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Washington is the problem, not the solution, so why is Abbas seeking new ‘powerful’ sponsors?

By Ramzy Baroud | MEMO | July 25, 2022

To describe US President Joe Biden’s recent visit to Israel and Palestine as a “failure” in terms of activating the dormant “peace process” is to use a misnomer. For this statement to be accurate, Washington would have had to indicate that it had even a nominal desire to push for negotiations between the Israeli government and the Palestinian leadership.

Political and diplomatic platitudes aside, the current US administration has done the exact opposite, as indicated by Biden’s words and actions. Alleging that the US commitment to a two-state solution “has not changed”, Biden dismissed his administration’s interest in trying to achieve such a goal by declaring that the “ground is not ripe” for negotiations.

Given that the Palestinian Authority led by Mahmoud Abbas has repeatedly announced its readiness to return to negotiations, one can only assume that the process is being stalled due to Israel’s intransigence. Indeed, none of Israel’s top leaders or major parties champion negotiations — the so-called peace process — as a strategic objective.

However, Israel is not the only one to blame. The Americans have also made it clear that they have moved on from that political sham altogether, one which they invented and then sustained for decades. In fact, the final nail in the “negotiated solution” coffin was hammered in by the Donald Trump administration, which has simply backed every Israeli claim and shunned all legitimate Palestinian demands.

The Biden administration has been blamed habitually by Palestinians, Arabs and progressive voices within the Democratic Party for failing to reverse Trump’s prejudiced moves in favour of Israel: moving the US Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, for example; shutting down the US Consulate in East Jerusalem; and accepting the unfounded Israeli claims regarding its jurisdiction over illegal Jewish settlements built on occupied Palestinian land. The list goes on.

Even if one assumes that the Biden administration is capable of reversing some or all of Trump’s unlawful actions, what good would that be in the greater scheme of things? Washington was, and remains, Israel’s greatest benefactor, funding its military occupation of Palestine with an annual gift of $4 billion, in addition to many other schemes, including a massive and growing budget allocated just for Israel’s Iron Dome missile defence system.

As horrific as Trump’s years were in terms of undermining a just resolution to the Israeli occupation of Palestine, Biden’s policies are but a continuation of an existing pro-Israel American legacy that surpasses that of Trump by decades.

For Israel, the “peace process” has served its purpose, which explains the infamous declaration by the CEO of the Jewish settlement council, Yesha, in the occupied West Bank in 2018: “I don’t want to brag that we’ve won… Others would say it appears that we’re winning.”

However, Israel’s supposed “victory” following three decades of a fraudulent “peace process” cannot be credited to Trump alone. Biden and other top US officials have also been quite useful. While it is understood widely that US politicians support Israel out of self-interest — they need, for example, to appease the influential pro-Israel lobby in Washington — Biden’s support for Israel has an ideological foundation. The US president was less than bashful when he repeated his famous statement at Israel’s Ben Gurion airport on 13 July: “You need not be a Jew to be Zionist.”

Consequently, it may appear puzzling to hear Palestinian officials call on the US — and Biden specifically — to put pressure on Tel Aviv to end its 55-year occupation of East Jerusalem, the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

Mohannad Al-Aklouk, the Palestinian representative at the Arab League, is just one who has repeated the same clichéd and unrealistic language of expecting the US to “exert practical pressure on Israel”, “set the stage for a fair political process based on international law”, and “meet its role as a fair sponsor of the peace process”. Strangely, Al-Aklouk truly believes that Washington, with its dismal track record of pro-Israel bias, can be the saviour of the Palestinians.

Another Palestinian official told the New Arab that PA President Abbas was “disappointed with the results of Biden’s visit” as, apparently, the Palestinian leader “expected that the US president would make progress in the peace process.” The same source added that Abbas’s authority is holding meetings with representatives from “powerful countries” to replace the US as sponsors of the negotiations.

Abbas’s political stance is confusing. The “peace process” is, after all, an American invention. It was a unique, self-serving style of diplomacy that was formulated to ensure Israel’s priorities remain centre stage of US foreign policy in the Middle East. In the Palestinian case, the “peace process” served only to entrench Israel’s colonisation of Palestine, while degrading, or completely sidelining, legitimate Palestinian demands. This “process” was also constructed with the aim of marginalising international law as a political and legal frame of reference for the Israeli occupation of Palestine.

Instead of questioning the entire “peace process” apparatus and apologising for the strategic blunder of pursuing American mirages at the expense of Palestinian rights, the Palestinian Authority is still clutching desperately to the same old fantasy, even when the US and Israel have long abandoned the political farce that they created.

Even if China, Russia or India, for example, would agree to be the new sponsors of the “peace process”, there is no reason for Tel Aviv to engage in future negotiations when it is able to achieve its colonial objectives with full support from the US. Moreover, none of these countries have, for now, much leverage over Israel, and so are unable to sustain any kind of meaningful pressure on Tel Aviv to respect international law.

Yet, the PA is still holding on, simply because the “peace process” has proved to be greatly beneficial in terms of funds, power and prestige enjoyed by a small but powerful class of Palestinians that was formulated largely after the Oslo Accords in 1993.

It is time for Palestinians to stop investing their political capital in the Biden or any other administration. What they need is not a new “powerful” sponsor of the “peace process”, but a grassroots-based struggle for freedom and liberation starting at home, one that galvanises the energies of the Palestinian people themselves. Alas, this new paradigm cannot be achieved when the priorities of the Palestinian leadership remain fixated on the financial handouts and political validation of Washington and its Western allies.

July 25, 2022 Posted by | Corruption, Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism | , , , | Leave a comment

Get Ready For The 100 Year Long Climate “Emergency”

By Francis Menton | Manhattan Contrarian | July 22, 2022

On March 13, 2020, then President Trump declared a “national emergency” due to the newly-arising outbreak of the Covid-19 virus. Three days later, on March 16, Trump set forth a program of “15 Days to Slow the Spread.” The program included strong recommendations for anyone who felt sick, or had tested positive for the disease, to stay at home during the two-week emergency window.

Here we are now some two years and four months later. The supposed Covid-19 15 day “emergency” has been repeatedly extended, first by Trump through the last ten months of his term, and then for the additional 18 months since January 2021 by President Biden. It’s been two-plus long years of lockdowns, work from home, business closures, school closures, mask mandates, vaccine mandates, and on and on, with little to no evidence that any of it ever did any good.

On Monday July 18 (2022) President Biden extended the Covid-19 “emergency” for yet another 90 days to mid-October. You might think that the whole concept of an “emergency” has lost all meaning if it can somehow persist for more than two and a half years, well past the point where normal people have stopped paying any attention to it whatsoever. “Emergency” used to mean something immediate, like a hurricane or a tornado wrecking a town, or someone having a heart attack, or a shooter actively firing. By any reasonable view of the word “emergency,” things connected with Covid-19 that might have fallen under that term ended months if not years ago. But for a bureaucracy, what the term “emergency” means is the opportunity to issue orders that you could not otherwise issue, and pass out money that you could not otherwise pass out. Now that you have gotten a taste of the heady drug of “emergency” powers, why would you ever give them up if you could avoid it? Years later, it’s still an “emergency” if the bureaucrats want it to be. Or at least, that’s their view.

