By James Bovard | Future of Freedom | July 2022
Joe Biden won the 2020 election as a result of 43,000 votes in three states. The election was far closer than the media has usually admitted. There were plenty of dubious factors that could have tipped the scales for a Biden victory, including machinations by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
The long history of FBI abuse
Though the media usually portray the FBI as the ultimate good guys, the bureau has long history of intervening in presidential elections. Shortly after taking office after Franklin Roosevelt’s death, President Harry Truman commented in his diary: “We want no Gestapo or Secret Police. FBI is tending in that direction. They are dabbling in sex-life scandals and plain blackmail… This must stop.” But FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover outfoxed Truman and every subsequent president.
In the 1948 presidential campaign, Hoover brazenly championed Republican candidate Thomas Dewey, leaking allegations that Truman was part of a corrupt Kansas City political machine. In 1952, Hoover sought to undermine Democratic presidential candidate Adlai Stevenson by spreading rumors that he was a closet homosexual.
In 1964, the FBI illegally wiretapped Republican presidential candidate Barry Goldwater’s presidential headquarters and plane and conducted background checks on his campaign staff for evidence of homosexual activity. The FBI also conducted an extensive surveillance operation at the 1964 Democratic National Convention to prevent embarrassing challenges to President Lyndon Johnson.
In 2016, the FBI whitewashed Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton, protecting her despite her various crimes regarding handling of classified information and destruction of emails and other evidence from her time as secretary of state. An Inspector General report revealed in 2018 that the key FBI agents in the investigations were raving partisans. “We’ll stop” Donald Trump from becoming president, lead FBI investigator Peter Strzok texted his mistress/girlfriend, FBI lawyer Lisa Page, in August 2016. One FBI agent labeled Trump supporters as “retarded” and declared “I’m with her” [Hillary Clinton]. Another FBI employee texted that “Trump’s supporters are all poor to middle class, uneducated, lazy POS.” The FBI failed to make any audio or video recordings of its interviews with Clinton aides and staffers. It also delayed speaking to Clinton until the end of the investigation and planned to absolve her “absent a confession from Clinton,” the Inspector General noted.
The FBI failed to stop Trump from winning in 2016, but FBI officials devoted themselves to crippling his presidency with fabricated evidence implying that Russia had illicitly intervened in the presidential election. One top FBI lawyer was convicted for falsifying evidence to secure a Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act warrant to target Trump campaign officials. FBI chief James Comey leaked official memos to friendly reporters, thereby spurring the appointment of Special Counsel Robert Mueller to investigate Trump. Mueller’s investigation generated endless allegations and controversies and helped Democrats capture control of the House of Representatives in 2018 prior to admitting in 2019 that there was no such Russian conspiracy. Not one FBI official has spent a single day in jail for the abuses.
The ongoing Hunter Biden laptop scandal
In December 2019, FBI agents came into possession of a laptop that Hunter Biden had abandoned at a Delaware computer repair shop. That laptop was a treasure trove of crimes, including evidence that Hunter and other Bidens had collected millions in payments from foreign sources for providing access in Washington and other favors. That laptop provided ample documentation that Joe Biden could be compromised by foreign powers.
When news finally leaked out about the laptop in October 2020, 50 former intelligence officials effectively torpedoed the story by claiming that the laptop was a Russian disinformation ploy. The FBI knew that the laptop was bona fide but said nothing to undercut the falsehoods by the former spooks. The Justice Department commenced an investigation of Hunter Biden in 2019, but Attorney General William Barr made sure that information did not surface publicly before the 2020 election. (The investigation is ongoing.)
The FBI has continued its pro-Democrat campaigns
The FBI’s most brazen intervention in the 2020 election consisted of fabricating a ludicrous plot to kidnap Michigan governor Gretchen Whitmer, one of Biden’s favorite governors. Michigan was a swing state in the election. Whitmer enraged many Michiganders by placing the entire state under house arrest after the outbreak of COVID-19. Anyone who left their home to visit family or friends risked a $1,000 fine, and business owners faced three years in prison for refusing to close their stores. Unemployment soared to 24 percent statewide, but Whitmer’s policies failed to prevent more than 2 million Michiganers from contracting COVID.
The FBI exploited the anger against Whitmer to try to add some scalps to their collection. A few weeks before the 2020 election, the FBI announced the arrests of individuals who had been lured by FBI informants and undercover agents to talk about capturing Whitmer and putting her on trial. After the arrests were announced, Whitmer speedily denounced Trump for inciting “domestic terrorism” and declared, “When our leaders meet with, encourage, and or fraternize with domestic terrorists, they legitimize their actions. They are complicit.”
