down there, fair enough. But always know that you have a choice. And that, if somehow they do manage to stage a presidential election in November 2024 as things stand now, it’ll be fake from A to Z. Grow a pair, people, grow a backbone. You’re going to need them.

August 12, 2023 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance | , , , , | Leave a comment

AZ Governor Katie Hobbs Asked Twitter To Censor Her Critics, Emails Show

By Christina Maas | Reclaim The Net | August 11, 2023

In a controversial blend of politics and social media censorship, it has been revealed that Democratic Arizona Governor Katie Hobbs has intervened with Twitter, now X, in an effort to silence critics of her tweet where she equated Trump supporters to neo-Nazis. This revelation raises critical concerns about free speech and political bias in the era of Big Tech censorship.

Hobbs had targeted Trump and his supporter base in a contentious 2017 tweet during her tenure in the Arizona state legislature. “Trump has made it abundantly clear he’s more interested in pandering to his neo-nazi base than being president for all Americans,” she stated, an assertion that drew widespread condemnation from her digital audience. This criticism wasn’t taken lightly by Hobbs, who ascended into her role as Arizona secretary of state while these contentious debates raged on.

Hobbs’ contentious social media posting subsequently ignited debates over her impartiality in administering elections, upon which the Democratic leader demanded the censorship of online judgments against her.

Leaked emails confirmed by Arizona Capitol Oversight, a conservative political entity, revealed Hobbs officially contacted Twitter in November 2020 to sanction her online critics.

However, when Twitter demanded further details to justify Hobbs’ request, she was unable to produce the required evidence. Instead, she laid claim to being “harassed” by political opponents for her comments labeling them as Nazis. Hobbs went on to argue that they had weaponized a three-year-old tweet to spread threatening messages.

Despite countless appeals for responses from X and Hobbs regarding the censorship requests, reactions have yet to surface. In the shadow of these unfolding revelations, there is mounting evidence that many more federal departments than expected could be deliberately downplaying their engagement in online censorship.

August 12, 2023 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance | | Leave a comment

Free Speech To The Supreme Court — And Beyond!

Historic Missouri v. Biden Censorship Lawsuit Likely Headed To Supreme Court

BY ALEX GUTENTAG | PUBLIC | AUGUST 11, 2023

Yesterday the Fifth Circuit court heard oral arguments in the Missouri v. Biden case, and the judges did not hold back. One judge suggested the government “strongarms” social media companies and that their meetings had included “veiled and not-so-veiled threats.”

Another judge described the exchange between the Biden administration and tech companies as the government saying, “Jump!” and the companies responding, “How high?”

“That’s a really nice social media company you got there. It’d be a shame if something happened to it,” the judge said, describing the government’s coercive tactics.

Attorney John Sauer, representing Louisiana, masterfully argued that the government had repeatedly violated the First Amendment. He pointed to specific evidence of coercion in the Facebook Files.

“You have a really interesting snapshot into what Facebook C-suite is saying,” Sauer explained. “They’re emailing Mark Zuckerberg and Sheryl Sandberg and saying things like… ‘Why were we taking out speech about the origins of covid and the lab leak theory?’” The response, Sauer said, was, “Well, we shouldn’t have done it, but we’re under pressure from the administration.”

He also cited an email from Nick Clegg, Facebook President of Global Affairs, that pointed to “bigger fish to fry with the Administration – data flows, etc.”

On Monday, Public reported that these “data flows” referred to leverage the Biden administration had over the company; Facebook needed the White House to negotiate a deal with the European Union. Only through this deal could Facebook maintain access to user data that is crucial for its $1.2 billion annual European business.

But Sauer also made it clear that coercion was not the only basis on which the court could rule against the Biden administration. Joint activity between the White House and social media platforms would also be unconstitutional.

Sauer compared what the government had done to book burning. “Imagine a scenario where senior White House staffers contact book publishers… and tell them, ‘We want to have a book burning program, and we want to help you implement this program… We want to identify for you the books that we want burned, and by the way, the books that we want burned are the books that criticize the administration and its policies.”

Daniel Tenny, the attorney for the Department of Justice, was left nitpicking and misrepresenting the record. In one instance, he denied that Anthony Fauci and Francis Collins had hatched a plan to orchestrate a “takedown” of the Great Barrington Declaration. Why? Because, Tenny said, according to their emails, they actually planned a takedown of “the premises of the Great Barrington Declaration.”