Which brings us to the so-called “climate emergency.” Since the Supreme Court’s decision in West Virginia v. EPA on June 30, the bureaucracies in the “climate” space, together with all the environmental activists, have been thrown into a tizzy. The Supreme Court just declared that the bureaucracies have no power to fundamentally transform the use of energy in the economy without a clear direction from Congress, which on the climate issue cannot be found in existing statutes. And it has become clear that no further such statutory direction is likely to emerge from Congress before the mid-term elections in November. After November, changes in the make-up of Congress will probably make further such legislation even less likely, if not completely off the table for years if not decades. So what is a self-respecting climate alarmist to do?

To those over there on the left, the answer seems obvious: Demand declaration of a “climate emergency.” With that declaration, the statutory gap could perhaps be filled by another whole category of laws providing special powers in the event of a declaration of “emergency.” The calls for President Biden to make such a declaration have been everywhere since the Supreme Court’s decision at the end of June. In the politician category, a collection of Democratic Senators (Edward Markey and Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, Cory Booker of New Jersey, Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island, Brian Schatz of Hawaii, Martin Heinrich of New Mexico, Alex Padilla of California, Jeff Merkley of Oregon and Bernie Sanders of Vermont) sent a strong letter to Biden on July 20 making the demand:

Declaring the climate crisis a national emergency under the NEA would unlock powers to rebuild a better economy with significant, concrete actions. . . . Under the NEA, you could redirect spending to build out renewable energy systems on military bases, implement large-scale clean transportation solutions and finance distributed energy projects to boost climate resiliency. All of these actions would employ Americans in new and emerging industries while securing American leadership in global markets.

Environmental groups were out even ahead of the Senators with the same demand. Here is Greenpeace on July 8:

Congress and the Courts are failing to protect our communities from the climate crisis and it’s time for President Biden to be the leader we need. By declaring a climate emergency, President Biden unlocks an expanded set of powers under the National Emergencies Act and other federal laws.

There are many, many more examples of the same demand from all the usual suspects.

Indeed, there was lots of talk that Biden was going to make the big declaration on Wednesday, when he went to Massachusetts to give a speech at a closed coal-fired power plant. He somehow stopped just short of the formal “emergency” declaration, but took the occasion to emit the usual clichés about the impending climate apocalypse, including liberal use of the term “emergency” itself. Excerpt:

“Climate change is literally an existential threat to our nation and to the world,” Mr. Biden said. . . . “This is an emergency, an emergency, and I will look at it that way.”

It’s entirely possible that the climate “emergency” declaration could issue literally any day now.

What would declaration of an “emergency” mean? The idea is that there are plenty of existing statutes out there granting the Executive powers of various sorts in the event of such an “emergency,” provided that there had been a formal declaration of it. Thus arguably there would be a way around the lack of clear statutory authority that sank the EPA’s power plant regulations in the West Virginia case. The Nation on July 21 gives a rundown of some of the powers that the Executive could purport to exercise in the event of such a declaration with respect to the climate:

[S]uch a declaration would enable the Biden administration to access funding from the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s Building Resilient Infrastructure and Communities program for combating the impacts of heat waves, extreme weather events, and natural disasters and could enable faster implementation of critical mitigation strategies. An official climate emergency announcement could also allow the Biden administration to curtail crude oil exports and stop offshore drilling through laws and exemptions related to national security and energy development. The Biden administration could access financial support for clean energy infrastructure through FEMA and the Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act, and it could cut energy costs for families by supporting domestic offshore wind projects, helping to facilitate an affordable clean energy transition.

Here’s the problem. There is no sense in which the climate is an “emergency” within the ordinary meaning of that word in the English language. Predictions by climate models of a few degrees of temperature rise over the next century are the opposite of an “emergency.” Indeed, the statutes granting various “emergency” powers to the Executive all deal with the question of time periods too short to give the Congress time to enact legislation appropriate to the situation at hand. That circumstance is the opposite of what we have with the climate.

But if you are on the left, or a climate activist, this situation is just too important to wait for Congressional action that may never come. An “emergency” must be declared, to last for — how long? A hundred years? During which time, the bureaucrats can issue whatever orders they want, and spend whatever funds they want, all in the name of saving the planet. None of which will or can have any effect on the 85% (and growing) of world carbon emissions that come from outside the U.S. and which the U.S. government cannot affect in any way.

It’s all a huge insult to the intelligence of the American people. I doubt that the courts will be fooled, most particularly the Supreme Court.

July 24, 2022 Posted by | Corruption, Deception, Malthusian Ideology, Phony Scarcity, Science and Pseudo-Science, Timeless or most popular | | Leave a comment

An idea about stopping this mess

By Meryl Nass | July 24, 2022

Let’s create a pledge, and ask everyone who agrees to sign it. We have a nearly identical pledge that citizens then ask ALL candidates for elected office to sign, or we note that they refused.

The concept is to get millions of signatures against all the emergency rules and mandated vaccines that have destroyed economies, jobs, kept people from home and work, mandated useless masks and 6 foot distancing, initiated vaccine passports and numerous other restrictions, and have maintained the emergency way beyond any rational need.

If enough people sign, the candidates will be forced to sign or be publicly exposed as in favor of the emergency regs and mandatory shots, possibly forever… basically in favor of the Great Reset.

Here is an initial version of the sort of pledge I envision:

  1. I support laws to revoke all emergency laws, declarations, rules and regulations immediately (examples include: PREP Act, Bioshield Act, PAHPRA, Emergency State Health Power Acts, International Health Regulations of the WHO that transfer authority for pandemic management and/or declare public health emergencies).
  2. If I am a candidate, I pledge to introduce and support such legislation as my highest priority.
  3. I support laws explicitly protecting bodily autonomy and preventing the imposition of vaccine or other medical mandates.
  4. If I am a candidate, I pledge to support such legislation as my next higest priority.

Who agrees? Who has a better idea? Who can help craft the best language? Who will collect signatures?

Meryl

July 24, 2022 Posted by | Civil Liberties | , , , | Leave a comment

Biden Is Extending The Covid Emergency And Prolonging The War On Doctors

By Pierre Kory, MD | The Federalist | July 22, 2022

A recent New York Times/Siena College poll showing 64 percent of Democrats preferring a new standard-bearer in 2024 rocked the White House and the political landscape, but it should not have come as a big surprise. After all, President Joe Biden continues to fall short of the promises that drew many Democrats, including myself, to his candidacy in 2020: his pledge for a new strategy combatting Covid-19.

Consider the Food and Drug Administration’s recent decision allowing pharmacists to play doctor and prescribe Pfizer’s anti-viral treatment Paxlovid, which Biden himself, having contracted Covid-19, is now taking. The agency claims this is meant to increase access to the medicine, which must be taken as soon as symptoms arise. But the drug’s fact sheet is a tangled web of restrictions that will make it impractical for most pharmacies to take the risk. Why is the FDA encouraging this?

The answer is plain to anyone who has been following the plight of independent doctors during the pandemic. Our public health agencies — heavily influenced by the pharmaceutical industry and beholden to Biden’s “vaccine first” approach — are committed to diminishing the medical profession and centralizing authority with bureaucrats in Washington, D.C. They have prosecuted a relentless campaign to reduce physicians to cogs in a health care system that is aggressively transforming all medical professionals from providers to prescribers.

