Hunter Biden Incident Shows That Gun Laws Are For The Little People
NRA-ILA | April 5, 2021
There is a central hypocrisy at the heart of the gun control effort. High-profile gun control-supporting politicians, the Hollywood elite, and billionaire tycoons, will advocate to strip ordinary Americans of their right to defend themselves and their family, all the while enjoying the security that armed men with guns provide. As Hunter Biden’s 2018 firearm incident shows, this hypocrisy extends even to incidents where a high-profile individual has taken the step of procuring their own firearm. The message from these elites could not be clearer: Gun laws are only for the little people.
For those who have yet to learn of Hunter’s escapades in firearm ownership, according to a report from Politico, the troubled son of the president purchased a .38-caliber revolver from a Delaware Federal Firearms Licensee (FFL) on October 12, 2018. In order to acquire the gun, Hunter filled out the required BATFE Form 4473. On October 23, Hallie Biden, widow to Joe Biden’s son Beau and then-companion to Hunter, searched the ne’er-do-well’s truck, which was parked at her home in Wilmington, Del., and found the handgun. Apparently fearing for Hunter’s safety, Hallie wrapped the revolver in a shopping bag and threw it into a trash receptacle outside nearby gourmet grocery store Janssen’s Market – which is located across the street from the campus of Alexis I. du Pont High School.
Later that day, after Hunter told Hallie to retrieve the firearm, Hallie returned to where she had disposed of the gun but could not find it. At this point law enforcement was notified of the missing firearm, prompting an investigation that reportedly involved the Delaware State Police, the United States Secret Service, and the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
As it happens, between Hallie’s disposal of the firearm and her return to the market, a man who routinely searches the store’s trash receptacles for recyclables recovered the firearm. This man returned the revolver a few days after finding it.
According to Politico, prior to the firearm’s return a pair of Secret Service agents visited the FFL where Hunter purchased the firearm in an attempt to obtain the corresponding Form 4473.
The Politico report noted,
Secret Service agents approached the owner of the store where Hunter bought the gun and asked to take the paperwork involving the sale, according to two people, one of whom has firsthand knowledge of the episode and the other was briefed by a Secret Service agent after the fact.
The gun store owner refused to supply the paperwork, suspecting that the Secret Service officers wanted to hide Hunter’s ownership of the missing gun in case it were to be involved in a crime, the two people said. The owner, Ron Palmieri, later turned over the papers to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives, which oversees federal gun laws.
As has been made clear in a previous item regarding this incident, NRA does not allege that Hunter or Hallie engaged in any criminal conduct. However, Hunter and Hallie’s conduct give rise to several legal questions.
Hunter was discharged from the U.S. Navy Reserve in 2014 after he tested positive for cocaine. Further, at various times, Hunter has been a notorious and admitted drug user. Hunter’s lengthy battle with drugs has been chronicled by himself and the Biden family in numerous interviews and a forthcoming memoir titled, “Beautiful Things.”
An April 1, 2020 USA Today piece on Hunter’s memoir contained the following summary of some of its contents,
In the spring of 2018, he used his “superpower – finding crack anytime, anywhere” – in Los Angeles. At one point, a dealer pointed a gun at his head before he realized Biden was looking for drugs.
He later learned how to cook drugs and spent a lot of time with thieves, addicts and con artists. “I never slept. There was no clock. Day bled into night and night into day,” he writes.
The situation grew out of control. “I was smoking crack every 15 minutes,” he writes.
Biden returned to the East Coast in the fall of 2018, again wanting to get better, though that didn’t happen.
Eventually, his family tried to stage an intervention. “I don’t know what else to do,” Joe Biden told him. “I’m so scared. Tell me what to do.” His son replied: “Not (expletive) this.”
It wasn’t until he met now-wife Melissa Cohen in Los Angeles – whom he married after only a week of knowing – that he got sober again. They told each other they loved each other on their first date; she had the same eyes as Beau, he writes. She championed his sobriety and dumped out his crack.
It is illegal for a person “who is an unlawful user of or addicted to any controlled substance” to possess a firearm. Possession of a firearm by a prohibited person is punishable by up to 10 years imprisonment.
In order to purchase a firearm from an FFL, a buyer must fill out a Form 4473. The form asks, “Are you an unlawful user of, or addicted to, marijuana or any depressant, stimulant, narcotic drug, or any other controlled substance?” Hunter answered “no” to this question.
Lying on a form 4473 is two separate crimes. It is a crime when a person “knowingly makes any false statement or representation with respect to the information required by this chapter to be kept in the records of a person licensed under this chapter,” such as the Form 4473. A violation of this provision is punishable by up to 5 years imprisonment. It is also a crime for a person to “make any false or fictitious oral or written statement” to a dealer “with respect to any fact material to the lawfulness of the sale.” A violation of this provision is punishable by up to 10 years imprisonment.
Janssen’s Market is located less than 250 yards from the campus of Alexis I. du Pont High School.
As a U.S. senator, Joe Biden was a key proponent of the federal Gun-Free School Zones Act of 1990. The initial version of this unconstitutional and unwise policy was struck down by the U.S. Supreme Court in U.S. v. Lopez. A later, similarly constitutionally dubious, version remains on the books.
18 USC 922(q)(2)(A) provides,
(A) It shall be unlawful for any individual knowingly to possess a firearm that has moved in or that otherwise affects interstate or foreign commerce at a place that the individual knows, or has reasonable cause to believe, is a school zone.