Tenny also stated that social media companies had not removed any true content. From the case’s discovery as well as the Facebook Files we know that is far from true. Facebook, against internal research and advicedid remove “often-true content” that might discourage people from getting vaccinated. Facebook’s own emails clearly suggest that the company only did this due to pressure from figures within the Biden Administration.

Tenny also claimed that when Rob Flaherty, the White House director of Digital Strategy, dropped the F-bomb in an exchange with Facebook it was not about content moderation. In fact, it was precisely about content moderation and occurred during a conversation about how Instagram was throttling Biden’s account. Ironically, the account couldn’t gain followers because Meta’s algorithm had determined that it was spreading vaccine misinformation.

Later, Sauer demolished an earthquake hypothetical that Tenny had introduced to justify state-sponsored censorship. “You can say this earthquake-related speech that’s disinformation is false, it’s wrong,” Sauer said. “The government can say it’s bad, but the government can’t say, ‘Social media platforms, you need to take it down.’ Just like a government can’t stand at the podium and say, ‘Barnes and Noble, you need to burn the bad books, burn the Communist books, whatever it is.’ They can’t say take down speech on the basis of content.”

Based on this hearing, the plaintiffs in Missouri v. Biden may have a strong chance of winning. Biden’s DOJ simply had no valid arguments to present. The evidence is clear: the administration brazenly engaged in an unlawful censorship campaign and instrumentalized private companies to do its bidding. This total disregard for fundamental civil liberties will be a stain on the Democratic Party for years to come.

The Supreme Court will be the supreme victory in the US, but our free speech work won’t be done after we win there. No nation enjoys free speech protections like ours. And so, after we win in the US, you can expect to see us helping our allies abroad achieve similar protections from government strongarming, aka censorship, in their own nations.

August 12, 2023 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance, Science and Pseudo-Science | , | Leave a comment

Maine Hospital That Fired Unvaccinated Nurses Over Mills’ Mandate Is Begging Them to Return Two Years Later

By Steve Robinson | Maine Wire |August 9, 2023

Nurses and other health care workers at MaineGeneral Health, one of Maine’s largest healthcare providers, were unceremoniously fired two years ago if they refused to take the experimental mRNA injections touted as COVID-19 preventatives.

Some of those workers were even slapped with misconduct charges for refusing to comply with the mandate, many were later denied unemployment benefits, and no requests for religious exemptions were honored.

Now, one of the nonprofit hospitals that left some employees jobless and without recourse to Maine’s unemployment insurance benefits is sending text messages to the same employees it cast aside practically begging them to come back to work.

“You were once a proud member of the MaineGeneral team. Would you consider rejoining us? We would be pleased to discuss options with you,” the MaineGeneral Health Recruitment team said in a text message to former registered nurse Terry Poland.

“As you know, nearly 2 years ago MaineGeneral had to comply with a state mandate for COVID-19 vaccination. We lost a number of great employees as a result, including you,” MaineGeneral said.

“MaineGeneral has eliminated the COVID-19 vaccination as an employment condition,” MaineGeneral said.

Poland, who lives in Augusta, had worked as a registered nurse for 33 years. Her career included employment with MaineGeneral, Central Maine Medical Center, Pen Bay Medical Center, and the Aroostook Medical Center.

She couldn’t believe that the hospital would contact her in such a manner after casting her life into chaos for nearly two years.

“I was livid. Like, how dare you force me out of a career that I’ve dedicated my whole life to, taken away my livelihood, my ability to earn a good income, and now you think I’m gonna come grovel back to you?” Poland said. “I don’t hardly think so. And that’s the attitude of most everybody that I’ve been in contact with since yesterday.”

A source told the Maine Wire that about 15 former MaineGeneral Health employees received similar text messages.

Poland refused to take the experimental COVID-19 shots after Gov. Janet Mills decreed on August 12, 2021 that healthcare workers would be forced to receive the shots as a condition of working in healthcare by October 1, 2021.

Documents reviewed by the Maine Wire show that MaineGeneral established a speedier timeline of Sept. 17 for compliance.

Eventually, the State pushed back the deadline to the end of October.

Poland was never opposed to vaccines generally speaking. Though she previously used a religious exemption to avoid taking an influenza shot, she willingly took the other vaccines required to work in healthcare prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, including immunizations for Measles, Mumps, Rubella, and Hepatitis-B.

