Global Research

First published on September 10, 2020

In times of great confusion and anxiety, when it feels like everything is going down the drain, like everyone is stumbling down a steep road, driven by a supposedly unstoppable disaster, it might be helpful to take a moment and a deep breath, to step aside and turn around. One might ask: What brought us here? What is the origin of this road? From where did we follow it? Who was sending us in this direction? Have we been here before? And, maybe even more important: Where will it lead us?

As the Spanish philosopher George Santayana wrote:

“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”

In this sense, the following is meant as a chronology of some selected events of the last twenty years related to our current situation, some more or less known, some more or less forgotten.

CHRONOLOGY (2000 -2020)

2000

The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (founded in 1999), UNICEF, the World Health Organization (WHO) and the World Bank found the “Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunization“, GAVI. The main goal of this PUBLIC-PRIVATE PARTNERSHIP (PPP) is to shape “healthy vaccine markets“. “GAVI brings together the vaccine industry with governments in both developing and industrialized countries, technical agencies, civil society and private PHILANTROPISTS.” In 1999, the Gates Foundation had pledged $ 750 million to set up GAVI and will make additional future donations of more than $ 4 billion until 2020.

March 15, 2003

Gro Harlem Brundtland, WHO Director-General, states in an alert about the “Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome“: “This syndrome, SARS, is now a worldwide health threat. The world needs to work together to find its cause, cure the sick, and stop its spread.”

Note: SARS, “the FIRST Pandemic of the 21st Century“, caused by the coronavirus SARS-CoV, originated from China, lead to 8,096 reported cases of illness and 774 deaths worldwide.

Note: Later, in 2019, Brundtland will be co-chair on the “Global Preparedness Monitoring Board” (GPMB), when the SARS-CoV-2 outbreak begins.

November 11-12, 2004

An “Informal meeting on influenza pandemic vaccines” of WHO, influenza vaccine manufacturers, national drug licensing agencies and government representatives takes place in Geneva, Switzerland. The meeting’s goal is to “explore ways to expedite the development of pandemic vaccines“ by establishing PUBLIC-PRIVATE PARTNERSHIPS.

January 2005

As a result of the meeting in November the WHO publishes a report with the title “Avian influenza: assessing the pandemic threat“. The authors claim that “during 2004, the world moved closer to a further pandemic than it has been at any time since 1968.“ About the H5N1 bird flu virus: “NEVER BEFORE had any avian influenza virus caused such extremely high fatality in humans, taking its heaviest toll on children and young adults in the prime of life.”

Note: At this point, the bird flu has caused 50 cases in South-East-Asia during the years 2003 / 2004.

The report emphasizes the importance of vaccination during a pandemic. Under the heading “Vaccines: the first line of defence” it says: “WHO network laboratories developed a prototype virus, for use as the “seed” for vaccine production, and made it available to manufacturers in April 2004.

During pandemics, more severe disease tends to arrive with the SECOND WAVE. Should this happen, a few more months could be available to augment vaccine supplies. Each day gained means an additional 5 million doses of vaccine. Larger quantities of vaccine, supported by well-planned distribution strategies, will SAVE many LIVES.

Ideally, safety testing should be exceptionally extensive, but the pressure to manufacture RAPIDLY during a public health emergency is expected to shorten the time available for testing.”

The authors also recommend the use of the antiviral drugs Tamiflu (Roche) and Relenza (GlaxoSmithKline) for treatment and prevention: “… Drugs in the second and newer class, the neuraminidase inhibitors (oseltamivir and zanamivir), have a better safety profile and are less prone to the development of drug resistance. Here, the main constraints are price and supplies. The drugs are much more expensive than the M2 inhibitors and supplies are very limited.”

March 7, 2005

In an interview with the German news magazine SPIEGEL, Klaus Stoehr, virologist and leader of WHO‘s Global Influenza Program, is asked about the bird flu: “How dangerous will this pandemic be?” He replies:

“The pandemics in 1957 and 1968 were relatively mild with between 1 to 4 million dying in each. (…) Taking into account the increase in the world population since then, one would estimate that a mild pandemic would result in between 2 to 7 million deaths and a further 28 million hospitalized. Health care systems will be OVERWHELMED very QUICKLY .”