Joe Biden claimed that the arrests showed President Trump’s “tolerance of hate, vengeance, and lawlessness to plots such as this one.” Former FBI official Frank Figluzzi told MSNBC that Trump should be investigated for “aiding and abetting” the Michigan plot. Former FBI deputy director Andrew McCabe announced on CNN: “The person most responsible for fomenting this kind of unrest, this sort of division, this sort of violence in this country right now is the president of the United States.” Law professor Jonathan Turley noted:
The media went into a frenzy, declaring that the case proved that: ‘Trump’s rhetoric and policies have unleashed a second pandemic in the form of far-right domestic terrorism.’ The breathless accounts of this plot by three ‘Boogaloo’ militiamen fit like a glove with the narrative just before the election.
There was plenty of reason to doubt the plot from the start. As I noted in an American Institute for Economic Research article on the day after the arrests were announced, “The alleged Michigan plot is almost too idiotic to believe.”
A Michigan jury in April effectively concluded that the plotters had been entrapped in an FBI-fabricated plot. There were as many FBI informants and undercover agents involved in the plot as private citizens. From the start, the FBI steered the participants into saying and doing things that would supposedly seal their legal doom. Stephen Robeson, an FBI informant with a list of felonies and other crimes, organized key events to build the movement. Dan Chapel, another FBI informant who was paid $54,000, became second-in-command and masterminded the military training for the group, even as he helped the feds wiretap their messages.
FBI operatives took the participants, who prattled idiotically about stealing a Blackhawk helicopter, for drives near Whitmer’s vacation home, which supposedly proved they were going to nab the governor and unleash havoc. Shortly before that excursion, an FBI agent texted instructions to Chapel: “Mission is to kill the governor specifically.”
The conspiracy began unraveling even before the trial began in March. Robert Trask, the lead FBI agent and “the public face” of the kidnapping case, was fired after he was arrested for “beating his wife during an argument over an orgy that the two had attended at a hotel in Kalamazoo, Mich.,” the New York Times reported. Two other key FBI agents were sidelined from the case for misconduct (including creating a side hustle with their own cybersecurity firm).
Thanks to Supreme Court rulings minimizing entrapment defenses, federal Judge Robert Jonker blocked defense attorneys from informing the jury of almost all the evidence of federal misconduct in the Whitmer case.
As BuzzFeed’s Ken Bensinger reported, the jury refused to convict “despite the government’s extraordinary efforts to muzzle the defense… Prosecutors went to extraordinary lengths to exclude evidence and witnesses that might undermine their arguments, while winning the right to bring in almost anything favorable to their own side.” BuzzFeed also noted that the judge “ruled that defendants could not inquire about the past conduct of several FBI agents, though the government would be allowed to question the defendants about episodes in their own past.”
The jury saw enough to smell a federal rat. As Turley wrote:
The Whitmer conspiracy was a production written, funded, and largely populated by FBI agents and informants. At every point, FBI literally drove the conspirators and controlled their actions. That is worthy of investigation by Congress, but neither house seems even marginally interested.
The Michigan jury verdict spurred plenty of howls by the friends of Leviathan. Former Justice Department lawyer Barbara McQuade lamented, “This verdict concerns me because it could embolden other anti-government extremists to engage in dangerous conduct in the name of vigilante justice. In a time when we see a growing number of threats of violence against public officials, it is important to hold such conduct accountable.” But the establishment media has perennially disregarded holding government officials accountable for violating Americans’ rights.
The ongoing FBI threat to liberty
Shortly before the Michigan trial began, the New York Times noted that it was “being closely watched as one of the most significant recent domestic terrorism cases, a test of Washington’s commitment in the wake of the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol to pursue far-right groups who seek to kindle a violent, anti-government insurgency or even a new civil war.” FBI chief Christopher Wray told Congress last year that the FBI has 2,000 ongoing domestic terrorism investigations. How many additional crimes or conspiracies is the FBI fomenting at this moment? Will Americans ever learn what role, if any, the FBI had in goading some of those arrested in the Jan. 6 Capitol clash into committing a crime? And what about Team Biden’s efforts to continually expand the definition of “dangerous extremist” to sanctify its power? Last June, the Biden administration revealed that guys who can’t get laid may be terrorist threats due to “involuntary celibate–violent extremism.” No wonder the terrorist watch list is expanding at breakneck pace.
The Founding Fathers wisely did not create a national police force, but federal law-enforcement agencies have multiplied like mushrooms. Almost 100 years ago, the American Civil Liberties Union warned that the FBI had become “a secret police system of a political character.” Neither Congress nor federal courts have since effectively reined in the most powerful domestic federal agency. What mischief will the FBI commit to influence future elections? And what are the odds that Americans will know about it before the polling booths close?
Fireworks in French Parliament as the government’s proposed legislation to extend vaccine passports and other covid restrictions was rejected by the Assembly
Resisting the Intellectual Illiteratti | July 31, 2022
The government’s Covid bill was brought to the lower house on Monday July 11th and the stormy debates started right away, lasting into late Tuesday night, amidst interrupted sessions and even a motion of censure against the government (which, sadly, fell short of the necessary votes to be successful).