She said she was concerned about the novel nature of the mRNA technology, a form of gene therapy, which prior to COVID-19 had not been used in the standard schedule of immunizations.

“I knew enough not to take it. I’ve been a nurse long enough to know I need to question what new products are,” Poland said. “I’m not going to be the first one to jump on board of an experiment.”

When she discovered that fetal tissues are commonly used in the development and production of the drugs, that only strengthened her resolve as a Christian not to get the injections.

In previous years, Poland has said she was allowed an exemption from taking the influenza shot so long as she wore a mask during flu season. However, the hospital was unwilling to provide this accommodation for COVID-19.

As a result of her choice, Poland faced not only termination, but also an allegation of misconduct from her former employer.

When she applied for unemployment benefits, she was rejected because of the misconduct allegation.

When she appealed, she was turned away.

Documents reviewed by the Maine Wire show that the Maine Department of Labor determined that MaineGeneral Health “discharged” her; however, the agency concluded that Poland’s refusal to get the injections was a violation that constituted a “culpable breach of obligations to the employer.”

As a result, Poland had to rely on her savings to get by in the middle of economically disastrous government lockdowns and soaring inflation.

Poland then sought help from the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, claiming that she’d been discriminated against on the basis of her religious beliefs.

MaineGeneral Health, in responding to the commission, argued that allowing Poland religious accommodations would impose an “undue hardship” on the hospital. On that basis, the commission declined to take on her case.

The Maine Human Rights Commission also rejected her discrimination complaint.

“[T]here has been positive energy between human resource personnel and managers who are in the process of working together to reach out to former employees to see if they are interested in returning,” said Joy McKenna, director of communications for MaineGeneral, in an email.

“Since Monday, we are only aware of a few people who have indicated that they are interested in having a conversation about applying for an open position,” she said. “We currently have 453 open positions, which is similar to our pre-COVID open position count.”

McKenna said the hospital did not intentionally fire unvaccinated employees in a way that would block them from getting unemployment benefits.

Some of those positions have been filled by foreign nationals with greencards, McKenna said, though she was not able to provide an exact number on Wednesday.

At the time MaineGeneral fired her, Poland was working at the MaineGeneral Rehabilitation and Long Term Care at Gray Birch facility in Augusta.

The facility provides nursing home and assisted living services and has a 37-bed capacity. Federal stats show the facility had 141 staff before the mandate and 110 after it was enforced.

In the years since she was fired, she estimates she’s earned only $12,000 and $17,000 as a home healthcare worker, a position that hasn’t provided similar benefits to the job she lost.

As a registered nurse, Poland was making about $75,000 per year.

She’s still not willing to give MaineGeneral another shot.

Poland is not the only one whose career was derailed by Gov. Mills’ mandate policy.

Jessie Boda worked for St. Mary’s Health System as a registered nurse in Psychiatric and Detox services for 13 years, her first job out of college.

When the mandate came down, she applied for a religious exemption.

In her letter requesting the exemption, Boda pointed to her religious faith and her concern over adverse vaccine reactions.

She also pointed out that natural immunity from a COVID-19 infection was in some cases a better protection against contracting the virus.

St. Mary’s, which has a formal affiliation with the Catholic Church, denied the request.

Like MaineGeneral, St. Mary’s also found a way for Boda’s exit from the company to prevent her from getting unemployment benefits.

“I did not comply and I never submitted a letter of resignation. Nor would they give me a letter of termination,” Boda said.

“The kind lady in the HR office gave me a letter stating my start date and end date of employment but told me she could not use the words ‘terminated’ or ‘fired’,” she said.

Boda took her case to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, which agreed to investigate her case but concluded there was no grounds for the complaint.

Kevin Palmer worked as a credentialing coordinator for Southern Maine Health Care, the Biddeford location of MaineHealth.

Palmer, who is in his 30s, was never opposed to taking vaccines before COVID-19, but he was skeptical of what he saw as a rushed process to roll out the COVID-19 shots.

“I had heart surgery in high school, survived brain cancer in my 20s, and now they’re telling me I have to get this shot over a virus with a 99.99 percent survival rate?” he said.

Like Boda and Poland, Palmer sought a religious exemption and was denied.

Like Boda and Poland, Palmer was fired in a way that later prevented him from obtaining unemployment.

In his termination letter, the HR department wrote: “This is also to confirm that September 30 will be your last day of employment. We want to thank you for your service.”