Note: Later Stoehr will become Vice President and Global Head of the Influenza Strategy Liaison for Novartis Vaccines, “…driving influenza based interactions with national and international authorities.”

August 3, 2005

Neil Ferguson, professor of mathematical biology at the Imperial College London, UK, warns THE GUARDIAN about the bird flu virus H5N1:

“What can we do if it hits our shores? We couldn’t stop it. There would be a constant number of NEW cases and we would be OVERWHELMED very RAPIDLY. (…) In just one year, half the world’s population – more than 3 billion people – would be infected.”

According to the article, Ferguson, other researchers and British government officials recommend to create a stock of millions doses of antiviral treatment and vaccines as a “first line of defence” against a catastrophic virus outbreak. “Currently the antiviral drug Tamiflu, made by Swiss-based pharmaceutical company Roche, stands the best chance of curbing pandemic bird flu. (…) Prof Ferguson said he understood Roche was prepared to make free donations of Tamiflu to the World Health Organization to help meet the threat.”

Note: In 2002 Ferguson had predicted 150.000 deaths in the UK from the Bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), also known as the mad-cow-disease. During the following 16 years 178 persons died from BSE in the UK.

September 20, 2005

In an interview, published under the headline “H5N1 – KILLER Flu“, Antony Fauci, immunologist and director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) suggests that the US should buy at least 100 million vaccine doses.

“Well, that takes many months. It takes several months to do if you’re doing nothing else. And that’s the reason why one of the issues that comes up when you talk about pandemic flu, is that the vaccine development and production enterprise in this country and worldwide is very fragile.

… the vaccine industry is fragile. It is not a big money maker.”

September 29, 2005

WHO‘s Director-General for Health Action in Crises, David Nabarro, physician and newly appointed senior UN system coordinator for avian and human influenza (bird flu), states in a UN press conference:

“I’m not, at the moment, at liberty to give you a prediction on numbers, but I just want to stress, that, let’s say, the range of deaths could be anything from 5 to 150 million.”

Note: Following WHO’s recommendations and driven by panic about an expectable outbreak of a bird flu pandemic, governments worldwide started stockpiling antiviral drugs and vaccines for large parts of their populations.

September 30, 2005

Neil Ferguson is quoted in an article in THE GUARDIAN: “Last month Neil Ferguson, a professor of mathematical biology at Imperial College London, told Guardian Unlimited that up to 200 million people could be KILLED (Note: by the bird flu).”

“Around 40 million people died in 1918 Spanish flu outbreak,” said Prof Ferguson. “There are six times more people on the planet now so you could scale it up to around 200 million people probably.”

Note: Between 2003 and 2009 worldwide 282 people died from the bird flu.

2006

Warren Buffett, US American business tycoon and Philanthropist, pledges $ 37 billion (85% of his fortune) to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

November 26, 2006

Warren Buffett is quoted in the NEW YORK TIMES: “There’s class warfare, all right, but it’s my class, the rich class, that’s making war and We’re winning.”

April 24, 2009

WHO announces an outbreak of human cases of H1N1, the swine flu, confirmed in Mexico and the USA.

April 27, 2009

The first two UK cases of H1N1 are confirmed in a couple from Scotland, WHO raises its alert level to Phase 4.

April 29, 2009

British PM Gordon Brown announces that the stockpile of antivirals will be increased from 33.5 to 50 million.

Note: The UK government spent £ 424 million on flu drug Tamiflu, the US government spent $ 1.3 billion on stockpiling 65 million dosages. Global sales of Tamiflu is estimated at almost $ 3 billion at the height of the swine flu pandemic.

May 4, 2009

On WHO‘s website, the criteria for a pandemic

“An influenza pandemic occurs when a new influenza virus appears against which the human population has no immunity, resulting in several simultaneous epidemics worldwide with enormous numbers of deaths and illness.” are altered.