18 USC 921 (a)(25) defines school zone as,
(25) The term “school zone” means—
(A) in, or on the grounds of, a public, parochial or private school; or
(B) within a distance of 1,000 feet from the grounds of a public, parochial or private school.
18 USC 922(q)(2)(B) does provide for some exemption for possession of a firearm,
(i) on private property not part of school grounds;
(ii) if the individual possessing the firearm is licensed to do so by the State in which the school zone is located or a political subdivision of the State, and the law of the State or political subdivision requires that, before an individual obtains such a license, the law enforcement authorities of the State or political subdivision verify that the individual is qualified under law to receive the license;
(iii) that is—
(I) not loaded; and
(II) in a locked container, or a locked firearms rack that is on a motor vehicle;
(iv) by an individual for use in a program approved by a school in the school zone;
(v) by an individual in accordance with a contract entered into between a school in the school zone and the individual or an employer of the individual;
(vi) by a law enforcement officer acting in his or her official capacity; or
(vii) that is unloaded and is possessed by an individual while traversing school premises for the purpose of gaining access to public or private lands open to hunting, if the entry on school premises is authorized by school authorities.
Maybe Hallie had a Delaware License to Carry a Concealed Deadly Weapon or placed the firearm in a locked container while she brought the gun to the store. However, a reasonable person might wonder whether an individual who would throw a handgun wrapped in a shopping bag away in a publicly accessible trash receptacle, would comport their conduct within these narrow exceptions while traversing the public roadways to Janssen’s Market.
If Hunter and Hallie are guilty of any illegal conduct, it’s difficult to fault the pair for ignoring the potential legal ramifications of their actions. After all, these gun control measures were not designed to be followed by well-connected elites like them.
This point is underscored by the Secret Service’s alleged involvement in the case. Rather than having their conduct scrutinized by federal law enforcement, if the Politico report and Hunter’s contemporaneous text messages are to be believed, the federal government tried to cover up for the prominent pair.
As well-protected politicians and their establishment allies push for new gun controls, ordinary law-abiding Americans should know that these hypocrites have no intention of parting with their own elaborate security measures or being otherwise inconvenienced by the burdens they foist upon the rest of us.
Anti-war activist visited by police after posting embarrassing AOC video
By MAX BLUMENTHAL · The Grayzone · APRIL 9, 2021
An anti-war activist said he was visited by California Highway Patrol officers after posting video of Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s bumbling comments on Israel-Palestine. The action was initiated by a call to US Capitol Police.
As he waited for a food delivery at his home in Los Angeles on April 8, Ryan Wentz, an anti-war activist and producer for the online viral program, Soapbox, heard two men calling his name from over his front gate. When he approached, he realized they were not delivery drivers, but police officers flashing badges of the California Highway Patrol.
The cops informed Wentz that they had received a call from the Capitol Police, the federal law enforcement agency tasked with protecting the US Congress, about a tweet he had sent that allegedly threatened Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
Wentz told The Grayzone, “The officers said, ‘We got a warning about a sitting member of Congress. And it was because of your tweet, which tagged them in it.’ And then they just wouldn’t back down from this accusation that I threatened to kill her.”
The California Highway Patrol indicated on Twitter that it had acted on a call from Capitol Police. The Grayzone has contacted the office of Ocasio-Cortez, known popularly as AOC, and will update this article when more information is available.
Whether or not AOC’s office was responsible for falsely informing Capitol Police of an online threat by Wentz, the Democratic congresswoman has demonstrated a pattern of spurious claims of violence against her critics, and of resorting to heavy-handed methods to suppress them. Any move by AOC to wield law enforcement against online detractors would be especially ironic given her status as a vehement advocate for defunding the police and ending mass incarceration.
Whoever called the police on Wentz furnished law enforcement with a patently false allegation, as he has never threatened violence against any member of Congress. In the tweet that triggered the police action, Wentz merely posted video of AOC delivering a vapid and embarrassingly convoluted answer to a question about resolving the crisis in Israel-Palestine. Describing her answer as “incredibly underwhelming,” he let the congresswoman’s cringeworthy commentary speak for itself.
Asked by Michael S. Miller of the New York Jewish Community Relations Council about actions that could be taken to support movements towards peace between Jewish Israelis and Palestinians, AOC responded as follows:
Earlier just now you and I were talking about the what and the how. And I think that when we talk about peace, centering people’s humanity, protecting people’s rights – it’s not just about the what and the end goal which actually gets a lot of focus, but I actually think it’s much more about the how, and the way we are coming together, and how we interpret that what, and how we act in, you know, the actions we take to get to that what. So what this really is about is a question more than anything else about process. And we really need to make sure that we are valuing a process where all parties are respected and have, you know, a lot of equal opportunity to really make sure we are negotiating in good faith, etcetera. That being said, you know, I think there’s just this one central issue of settlements, because if the what – if the what has been decided on as two state, then the action of settlements, it’s not the how to get to that what. And so, you know, I think that’s a central thing that, you know, we center. And that we value Jewish and rather, we value Israeli, uh, uh, uh, we value the safety and human rights of Israelis, we value the safety and human rights of Palestinians, in that process that is similar, and that is on equal footing. And so all of that is extremely important in that process.
The video that Wentz tweeted of AOC’s long-winded dodge of a fundamental question about resolving the Israeli occupation of Palestine prompted a flood of online mockery and contempt, mostly from leftist Twitter users. Many derided AOC as a careerist who had abandoned progressive causes like Palestinian liberation in order to curry favor with Democratic Party power brokers, while others ridiculed her meaningless word salad.