Even though the hospital gave him an employment date in an email, the Maine Department of Labor ruled against him.

“I never got a penny,” Palmer said.

He wasn’t able to find another job until four months later and the job he eventually found came with a 20 percent pay cut.

“I ran out of money like everybody else. It was crazy. I was trying to apply to jobs, similar to what I had done in credentialing. And I couldn’t even get a job with with the experience I had because they were mandating the vaccine even for remote positions,” said Palmer.

“How crazy is that?” he said.

A Healthcare Worker Crisis Caused by Authoritarian Policies

Thousands of former healthcare workers in Maine are currently unemployed or working in other fields because they refused to comply with Gov. Mills’ order that they receive injections.

Some refused because they were skeptical of all vaccines or because of religious beliefs concerning the ethical problems with vaccine research that uses fetal tissue.

Others were fearful that the long-term consequences of the experimental products were unknown, unknowable, and potentially harmful.

But in every case, the substantial drop in employment in Maine’s healthcare sector because of the mandate has severely exacerbated a workforce shortage that threatens to undermine healthcare quality in the state.

Text messages like the one Poland received will hardly fix the problem.

It’s virtually impossible to determine how much of the sharp drop in healthcare employment has been caused by Mills’ order, how much of it was caused by COVID-19, and how much of it was caused by lockdown policies generally.

Regardless, labor statistics show Maine is in the middle of the steepest decline in healthcare jobs. Ever.

According to stats from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, those losses have been particularly acute in Maine’s nursing homes and assisted living facilities, like the facility where Poland worked.

In 2019, Maine had more than 22,600 individuals employed at nursing homes.

That number hit 19,800 in 2022.

At skilled nursing facilities, employment dropped from 8,426 in 2019 to 6,907 in 2022, according to Maine Department of Labor statistics.

The shortage of long-term care workers is all the more severe in Maine since the state consistently ranks as the oldest in the nation. As demand for nursing home beds increases, the number of workers available to provide that care has plummeted.

In home healthcare, total employment has declined from 4,401 workers in 2019 to 4,054 in 2022.

The same shortage can be seen in employment figures for hospitals in Maine. Mainers working in Maine hospitals declined from 33,000 in 2019 to 30,900 in 2021, according to federal statistics.

Even as Maine’s opioid epidemic has continued to break records for overdoses and deaths, the number people employed in the health sector that includes substance abuse facilities has declined from 7,509 workers in 2019 to 7,149 in 2022, according to Maine Department of Labor numbers.

One health care area that hasn’t seen such sharp declines is ambulatory health care, which includes facilities that are out-patient only, such as urgent care clinics and dentists offices.

At the same time the medical field is suffering from a lack of employees, Mainers have never spent more money on their health care.

Personal consumption of outpatient and in-home care topped $11,897,000,000 in 2021, according to the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis. That’s a massive increase over the $11.2 billion reported for 2019.

At least some of that money is making its way into the pockets of Maine’s remaining health care workers. According to federal stats, Mainers who work in health care or social assistance made a record $7,028,362,000 in collective wages — the highest ever in Maine history.

Vaccine Mandate Victims Seek Discrimination Case

Gov. Mills’ mandate was based on the theory that the pharmaceutical products being touted as “vaccines” or “immunizations” would prevent healthcare workers from contracting the virus or transmitting it to patients.

It’s now generally understood that the vaccine never inhibited transmission of the virus.

Mills, who has followed the recommended injection schedule, has herself caught COVID-19 twice despite getting the jabs.

The Aug. 3 decision by the Mills Administration to rescind the mandate after nearly two years followed on the heels of an embarrassing legal defeat in a case challenging the constitutionality of Mills’ decision to eliminate religious and philosophical exemptions from the mandate.

That court case hinges on the fact that Mills continued to allow medical exemptions while denying a comparable exemption for medical reasons.

Although the plaintiffs in that case, several healthcare workers who lost their jobs over the mandate, initially lost in Maine District Court, an appeals court panel has determined that the lower court erred when it rejected their claim of religious discrimination.

In May, when that decision came down, Matt Staver, who represents the plaintiffs via Liberty Counsel, said he was looking forward to discovery.

“We’re frankly looking very much forward to going to discovery and holding Governor mills and the Maine authorities accountable for this terrible and, frankly, unconstitutional decision,” said Staver.