The new definition is: “An influenza pandemic may occur when a new influenza virus appears against which the human population has no immunity.” For the declaration of phase 6 (the highest level, the pandemic) the presence of several simultaneous epidemics and high death numbers are no longer necessary.

Note: Later Andrej Hunko, German MP, will say in a speech at the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe on 24.06.2010:

“Here I have secret contracts that were signed in Germany between GlaxoSmithKline and the German state. As a simple Member of Parliament, officially I am not allowed to view these contracts. They were posted on the Internet by whistleblowers in Germany.

These contracts specify exactly what needs to happen when phase 6 is announced: what amounts of vaccine doses the states have to buy, etc.. Such contracts were concluded by most states before the criteria have been changed.”

June 11, 2009

WHO‘s Director-General Margaret Chan declares the swine flu pandemic:

“This particular H1N1 strain has not circulated previously in humans. The virus is entirely new  (…) Further spread is considered inevitable. On the basis of available evidence, and these expert assessments of the evidence, the scientific criteria for an influenza pandemic have been met. I have therefore decided to raise the level of influenza pandemic alert from phase 5 to phase 6. The world is now at the START of the 2009 influenza pandemic.

WHO has been in close dialogue with influenza vaccine manufacturers. I understand that production of vaccines for seasonal influenza will be completed soon, and that full capacity will be available to ensure the largest possible supply of pandemic vaccine in the months to come.”

Note: Under enormous pressure (and because of the existing contracts) governments bought millions of vaccine doses. Germanyfor example, bought 34 million doses for € 280 million. Only 14% were used, the rest had to be disposed as hazardous waste at high costs.

July 16, 2009

Based on Neil Ferguson‘s advice, the British government warns about the swine flu that “in the worst case scenario 30% of the UK population could be infected by the H1N1 virus, with 65,000 Killed.”

Note: Eventually, the swine flu killed 457 people in the UK.

December 18, 2009

The Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) publishes a motion for a recommendation with the title “Faked Pandemics – a Threat for Health“.

The document states about the “birds-flu-campaign (2005/06)” and the “swine-flu-campaign (2009/10)”:

“In order to promote their patented drugs and vaccines against flu, pharmaceutical companies have influenced scientists and official agencies (…) to alarm governments worldwide. They have made them squander tight health care resources for inefficient vaccine strategies and needlessly exposed millions of healthy people to the risk of unknown side-effects of insufficiently tested vaccines.”

The authors also see “a great deal of damage“ for the “credibility and accountability of important international health agencies”. Meant is the WHO: “The definition of an alarming pandemic must not be under the influence of drug-sellers.”

January 2010

Exactly 10 years before the outbreak of the “pneumonia of unknown etiology” in Wuhan, Bill Gates calls for a “DECADE of Vaccines” and pledges $ 10 billion to the WHO for this purpose.

February 2010

In a TED talk Bill Gates says:

“First, we‘ve got population. The world today has 6.8 billion people. That’s headed up to about nine billion.

Now, if we do a really great job on new vaccines, health care, reproductive health services, we could lower that by, perhaps, 10 or 15 percent.”

May 2010

The Rockefeller Foundation publishes “Scenarios for the Future of Technology and International Development“. The report predicts four different possible future scenarios. In one of them, called “LOCK STEP“,

“…the pandemic that the world had been anticipating for years finally hit. Unlike 2009’s H1N1, this NEW influenza strain (…) was extremely virulent and deadly. Even the most pandemic-prepared nations were QUICKLY OVERWHELMED when the virus streaked around the world, infecting nearly 20 percent of the global population and KILLING 8 million in just seven months.

The pandemic also had a deadly effect on economies: international mobility of both people and goods screeched to a halt, debilitating industries like tourism and breaking global supply chains.

The Chinese government’s quick imposition and enforcement of mandatory quarantine for all citizens, as well as its instant and near-hermetic sealing off of all borders, SAVED millions of LIVES, stopping the spread of the virus far earlier than in other countries.

During the pandemic, national leaders around the world flexed their authority and imposed airtight rules and restrictions, from the mandatory wearing of FACE MASKS to body-temperature checks at the entries to communal spaces like train stationsand supermarkets. Even after the pandemic faded, this more authoritarian control and oversight of citizens and their activities stuck and even intensified.