The Macron government’s main aim with the Covid bill was/is to extend the use of so-called health passes for all travelers coming into and out of France, creating a sort of “border pass.” What’s interesting is that on that Monday evening, I think it was, a motion was introduced by an opposition party to cut out the entire article dealing with this provision. The article in question, Article 2, would require anyone coming into or leaving France, regardless of nationality, to show either a negative PCR test, proof of recovery or proof of injection at the border. It would also make it possible to require children (between 12 and 18, I think) to use a health/border pass for travel as well.
Unfortunately, this bold move to scrap article 2 right out of the gate fell short of the necessary votes (by only 14 votes), and the debates raged on. It was a blow to all of us, especially those of us present at the protest next to the Assemblée on the 11th, because we were all hoping that the new lot of parliamentarians would do the right thing immediately.
But then, to everyone’s surprise, just a day later the newly elected députés ended up doing just that, when Article 2 was taken out of the bill by a majority of parliamentarians in the opposition who were able to set aside their differences on this crucial issue. In subsequent votes, another article was removed, and the bill ended up passing with only the first article intact. But it is now a watered down version of what the government wanted.
As things presently stand, the state of emergency and the dictatorial powers it has conferred on the executive for the last 2.5 years will come to an end on the 31st of July 2022. In addition, health passes (rebranded as border passes) cannot be brought back for travel at the border or for any other reason. For anyone.
So not only will lockdowns, curfews and business/school closures be off the table (at least not without the parliament passing a new law), but the government won’t be allowed to issue mask mandates or set capacity limits on businesses. Those are the very positive outcomes of the vote.
On the downside, medically meaningless and invasive testing and contact tracing will continue, with the intolerable and absurd obligations and restrictions they entail becoming more and more normalized. So even if the positive developments are not to be scoffed at, the nightmare is far from over and the battle is in no way won.
The bill is now before the Senate — whose composition, unlike the lower house, has not changed — where the majority right-wing Les Républicains, who lent their support to just about every totalitarian measure that has come before them since 2020, could easily vote the 2nd article back into the bill. The text is currently being studied by a Constitutional Law Committee (about which little has been reported) and tomorrow, Wednesday July 20th, it will be debated in the Senate, with the session open to the public, so broadcast.
It has been reported on a government website that amendments have been introduced by Senators, perhaps providing for some limited return of mask mandates or the health/border pass, but what these are exactly won’t be known until tomorrow, when the debates are held.
The Macron government was up in arms over the lower house’s amputation of the second article from its precious bill and has vowed to use all legal means and pressures to get the evil parts put back in by the sénateurs. Whatever the outcome in the senate, the bill will be the subject of further discussion and another vote in the lower house, which has the final say in the legislative process. A possible wild card that the government could still use would be to claim an unacceptable deadlock between the two houses and call for the creation of a joint parliamentary committee to find some compromise.
Even if this were to happen, the lower house will still have the final word in the legislative process. However, the wheeling and dealing that takes place in such drawn-out situations tends to favor the government.
Our hope is that the momentum created from the small victory over article 2 will gather force and prove to be unstoppable. Perhaps the efforts of the heroic groups of scientists, researchers, and doctors (and the alternative media that have given them a platform) who have spoken out over the past year and challenged the official narrative have made a difference. Even the most obtuse of the parliamentarians will know by now that the injections don’t prevent transmission or infection, or that a positive PCR test is not a “case,” at least not in the way that word was used up until long-established principles of public health and basic scientific facts were subverted in 2020.
The one thing I can’t quite understand in connection with this covid bill is how the government is still getting away with maintaining the suspension of the several thousand nurses and doctors who refused to take the experimental injection last September as part of their new Orwellian conditions of employment.
Of the 15,000 who have been prevented from earning a living in the healthcare professions for the last 10 months, it is believed that perhaps up to 5,000 have pivoted to other jobs or sectors, and may never return to healthcare. But it seems that the majority of those whom the government suspended do not want to do anything else and desperately would like to return to work to help sick and injured people get better.
During a time of chronic shortages in the healthcare system in France, and in light of the aforementioned reality that the injections don’t protect patients from infection from hospital staff, one would think the government would cede ground on this critical issue and allow the sorely needed personnel to go back to work. But not only is the Macron government continuing to refuse to allow thousands of experienced doctors, nurses and orderlies back to work, it continues to get away with saying that the so-called vaccinations are necessary to protect patients.
It is maintaining this delirious position not only amidst increasingly vociferous and vehement calls by the opposition parties in the lower house to reinstate the thousands of healthcare workers but also in light of the fact, now well documented and part of the public record, that the Macron gouvernement has reduced public hospital capacity by something like 18 thousand beds over the past 5 years and that perhaps 5 thousand of these were closed during the worst months of the pandemic. At the same time the government and the MSM are working hard to ramp up fear again, warning of a coming 7th or 8th wave (I’ve lost track), once again in complete contradiction to publicly available epidemiological data. The cognitive dissonance is unprecedented.