[RELATED: Appeals Court Rules Against Gov. Mills in Case Challenging Vaccine Mandate for Health Care Workers…]

August 11, 2023 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Science and Pseudo-Science | , , | Leave a comment

X CEO Linda Yaccarino: “Lawful But Awful” Content To Be Hidden

Who gets to decide what’s awful?

By Christina Maas | Reclaim The Net | August 10, 2023

Linda Yaccarino, X CEO and a former NBC advertising executive, underscored her autonomy in managing the day-to-day operations of X, previously known as Twitter, and shed some light on the shadowbanning operation at Twitter.

Appointed CEO by Elon Musk, she reasserted her independence from the entrepreneur, placing him firmly in a tech-based role. Her remarks have reignited debates surrounding freedom of speech and the direction online platforms should take in moderating content.

During a CNBC interview, Yaccarino discussed the demarcation of duties between herself and Musk, with the latter focusing on “product design” and leading “a team of extraordinary engineers [focusing] on new technology.”

However, it is her stance on the website’s content policies that has raised eyebrows among free speech enthusiasts.

In clarifying X’s approach to moderation, Yaccarino introduced the concept of “freedom of speech, not freedom of reach,” a policy where users, when posting narratives that are not in line with approved standards, are labeled, possibly demonetized for that content, and have their visibility reduced on the platform.

“If it is lawful but it’s awful, it’s extraordinarily difficult for you to see it,” she remarked, insinuating that even legally permissible content might be obscured if deemed undesirable by the company.

Some free speech advocates are concerned that this strategy of content labeling and demotion can quickly escalate into censorship. They argue that the distinction between “awful” and “lawful” is often a subjective one and fear the potential for misuse.

The decisions and comments made by Yaccarino might seem like a strict stance against divisive or hurtful rhetoric but critics may see it as an alarming move away from the ethos of open dialogue and free speech.

Video interview

August 10, 2023 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance | | Leave a comment

FBI Memo Linking Catholic Faith to ‘Extremists’ Drafted by Several Offices – GOP Lawmakers

By Fantine Gardinier – Sputnik – 10.08.2023

House GOP lawmakers have blasted the FBI director for “inconsistencies” in his testimony after he claimed that a report from the bureau’s Richmond, Virginia, field office identifying “radical traditionalist Catholic ideology” as a potential source of “violent extremism” was an isolated incident. They say that new evidence suggests otherwise.

In a Wednesday letter to FBI Director Christopher Wray that was published by US media, US Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH), who chairs the House Judiciary Committee, and Rep. Mike Johnson (R-LA), who chairs the Subcommittee on the Constitution and Limited Government, requested a slew of bureau documents related to communications between FBI field offices in Richmond, Virginia; Portland, Oregon; and Los Angeles, California.

“From information recently produced to the Committee, we now know that the FBI relied on information from around the country – including a liaison contact in the FBI’s Portland Field Office and reporting from the FBI’s Los Angeles Field Office – to develop its assessment,” they wrote.

“This new information suggests that the FBI’s use of its law enforcement capabilities to intrude on American’s First Amendment rights is more widespread than initially suspected and reveals inconsistencies with your previous testimony before the Committee,” they lawmakers said. “Given this startling new information, we write to request additional information to advance our oversight.”

They noted that in his testimony before the committee last month, Wray claimed that a January 2023 memo on the potential of right-wing activists motivated by “radical traditionalist Catholic ideology” to pose a violent threat to certain minority groups had been the sole product of the field office in Richmond, the Virginia state capital.

The memo, which was leaked to the press in February, said the office had received a tip from a local informant leading them to believe in an “increasingly observed interest of racially or ethnically motivated violent extremists (RMVEs) in radical-traditionalist Catholic (RTC) ideology.” This, they said, was especially associated with the sect of Catholics who rejected the reforms of the Second Vatican Council in 1965 and with “white supremacist ideology.”

This threat, they said, “presents opportunities for threat mitigation through the exploration of new avenues for tripwire and source development.”

Notably, the unredacted parts of the document do not contain the words “potential terrorists,” as reported in some parts of the American press.

In response to the lawmakers’ letter, the FBI gave a statement to US media on Wednesday doubling down on Wray’s testimony, saying the lawmakers had become confused by similar terminologies used by multiple FBI field offices.
“Director Wray’s testimony on this matter has been accurate and consistent. While the document referred to information from other field office investigations of Racially or Ethnically Motivated Violent Extremist (RMVE) subjects, that does not change the fact the product was produced by a single office,” the statement said.