Within hours of the online pile-on, someone reported Wentz to the Capitol Police for tweeting the video that embarrassed AOC. Because Wentz does not provide any information about his personal identity in his public Twitter profile, the social media giant appeared to have provided his private details to federal law enforcement.
“Another weird thing is usually I would get a report [from Twitter],” Wentz said, “because I’ve gotten my tweets reported before. But I didn’t get any notification about this.”
AOC’s staff has previously appealed to certain authorities to punish online critics. On February 4, 2021, her campaign sent a mass email to supporters asking them to “scan your social media to find posts with misleading information” about the congresswoman, and “use the built-in report feature to flag them for moderators.”
Team AOC issued its appeal for supporters to police social media in response to right-wing mockery of a dramatic livestream in which AOC suggested that the mob which stormed the Capitol building on January 6 nearly assassinated her.
“I just hear these yells of ‘WHERE IS SHE? WHERE IS SHE?’” she recounted in the livestream. “This was the moment where I thought everything was over. I thought I was going to die.”
Her eyes welling with tears, AOC continued, “I felt that if this was the journey my life was taking, I felt that things were going to be okay, and that I had fulfilled my purpose.”
However, the source of the yells which had terrified AOC turned out to be a Capitol Police officer who had been dispatched to protect her. Further, the congresswoman’s office was located in the Cannon House Office Building, which had not been penetrated by any rioters on January 6 and was located a block away from the melee.
Right-wing activists responded to AOC’s claims by launching a viral hashtag likening her to Jussie Smollet, the actor who faked an attack on himself. After attempting to challenge her critics directly, AOC delegated her staff to dispatch its army of supporters to report critics en masse to Twitter and Facebook censors.
Weeks earlier, online podcaster Jimmy Dore had initiated a “Force The Vote” campaign to pressure AOC and fellow members of the progressive congressional “Squad” to withhold their votes for Rep. Nancy Pelosi as Speaker of the House until Pelosi agreed to bring a bill for Medicare for All to the floor for a vote.
In response to incendiary criticism from Dore for her refusal to buck centrist party leadership, AOC declared, “That’s not tone, that’s violence.”
AOC’s record of characterizing harsh criticism as violent abuse, and turning to online censors to suppress it, raises questions about whether her team was responsible for siccing the police on an anti-war activist.
According to Wentz, the police officers that visited him asked if he had any violent intent behind his tweet, then left. “If this was like a purely intimidation thing,” he reflected, “then I guess it did its job. It’s not comforting to be on the receiving end of that. But at the same time, they’re not going to shut the left up.”
Wentz added, “We are told that AOC is a member of the left, but if she really was involved in this [call to the Capitol Police] – and that’s how the left treats the left – then I want no part of that. I don’t want this fake adversarial movement that just entrenches the horrible deeds that we’re living under now.”
Armed Iraq groups threaten to strike US forces if no withdrawal date is set
MEMO | April 8, 2021
The Coordinating Body of the Iraqi Resistance Factions yesterday warned that it would direct large and accurate strikes against US forces in Iraq if no clear date is set for their final withdrawal from the country, Anadolu reported.
“Today, the resistance finds itself obliged (…) to direct large and precise blows if this dialogue does not include a clear and explicit declaration of the final withdrawal date for the occupation forces: by land, air, and completely,” the body, which includes Iran- backed militia groups such as the Iraqi Hezbollah Brigades, said in a statement.
Iraqi and US officials held the third round of strategic dialogue to discuss a number of issues including cooperation in combating terrorism yesterday.
In a joint statement after the talks, the two governments said the mission of US forces was now focused on training Iraqi troops to fight Daesh and as a result US combat troops wouldn’t be needed in the country.
They added that they had agreed on the eventual withdrawal of US combat troops from Iraq and that the two governments would hold further talks to work out the timing.
The Iraqi Resistance Factions said the meeting’s final statement was “vague.. and does not contain any indication of the implementation of the Parliament’s decision to expel American occupation forces from Iraq.”
In January 2020, the Iraqi parliament voted on a resolution to remove all foreign forces from the country after the US assassinated Iranian General Qasem Soleimani in a drone attack near Baghdad airport.
Some 2,500 American soldiers are stationed in Iraq as part of the anti- ISIS international coalition.
YouTube Censors Florida Governor DeSantis and His Science Advisors
By Jeffrey A. Tucker | AIER | April 7, 2021
In 2020, Florida took the lead in rejecting lockdowns. The effort was led by Governor Ron DeSantis, who in the course of the pandemic became a master of knowledge and erudition on matters of public health and the cell biological issues concerning immunity. In removing mandates and restrictions, he was under the influence of the signatories of the Great Barrington Declaration along with public health scholar Scott Atlas.
The efforts in Florida to protect the elderly while permitting the rest of society to function normally led to a success that has been celebrated the world over. It causes major disruption to the lockdown narrative that the only way to suppress a virus is to suppress rights and freedoms.
As a retrospective on the policy, the governor held a roundtable with all four scientists. Lasting an hour and a half, they covered all the major issues. The video itself came to serve as a tutorial in the relationship between public policy and virus mitigation.
With no warning, no announcement, and no explanation, YouTube on April 7, 2021, suddenly deleted the entire video from its platform. Once hosted by WTSP Tampa Bay, an NBC affiliate, it originally appeared as embedded in a story on WTSP.com. The video that once lived here is now replaced by this.
AIER embedded that same video on our story about the event, along with the first and still the only full transcript of the event. In the late afternoon, the video appeared completely blanked out.