What I’m not clear about is how Macron, through his Prime Minister and Health Minister, will be able to keep healthcare workers suspended from their jobs after the state of emergency ends on the 31st of July. I would have thought the Parliament could find some way to legislate the healthcare workers back to their jobs either before or after this date.
If an absolute majority of lawmakers from several very different parties who are usually at each other’s throats (socialists, far-leftists, right and far-right) can agree that health/border passes must not be brought back, the same people can surely agree that over 10,000 healthcare workers vital to the health of the nation should have their right to earn a living restored to them, along with their right be free from medical coercion.
Although many have spoken out publicly against this continued outrage, what is missing, in my view, is for some high-profile dissident or attorney to publicly make the argument (for which it seems there is no shortage of evidence) that the Macron government has committed, in some form, reckless endangerment to human life by reducing hospital capacity and suspending thousands of health care workers during a so-called public health emergency. How wonderful would it be if someone just floated the idea.
Yet even during the most polite and thoughtful discussions between government officials and dissident academics, or during the more bold and humorous exchanges between critical media hosts and their guests, I have never heard it respectfully submitted — with all the careful wording and gentle tones that could be used to soften the accusation — that the closing of hospital beds and the suspension of healthcare workers, both by the thousands, in the middle of a pandemic must be considered a criminal act and should therefore be prosecuted as such. There must be some mathematical modeler on our side up to the challenge of estimating how many lives may have been lost due to these irrational and reckless actions taken by the government.
It’s maddening to see that after all the headway made in bringing certain basic facts to public attention (in this case, facts having to do with the uselessness of the injections for healthcare workers), the livelihoods of thousands of doctors and nurses essential to the health of the nation remain in the hands of Macron’s Prime Minister, who has once again said, peremptorily, that letting them return to work “is not on the agenda.” Such arbitrary, arrogant power would have been unthinkable a few years ago. It continues to be extremely worrying.
Prior posts from this author:
By Ken Macon | Reclaim The Net | July 30, 2022
New Democratic Party member of parliament Brian Masse said that ArriveCAN, which is mandatory for entry into Canada, is not about safety, it is about tracking. Despite pushback from the opposition, the public, and industry experts, the Liberal Trudeau government insists on the continued use of the app.
“I always fight for safety 1st, ArriveCAN is not that. It’s being used as a back door to permanently track all border crossing,” Masse wrote on Twitter.
“MPs need to speak up now or it will destroy our tourism industry, frustrate & create longer line ups when the technology fails.”
Speaking to the Windsor Star, Masse said he had been urging the government to remove the requirement for about a month. He argued that the app delays traffic and does not improve public safety because testing results can be input 72 hours before arrival, which is enough time for someone to get infected.
He further argued that the app is outdated because it only covers the first two doses; it does not cover the boosters.
Masse also said that the app is harming Canada’s tourism.
“Branding is now becoming an issue,” said Masse. “All border MPs know this. We are basically watching the destruction of our tourism industry…People are just going to stay away.”
Despite all these concerns, the government insists on the continued use of the app, saying that the pandemic is not over.
The government also recently announced that the app can be used for customs and immigration declarations, leading to speculations that ArriveCAN might become permanent.
Samizdat | July 30, 2022
Kiev has ordered mandatory evacuations from the parts of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) that remain under the control of Ukrainian forces. Deputy Prime Minister Irina Vereshchuk explained on Saturday the decision by saying that it would be impossible to provide the region’s residents with heating in the cold months.
Speaking during a national TV marathon, Vereshchuk, who also heads up what Ukraine calls the ‘Ministry for Reintegration of Temporarily Occupied Territories’, said that given the complete lack of gas supplies and widespread electricity outages, “there will be no heat in Donetsk region in the winter period,” and therefore about 200,000-220,000 residents will have to leave their homes.
“There is absolutely no gas supply in the Donetsk region, all the gas pipelines that could be repaired were repaired, but, unfortunately, the enemy destroys again and again everything that would help to warm people in winter,” she claimed.
Even before Russia’s military offensive in Ukraine, the DPR had been accusing Ukraine of targeting civilian infrastructure. With the launch of the operation, the bombings only escalated, as have the accusations from both sides.
Vereshchuk emphasized that the evacuation of households is “the duty of every adult member of the family.”
“For example, there are 52,000 of our children in the Donetsk region. They must be evacuated, they cannot be exposed to danger if left without heat and light in the winter,” the minister stressed.
Vereshchuk emphasized that mandatory evacuations are permitted under Ukrainian law and said that those who refuse to leave will have to sign a document confirming that they understand the consequences of their decision and take full responsibility for it.
Zaporozhye Region, 65% of the territory of which is without gas supply, may be the next to be evacuated, Vereshchuk added.
According to the minister, the authorities have taken all of the necessary measures to provide evacuees with accommodation and proper social services.
“There is an understanding of where these people will be resettled, in which regions, where their children will study,” she said.
On Friday, the government supported her ministry’s initiative to create a coordination center, which will supervise the evacuation from Donbass.