“To be clear, the document was a domain perspective which is an intelligence product designed to address potential threats in a particular area – in this case, the Richmond Field Office’s area of responsibility,” the bureau continued. “Because the product failed to meet FBI standards, it was quickly removed from all FBI systems and a review was launched to determine how it was produced in the first place.”

The situation has revived anger at the FBI for its wiretapping activities and profiling of religious groups, for which the bureau became notorious after spying on American Muslims in the wake of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

However, conservatives especially have accused the FBI of political bias for years, pointing to its investigation of Donald Trump’s presidential campaign in the months preceding the 2016 presidential election and its August 2022 raid on Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate to serve a search and seizure warrant for hundreds of classified files Trump did not return to the National Archives after leaving office. The former president is facing dozens of criminal charges related to alleged mishandling of the secret files.

August 10, 2023 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Deception, Islamophobia | , , | Leave a comment

Ukrainian Orthodox Christian Priest Sentenced to 5 Years in Prison by Zelensky Regime

By Chris Menahan | InformationLiberation | August 8, 2023

A Ukrainian Orthodox Christian priest was sentenced to 5 years in prison on Monday after being accused of “justifying” Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

From OrthoChristian, “UKRAINIAN HIERARCH SENTENCED TO 5 YEARS IN PRISON”:

A hierarch of the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church has been sentenced to 5 years imprisonment and the confiscation of property for various supposed crimes against the state.

His Eminence Metropolitan Jonathan of Tulchin was sentenced in a Vinnitsa Court today, reports the Tulchin Diocese.

[…] His Eminence has repeatedly denied all charges against him and will file an appeal “against the clearly illegal verdict of the Vinnitsa City Court.”

Met. Jonathan was found guilty of crimes under four articles of the criminal code:

  • justification, recognition as lawful, denial of the armed aggression of the Russian Federation against Ukraine, glorification of its participants
  • actions aimed at forcibly changing or overthrowing the constitutional order or seizing state power
  • encroachment on the territorial integrity and inviolability of Ukraine, distribution of materials calling for changing the borders of the territory and state border of Ukraine
  • violation of equal rights of citizens depending on their race, nationality, regional affiliation, religious beliefs, disability, and other grounds

The state persecution of Met. Jonathan has been going on for nearly a year already, beginning with the search of his home last October, during which the Ukrainian Security Service claims to have found “pro-Kremlin” leaflets.

His Eminence even had to undergo open-heart surgery last November, in the midst of the state persecution against him.

Zelensky seized control of the mediarounded up his opposition en masse and is now talking about suspending Ukraine’s elections under martial law.

“If we have martial law, we cannot have elections,” Zelensky told the Washington Post in May. “The constitution prohibits any elections during martial law. If there is no martial law, then there will be.”

Follow InformationLiberation on TwitterFacebookGabMinds and Telegram.

August 9, 2023 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance | | Leave a comment

Estonian social crisis worsening

By Lucas Leiroz | August 8, 2023

Estonia is in serious trouble due to its irrational stance in the current NATO proxy conflict with Russia. Simultaneously focused on meeting Ukrainian humanitarian demands and the war plans of the Atlantic alliance, the Estonian government virtually excludes its own people from national priorities, which resulted in the aggravation of the internal crisis. Uncontrolled immigration, deindustrialization, economic instability and rising living costs are some of the problems that currently affect the country – and that will continue to do so if the government does not take a sovereign attitude.

Committed to helping solve the Ukrainian humanitarian issue, Estonia has been receiving thousands of refugees every day. Last year, the country received more than 115,000 Ukrainians – 62,000 of them planning to stay there permanently. This year, it is estimated that 300 to 400 Ukrainians are applying for Estonian asylum every week. Not all migrants are really in need of humanitarian aid due to the impact of the conflict. Many of the Ukrainian citizens in Estonia are men of military age who should be on the battlefield according to Kiev’s law, but who fled the country to escape the war.

Despite Kiev’s forced recruitment system being dictatorial and unacceptable, Estonia has no humanitarian obligation to receive people who are simply fleeing their military duties. These refugees get help from the Estonian government, and their stay in the country is subsidized by local taxpayers. So, it would be legitimate for Tallinn to have stricter guidelines on who to welcome into its territory – but it does not. In practice, any Ukrainian can enter the country, and the government remains silent, given its irrationally “humanitarian” stance, which prioritizes foreign citizens over nationals.