Citizens willingly gave up some of their sovereignty – and their privacy – to more paternalistic states in exchange for greater safety and stability. Citizens were more tolerant, and even eager, for top-down direction and oversight, and national leaders had more latitude to impose order in the ways they saw fit. In developed countries, this heightened oversight took many forms: BIOMETRIC IDs for all citizens, for example…”

June 7, 2010

PACE, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe publishes the report “The handling of the H1N1 pandemic: more transparency needed“. The report criticizes

“possible influence of the pharmaceutical industry on some of the major decisions relating to the pandemic.

The way in which the H1N1 influenza pandemic has been handled, not only by WHO, but also by the competent health authorities at the level of the European Union and at national level, gives rise to alarm. Some of the consequences of decisions taken and advice given are particularly troubling, as they led to distortion of priorities of public health services across Europe, waste of large sums of public money and also unjustified scares and fears about health risks faced by the European public at large.”

August 10, 2010

The Director-General of WHO, Margaret Chan, declares the end of the influenza (H1N1) pandemic.

Note: The swine flu killed 18.500 people worldwide. For comparison: the seasonal flu 2017 / 2018 killed 25.000 in Germany alone.

December 2, 2010

WHO, UNICEF, US’s National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) and the Gates Foundation announce the “DECADE of Vaccines Collaboration“, a partnership to increase coordination across the international vaccine community and create a “Global Vaccine Action Plan” (GVAP).

“The collaboration follows the January 2010 call by Bill and Melinda Gates for the next ten years to be the Decade of Vaccines. The Global Vaccine Action Plan will enable greater coordination across all STAKEHOLDER groups – national governments, multilateral organizations, civil society, the private sector and Philanthropic organizations.”

Note: Among others, the Leadership Council is comprised of Margaret Chan and Anthony Fauci, Director of NIAID, part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The Steering Committee includes (among others) Seth Berkley, President & CEO, International AIDS Vaccine Initiative (IAVI).

September 2012

The “Better Than Cash Alliance” is launched by the UN Capital Development Fund, the United States Agency for International Development, the Gates Foundation, Citigroup, the Ford Foundation, the Omidyar Network, and VISA. The global PUBLIC-PRIVATE PARTNERSHIP consisting of companies, international organizations and 25 (mostly developing) countries, aims to “accelerate the transition from cash to DIGITAL PAYMENTS.”

April 10, 2014

The international network of researchers, Cochrane, provider of “evidence-based informations to make health decisions”, publishes a systematic review about neuraminidase inhibitors (NIs) like Tamiflu. The researchers were also able to use previously secret studies conducted by the manufacturers.

The review found that

“while oseltamivir and zanamivir have small, non‐specific effects on reducing the time to alleviation of influenza symptoms, oseltamivir (Tamiflu) increases the risk of adverse effects, such as nausea, vomiting, psychiatric effects and renal events in adults and vomiting in children, and both drugs do not reduce the important outcomes such as pneumonia and hospitalizations.”

January 17-20, 2017

World Economic Forum (WEF) Annual Meeting in Davos, Switzerland. Official announcement of the foundation of the “Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations” (CEPI), a global partnership to “develop vaccines to stop future epidemics“ by the Gates Foundation, Wellcome Trust, WEF and the governments of Norway and India.

February 8, 2017

The government of India cuts all ties with Gates Foundation on immunization, after scientists blamed the Gates-funded polio vaccination campaign for almost half a million cases of childhood paralysis. From an article of the INDIAN JOURNAL OF MEDICAL ETHICS: “During the last five years, globally, cases of polio caused by vaccine viruses have outnumbered those of polio caused by natural (wild) polioviruses“.

July 2017

WHO downgrades the status of Tamiflu from a “core” drug to a “complementary” drug. At this point, Roche‘s Tamiflu has generated over $18 billion in sales worldwide, half of it from governments stockpiling the drug.