“Donetsk is now on the brink of a humanitarian disaster. Active hostilities continue there, the infrastructure is destroyed. People are not only at risk of coming under fire every second – it will not be easy to survive in the absence of light, heat, medicine and food in winter. The solution – evacuation,” the government said in a statement.
By Robert Carter | Press TV | July 30, 2022
London – A new study has revealed a shocking disparity by British schools which have gone to great lengths to promote Ukraine solidarity among their students, in stark contrast to how Palestinian solidarity is suppressed in the classroom.
Human rights group CAGE carried out the survey, which received 532 responses from parents, students and teachers. The group said the survey revealed a ‘cavalier attitude to due diligence’, including collaboration with organizations with far-right links and the soft penetration of security think tanks and those linked to the UK’s so-called prevent counter-extremism program.
Some of the survey’s findings include 96% of respondents confirmed proactive engagement on the Ukraine issue by their school, including holding non-uniform days, activities or donation appeals. 62% indicated their schools had fundraised or hosted donation drives for Ukraine.
While 17% also mentioned schools promoted the Ukraine flag, such as encouraging children to wear blue and yellow for non-uniform days, or hoisting the Ukrainian flag on school grounds. And perhaps most shockingly, alleged funding from some schools was intended to provide military gear for the war.
In 2021, Israel’s bombing of Gaza drew huge international backlash as millions took to the streets worldwide.
British students also joined the outpouring of support for Palestine. However, British schools responded negatively. With students being punished for waving a Palestinian flag or branded “racist” for expressing solidarity.
In early July, London’s High Court dismissed a legal challenge by CAGE against the Department for Education for issuing “discriminatory” guidance that led to the censure of dozens of schoolchildren showing support for Palestine during the Israeli bombing last year. The whole saga appears to have proven beyond reasonable doubt that the UK is indeed biased when it takes a stand on Human Rights.
By John Roberts | TCW Defending Freedom | July 30, 2022
LATELY I have been listening to interviews with Mattias Desmet, the Belgian psychologist who has popularised, if not invented, the term ‘mass formation’, a sort of mass hypnosis, a condition which he says often leads to tyranny. If I understand him correctly mass formation occurs when people feel estranged from each other and the world around them, they lack purpose and feel out of control. Fear is an important factor in this and frightened people are amongst the easiest to hypnotise since they will unquestionably follow an ‘authoritative’ voice. The door is open for someone to come along and offer them a place to belong, make them feel safe and give them a purpose. Thus the tyrant is born. Desmet contends that although this has happened throughout history it has become more common in modern times because we have become increasingly estranged from nature, and he attributes this to the invention of the clock.
As soon as reliable clocks were available, people in their everyday lives were less influenced by the sun and the seasons. Reliable clocks are a symbol of industrialisation, and this has led to movement of people into cities and consequently less in touch with nature. The mechanisation of agriculture gave us the ability to feed large numbers using very little labour. Cheap energy from oil and coal accelerated this industrialisation. Cities and towns have benefits: it’s easier to provide services including education and health, clean water, power and transport, and as someone who lives in a rural area I am well aware of the difference. This has happened in a very short space of time to a species which has evolved over millennia as part of the natural world. In truth we are as much a part of nature as trees, earthworms, bacteria and viruses (although it’s debatable whether or not the current coronavirus is natural).
There’s a wonderful grounding reality about the natural world. Gravity is all too real if you fall out of a window, and rain, wind and sunshine can make you feel wonderful or damage your health. Childbirth is both joyous and potentially fatal. Relationships can be enriching or toxic.
All this may sound obvious, but doesn’t seem to be for many of our fellow citizens who think that bad things shouldn’t and wouldn’t happen if the State took proper care of us which, of course, it promises to do: that voice of authority again.
This detachment from the real leads to living too much in the head. Your ideas, arguments, your emotions become the greater part of your reality. The constantly chattering voice in your brain becomes louder unless you can ground yourself. This is the default position for many and it can be dangerous. The signs are everywhere.
Climate change is one such situation. As we know all too well, this is the idea that a small increase in the atmosphere of a trace gas which is essential to life is responsible for rising global temperatures, storms, mass extinctions, diseases, and I could go on but you’ve heard it all before. Some say that this is proven to be true and the science is settled and isn’t science a really good way of connecting with the real world? Yes, when it isn’t manipulated for political purposes or carried out by people who think that computer models are the real world.
Talking of modelling takes us to Covid. Policy to deal with the virus was largely driven by models which chimed with certain political aims and gave rise to disastrous consequences. For many years the UK had a pandemic policy based on accumulated data and real-world results of public health interventions, yet this policy was thrown out and its proponents, people at the top of their field, were ignored, smeared or insulted and often all three. Vilification of ‘outsiders’ is another aspect of mass formation. The fact of natural immunity was debunked by people who could not admit to the existence of this wonderful example of the interrelationship between us and the rest of nature.