The Estonian state’s efforts to receive these refugees have been extremely expensive. In the first quarter of 2023 alone, Estonia spent more than 25 million euros on costs related to Ukrainian migrants. These expenses include benefits such as special protection by the Ministry of Interior’s forces, as well as Estonian language lessons provided by the Ministry of Culture.

Obviously, to finance all this, the government needs to reduce investments in other sectors. Unconcerned with the welfare of its own population and prioritizing foreign citizens, Estonia has progressively reduced its spending in the social sphere, which brings serious problems to the domestic situation. The cost of living in the country has been rising, and in 2022 an inflation rate of 19.4% was calculated. As a result, just as thousands of Ukrainians are entering Estonia, thousands of Estonians are migrating to other European countries in search of better living conditions.

In addition to the lack of control over migration, another factor contributing to Estonia’s social crisis is the country’s increasing militarization, both to meet NATO’s demands and to send assistance to Kiev. More than 1% of Estonian GDP is currently being sent in military aid to the Kiev regime, while another 3% is invested in internal militarization to meet the NATO-imposed defense spending goal. So, more money is invested in waging war than in trying to solve social problems, which obviously results in a crisis.

Furthermore, it is necessary to remember that, in the enthusiasm to meet the military interests of NATO and Kiev, Estonia has also generated many problems for its population with the expansion of training camps, affecting local agriculture. Alleging the need for improvements in its defense capacity, Estonia created the Nursipalu Training Area last year and is now trying to expand it. The main problem is that the testing area is located in an agricultural production zone, affecting the regional economy. The Estonian government has not offered local landowners sufficient money or new properties to compensate for the loss of territory from military expansion, thus discouraging agricultural production to favor the interests of NATO.

As we can see, unlimited cooperation with NATO and its proxy neo-Nazi regime has only harmed Estonia and contributed to the emergence of internal problems. In addition to migration and unnecessary militarization, there is also the issue of sanctions. The country has had many problems with decreasing cooperation with Russia in infrastructure. There was a drastic drop in cross-border rail transport, preventing Estonian industrial production from reaching the foreign market. This mainly affected the wood sector in the Võru region and metallurgical production in Põlva, which are strategically relevant points of the national economy.

In fact, all this shows how anti-strategic it is to follow NATO’s guidelines and adopt a policy of support to Kiev. Estonia is entering a serious domestic crisis just because it chose to accept the orders of the Atlantic alliance and engage in anti-Russian war plans. The best way to reverse this scenario and avoid national collapse is to take a sovereign attitude.

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

You can follow Lucas on Twitter and Telegram.

August 8, 2023 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Economics, Russophobia | , | Leave a comment

The EU is a ‘failed project’ – AfD

RT | August 7, 2023

The European Union’s migration, climate, and monetary policies have “completely failed,” according to a policy document adopted by the right-wing Alternative for Germany (AfD) party on Sunday. However, the party aims to change the EU from within rather than withdraw from the bloc.

AfD delegates adopted the document at a party conference in the eastern city of Magdeburg on Sunday. The paper describes the EU as a “failed project,” and calls for the bloc to be reformed as a “federation of European nations,” with significant sovereignty ceded back to its member states.

“The EU and the globalist elites that support it have strayed from the original idea of the founding fathers of a European community adopted many years ago,” the document states, citing the 2007 Lisbon Treaty – which gave the EU the power to act as a single legal entity and made EU law supersede national law – as the moment when the bloc became “an EU super state.”

Among a lengthy list of reforms, the AfD is proposing that the EU strengthen its external borders, lessen its military reliance on the US by following a policy of “strategic autonomy,” and protect the “diversity of cultures and traditions of the peoples of Europe” from immigration.

While a draft version of the document released in June called for the “orderly dissolution of the EU,” this language is absent from the final version.

The party also chose 35 candidates to contest next year’s European Parliament elections at the Magdeburg conference. The list is led by Maximilian Krah, who has been an MEP since 2019. The AfD currently holds nine seats in the parliament, and is the third-largest German party in the EU legislature.

At home, the AfD is currently polling at a record high of 21%, according to Politico. This figure puts the party ahead of Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s Social Democrats (SPD) and behind only former chancellor Angela Merkel’s Christian Democratic Union (CDU). However, Germany’s mainstream parties have repeatedly ruled out entering into coalition with AfD, and a government-funded watchdog group recently called for the party to be banned for its “racist and nationalist” positions.