The problems with Paxlovid are no secret. FDA granted Pfizer emergency use authorization for the drug after a single trial with questionable results. The medicine has many contraindications, meaning it can’t be taken by someone who simultaneously would be taking certain anti-depressants, anti-seizure, anti-psychotic, cholesterol, or blood pressure medications. Furthermore, many Americans cannot take Paxlovid, given that nearly half of adults have cardiovascular disease.

The risks are plain to see in FDA’s guidance, which recommends referring the patient to a doctor if “sufficient information is not available to assess renal and hepatic function” or “potential drug interactions.” Numerous contraindications are listed, and caution is advised throughout. The burden is on the patient to furnish medical records to prove that he or she doesn’t have any significant kidney or liver disease, drug sensitivities, or other medications that could cause serious adverse events.

Nevertheless, pharmacies have spent months and millions of dollars lobbying for the right to play doctor and prescribe Paxlovid. The economic motives of such a move are clearly in their favor, as, unlike doctors, they profit directly from dispensing drugs. It’s no surprise the National Community Pharmacists Association celebrated the win as a “course correction.” Its CEO said, “Pharmacists are the drug therapy and drug interaction experts. This move opening up their ability to assess the need for and prescribe Paxlovid will improve patients’ timely access to treatments that will help keep them out of the hospital and alive.”

This may be as absurd a statement by a health organization as any I have heard in the pandemic. No pharmacist could ever safely dispense a novel medicine with an unprecedented amount of drug interactions without in-depth knowledge of the severity of the patient’s medical problems or the critical necessity of each of their other medicines. This fact was not lost on the American Medical Association, which temporarily snapped out of its woke-activist-induced coma to offer qualified criticism.

“While the majority of COVID-19 positive patients will benefit from Paxlovid, it is not for everyone, and prescribing it requires knowledge of a patient’s medical history, as well as clinical monitoring for side effects and follow-up care to determine whether a patient is improving—requirements far beyond a pharmacist’s scope and training,” American Medical Association President Jack Resneck Jr. said in a statement.

The tell is right there, though. The AMA is fine with Paxlovid as long as physicians are doing the prescribing. Ceding authority is the problem, which is why the agency previously called the idea “dangerous in practice and precedent” when the Biden administration first proposed it in the Test to Treat initiative.

Covid cases and deaths are down massively from their last peak in January. Most states have lifted restrictions and returned to normal. Yet just days after the FDA made this announcement, the Biden administration again extended the Covid public health emergency — because the president can’t lose the specter of Covid as a political tool.

Vaccination rates have leveled off, and Paxlovid sales bottomed out in April due to a combination of supply problems and sinking demand. Pfizer pushed expectations for the drug sky high, and now it needs to deliver on that promise. The FDA’s move shows how deftly the company has used the pandemic to influence government and public health agencies to serve its shareholders.

The pharmaceutical industry, led by Pfizer and in league with the Biden administration, is waging war against independent doctors who refuse to cede control over patient well-being — and they are winning. If there is any hope for change, it will come in November.

The red wave forming off our political shores is a culmination of many factors. Inflation and gas prices are hitting all-time highs, and just 13 percent of Americans believe the country is heading in the right direction. But relying on scare tactics to distract voters back to Biden is a strategy not supported by medical conditions on the ground.

Let’s hope whoever rides into Washington on that red wave will take on this fight with integrity.

Pierre Kory, MD, is president and chief medical officer of the Front-Line COVID-19 Critical Care Alliance.

July 23, 2022 Posted by | Corruption | , , | Leave a comment

US is Trying to Drive Erdogan into a Corner – but Without Success

By Vladimir Platov – New Eastern Outlook – 23.07.2022

Joe Biden’s administration is currently losing on all its foreign policy fronts, but he is still hoping for success, if nowhere else, in his confrontation with the Turkish leader Recep Erdoğan, so that he can demonstrate to the world and the US public, that there is still some “gunpowder left in the barrel.” This consideration took on a special importance for Joe Biden and his team in the days leading up to the US President’s Middle East trip, which promised little chance of victory for the White House. Joe Biden’s trip to Saudi Arabia did, in fact, turn out to be a total failure – it did nothing to improve his image and yielded no positive results either in terms of oil deals or in terms of reining in Russia’s influence in the region. In view of this failure, Washington needed to find a scapegoat, and picked on Recep Erdoğan.

The White House has realized that getting rid of the Turkish president, as it had hoped, is not going to be an easy matter, and has therefore stepped up its machinations in a bid to entrap him. One of its tactics was to inflame tensions between Turkey and Greece in the Eastern Mediterranean. Relations between the two countries are not easy at the moment, given Turkey’s demands for Athens to demilitarize certain Aegean islands near the Turkish border and its challenges to Greece’s sovereignty over these islands. At the end of June Recep Erdoğan took the rather undiplomatic approach of publishing threatening tweets in Greek, demanding that Greece give up its territorial claims in the Aegean Sea, and referring to the 1919-1922 war between the two countries: “We warn Greece once more to avoid dreams, statements and actions that will lead to regret, as it did a century ago… .” He also warned Turkey will “not hesitate to enact rights recognized by international agreements on the demilitarization of the islands.” In a later tweet he accused Greece of “oppressing” the Turkish minorities in Western Thrace, Rhodes, and Kos, and supporting international terrorism, a reference to Athens’ relations with the Kurds. Greece, in turn, accuses Turkey of violating Greek airspace, and of carrying out illegal hydrocarbon exploration activities off the coast of Cyprus – a region that, Greece claims, falls within its exclusive economic area.

Over the last 200 years there have been numerous wars between Greece and Turkey – the Greek War of Independence in 1821-1829, and subsequent conflicts in 1897, 1912–1913, 1919–1922, and, in Cyprus, 1974. But Greece was only able to win with support from powerful allies, including Russia. Currently, however, as one of the key supporters of the West’s sanctions against Russia, Greece cannot rely on support from Moscow. Athens is unlikely to get much support from the US either, as recent years have seen a marked shift in Washington’s attitude to its vassal states and even to its obligations under international agreements. Washington’s recent decision to support Greece rather than Turkey in the Eastern Mediterranean region is a striking example of such a change.

As for the relative strengths of the Greek and Turkish militaries, here Athens clearly lags behind Istanbul – the Greek army may be large, but due to lack of funding its weaponry is very out of date and its troops are poorly trained. Turkey, on the other hand, has the second most powerful military in NATO, after the US.

The standoff between Greece and Turkey, both members of NATO, has been going on for a long time, but it has intensified in recent years as relations between Washington and Turkey have deteriorated and Greece has replaced Turkey as the main US ally in the region. The new military alliance in the Eastern Mediterranean was recently formalized by an agreement between the two countries on long-term military support, under which Greece will host additional four US military bases.

Washington was perhaps hoping that the heightened tensions with Greece will encourage domestic opposition to Recep Erdoğan’s policies, but the effect has in fact been quite the opposite – the Turkish public have rallied round their president. On June 20 the Turkish opposition newspaper Cumhuriyet published an article by Mehmet Ali Guler, calling on Turkey to “sever ties with NATO” and looking at how its departure from the alliance might affect the balance of powers in the region. And, according to the Greek newspaper Vima, citing an interview with the commentator Erdoğan Karakuş for the Turkish television channel Haber Global, there have even been belligerent calls within Turkey for the country to “attack the US” if the latter were to provide assistance to Greece.