After the lockdowns last spring, YouTube announced that it would pull any video with coronavirus information that was at odds with the recommendations by the Centers for Disease Control and the World Health Organization, organizations that aggressively backed lockdowns in 2020 (after ten years of opposing them). When the CDC and WHO began to contradict themselves on many issues, among which included immunities and their source, YouTube took a different direction, curating the “science” themselves and deleting any video that its employees didn’t like.
This policy has now run afoul of the basic needs of public health messaging, science, and sound policy decision making, even to the point of removing a serious forum of a popular government along with his scientific advisors from Harvard, Stanford, and Oxford universities.
AIER has dealt with problems of censorship for the better part of a year. We began to find alternative sources to host our content, companies that would not engage in sudden takedowns and censorship. Our own choice has been LBRY, which hosts all our videos on a channel.
This sounds like a good solution to censorship, but there is a vulnerability. The Securities and Exchange Commission has singled out LBRY for investigation and fines as high as $11 million for unlawful distribution of securities. The complaint is about the protocol ownership tokens that are distributed to those who use the platform, as a way of incentivizing and monetizing the creation of content. LBRY is only one of many thousands of companies that are using this new method, which is made possible by blockchain technology and the tokenization of internet finance. The SEC has been ambiguous on the question of whether a token is a security but states such as Wyoming have specifically legislated against this claim that fundamentally threatens the entire crypto industry.
Why is LBRY being singled out for investigation? Is it possible that the complaint against the company was initiated by YouTube as a way of tightening the tech giant’s control over internet content? We do not know but it is not crazy to suspect that this is what’s going on.
This latest attack on public health information comes barely one week after Twitter aggressively censored one of the scientists on DeSantis’s panel, Martin Kulldorff, one of the original creators of the Great Barrington Declaration. Meanwhile, Twitter itself has bragged about its new tools for removing anything that contradicts the government/corporate agenda.
And to mention one more case of big-tech/big-media manipulation, Governor DeSantis himself was subjected to an outrageous case of editing by 60 Minutes. The show deliberately distorted its broadcast version of a question and answer session, completely leaving out of its account an extended explanation by the governor that proved that the nature of the question was completely false.
The pulling of the roundtable video comes a day after the total humiliation of 60 Minutes in many stories that defended the governor. Its deletion of the most viewed version online denies viewers the opportunity to observe DeSantis’s impressive knowledge on the subject of the coronavirus and the public policy response.
A new version of the original video of the DeSantis roundtable still appears at AIER, along with a complete transcript.
Beijing blames Washington’s aggression for Taiwan tensions
RT | April 8, 2021
The Chinese Foreign Ministry has dismissed accusations that Beijing is engaging in “intimidation” and “coercion” in Taiwan, and called on the US to recognize the one-China principle and refrain from coercive practices.
Speaking on Thursday, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian blasted Washington’s history of intimidation and international aggression as he questioned why the USS John S. McCain had transited through the Taiwan Strait on Wednesday.
“Do Chinese warships go to the Gulf of Mexico?” he asked, adding that China had never intended to intimidate anyone, but was not afraid of intimidation. He stated that the hat of “intimidation” and “coercion” does not sit on Beijing’s head.
Zhao claimed that the US has seen only 16 years of peace in its 250-year history and had frequently fought wars under false pretenses. “Back then, the United States fought over a bottle of washing powder and a fake video as evidence. In wars against the sovereign states of Iraq and Syria, they caused countless civilian casualties and the breakup of countless families.”
Turning his attention to Taiwan, the spokesman reiterated Beijing’s position that the island was a part of Chinese territory and that the People’s Republic of China was the sole legal government representing the whole of China.
Zhao called on Washington to recognize Chinese authority over Taiwan and stop sending the wrong signals about Taiwanese independence by “showing their muscles” in the South China Sea and provoking unrest. The spokesman said the one-China principle was an “an insurmountable red line.”
On Wednesday, the US Navy confirmed that the guided-missile destroyer the USS John S. McCain conducted a “routine” transit of the Taiwan Strait. At the same time, Taipei reported that 15 Chinese aircraft had flown over its airspace.
China has previously stated its opposition to the US military transiting through the Taiwan Strait.
Florida and Texas Ban Vaccine Passports
By Stephen Lendman | April 8, 2021
Digital vaccine passports are all-about pushing unwitting people to be jabbed with experimental, hazardous to heath drugs that risk potentially irreversible harm short-or-longer-term when taken as directed.
Already rolled out in Israel, Denmark, and Estonia by late April, they’re coming to the US and other Western states.
Apartheid in new form, they’ll create two-tiered societies — jabbed individuals afforded rights everyone deserves and unjabbed social outcasts denied them.
Where vaccine/health passports are instituted, they’ll likely be required for employment, attending school, air travel, other public transportation, hotel reservations, restaurant dining, in-store shopping, attending sporting events, and other social interactions.
Normal daily lives and routines will likely be denied without proof of covid jabs.
What was inconceivable not long ago already became the new abnormal.
Refuseniks will become untouchable social outcasts.
Draconian brave new world conditions will be more intolerable, unsafe and unfit to live in than already.
Nothing remotely justifies lockdowns, quarantines, face masks that don’t protect and risk harm from longterm use, PCR tests not designed to diagnose viral infections, social distancing that destroys normal human interactions, and hazardous experimental drugs that risk contracting diseases they’re supposed to protect against, but don’t.
What’s happening in real time is all-about replacing free and open societies with dystopian ones.
It’s about transforming world community states into ruler-serf societies.
It’s about instituting social control — enforced by police state harshness.
It’s about powerful monied interests owning everything, exploited ordinary people nothing.