Now we come to woke, perhaps the most glaring example of living in your head instead of the real world. The hallmark of this is a belief in something that defies logic, history and science (the real thing, not the made-up stuff). No amount of education or reasoning permeates the world that is firmly embedded in the head. The transgender issue is an astonishing example. It wouldn’t be so bad if these ideas stayed inside the head but they escape into the real world where they can have serious consequences: men in female prisons and hospital wards, and male athletes competing in women’s sports events for example. I have heard of midwives saying that a man can have a cervix. I suppose the beings in your head can have any anatomy you want. I’m just waiting for the day when gravity is seen as a Western construct and people start walking off cliffs.
When challenged, those who live in their heads can react aggressively because you have challenged their very being. Perhaps the most frightening consequence of this detachment from reality and its subsequent mass formation is illustrated by the thoughts of Dr Yuval Noah Harari, adviser to everyone’s favourite human being, globalist Klaus Schwab. Harari believes that ‘science is replacing evolution by natural selection with evolution by intelligent design’. Not sure how the word ‘intelligent’ belongs in that sentence, but he seems to show a complete lack of understanding of the real world and the way everything in it is connected. Harari suggests that it will be possible to tweak human DNA in the way that we can alter computer coding. Very few processes in the body are controlled by one gene; physiological activity results from the interaction of many genes which may be on different chromosomes. Tinkering with a few genes is likely to have unforeseen consequences. Our DNA is intimately connected to the outside world. We express genes in response to outside stimuli, viruses incorporate themselves into our DNA and our body’s immune history is written in our genes. In short, our DNA is finely tuned to nature and to suggest that manipulating the various molecules in its strands will improve our lot is hubris beyond belief. Perhaps in Harari’s head we are all machines. Maybe he finds that comforting.
Liberty Counsel | July 29, 2022
Today, Liberty Counsel settled the nation’s first classwide lawsuit for health care workers over a COVID shot mandate, for more than $10.3 million. The class action settlement against NorthShore University HealthSystem is on behalf of more than 500 current and former health care workers who were unlawfully discriminated against and denied religious exemptions from the COVID shot mandate. The agreed upon settlement was filed today in the federal Northern District Court of Illinois.
As a result of the settlement, NorthShore will pay $10,337,500 to compensate these health care employees who were victims of religious discrimination, and who were punished for their religious beliefs against taking an injection associated with aborted fetal cells.
This is a historic, first-of-its-kind class action settlement against a private employer who unlawfully denied hundreds of religious exemption requests to COVID-19 shots.
The settlement must be approved by the federal District Court. Employees of NorthShore who were denied religious exemptions will receive notice of the settlement, and will have an opportunity to comment, object, request to opt out, or submit a claim form for payment out of the settlement fund, all in accordance with deadlines that will be set by the court.
As part of the settlement agreement, NorthShore will also change its unlawful “no religious accommodations” policy to make it consistent with the law, and to provide religious accommodations in every position across its numerous facilities. No position in any NorthShore facility will be considered off limits to unvaccinated employees with approved religious exemptions.
In addition, employees who were terminated because of their religious refusal of the COVID shots will be eligible for rehire if they apply within 90 days of final settlement approval by the court, and they will retain their previous seniority level.
The amount of individual payments from the settlement fund will depend on how many valid and timely claim forms are submitted during the claims process. If the settlement is approved by the court and all or nearly all of the affected employees file valid and timely claims, it is estimated that employees who were terminated or resigned because of their religious refusal of a COVID shot will receive approximately $25,000 each, and employees who were forced to accept a COVID shot against their religious beliefs to keep their jobs will receive approximately $3,000 each.
The 13 health care workers who are lead plaintiffs in the lawsuit will receive an additional approximate payment of $20,000 each for their important role in bringing this lawsuit and representing the class of NorthShore health care workers.
Liberty Counsel will receive 20 percent of the settlement sum, which equals $2,061,500, as payment for the significant attorney’s fees and costs it has required to undertake to sue NorthShore and hold it accountable for its actions. This amount is far less than the typical 33 percent usually requested by attorneys in class action litigation.
In October 2021, Liberty Counsel sent a demand letter to NorthShore on behalf of numerous health care workers who had sincere religious objections to NorthShore’s “Mandatory COVID-19 Vaccination Policy.” If NorthShore had agreed then to follow the law and grant religious exemptions, the matter would have been quickly resolved and it would have cost it nothing. But, when NorthShore refused to follow the law, and instead denied all religious exemption and accommodation requests for employees working in its facilities, Liberty Counsel filed a class action lawsuit, along with a motion for a temporary restraining order and injunction.
Liberty Counsel Vice President of Legal Affairs and Chief Litigation Counsel Horatio G. Mihet said, “We are very pleased with the historic, $10 million settlement achieved in our class action lawsuit against NorthShore University HealthSystem. The drastic policy change and substantial monetary relief required by the settlement will bring a strong measure of justice to NorthShore’s employees who were callously forced to choose between their conscience and their jobs. This settlement should also serve as a strong warning to employers across the nation that they cannot refuse to accommodate those with sincere religious objections to forced vaccination mandates.”