Well aware of Turkey’s need to update its Air Force, Washington is making use of the situation to put pressure on Ankara. Thus, even though following the meeting between Joe Biden and Recep Erdoğan in Madrid earlier this year Congress approved the supply of F-16 fighter jets to Turkey, Washington has recently made the supply conditional on Turkey demonstrating its willingness to toe the White House policy line. First, a group of US Congressmen signed a statement objecting to the sale of the jets to Turkey. And then Washington required Ankara to break off its relations with Russia as a precondition for the supply of the jets. It appears that the US is only ready to sell its military hardware to countries that share its values. According to a report from the Greek press agency AMNA, that was the stance taken by Senator Robert Menendez, Chair of the US Senate’s Foreign Relations Committee.

The US House of Representatives has also obstructed the sale, by approving an amendment to the defense budget preventing the US from transferring the jets to Turkey unless the Turkish government guarantees that they will not be used in order to violate Greek airspace.

In response to these moves, Turkey reiterated its support for Recep Erdoğan’s policies, making no secret of the fact that anti-American sentiments are growing in the country. For example, according to the Turkish newspaper Aydınlık, Doğu Perinçek, President of the Vatan Partisi, or Patriotic Party, called on the Turkish government to cancel its order for the F-16s on national security grounds.

Given the above background, it is interesting to speculate about the content of the private meeting between Recep Erdoğan and Russian President Vladimir Putin on July 19. Especially since Russian military aircraft have demonstrated their clear superiority of US jets both in Syria and in Ukraine. Moreover, Turkey and Russia have in recent months been stepping up their cooperation on defense industry projects, and, in an interview published in Turkey’s Milliyet newspaper last December, Ismail Demir, President of Turkey’s Defense Industries, stated that the two countries may work together on the development of Turkish TF-X jets. Unlike the US, Russia will not impose any conditions on Turkey that go against its interests, nor will it push the Turkish Air Force into a corner by refusing to service its aircraft when Turkey most needs them, as the US is quite capable of doing should its strategic interests so require.

July 23, 2022 Posted by | Militarism | , , , | Leave a comment

Orban: Sanctions Made No Change in Moscow’s Course, Europe Lost Four Governments

Samizdat – 23.07.2022

Russia-related sanctions have not shattered Moscow’s resolve, while Europe has already lost four governments amid economic and political crises, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban said on Saturday.

“The West’s strategy is like a car with flat tires on all four wheels… The sanctions did not destabilize Moscow. Europe is in trouble, economically and politically, and four governments have become victims: UK, Bulgarian, Italian and Estonian… People will face a sharp increase in prices. And the better part of the world deliberately did not support us as well — China, India, Brazil, South Africa, the Arab world, Africa — everybody is aloof from this conflict, they are interested in their own affairs,” Orban said, delivering a speech in the Romanian city of Baile Tusnad.

Orban further noted that the Ukrainian conflict is likely to “put an end to the Western hegemony, which could unite the world against someone,” and that a “multipolar global order will knock on the door.”

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban said on Saturday that Europe needs a new strategy aimed at peace in the Ukrainian conflict.

“Hungary should not be under the illusion that we can influence the strategy of the West. Nevertheless, it is a matter of honor and morality for us to state our position that a new strategy is needed, the goal of which would be peace and the formulation of a good proposal for peace. The task of the European Union is not to take sides, but to stand between Russia and Ukraine,” Orban said in the Romanian city of Baile Tusnad.

Orban noted that for the first time since World War II, Europe again has no say in important security issues as decisions are made by the United States and Russia.

Peace in Ukraine may be established only after the negotiations between Russia and the United States, and Europe has lost its chance at mediation since it failed to ensure the fulfillment of the Minsk agreements, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban said on Saturday.

“When we are talking about the war, it begs the question: what should we do? Peace talks between Russia and Ukraine will not take place. People who are waiting for them, they are waiting in vain. Russia wants security guarantees, that is why only the talks between Russia and the US can end this war. Until Russian-American negotiations take place, there will be no peace,” Orban said, delivering a speech in the Romanian city of Baile Tusnad.

Orban noted that Europeans cannot mediate the process anymore as Moscow is not willing to listen to the EU after the failure of the Minsk agreements.

“We lost it after 2014 when we could not ensure the fulfillment of the Minsk agreements containing the guarantees from France and Germany. And the Russians do not want to conduct talks with us anymore,” he added.

On February 24, Russia began a military operation in Ukraine responding to calls for help from the breakaway republics of Donetsk and Lugansk. The United States and its allies responded by imposing comprehensive sanctions against Russia while also ramping up their military support for Ukraine.

July 23, 2022 Posted by | Economics | , , , | Leave a comment

The Korean War May Never End

Tales of the American Empire | July 21, 2022

The Korean War that began in 1950 is technically ongoing because only an armistice was signed in 1953, rather than a peace treaty. American warmongers argue the United States must spend $8 billion a year to keep 30,000 troops there at a dozen bases until the war ends. This is only because the United States refuses to even discuss an end to the war because it will lose control of South Korea’s military if American Generals leave. In addition, part of the justification for the Pentagon’s massive annual budget is to defend South Korea, and those who profit off the perpetual American presence spend millions of dollars each year to lobby American congressmen to keep their racket going. The South Korean military is five times stronger than the North Korean military, and there are no Russian or Chinese soldiers based in North Korea. South Korea has twice the population and forty times the GDP of decrepit North Korea and has fortified its mountainous border. American troops are not needed there but powerful interests protect the status quo. Withdrawing just half the American troops would save the United States over three billion dollars a year and may allow a formal peace treaty to be signed.

________________________________

Related Tale: “The Mythical North Korean Threat”; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oG1b-…

Related Tale: “All Nuclear Weapons are Illegal”; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7tod8…

“Withdraw from DMZ Bases”; Carlton Meyer; G2mil; 2013; https://www.g2mil.com/casey.htm

“Thirty-five House Republicans are ‘gravely concerned’ about formally ending the Korean War”; David Choi; Stars and Stripes; December 9, 2021; https://www.stripes.com/theaters/asia…

“The unknown oligarch fighting for an endless Korean War”; Eli Clifton; Responsible Statecraft; March 8, 2022; https://responsiblestatecraft.org/202…

“Cut Army Fat in Korea”; Carlton Meyer; G2mil; 2011; https://www.g2mil.com/daegu.htm

“Pull Airmen and Aircraft out of Osan”; Carlton Meyer; G2mil; 2011; https://www.g2mil.com/osan.htm

July 23, 2022 Posted by | Militarism, Timeless or most popular, Video | , | Leave a comment

Fauci, Top Biden Officials Subpoenaed in Lawsuit Alleging They Colluded With Social Media to Suppress Free Speech

By Megan Redshaw | The Defender | July 21, 2022

Top-ranking Biden administration officials — including Dr. Anthony Fauci — and five social media giants have 30 days to respond to subpoenas and discovery requests in a lawsuit alleging the government colluded with social media companies to suppress freedom of speech “under the guise of combatting misinformation.”

Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt and Louisiana Attorney General Jeff Landry on Wednesday served third-party subpoenas on Twitter, Meta (Facebook’s parent company), Youtube, Instagram and LinkedIn.