It’s the worst of Orwell’s 1984 and Huxley’s Brave New World combined.
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and Texas Governor Greg Abbott banned the transformation of their states into two-tiered ones.
On April 2, DeSantis banned businesses from requiring customers to show proof of covid jabs (by executive order) to enter their premises and be served.
Barring government agencies from requiring proof of jabs, he said “vaccination passports reduce individual freedom and will harm patient privacy.”
His order doesn’t prevent businesses from establishing screening protocols and other policies recommended by state and federal public health officials.
On Tuesday, Texas Governor Abbott banned state agencies, political organizations receiving public funds, and some private entities from requiring vaccine passports or other proof of jabbing for covid to receive services.
His executive order overrides local ones that call for mandating what infringes on civil liberties.
“We will continue to (jab) Texans (for covid) and protect public health, (but) will do (it) without treading on Texans’ personal freedoms,” Abbott said, adding:
The US Constitution does not permit the federal government to mandate proof of inoculations.
The Biden regime ruled out establishing a national mandate to show proof of covid jabs — so far.
At this time, it’s up to states and local communities to set their own standards.
That policy isn’t written in stone and could change ahead — notably if millions of refuseniks refuse jabs to protect their health and well-being.
Pre-2020, no one could have imagined what’s going on now.
Draconian policies may harden ahead. Guidelines being developed by the White House could be stiffened after in place.
Free and open societies in the West are being replaced by draconian ones.
Based on what happened since early last year, what remains of personal freedoms may disappear entirely ahead — full-blown tyranny replacing them.
A Final Comment
Since Texas scrapped mandatory mask-wearing in public weeks earlier, seasonal flu-renamed covid outbreaks and deaths declined in numbers.
Days earlier, MSNBC noted that Texas today resembles 2019, adding:
“(R)estaurants are full. Ballparks are full.” Yet covid outbreaks declined.
Asked for an explanation, pro-mass-jabbing huckster, fraudster, profiteer, chief Biden regime medical adviser Fauci — a doctor who never treated a patient — failed to explain what’s clear to truth-telling medical and scientific experts.
Policies imposed since early last year did infinitely more harm than any number of serious diseases combined — notably by creating deeper Main Street Depression conditions than in the 1930s and deceiving the public to self-inflict harm from toxic covid jabs.
Former Trump regime trade representative Peter Navarro slammed Fauci, saying the following:
“From the first time I met him, he just did not make a lot of sense.”
“We’ve seen all of his flipflops.”
“My new theory is that he’s simply a sociopath. He just lies to advance his own interest.”
Navarro wants him held accountable for serial lying that contributed to inflicting enormous harm on millions of Americans and countless others abroad.
For what I call crimes against humanity, US and other Western political hardliners, their public health handmaidens, Pharma and media press agents for all of the above share guilt.
Biden Regime Pushing for War on Russia?
By Stephen Lendman | April 8, 2021
What interventionist Blinken calls “reckless…adversarial actions” by Russia is how the US operates at home and abroad, not Moscow.
What his spokesman Price calls “profound (Biden regime) disagreements with the Russian Federation” were made-in-the-USA, not at the Kremlin.
No “Russian attempts to destabilize the West” exist, no military threat against any country.
Hostile Biden regime actions against Russia risks turning escalated Cold War hot.
More illegal US sanctions on Russia are coming for invented/illegitimate reasons.
According to unnamed Biden regime officials, Russian diplomats in Washington may be expelled, others close to Vladimir Putin sanctioned.
Biden regime hardliners falsely accused Moscow of US election meddling (sic), offering the Taliban bounties to kill Pentagon troops in Afghanistan (sic), cyber-attacking SolarWinds (sic), poisoning Navalny (sic), and likely more illegitimate accusations to come.
Illegal Biden regime sanctions on Russia in March were prelude for likely stiffer unlawful ones in the works.
When Biden — or his impersonator — called Putin a “killer,” warning that he’ll “pay a price,” US Cold War on Russia escalated a step closer to possibly turning hot by accident or design.
On Wednesday, White House spokeswoman Psaki said Biden regime hardliners intend “hold(ing) Russia to account for its reckless and adversarial actions (sic).”
It’s how the US operates, notably when undemocratic Dems control things in Washington like now.
Russia under Vladimir Putin operates by higher standards — notably by waging peace, not war, respecting the sovereignty and territorial integrity of other nations, and observing international law — polar opposite US war on humanity at home and abroad.
US-orchestrated war by Kiev on Donbass along Russia’s border has its forces mobilized to respond defensively if necessary.
Earlier this week, Russia’s Security Council secretary Nikolai Patrushev said Moscow has no intention of intervening cross-border, adding:
“(W)e are closely watching the situation. Concrete measures will be taken depending on how it develops” — to protect Russian Federation security.
Separately, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said “Russia’s armed forces are (in its own) territory in places it considers necessary and appropriate.”
“(T)hey will stay there for as long as our military leadership and supreme commander consider it appropriate.”
Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) leader (in Donbass) Denis Pushilin said the following in response to escalated Kiev aggression:
“The situation on the line of contact remains, alas, extremely unpeaceful.”
“The situation is escalating and changing for the worse. The amount of (preemptive) shelling (by Kiev forces) is increasing.”
Military spokesman for the Lugansk People’s Republic (LPR) in Donbass Yakov Osadchy said the following:
“Throughout the past day, militants of (Kiev’s) 59th brigade have been shelling Logvinovo from the direction of Luganskoye by order of the military criminal Gennady Shapovalov, with the use of a 120mm mortar (rounds) banned by the Minsk agreements.”