Mat Staver, Founder and Chairman of Liberty Counsel said: “This classwide settlement providing compensation and the opportunity to return to work is the first of its kind in the nation involving COVID shot mandates. This settlement should be a wake-up call to every employer that did not accommodate or exempt employees who opposed the COVID shots for religious reasons. Let this case be a warning to employers that violated Title VII. It is especially significant and gratifying that this first classwide COVID settlement protects health care workers. Health care workers are heroes who daily give their lives to protect and treat their patients. They are needed now more than ever.”
MEMO | July 29, 2022
In a victory for the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign against Israel, a US judge has thrown out bogus anti-Semitism claims against a professor at Pittsburgh university in a lawsuit based on the highly controversial International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of anti-Jewish racism.
Pro-Israel groups have been advocating IHRA’s adoption for several years saying that the non-binding definition will not stifle free speech on Israel. Critics, however, have consistently warned that not only will the IHRA have a chilling effect on free speech, but it will also give ammunition to radicalised Zionist groups to pursue malicious lawsuits against critics of the Apartheid State.
Robert Ross, who teaches literary arts and social justice studies at Point Park University appears to have been the victim of such spurious and malicious lawsuits which are designed to intimidate critics of Israel as much as to instil fear in anyone advocating for Palestinian rights.
The lawsuit against Ross was filed in 2019 by Channa Newman, a professor at the university. Newman claimed that she was a target of anti-Semitism due to her Zionist beliefs. According to the Electronic Intifada, Newman’s lawsuit alleged Ross used his position to foster “a militant version” of the BDS movement and “hateful views against Israel” that “are anti-Semitic.”
Newman, who made her case using the US State Department’s definition of anti-Semitism which has very similar wording to the IHRA, further alleged that the political views of Ross, and those of his students, led to a hostile work environment for her. As is the case with the IHRA, the State Department definition includes claims that it is anti-Semitic to say Israel’s foundation was a “racist endeavour” or to apply “double standards” to Israel by requiring from it “behavior not expected or demanded of any other democratic nation.”
In his ruling, the judge asserted that if the court accepted Newman’s allegations, it would “invalidate” on its face and on civil rights grounds “an entire academic and public debate” and that it would give Newman “a veto over others engaging in that same debate.” The judge further added that Newman was effectively seeking to “compel” the speech and views of others to be consistent with hers.
“I am relieved and thrilled,” Ross told the Electronic Intifada. “The judge took the time to articulate why he’s not granting this work environment claim and that there’s nothing inherently hostile with [advocating for] BDS. In these times, we’ll take what we can get. I think it’s a victory,” he explained.
“The judge, to me, made it clear that there’s nothing legally wrong with teaching BDS, participating in BDS, or advocating for it,” Ross added. The dismissal of the hostile work environment claims, Ross added, “should be empowering, it should be a green light for other folks to engage in this movement.”
Consortium News | July 27, 2022
Scott Ritter was among those blacklisted by a Ukrainian government agency that appears to be funded by the United States. Ritter has written the following letter to his representatives in Congress.
Senator Charles Schumer
Leo W. O’Brien Federal Office Building
11A Clinton Avenue, Room 827
Albany, NY 12207
Senator Christine Gillibrand
Leo W. O’Brien Federal Office Building
11A Clinton Avenue, Room 821
Albany, NY 12207
Representative Paul Tonko
19 Dove Street, Unit 302
Albany, NY 12210
July 27, 2022
Dear Senators Schumer and Gillibrand, and Congressman Tonko,
My name is Scott Ritter. I am a New York State resident, currently residing in the Town of Bethlehem, in Albany County. My family and I have lived at our current address since July 2000.
I am writing to you in your collective role as my elected representatives in the United States Congress, specifically regarding H.R. 7691, the Additional Supplemental Appropriations Act of 2022, which became Public Law 117-128 on May 21, 2022, which each of you voted in favor of.
I draw your attention to the First Amendment of the United States Constitution, specifically the following language: “Congress shall make no law…abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press.”
By enacting Public Law 117-128, you appear to have abrogated your Constitutional responsibilities in so far as you may have, in fact, made a law which both abridges the freedom of speech and a free press by enabling the Government of Ukraine, through the use of US taxpayer dollars appropriated under Public Law 117-128, to publish a “blacklist” singling out US citizens as “Russian propagandists” for exercising their Constitutional rights pertaining to free speech and a free press.
The “blacklist” in question was published on July 14, 2022, by the Ukrainian Center for Countering Disinformation, and consists of a list of politicians, academics, and activists who the Center claims promote “Russian propaganda.” Many on this list are citizens of the United States, some of whom, like me, have taken an oath to uphold and defend the Constitution of the United States.