November 13, 2017

Seth Berkley, CEO of GAVI and board member of ID2020, publishes his article “Immunization needs a technology boost” in the science magazine NATURE. Berkley emphasizes the importance of digital tracking of children who receive vaccines in order to provide “a full course of a vaccine regime“ to 100% of “infants living in the world’s 73 poorest countries” and to “ensure that everyone has a legal identity by 2030.”

January 23, 2018

WEF‘s report “The Known Traveller – Unlocking the potential of DIGITAL IDENTITY for secure and seamless travel” is published in consultation with Accenture, the Government of Canada, Google, Interpol, the Kingdom of the Netherlands, Marriott International, UK National Crime Agency, US Department of Homeland Security, VISA and others.

The “Known Traveler Digital Identity” (KTDI) website claims that KTDI

“brings together a global consortium of individuals, governments, authorities and the travel industry to enhance security in world travel. (…) KTDI allows individuals to manage their own profile and collect DIGITAL ‘ATTESTATIONS’ of their personal data, deciding what data to share and when. The more attestations a traveller accumulates and shares, the better consortium partners, governments and other parties can provide a smooth and safe travel experience.”

Note: Conversely, this could imply that a person unwilling to share data might have to face a hard time in an attempt to travel.

January 25, 2018

At the 48th World Economic Forum‘s Annual Meeting in Davos, Switzerland, several “STAKEHOLDERS” from finance, business, tech companies, foundations and international organizations call to unite in a global PUBLIC-PRIVATE PARTNERSHIP in order to push along the idea of a “DIGITAL IDENTITY for everyone“. Among them: ID2020, World Bank, Barclays, Deutsche Bank, Mastercard, Visa, Microsoft, Accenture, Consumers International, Omidyar Network, FIDO Alliance, GSMA, Hyperledger, Open Identity Exchange, World Identity Network, sedicii, World Food Programme and the UNHCR.

Derek O’Halloran, WEF:

“Digital identities and access systems are foundational elements of our shared digital future. They offer tremendous opportunities for individuals and society, especially for those without formal ID.”

The Government of Canada announces that it will pioneer the testing of the KTDI prototype system together with the with the Kingdom of the Netherlands to “explore opportunities for demonstrating the potential of digital identity systems to engender trust and cooperation between international partners.”

April 18, 2018

At the Malaria Summit in London Bill Gates says: “The world needs to prepare for pandemics in the same serious way it prepares for WAR.”

September 25, 2018

At the “Sustainable Development Impact Summit 2018” in New York, USA, the WEF is announcing the launch of a shared platform for “Good Digital Identity“. Good DIGITAL ID is supposed to provide “access to digital services, enabling personalization, customer loyalty, increased security and reduced costs. Innovative customer services are possible: telemedicine and digital prescriptions, gig economy, more fluid workforce, DIGITAL BANKING via devices in the internet of things (IoT), digital transformation of supply chains and the provision of government services.”

November 18, 2018

Billionaire Media Mogul and former mayor of New York City, Michael Bloomberg donates $ 1,8 billion to the Johns Hopkins University, the largest donation on record to an American academic institution.

September 12, 2019

“Global Vaccination Summit“, Brussels, Belgium. Organized by the European Commission and the WHO, the event‘s overall objective is to “demonstrate EU leadership for global commitment to vaccination, boost political commitment towards eliminating vaccine preventable diseases and engage political leaders and leaders from scientific, medical, industry, PHILANTROPIC and civil society in global action against the spread of vaccine MISINFORMATION.”

The summit’s synopsis

“Ten Actions Towards Vaccination For All” complains that “vaccine shortages, misinformation, complacency towards disease risks, diminishing public confidence in the value of vaccines and disinvestments are harming vaccination rates worldwide.”

September 19, 2019

At the annual summit of the ID2020 Alliance in New York, USA, the “Good Digital ID” project named “Access to Information Cooperation“ (a2i) is announced, run by ID2020, GAVI and the Government of Bangladesh. “Recognizing the opportunity for immunization to serve as a platform for DIGITAL IDENTITY, this program leverages existing vaccination and birth registration operations to offer newborns a persistent and portable biometrically-linked digital identity.”