At the same time, US-controlled Ukraine abandoned Minsk peace talks — agreements its ruling regimes never observed.
According to Peskov, US-installed puppet Zelensky never advanced peace along the Contact Line between Ukraine and Donbass “one iota” — in deference to his imperial master in Washington.
The 2014 Minsk Protocol peace deal — agreed to by Kiev, Moscow, the OSCE, the DPR and LPR — is “dead,” Peskov explained — because US hardliners want endless war along Russia’s borders.
“(R)eaching new agreements (with US-controlled Kiev) is impossible, because how can one resolve a conflict if one side (won’t) communicate with the other” and rejects peace, Peskov added.
On Tuesday, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov said his government held emergency talks with Biden regime officials in an attempt to prevent full-scale war by Kiev on Donbass, adding:
US-dominated Western rhetoric is “increasingly belligerent.”
Hardliners in “Washington should be concerned about the consequences of this coordinated policy” for escalated war along Russia’s borders.
Defying reality, the Biden regime “call(ed) on Russia to refrain from escalatory actions (sic)” — engaged in by the US and puppet regime in Kiev, not Moscow.
Days earlier, Ukrainian official Aleksey Arestovich said ongoing large-scale (US-controlled) DefenderEurope 2021 military exercises in European Baltic states are all-about preparing for possible war with Russia, adding:
Drills focus on areas “from the waters of the Baltic to the Black Sea, to put it bluntly, armed confrontation with Russia.”
Cognitively and physically impaired figurehead Biden is uninvolved and perhaps unaware of reckless actions by his regime’s hardline/interventionist geopolitical team.
In short order after replacing Trump — illegitimately by brazen election rigging — escalated US Cold War it’s waging on Russia risks turning things hot.
Russia unlikely to send recalled ambassador back to Washington without clear sign US ready for bilateral relations
RT | April 7, 2021
Russia’s Foreign Ministry has revealed it has no plans to restore full diplomatic representation in Washington until it sees evidence that the US is interested in building constructive relations between the two countries.
Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov was asked by RIA Novosti on Wednesday whether Ambassador Anatoly Antonov would return to America in the near future, having been recalled in March amid a growing diplomatic row. “This is not a question for the next few days,” he said.
“The timings will be determined based on what steps Washington plans to take on the bilateral track,” he continued. “We expect that they are still able to demonstrate a desire to at least relatively stabilize our relationship and that they will do something visible and noticeable in this regard.”
Antonov flew to Moscow for a series of crunch talks with senior officials in the days following US President Joe Biden’s interview with the ABC news network, in which he was asked whether he believes Russian President Vladimir Putin is a “killer,” and replied, “Mmm hmm, I do.”
The American leader also said he had warned the Russian president that the US would potentially take action if it found evidence of Moscow’s interference in the US election. “He will pay a price,” Biden added.
His comments came as a joint report by Washington’s spy agencies, including the CIA and the Department of Homeland Security, was declassified and made available to the public. It declared that Russia attempted to influence the 2020 US election with the aim of “denigrating President Biden’s candidacy and the Democratic Party, supporting former President Trump, undermining public confidence in the electoral process, and exacerbating sociopolitical divisions in the US.”
Since then, the US has imposed sanctions against a group of Russian officials that it claims are responsible for the jailing of opposition figure Alexey Navalny and alleged “human rights” breaches in the policing of the protests after his arrest.
Washington’s package of measures also targeted companies and a state institute it says are engaged in “the production of biological and chemical weapons,” as well as “activities that are contrary to US national security and foreign policy interests.” The Kremlin strongly denies that such a program exists.
An unnamed official told reporters at the time that “the United States is neither seeking to reset our relations with Russia, nor are we seeking to escalate.”
US Colleges Tell Students They Must Be Fully Vaccinated By Autumn
By Richie Allen | April 7, 2021
At least seven colleges in the US have told students that they will not be permitted on campus this Autumn, if they cannot prove that they have been fully vaccinated.
Brown, Northeastern, Cornell, Rutgers, Fort Lewis, Nova Southeastern and St. Edward’s, are among a growing number of academic institutions to introduce the “no jab, no school” policy.
Students with underlying medical conditions can apply for an exemption. The colleges claim that vaccination is the only way to return to in-classroom learning.
Ivy-league university Brown, became the latest school to announce that it planned to introduce the measure.
Brown President Christina Paxson announced the decision in a letter, in which she declared that the vaccine is mandatory “for all undergraduate, graduate and medical students who will be on campus or engage in any level of in-person instruction.”
Paxson went on to say that students can apply for medical or religious exemptions but warned that those who refuse the vaccine and don’t qualify for an exemption, will be banned from campus.
Brown University is also considering making vaccination mandatory for all staff.
Northeastern University in Boston, announced yesterday that all students must be fully vaccinated by the first day of the semester in September. Senior vice-president for learning, Ken Henderson, said that the policy is vital in order to achieve herd-immunity.
The under-25’s are unlikely to contract covid-19, let alone become ill from it and there is zero evidence that they transmit the virus to others.
Then again, this was never about a virus now was it?
For What Should We Fight Russia or China?
By Patrick Buchanon | Unz Review | April 6, 2021
Last Monday, in a single six-hour period, NATO launched 10 air intercepts to shadow six separate groups of Russian bombers and fighters over the Arctic, North Atlantic, North Sea, Black Sea and Baltic Sea.
Last week also brought reports that Moscow is increasing its troop presence in Crimea and along its borders with Ukraine.