While the specific criterion used by the Ukrainian Center for Countering Disinformation for selecting persons for inclusion on this “blacklist” is not known, in my case the Ukrainian government appears to have taken umbrage against my articulation of Ukraine as a NATO base of operations, my analysis of the Bucha Massacre in early March which assigns responsibility to Ukrainian security services, and my description of the current Ukraine-Russian conflict as a “proxy conflict” being waged on behalf of the United States.
Whether one agrees with my positions on these and other matters pertaining to Ukraine is not the point; by articulating my views, I am exercising my rights under the Constitution of the United States. While the Government of Ukraine is free to express its opinions regarding my viewpoints as it sees fit, the Government of the United States, by using funds appropriated by the United States Congress, should not facilitate the actions of the Government of Ukraine in this regard.
I draw your attention to Section 507(a) of Public Law 117-128, which directs that “[f]unds made available by this title under the heading Economic Support Fund may be made available for direct financial support for the Government of Ukraine.”
Public Law 117-128 makes available $8,766,000,000 for assistance for Ukraine under the heading “Economic Support Fund.”
On July 12, 2022, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) issued a press release in which it announced that $1.7 billion in direct budgetary aid was provided to Ukraine under Public Law 117-128, which allowed the Government of Ukraine, among other things, to pay the salaries of Ukrainian civil servants. This would logically include the salaries of the employees of the Ukrainian Center for Countering Disinformation.
As a constituent whose name has appeared on a so-called “blacklist” published by the Ukrainian Center for Countering Disinformation, my personal and professional life has been, and continues to be, detrimentally impacted by the chilling effect of being labeled a “Russian propagandist” for simply exercising the right to free speech guaranteed by the United States Constitution. Moreover, Ukraine has a history of converting “blacklists” of this nature into “kill lists”, where those who speak out against the policies of the Ukrainian government are being murdered or threatened with violence. I am certain you agree with me that Congress cannot be in a position where, through its actions, foreign governments are provided the means to intimidate citizens of the United States from exercising their Constitutionally protected rights regarding free speech.
As such, I respectfully request that each of you investigate what role, if any, funds authorized by you under Public Law 117-128, have been used to underwrite the actions of the Ukrainian Center for Countering Disinformation, and more specifically, if any funds appropriated under Public Law 117-128 have been used to pay the salaries of Ukrainian civil servants employed by the Ukrainian Center for Countering Disinformation involved in the preparation and dissemination of this so-called “blacklist”.
Under Section 507(d) of Public Law 117-128, Congress directs that “[t]he Secretary of State or the Administrator of the United States Agency for International Development, as appropriate, shall report to the appropriate congressional committees on the uses of any funds provided for direct financial support to the Government of Ukraine pursuant to subsection (a) and the results achieved, not later than 90 days after the date of enactment of this Act and every 90 days thereafter until September 30, 2025,” and that such a report “shall also include the metrics established to measure such results.”
I request that each of you become personally involved in preparing the appropriate questions to be asked of either the Secretary of State or the Administrator of USAID when they next appear before Congress to carry out their mandated reports regarding the use of funds provided for the direct financial support of the Government of Ukraine. The specific metric of interest here is whether any of these funds were used to pay the salaries of civil servants employed by the Ukrainian Center for Countering Disinformation involved in the preparation and dissemination of the aforementioned “blacklist”.
If funds were, in fact, used in this manner, I would respectfully request that you, in your status as my elected representatives to the United States Congress, take the appropriate action necessary to ensure that funds appropriated by the United States Congress are not used to suppress the free speech rights afforded to citizens of the United States, including myself, by the First Amendment of the United States Constitution. Moreover, I would insist that you take the appropriate action to guarantee that the Government of Ukraine immediately cease and desist in all activity designed to threaten and intimidate citizens of the United States. You are duty bound to protect the interests of the United States and its citizens rather than facilitate the actions of a foreign power that are, by design, intended to accomplish just the opposite.
Congress cannot be allowed to bypass Constitutionally imposed constraints on its actions by allowing a foreign government to do that which would not be permitted here in the United States. By paying the salaries of the civil servants employed by the Ukrainian Center for Countering Disinformation, who have prepared and disseminated the so-called “blacklist”, you and your fellow Senators and Representatives appear to be doing just that—allowing the Government of Ukraine to suppress the right of free speech guaranteed to United States citizens under the Constitution.
I look forward to hearing back from each of you as to how you propose to proceed in this matter.
Sincerely,
Scott Ritter
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Aletho News Archives – Video-Images
By Randi Nord | Geopolitics Alert | April 5, 2019
Beirut – During his visit with US Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, Lebanese President Michael Aoun reportedly received a US-Israeli document detailing plans for creating a civil war in Lebanon with covert false flag operations and possible Israeli invasion.
Although the source of the document is Israeli and created in partnership with Washington, no one knows who presented it to Aoun. The Lebanese TV station, Al-Jadeed, initially reported the document on Lebanese TV and a video on its website. Geopolitics Alert translated the report for this article. … continue
Aletho News If Americans Knew No Tricks Zone