Note: Immunization means vaccination.

September 24, 2019

António Guterres, UN‘s Secretary General, calls on all sectors of society to mobilize for a “DECADE of Action to deliver the Global Goals“.

October 18, 2019

Event 201, a high-level pandemic exercise takes place in New York, USA. Organized by the Johns Hopkins University, the World Economic Forum and the Gates Foundation, the exercise simulates a pandemic outbreak of a NEW coronavirus from the SARS family. Purpose of the exercise is to show that only with the help of PUBLIC-PRIVATE PARTNERSHIPS the states will be able to face the next severe pandemic(s) without catastrophic loss of lives and economic destruction.

The participants (“players“):

• Brad Connet, President of Henry Schein’s U.S. Medical Group
• Adrian Thomas, Vice President Global Public Health at Johnson & Johnson
• Christopher Elias, President of the Global Development Program of Gates Foundation, adviser of the U.S. CDC (Center for Disease Control and Prevention)
• Tim Evans, formerly World Bank Group, WHO, Rockefeller Foundation, co-founder of GAVI
• Avril Haines, formerly Deputy Director CIA
• Jane Halton, later member of Australia’s COVID-19 Coordination Commission in March 2020
• Matthew Harington, CEO of Edelman, the world’s biggest PR and marketing consultancy firm
• George Fu Gao, Director-General, Chinese Center for Disease Control
• Steven Redd, Incident Commander of CDC’s swine flu response (including vaccination of 81 million US citizens) in 2009 / 2010.
• Sofia Borges, Vice President of the UN foundation
• Hasti Taghi, Vice President & Executive Advisor, NBCUniversal Media
• Eduardo Martinez, WEF’s “Managing the Risk and Impact of Future Epidemics Steering Committee. Dr. Martinez also serves on the UN Global Logistics Cluster’s Logistics Emergency Team Steering Council (…) and he serves on the Executive Committee of IMPACT 2030, a business-led coalition to advance the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals and on the Board of UN’s public-private sector coalition innovation incubator, Global Humanitarian Lab.”
• Latoya Abbott, Marriott International
• Martin Knuchel, Lufthansa Group
• Lavan Thiru, “Monetary Authority” of Singapore

“In this NEW ERA of extreme pandemic threat, public-private cooperation is essential for an effective response.” said Tom Inglesby, Director of Center for Health Security, Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. “While governments and public health systems are already strained due to the increase in dangerous outbreaks, experts agree that a severe, fast-spreading human-to-human pandemic incident could happen at any time.”

Note: Tom Inglesby, Christopher Elias and George Fu Gao are, together with Antony Fauci and Jeremy Farrar (Director Wellcome Trust) board members of the “Global Preparedness Monitoring Board” (GPMB), the “joint forces” of WHO and World Bank.

Michael Ryan, Executive Director of WHO‘s “Health Emergencies Programme“, stated in his introduction:

“I don’t think we have ever been in the situation where we have had to respond to so many health emergencies at once. This is a NEW NORMAL.”

According to the event’s scenario, the number of cases would increase exponentially, because the whole human population is vulnerable. Until the end of the pandemic 18 months later, when a vaccine is available, the disease will cause 65 million deaths.

One segment of the exercise deals with “MISINFORMATION and disinformation“. From the fact sheet “Communication in a Pandemic“:

“Disinformation campaigns are widely recognized in the political world but have been identified in the public health realm as well. In the fall of 2018, a team of researchers systematically identified a concerted effort to spread disinformation and discord about vaccine safety.

More than 50 countries globally have taken different government-led actions that, in theory, aim to combat misinformation. These actions can range from media literacy campaigns and fact-checking websites to more extreme measures, such as jailing users for publishing content deemed to be misinformation. In some cases, authorities have shut down social media sites or the internet entirely.

Misinformation and disinformation are likely to be serious threats during a public health emergency. Unfortunately, thus far, there are limited ways to control the propagation of misinformation, leading to potentially draconian methods to manage this problem.”