Joe Biden responded. In his first conversation with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, Biden assured him of our “unwavering support for Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity in the face of Russia’s ongoing aggression in the Donbass and Crimea.”
Though Ukraine is not a member of NATO, and we have no treaty obligation to fight in its defense, this comes close to a war guarantee. Biden seems to be saying that if it comes to a shooting war between Moscow and Kiev, we will be there on the side of Kiev.
Last week, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov answered that if the U.S. sends troops to Ukraine, Russia will respond.
Again, is Biden saying that in the event of a military clash between Ukrainians and Russians in Crimea, Donetsk or Luhansk, the U.S. will intervene militarily on the side of Ukraine?
Such a pledge could put us at war with a nuclear-armed Russia in a region where we have never had vital interests, and without the approval of the only institution authorized to declare war — Congress.
Meanwhile, off Whitsun Reef in the South China Sea, which Beijing occupies but Manila claims, China has amassed 220 maritime militia ships.
This huge Chinese flotilla arrived after Secretary of State Anthony Blinken put Beijing on notice that any attack on Philippine planes or ships challenging Beijing’s claim to rocks and reefs of the South China Sea that are in Manila’s exclusive economic zone will be backed by the U.S.
Our 70-year-old mutual security treaty with Manila covers these islets and reefs, said Blinken, though some are already occupied and fortified by China.
Apparently, if Manila uses force to assert its claims and expel the Chinese, then we will fight beside our Philippine allies. This amounts to a war guarantee of the kind that forced the British to declare war on Germany in 1939 over the invasion of Poland.
Two weeks ago, 20 Chinese military aircraft entered Taiwan’s air defense identification zone in the largest incursion yet by Beijing over the waters between Taiwan and Taiwan-controlled Pratas Islands. As national security correspondent Bill Gertz writes in today’s Washington Times:
“China is stepping up provocative activities targeting regional American allies in Asia … with an escalating number of military flights around Taiwan and the massing of more than 200 fishing ships near a disputed Philippines reef.
“China also raised tensions with Japan, announcing last week that Tokyo must drop all claims to the disputed Senkaku Islands, an uninhabited island chain that Japan has administered for decades but that Beijing recently claimed as its territory.
“The most serious provocation took place March 29. An exercise by the People’s Liberation Army air force that included 10 warplanes flew into Taiwan’s air defense zone is what analysts say appeared to be a simulated attack on the island. It came just three days after an earlier mass warplane incursion.”
While China appears clear about its aims and claims to virtually all of the islands in the South China Sea and East China Sea as well as Taiwan — it is less clear about its intentions as to when to validate those claims.
As for the U.S., does the present foggy ambiguity as to what we may or may not do as China goes about asserting its claims serve our vital interests in avoiding war with the greatest power on the largest continent on earth?
If red lines are to be laid down, they ought to be laid down by the one constitutional body with the authority to authorize or declare war — Congress. And questions need to be answered to avoid the kinds of miscalculations that led to horrific world wars in the 20th century.
Are the reefs and rocks the Philippines claim in the South China Sea, claims contradicted by China, covered by the U.S. mutual security treaty of 1951? Are we honor-bound to fight China on behalf of the Philippines, if Manila attempts to reclaim islets China occupies?
What is our obligation if China moves to take the Senkakus? Would the United States join Japan in military action to hold or retrieve them?
What, exactly, is our commitment to Taiwan if China attempts to blockade, invade or seize Taiwan’s offshore islands?
John F. Kennedy in the second debate with Richard Nixon in 1960 wrote off Quemoy and Matsu in the Taiwan Strait as indefensible and not worth war with Mao’s China.
With its warnings and threats, China is forcing America to address questions we have been avoiding for about as long as we can.
China is saying that it is not bluffing: These islands are ours!
Time to show our cards.
Copyright 2021 Creators.com
Would Israel Blackmail a US Congressman?
Should there be any doubt?
By Philip Giraldi | Unz Review | April 6, 2021
Israel has been involved in several stories currently making their way through the US media. The most fascinating tale concerns Republican Party Congressman from Florida Matt Gaetz. Gaetz is a Donald Trump loyalist who has up until recently been touted as the party’s future. Young, photogenic and a “firebrand” defender of GOP priorities, he has been much in the news lately.
Per the New York Times coverage of the current story involving him “The Justice Department is investigating whether Gaetz… a close ally of former President Donald Trump, broke federal sex trafficking laws. The inquiry focuses on his relationships with young women who had been recruited online, and whether he had sex with a 17-year-old girl. Investigators believe that he paid for sex with a number of women he met through Joel Greenberg — a former Florida tax collector who was indicted last year on a federal sex trafficking charge, among other offenses… Gaetz has denied paying for sex or sleeping with anyone underage, but it’s clear that the story is far from over. And he’s increasingly isolated: Few Republicans have spoken up in support of him, and today [April 2nd] his own communications director, Luke Ball, resigned.”
There have also been claims that Gaetz, who is engaged but not married, paid for transporting the young woman with whom he had sex across state lines, a federal offense. Reportedly, Gaetz is not well liked by his peers due to his impulsive and even erratic behavior “including a fondness for illicit drugs and younger women” with many considering him to be the proverbial “loose cannon on deck.” CNN reports that “Gaetz had a history of showing off nude photos and videos of women that he said he’d slept with to colleagues on the House floor.”
The Gaetz story also has spawned back stories to the investigation. The Daily Beast is reporting that in April 2018 Matt was involved in a secret midnight visit to the Seminole County Tax Collector’s rooms accompanied by Greenberg, who worked in the office during the day. The two men were recorded on surveillance cameras and they forgot to reset the office alarm, which led to inquiries on the following day that produced a series of text messages in which Greenberg admitted that they had been in the office so he could show the congressman how everything was being done there. They apparently had been going through expired drivers’ licenses, which were stored for disposal in the office.