Schmitt and Landry on Tuesday filed discovery requests seeking documents and information from the National Institute of Allergies and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) and Fauci, its director; White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre; Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy; and former Disinformation Governance Board executive director Nina Jankowicz.

Discovery requests also were sent to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC); the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency and its director, Jen Easterly; the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS); and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).

“In May, Missouri and Louisiana filed a landmark lawsuit against top-ranking Biden Administration officials for allegedly colluding with social media giants to suppress free speech on topics like COVID-19 and election security,” Schmitt said in Tuesday’s press release.

Schmitt added:

“Earlier this month, a federal court granted our motion for expedited discovery, allowing us to collect important documents from Biden Administration officials. Yesterday, we served discovery requests and today served third-party subpoenas to do exactly that.

“We will fight to get to the bottom of this alleged collusion and expose the suppression of freedom of speech by social media giants at the behest of top-ranking government officials.”

Schmitt announced in a July 12 statement that Terry Doughty, a judge in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Louisiana, ruled in favor of a June 17 motion for expedited preliminary injunction-related discovery and set a timetable with specific deadlines for depositions.

According to Schmitt, government officials “both pressured and colluded with social media giants Meta, Twitter and Youtube to censor free speech in the name of combating so-called ‘disinformation’ and ‘misinformation,’ which led to the suppression and censorship of truthful information on several topics, including COVID-19.”

“The Court’s decision cleared the way for Missouri and Louisiana to gather discovery and documents from Biden Administration officials and social media companies,” Schmitt said in a press release on Tuesday.

“The order states, ‘The First Amendment obviously applies to the citizens of Missouri and Louisiana, so Missouri and Louisiana have the authority to assert those rights,’” he said.

Children’s Health Defense (CHD) President Mary Holland, who also serves as CHD general counsel, praised the ruling:

“CHD welcomes this groundbreaking ruling from Judge Doughty of the Western District of Louisiana to discover whether the Biden administration has violated the First Amendment through censorship.

“For two years, CHD and many other media outlets have not been able to comprehend the mechanisms whereby our major media platforms have ruthlessly censored, suppressed and distorted our information.

“Now, through the discovery process that the judge has allowed, we’ll find out how Meta, Instagram, Twitter and YouTube have been colluding with the federal government to curb so-called ‘disinformation’ and ‘misinformation.’ This is a new day.”

Fauci, CDC, White House press secretary and more must turn over documents

According to the press release, Fauci, chief medical advisor to President Biden and director of the NIAID, was asked to turn over any communications with social media platforms related to content modulation and/or misinformation, and to disclose all meetings with any social media platform related to the subject and to provide all communications with Mark Zuckerberg from Jan. 1, 2020, to the present.

Fauci also must turn over all communications with any social media platform related to the Great Barrington Declaration; the authors and original signers of the Great Barrington Declaration; Dr. Jay Bhattacharya; Martin Kulldorff, Ph.D.; Dr. Aaron Kheriaty, Sunetra Gupta, Ph.D.; Dr. Scott Atlas; Alex Berenson; Peter Daszak, Ph.D.; Shi Zhengli, Ph.D.; the Wuhan Institute of Virology; EcoHealth Alliance; and/or any member of the so-called “Disinformation Dozen,” including CHD chairman and chief legal counsel Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.

White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre is required to identify every officer, official, employee, staff member, personnel, contractor or any other person associated with the White House communications team who communicated or is communicating with any social media platform related to content modulation and/or misinformation — and to turn over those communications.

Jean-Pierre also must identify all persons who “engage[s] regularly with all social media platforms about steps that can be taken” to address misinformation on social media, which engagement “has continued, and … will continue,” as stated during an April 25 White House press briefing — and turn over all communications with any social media platform involved in such engagement.

Defendant Nina Jankowicz, who was tasked with heading up the Biden administration’s “Disinformation Governance Board” must provide all documents related to communications with social media platforms and content modulation and/or misinformation.

Jankowicz is required to identify the nature, purpose, participants, topics to be discussed and topics actually discussed at the meeting between DHS personnel and Twitter executives Nick Pickles and Yoel Roth scheduled on or around April 28.

The CDC is required to provide the names of every officer, official, employee, staff member, personnel, contractor or agent of CDC or any other federal official or agency who communicated or is communicating with any social media platform regarding content modulation and/or misinformation.

The CDC must disclose communications with any social media platform related to content modulation or misinformation, any meetings that took place with social media platforms related to content modulation and/or misinformation, and must identify all “members of our senior staff” and/or “members of our COVID-19 team” who are “in regular touch with … social media platforms,” as “Jennifer Psaki [former White House press secretary] stated at a White House press briefing on or around July 15, 2021.”

The agency must also disclose all “government experts” who are federal officers, officials, agents, employees or contractors, who have “partnered with” Facebook or any other social media platform to address misinformation and/or content modulation, including all communications relating to such partnerships.

Like Fauci, the CDC must turn over information and communications on the “so-called disinformation dozen,” Great Barrington Declaration, alternative news outlets and key experts and scientists who have spoken out against the government’s approach to treating COVID-19 or mandating face masks and lockdowns.

Meta (Facebook) was “commanded” to produce all communications with any federal official relating to misinformation and/or content modulation, to produce all documents and communications-related actions taken based in whole or in part on information received, directly or indirectly, from any federal official and to produce all communications and documents related to a list of search terms that include Kennedy’s name and/or the names of prominent doctors and physicians who were censored for their views on COVID-19.

Facebook also must disclose meetings, communications and documents related to remarks made by Psaki, who said the White House is “in regular touch with these social media platforms, and those engagements typically happen through members of our senior staff, but also members of our COVID-19 team,” and regarding the White House’s efforts to flag “problematic posts for Facebook that spread disinformation.”

Similar requests were made to other government officials and social media platforms, including Twitter, YouTube, Instagram and LinkedIn.

Lawsuit alleges collusion to suppress disfavored speakers and viewpoints

Attorneys general of Louisiana and Missouri in May filed a lawsuit alleging government defendants “colluded with and/or coerced social media companies to suppress disfavored speakers, viewpoints, and content on social media platforms by labeling the content ‘disinformation,’ ‘misinformation’ and ‘malinformation.’”

The court lawsuit alleges social media companies falsely labeled truthful content “disinformation” and “misinformation” and contends the suppression constitutes government action, violating free speech protected by the U.S. constitution.

The complaint also alleges that DHS’ Disinformation Governance Board was created “to induce, label, and pressure the censorship of disfavored content, viewpoints and speakers on social-media platforms,” and that HHS and DHS violated the Administrative Procedure Act to “hold unlawful and set aside final agency actions” that are deemed to be an abuse of power and arbitrary and capricious.

The lawsuit provides several examples of truthful information that was censored by social media companies who later admitted the content was truthful or credible.

According to The Epoch Times, the lawsuit could help bring to light the Biden administration’s “behind-the-scenes efforts” to discourage the dissemination of information related to the lab-leak theory of COVID-19’s origins and the efficiency of masks and lockdowns.

© 2022 Children’s Health Defense, Inc. This work is reproduced and distributed with the permission of Children’s Health Defense, Inc. Want to learn more from Children’s Health Defense? Sign up for free news and updates from Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. and the Children’s Health Defense. Your donation will help to support us in our efforts.