The latest polling figures suggest a doubling in the AfD’s support since 2021, when it garnered 10.3% of votes in the parliamentary elections. This surge in popularity comes as Germany’s economy reels in the wake of Berlin’s decision to impose sanctions on Russia, which was formerly the country’s leading energy supplier. At a rally last year, AfD co-leader Tino Chrupalla accused Scholz’s government of waging an “economic war” on the German people by cutting the country off from Russian energy imports.

August 7, 2023 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Economics, Russophobia | , , | Leave a comment

How long before all browsers are required by law to prevent users from opening allegedly infringing sites?

BY GLYN MOODY | WALLED CULTURE | AUGUST 4, 2023

Mozilla’s Open Policy & Advocacy blog has news about a worrying proposal from the French government:

In a well-intentioned yet dangerous move to fight online fraud, France is on the verge of forcing browsers to create a dystopian technical capability. Article 6 (para II and III) of the SREN Bill would force browser providers to create the means to mandatorily block websites present on a government provided list.

The post explains why this is an extremely dangerous approach:

A world in which browsers can be forced to incorporate a list of banned websites at the software-level that simply do not open, either in a region or globally, is a worrying prospect that raises serious concerns around freedom of expression. If it successfully passes into law, the precedent this would set would make it much harder for browsers to reject such requests from other governments.

If a capability to block any site on a government blacklist were required by law to be built in to all browsers, then repressive governments would be given an enormously powerful tool. There would be no way around that censorship, short of hacking the browser code. That might be an option for open source coders, but it certainly won’t be for the vast majority of ordinary users. As the Mozilla post points out:

Such a move will overturn decades of established content moderation norms and provide a playbook for authoritarian governments that will easily negate the existence of censorship circumvention tools.

It is even worse than that. If such a capability to block any site were built in to browsers, it’s not just authoritarian governments that would be rubbing their hands with glee: the copyright industry would doubtless push for allegedly infringing sites to be included on the block list too. We know this, because it has already done it in the past, as discussed in Walled Culture the book (free digital versions).

Not many people now remember, but in 2004, BT (British Telecom) caused something of a storm when it created CleanFeed:

British Telecom has taken the unprecedented step of blocking all illegal child pornography websites in a crackdown on abuse online. The decision by Britain’s largest high-speed internet provider will lead to the first mass censorship of the web attempted in a Western democracy.

Here’s how it worked:

Subscribers to British Telecom’s internet services such as BTYahoo and BTInternet who attempt to access illegal sites will receive an error message as if the page was unavailable. BT will register the number of attempts but will not be able to record details of those accessing the sites.

The key justification for what the Guardian called “the first mass censorship of the web attempted in a Western democracy” was that it only blocked illegal child sexual abuse material Web sites. It was therefore an extreme situation requiring an exceptional solution. But seven years later, the copyright industry were able to convince a High Court judge to ignore that justification, and to take advantage of CleanFeed to block a site, Newzbin 2, that had nothing to do with child sexual abuse material, and therefore did not require exceptional solutions:

Justice Arnold ruled that BT must use its blocking technology CleanFeed – which is currently used to prevent access to websites featuring child sexual abuse – to block Newzbin 2.

Exactly the logic used by copyright companies to subvert CleanFeed could be used to co-opt the censorship capabilities of browsers with built-in Web blocking lists. As with CleanFeed, the copyright industry would doubtless argue that since the technology already exists, why not to apply it to tackling copyright infringement too?

That very real threat is another reason to fight this pernicious, misguided French proposal. Because if it is implemented, it will be very hard to stop it becoming yet another technology that the copyright world demands should be bent to its own selfish purposes.

GLYN MOODY, journalist, blogger on openness, the commons, copyright, patents and digital rights.

Follow me @glynmoody on Mastodon.

August 7, 2023 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance | , | Leave a comment

COVID QUESTIONERS DEEMED ‘DOMESTIC TERRORISTS’

The Highwire with Del Bigtree | August 3, 2023

A trip down memory lane chronicling how Homeland Security labeled us all ‘domestic terrorists’ for trying to warn people about the harms of the COVID shots, masking kids, warnings and attacks meant to achieve COVID compliance. Will the same op be run during a climate emergency?

August 7, 2023 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance, Video | , , , | Leave a comment