Greenberg has since lost his job and is being investigated in a “…case has now vastly expanded to a 33-count indictment that includes a diverse list of crimes that range from wire fraud to sex trafficking. Investigators say Greenberg recruited at least one teenager between 14 and 17 years old to engage in a ‘commercial sex act’ between May and November 2017 in Central Florida and elsewhere. Investigators also say that Greenberg used his privileged access to Florida’s drivers’ license database to look up private information on ‘individuals’ with whom he ‘was engaged in “sugar-daddy” relationships.’ Additionally, Greenberg is also accused of making fake IDs—potentially explaining why the 2018 surveillance footage raised concerns that led to that text message conversation handed to investigators.”
What a naughty Gaetz was allegedly up to fits in nicely with what Greenberg was also doing but the fun involving Israel really starts with an apparent extortion scheme linked to the investigation that has involved Gaetz’s father Don, a wealthy former president of the Florida State Senate. Following up on the Gaetz story, the Washington Examiner discovered that Don had been approached by a Florida lawyer named Don McGee who promised that a payment of $25 million would make Matt’s “future legal and political problems go away.” Don Gaetz subsequently contacted the FBI and wore a wire that recorded a second visit made by a former Air Force officer named Bob Kent, who explained that the money would be a loan for “Project Homecoming,” a plan to arrange the liberation of ex-FBI agent Robert Levinson, who is generally believed to be either dead or in prison after an ill-advised somewhat mysterious visit to Iran where he disappeared fourteen years ago.
And then the tale really takes off. The American Conservative magazine has obtained a series of “authenticated” text messages between Scott Adams, creator of Dilbert, and Israeli New York Consulate General’s media officer, Jake Novak, which suggest that the Israeli government was associated with both Kent and McGee and might have been behind the extortion. Presumably Israel was prepared to use its political clout with congress and the media to make Matt’s problems go away in return for the funding of a commando raid that would free Levinson and deliver both a blow to Iran and a major propaganda victory for Jerusalem.
Cartoonist Adams’ alleged connection with the Israeli Consulate is not at this point completely clear, though the texts would suggest that he is a trusted contact. An angry Novak, referring to the Times article on the investigation, wrote to him complaining that “The backstory is that this is screwing up my efforts to free Bob Levinson. Gaetz’s dad was secretly f[u]nding us. So I’m very much wanting this to be untrue. I’ve got a commando team leader friend of mine nervously waiting for the wire transfers to clear.” He then goes on to claim that it was not extortion in a legal sense, “The real documents do not extort. And we only asked for $25 million as an estimate at first. We came way down.”
The two men also exchanged their view of the case against Matt Gaetz. Novak wrote “Scoop I can’t report: Rep. Gaetz is the subject of a secret Grand Jury probe of sex with minors and possibly murder conspiracy. I trust the source. Charges/accusations are apparently ‘very credible.’” Adams responds that “The allegations against him do not sound credible” with Novak answering “I don’t want to believe them but my source says it looks bad from closer in.” Adams then texts “I’m betting against it but the extortion counter claim sounds credible. Has witnesses apparently.” Novak concludes that “Now the Gaetz’s have burned Kent AND Levinson.”
If the American Conservative documents are not part of some elaborate hoax, the evidence of how Israel systematically interferes in American politics is yet again clearly visible. One of the most remarkable aspects of the story is the impression that Israeli consulate employee Jake Novak, who sounds somewhat like an intelligence officer, appears to believe that the exposure of the game he was involved in is annoying but no big deal, confident that Israel is never punished by Washington no matter what it does. He also appeared to have inside information on a confidential Justice Department investigation. Beyond that, the possible extortion scheme itself may be based on a possible set-up “honey trap” followed by what amounts to the blackmailing of an American Congressman.
What exactly did the Israeli Consulate’s proxies McGee and Kent have on Matt Gaetz that might have impelled his wealthy father to fund an implausible rescue operation directed against Iran which could easily escalate into a major international incident, possibly even a war? There are clearly documents, recordings and transcripts…will we the public ever see or hear them? If this all begins to smell like the Jeffrey Epstein saga it should and it is just one more good reason not to trust the Israelis on any issue. One wonders if anyone in the FBI or the Joe Biden Administration has the courage to follow this investigation through to wherever it might lead.
Philip M. Giraldi, Ph.D., is Executive Director of the Council for the National Interest, a 501(c)3 tax deductible educational foundation (Federal ID Number #52-1739023) that seeks a more interests-based U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East. Website is councilforthenationalinterest.org, address is P.O. Box 2157, Purcellville VA 20134 and its email is inform@cnionline.org
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British weapons and personnel doing much of the killing in Yemen
Press TV – June 18, 2019
A detailed report published by the Guardian newspaper has shown how Britain is massively contributing to Saudi Arabia’s devastating war on Yemen as it suggests that London is not only supplying the bombs that fall on Yemenis, but it provides the personnel and expertise that keep the war going.
The comprehensive report by Arron Merat published on Tuesday showed that Britain was doing much of the killing in Yemen as the country continues to provide Saudi Arabia with everything it needs to turn its southern impoverished neighbor into a graveyard.
“Every day Yemen is hit by British bombs – dropped by British planes that are flown by British-trained pilots and maintained and prepared inside Saudi Arabia by thousands of British contractors,” said Merat in the report. … continue
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