July 22, 2022 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Deception, Full Spectrum Dominance, Science and Pseudo-Science | , , | Leave a comment

US sends more weapons to Ukraine

Samizdat | July 22, 2022

The White House on Friday announced another $270 million worth of US “security assistance” to Ukraine. The newest batch of supplies will include four HIMARS rocket artillery launchers, a large quantity of ammunition, as well as hundreds of ‘Phoenix Ghost’ suicide drones, AP reported citing National Security Council spokesman John Kirby.

In addition to four more High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems (HIMARS) and an unspecified number of GLMRS rockets for them, the aid package includes up to 580 drones and 36,000 rounds of artillery ammunition for the M777 towed howitzers already supplied to Kiev by the Pentagon.

President Joe Biden “has been clear that we’re going to continue to support the government of Ukraine and its people for as long as it takes,” Kirby told AP. Biden is currently being treated for Covid-19 and isolating at the White House.

With this latest batch of weapons and equipment, the Biden administration will have spent a total of $8.2 billion on arming Ukraine. The funds are drawn from the $40 billion package approved by Congress in May.

The US has previously sent Ukraine about 120 of the drones, which had been “rapidly developed by the Air Force in response specifically to Ukrainian requirements,” the Pentagon said back in April. The decision to send more follows claims by Biden’s national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, that Iran was preparing to sell “several hundred” attack drones to Russia. Despite rampant speculation in the media, no evidence of such a deal has since materialized.

According to Kirby, the Ukrainian troops have used the dozen previously supplied HIMARS launchers and Phoenix Ghost drones to hold off “larger and more heavily equipped” Russian troops.

Four HIMARS launchers and one ammunition transport vehicle were destroyed by precision missile strikes between July 5-20, the Russian Ministry of Defense said on Friday.

Earlier this week, three suicide drones targeted the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant in Energodar, damaging the complex. It was not clear whether they were Phoenix Ghosts or some other model in the Ukrainian arsenal, such as the US-made Switchblades. Europe’s largest atomic power plant is in territory controlled by Russian forces.

US military and intelligence officials continue to insist that Russia is not making much progress in Donbass and taking heavy casualties due to the weapons supplied to Ukraine by the West. However, both US and UK military think-tanks have recently voiced concerns over the sheer diversity of weapons systems sent to Ukraine by the variety of NATO allies.

Washington maintains that the US is not a party to the conflict because no US troops have set foot in Ukraine, but it has openly provided Kiev with weapons, ammunition, intelligence and even satellite targeting data.

July 22, 2022 Posted by | Militarism | , | Leave a comment

US “Iran Nuclear Deal” Ploy Coming Full Circle

By Brian Berletic – New Eastern Outlook – 22.07.2022 

Hopes for the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) simply known as the Iran Nuclear Deal seemed to fade further during US President Joe Biden’s recent trip to Israel where the US and Israeli governments signed a pledge to use force against Iran should it pursue nuclear weapons (weapons both the US and Israel possess).

US-based ABC News in its article, “Biden left with few options on Iran as nuclear talks stall,” would claim:

President Joe Biden made a clear promise on Iran, declaring that the country would never become a nuclear power under his watch. But during his time in the White House, the path towards upholding that promise has only become murkier.

During his trip to the Middle East, the president said he would consider using force against Iran only as a “last resort,” although Israel, the US.’s most ardent ally in the region, has pushed for the administration to issue a “credible military threat” against Tehran.

The article would mention the Iran Nuclear Deal specifically, claiming:

… while the administration initially hope to cut a “longer and stronger” deal with Iran, over a year and half of indirect negotiations has produced little movement towards restoring even the original terms of the agreement.

After a monthslong stalemate, a 9th round of talks took place in Doha, Qatar, at the end of June. A State Department spokesperson did not sugarcoat the outcome, saying “no progress was made.”

The 2018 unilateral withdrawal of America from the deal by the administration of US President Donald Trump is blamed for the deal’s failure. Yet the Trump administration’s withdrawal was predicted long before President Trump took office, and in fact, long before US President Barack Obama even signed the deal in the first place. President Biden’s recent activities are only wrapping up what was always a diplomatic ploy meant to trap Iran.

The Nuclear Deal Was Always a Trap

When President Obama signed the Iran Nuclear Deal, it was celebrated as a breakthrough in US diplomacy and a departure from the previous Bush administration’s expanding wars of aggression spanning Iraq and Afghanistan while threatening Iran next.

Signed by the United States and Iran along with other participating nations (the UK, EU, Germany, Russia, China, and France) in 2015, NBC News in their article, “What is the Iran nuclear deal?” would explain:

The Iran nuclear deal, formally known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, offered Tehran billions of dollars in sanctions relief in exchange for agreeing to curb its nuclear program.

The agreement was aimed at ensuring that “Iran’s nuclear program will be exclusively peaceful.” In return, it lifted UN Security Council and other sanctions, including in areas covering trade, technology, finance and energy.

At face value, the United States imposing sanctions on Iran to impede its development of nuclear weapons was problematic. The United States is the only nation in human history to use nuclear weapons against another nation, twice. Following the 2001 US invasion and occupation of Afghanistan and the 2003 US invasion and occupation of Iraq, the United States had military forces to Iran’s west and east. US hostilities toward Iran stretch back decades and the US State Department, regardless of administration, has made little secret that Washington seeks regime change in Tehran just as it did in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Worse still, US policymakers as early as 2009 had articulated a ploy by which the US would offer Iran a “deal” before deliberately sabotaging it and using its failure as a pretext for the long sought-after regime change war the US has wanted against Iran.

The Washington DC-based Brookings Institution, funded by the largest corporate-financier interests in the Western world as well as Western governments themselves including the US through the US State Department published the 2009 paper (PDF), “Which Path to Persia? Options for a New American Strategy Toward Iran.” In it, the Brookings Institution’s policymakers explicitly articulated options the US could pursue to achieve regime change in Iran.

These options were broken down into sections and chapters within the 170-page report and ranged from “An Offer Iran Shouldn’t Refuse: Persuasion,” to “Toppling Tehran: Regime Change,” to “Going All the Way: Invasion,” and “The Velvet Revolution: Supporting a Popular Uprising.” Everything from setting diplomatic traps to arming designated terrorist organzations were not only discussed, but in the years that followed the paper’s publication, they were implemented one after the other without success. The remaining options on the long list are military in nature involving either the US or Israel (or both) waging war directly and openly against Iran.

All that is required before doing so is a pretext, including the “offer” the US made, but Iran “refused.”

“An Offer Iran Shouldn’t Refuse”

Under “Chapter 1” titled, “An Offer Iran Shouldn’t Refuse: Persuasion,” Brookings policymakers would explain (emphasis added):

… any military operation against Iran will likely be very unpopular around the world and require the proper international context—both to ensure the logistical support the operation would require and to minimize the blowback from it.

The paper then laid out how the US could appear to the world as a peacemaker and depict Iran’s betrayal of a “very good deal” as the pretext for an otherwise reluctant US military response (emphasis added):

The best way to minimize international opprobrium and maximize support (however, grudging or covert) is to strike only when there is a widespread conviction that the Iranians were given but then rejected a superb offer—one so good that only a regime determined to acquire nuclear weapons and acquire them for the wrong reasons would turn it down. Under those circumstances, the United States (or Israel) could portray its operations as taken in sorrow, not anger, and at least some in the international community would conclude that the Iranians “brought it on themselves” by refusing a very good deal.

The Iran Nuclear Deal was doomed before it was ever signed. It was conceived wholly as a pretext for war, not as a diplomatic solution to avoid it.

False Hope Spanning Multiple US Presidencies

In many ways, Iran would be foolish not to create a sufficient military deterrence against US aggression, including the development of nuclear weapons if necessary. However, Iran nonetheless agreed to the nuclear deal’s terms and until the US unilaterally abandoned the deal in 2018, abided by it.

In fact, following the US withdrawal from the deal, Iran continued abiding by many of its conditions alongside its other signatories in the vain hope that under a new US administration it could be salvaged.

When US President Joe Biden took office, the obvious first step by Washington should have been to unconditionally rejoin the deal by removing sanctions, followed by Iran’s renewed and full compliance to the deal’s conditions. Yet the US demanded Iranian compliance first before even agreeing to negotiate Washington’s return to the deal.

It was clear long before President Obama’s signature was inked on the deal’s documents that the US would sabotage it, blame Iran, then pursue renewed and expanded aggression against Iran directly, by proxy, or both. President Trump in 2018 took advantage of America’s domestic politics and the perceived notion that US “Republicans” seek a harder line versus Iran in order to abandon the deal. Because of President Trump’s perceived trait as an “outsider” both to his own party and wider US politics, the US could shift the blame squarely on his administration. Yet the continuity of this ploy across presidential administrations is evident by the fact that upon coming into office, President Biden did not immediately and unconditionally return the US to the deal’s framework.

Instead, President Biden’s administration prevented America’s return to the deal by creating unreasonable preconditions placed entirely upon Iran. With President Biden’s statement in Israel coupled with a recent claim made by US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan that Iran is preparing to supply Russia with drones, the US is closing the door on the deal indefinitely.

Further evidence of continuity between US administrations can be seen throughout the US-led destabilization, invasion, and occupation of Syria. The campaign was meant as one of several prerequisites laid out by the Brookings Institution’s experts in 2009 before attempting regime change against Iran directly. Ironically, as the Obama administration appeared reconciliatory toward Iran by signing the Iran Nuclear Deal, the same administration presided over the devastating proxy war targeting Iran’s key ally in the region, Syria.

Support of US aggression in Syria transcended presidencies, from the Bush administration who set the stage for it, to the Obama administration who presided over the opening phases of hostilities and occupation, to the Trump and now Biden administrations who have perpetuated a US military presence in Syria along with a policy of denying Syria its key fuel and food production regions in the east to block reconstruction. US foreign policy toward Syria and Iran should not be interpreted separately. The fate of both nations is entwined and illustrates the wider agenda the US is pursuing in the region and has been for decades regardless of US administration.

Barring a fundamental reordering of both American foreign policy objectives and a reordering of the special interests driving them, the Iran Nuclear Deal’s prospects of success will only fade further in the distance. While Tehran’s patience is admirable, Iran and its allies must prepare for the inevitable hostilities that will follow US blame against Tehran for “undermining” a deal the US never had any intention of honoring in the first place.

Brian Berletic is a Bangkok-based geopolitical researcher and writer.

July 22, 2022 Posted by | Deception, Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Militarism, Wars for Israel | , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Why Did Anthony Fauci Suddenly Switch One Day From Promoting Calm to Promoting Lockdown?

BY WILL JONES | THE DAILY SCEPTIC | JULY 22, 2022

I’ve been looking again at Covid’s origins and the start of the pandemic. Last time I wrote on it I argued that Italy brought in China-style lockdowns on March 8th and 10th 2020 mainly as a result of panic owing to the leap in the death rate, with it being clear from the hospital situation there were many more deaths to come. I still believe that that was the immediate trigger for imposing lockdowns at the time. However, I now recognise that that is far from the full story. What it leaves out is the backdrop of who was pushing for lockdowns throughout the preceding two months, and why.

Two key pieces of data have emerged in the last few months that help to bring the picture into clearer focus. The first is that with the arrival of Omicron the Chinese have continued fanatically to pursue lockdowns, crippling their economy as they do it. To my mind, this is convincing evidence that the Chinese are sincere about their belief in the radical new disease management strategy they inaugurated on January 23rd 2020 in Wuhan. I initially (in 2020) thought it may be an elaborate ruse to convince the world to do something monumentally and pointlessly self-destructive. But it appears they really do think lockdowns are highly effective and the right way to fight a disease like COVID-19. I’m aware some suggest it could just be a cunning strategy to strengthen the grip of the ruling party on the population, but all the evidence indicates to me that they actually are trying to fight the disease in this way.

If this is accepted then one of the key pieces of the puzzle snaps into place: the global Covid narrative has, both behind closed doors and in front of them, been driven in part by the Chinese Government’s commitment to its extreme suppression strategy and its desire for other countries to adopt it as well. It’s been suggested this derives from a sense of national pride and seeking vindication of their efforts and ideas, and is part of a wider aim of achieving global Chinese cultural supremacy, which sounds plausible to me.

The second key piece of data are emails sent by White House Chief Medical Advisor Dr. Anthony Fauci, which reveal that behind closed doors as late as February 26th 2020, Dr. Fauci was still, as he had been consistently up to that point, advising people not to panic. But as of February 27th his approach suddenly changed and, from that moment on, he began consistently pushing restrictions.

On February 26th he wrote to CBS News that Americans should not yield to fear:

You cannot avoid having infections since you cannot shut off the country from the rest of the world… Do not let the fear of the unknown… distort your evaluation of the risk of the pandemic to you relative to the risks that you face every day… do not yield to unreasonable fear.

But by the next day he was writing to actress Morgan Fairchild that the American public should prepare for pandemic restrictions:

It would be great if you could tweet to your many Twitter followers that although the current risk of coronavirus to the American public is low, the fact that there is community spread of virus in a number of countries besides China… poses a risk that we may progress to a global pandemic of COVID-19… And so for that reason, the American public should not be frightened, but should be prepared to mitigate an outbreak in this country by measures that include social distancing, teleworking, temporary closure of schools, etc. There is nothing to be done right now since there are so few cases in this country and these cases are being properly isolated, and so go about your daily business. However, be aware that behavioural adjustments may need to be made if a pandemic occurs.

Interestingly, February 27th was also the day the media narrative in the U.S. shifted, with the New York Times leading the way with its first alarmist piece, by Peter Daszak of the EcoHealth Alliance, and also an alarmist podcast with science and health reporter Donald G. McNeil Jr., which quoted directly from China a 2% mortality rate for the virus.

The context for this shift was a WHO press briefing on February 24th by Bruce Aylward, who had just concluded a WHO-China Joint Mission on COVID-19 and told the world that lockdown worked and “you have to do this. If you do it, you can save lives and prevent thousands of cases of what is a very difficult disease.”

The timing obviously suggests the events are connected, but crucially it also implies that Fauci and those around him were not part of the behind-the-scenes decision of Aylward to throw the WHO’s weight behind the Chinese approach. This leaves, then, the question of why Fauci & Co flipped from their previous position of playing down the threat from the virus and not supporting extreme Chinese-style interventions to going all in with the panic.

The picture being painted here is of at least two ‘conspiracies’ going on – the Chinese one, seeking to push lockdowns as part of Chinese vindication and cultural supremacy, and the Fauci & Co one, the potential motives for which are discussed below. I am pretty confident these are not the same ‘conspiracy’, as I assume that Fauci and Co are not motivated by vindicating China and advancing its cultural supremacy (I’ve seen no evidence this should be the case).

A further element to throw into the mix is that the first Western lockdown occurred three days before the Aylward WHO briefing, on February 21st 2020, in a region of 50,000 people in Lombardy. Oddly, it seems to have been an isolated local initiative in response to the first identified ‘cases’ led by the regional health chief Giulio Gallera, with no clear links to the WHO or any other known lockdown protagonists. It would be interesting to ask Mr. Gallera why he decided to follow such a radical course of action that day.

Italy locked down on March 8th and 10th, a response it seems to the climbing death rate, and most of the rest of the world followed in the ensuing two weeks. The U.S. Government was persuaded by Deborah Birx and others to back lockdowns on March 16th. On March 12th-14th, U.K. Government ministers and officials did a media round promoting the idea of aiming for herd immunity and keeping calm and carrying on. However, that strategy soon collapsed in the face of shifting public opinion and alarmist models from scientists like Imperial’s Neil Ferguson. After March 23rd, Sweden was the only holdout among Western Governments.

Such a mess of uncoordinated action confirms to my mind a picture of different groups driven by different motives and agendas which sometimes overlap, catalysed by groupthink and hysteria, rather than any grand behind-the-scenes conspiracy involving all in a coordinated fashion.

The Chinese Communist Party is a crucial actor, of course. It invented lockdowns and since then has persistently pushed them to the rest of the world, including through an all too willing WHO. However, that doesn’t mean that all who promote panic and lockdowns do so because they are in thrall to China or doing its bidding.

So what was the deal with Fauci & Co – why did they oppose panic and lockdowns until February 27th, then flip to become among their most eager and high-powered proponents?

Fauci’s emails show that, starting at the end of January and into February 2020, he organised a series of secretive video conferences and phone calls because he and his associates suspected the virus may have been genetically modified and leaked from a lab. Yet despite these suspicions, on February 19th the group wrote a letter to the Lancet denouncing the lab leak as a “conspiracy theory”. The organiser of the letter was Peter Daszak of the EcoHealth Alliance, one of Fauci’s associates who it later turned out had been funding gain of function research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology of exactly the kind that was suspected as being responsible for creating COVID-19. Biologist Nick Patterson notes a grant application from EcoHealth Alliance to DARPA (the research agency of the U.S. Department of Defence), of which he says, “as far as I can make out, the plan here was for WIV to collect live virus, ship it to the USA, have U.S. scientists genetically modify the virus, and then ship modified virus… back to China”.

In light of information like this and Fauci and Co’s preoccupation during February 2020 with the origin of the virus, culminating in their cynical effort to suppress the claims of lab leak and genetic modification, I surmise that their major motivation was to cover themselves for the possibility that they and their research fields would be held responsible for the virus. Initially this took the form of suppressing the lab leak theory while also playing down the threat from the virus, which they would have been keen to be as uneventful as possible. But why then the flip to panic mode after February 27th? Did the WHO backing lockdowns on February 24th change the equation, so it was no longer deemed viable or good cover to oppose the new approach? The path of least resistance in other words. A related question is whether they were genuinely persuaded that the measures would be effective or if they retained an unspoken scepticism. If they did retain any scepticism there’s been precious little sign of it since March 2020.

Overall, I see no indication of a grand plan from the earliest days in which all are working from a common script to a common goal. Instead, I see various groups with their own agendas, interests and fears. It’s clear that, following Aylward’s team’s visit, China managed to capture the WHO and bring it on board with championing lockdowns. However, the motives of everyone besides China are largely opaque. Why did Aylward become China’s biggest fan – was he threatened or bribed or just duped and naïve? Why exactly did Lombardy regional health chief Giulio Gallera respond to the first cases in his region by imposing a Chinese-style lockdown even before the WHO had backed them? Why did Fauci flip on February 27th? What about curious figures like Deputy National Security Advisor Matt Pottinger, highlighted by Michael Senger, who despite being a known China critic, was a major alarmist influence within the White House from the get-go, drawing on mysterious ‘contacts in China’ to call for panic and restrictions as early as January?

What drove each of these people to get behind the closing down of society as the ‘solution’ to a respiratory virus? We can largely see now who did what and when. What’s mainly missing is the why.

July 22, 2022 Posted by | Science and Pseudo-Science, Timeless or most popular | , , , | Leave a comment

Hezbollah rejected US support offer to stop confrontation with Israel: Nasrallah

Press TV – July 22, 2022

In a rare interview recorded some 20 years ago and aired this week, Hezbollah Secretary General Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah says the resistance movement rejected American offers of money and support that were made in exchange for its elimination from the Arab-Israeli conflict equation.

Lebanon’s al-Mayadeen channel is airing a five-part documentary series dubbed “40 and Beyond” about Hezbollah. The series comes on the occasion of the 40th anniversary of the establishment of Hezbollah as well as the 30th anniversary of the election of Nasrallah as the head of the movement. The episodes include an unseen interview of Nasrallah with Ghassan Ben Jeddou, current CEO of al-Mayadeen.

In the third episode of the series, Nasrallah says the United States made several offers to Hezbollah after the liberation of southern Lebanon and western Bekaa in 2000, aiming at neutralizing the movement and eliminating it from the Arab-Israeli conflict equation.

The United States was trying to convince Hezbollah that Shebaa farms were not worth a conflict and that the issue could be resolved through dialogue, Nasrallah said.

According to the top resistance figure, what the United States was offering in exchange for the movement’s neutralization included working out a solution about the issue of Lebanese prisoners in Israeli prisons, recognizing Hezbollah’s political role and its inclusion of Hezbollah into the government, providing the resistance with a significant financial aid to rebuild the liberated areas, and removing Hezbollah from the so-called terror list.

Washington was also asking the Lebanese movement to abandon its military and financial support for the Palestinian Intifada, said Nasrallah.

These offers, he said, were strongly rejected by Hezbollah because the movement sought to help the Palestinians and considered Israel a permanent threat to Lebanon’s security.

American authorities repeated the same offers after 9/11 following its declaring of war against organizations it recognizes as terrorists, added the resistance leader.

Hezbollah was established following the 1982 Israeli invasion and occupation of southern Lebanon. Since then, the popular resistance group has grown into a powerful military force.

The resistance group fought off two Israeli wars against Lebanon in 2000 and 2006, forcing a humiliating retreat upon the regime’s military in both wars. The movement has vowed to resolutely defend Lebanon in case of another Israeli war.

In an interview with Iran’s Arabic-language al-Alam news network in early January 2022, Nasrallah also pointed to the offer by the United States to turn its back on Palestine and end confrontation with the occupying regime.

“Previously, they (the Americans) sent us a delegation on behalf of Dick Cheney to negotiate a halt in our support for Palestine and attacks against Israel. In return, they said that they would pay us billions of dollars and even allow us to have our weapons, an offer which we naturally opposed,” he said.

Lebanon and the occupying entity are technically at war since the latter has kept the Arab country’s Shebaa Farms under occupation since 1967.

“We do not recognize the existence of Israel. This is the land of Palestine,” Nasrallah said.

July 22, 2022 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Solidarity and Activism, Timeless or most popular | , , , , , | Leave a comment

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