Note: Later, the European Commission will state on its website:

“MISINFORMATION and disinformation in the health space are thriving, including on COVID-19. It is important that you rely only on authoritative sources to get updated information on the COVID-19 outbreak.

WE suggest that you follow the advice of your public health authorities, and the websites of relevant EU and international organizations: ECDC and WHO. You can also help by not sharing unverified information coming from dubious sources. The fight against coronavirus misinformation and disinformation SAVES LIVES.”

November 2019

The Robert Koch Institute (RKI), Germany’s national public health institute, receives a $ 253,000 donation from the Gates Foundation.

November 20, 2019

After a prioritized procedure, the European Patent Office grants a patent on a genetically modified coronavirus. Patent claim #5: “The coronavirus (…) is an infectious bronchitis virus (IBV), preferably IBV M41.”

Patent holder: the Pirbright Institute in Surrey, England. Major STAKEHOLDERS (among others): the WHO, the European Commission and the Gates Foundation.

December 1, 2019

China‘s new “Law on Vaccine Administration” comes into effect. According to the law, China is to implement a state immunization program, and residents living within the territory of China are legally obligated to be vaccinated with immunization program vaccines, which are provided by the government free of charge. Local governments and parents or other guardians of children must ensure that children be vaccinated with the immunization program vaccines.

An electronic information system will be set up to make all information of vaccines trackable, such as production and package information of vaccines, period of validity, date of vaccination, medical workers who conduct the vaccination and the recipients.

The law introduces a compensation system for cases of adverse events leading to death, serious disability or organ damage during or after vaccination. For mandatory vaccination, the compensation must be paid through local fiscal budgets, while for voluntary vaccination, the vaccine license-holder must shoulder the responsibility.

December 18, 2019

Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) announce the development of a “NOVEL way to record a patient’s vaccination history“, using smartphone-readable nano-crystals called “quantum dots” embedded in the skin using micro-needles. “The work was funded by the Gates Foundation and came about because of a direct request from Microsoft founder and Philanthropist Bill Gates himself.”

December 31, 2019

Wuhan Municipal Health Commission, China, reports a cluster of cases of pneumonia to the WHO.

January 11, 2020

China publicly shares a draft of the genetic sequence of the “Wuhan virus”.

January 13, 2020

Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO Director General, states:

“WE face shared threats and WE have a shared responsibility to act. With the deadline for the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals QUICKLY approaching, the United Nations General Assembly has underscored that the next 10 years must be the “DECADE of Action“.

Declared goals (among others): “Expanding access to medicines”, “Stopping infectious diseases”, “Preparing for epidemics”, “Earning public trust”, “Harnessing NEW technologies”, “Protecting the medicines that protect us“.

January 16, 2020

The Charité university in Berlin, Germany, announces the successful development of a test for the  Wuhan virus, based on the Chinese researchers’ description of the virus’ genetic sequence:

“The coronavirus, which first emerged in Wuhan, China, and can cause severe pneumonia, can now be detected in the laboratory. Developed by a group of DZIF researchers working under the leadership of Prof. Dr. Christian Drosten, Director of the Institute of Virology on Campus Charité Mitte, the world’s first diagnostic test for the coronavirus has now been made publicly available. Following its online publication by the WHO, the test protocol will now serve as a guideline for laboratories. An international consortium is currently conducting a joint evaluation study.”

Note: Drosten was also the first to develop tests for SARS-CoV (2003), bird flu (2005), swine flu (2009), Chikungunya virus(2009), MERS (2012), ZIKA (2016) and yellow fever in Brazil (2017).

Note: The PCR tests that will be developed later, based on this invention, are not approved for diagnostic use. The instruction manual of “RealStar” by Altona Diagnostics: “For research use only! Not for use in diagnostic procedures.” “Multiplex RT-qPCR Kit” of Creative Diagnostics: “This product is for research use only and is not intended for diagnostic use.” The product announcement of the “LightMix Modular Assays” by Roche: “These assays are not intended for use as an aid in the diagnosis of coronavirus infection. For research use only. Not for use in diagnostic procedures.”

January 16, 2020

Germany joins the “1+Million Genomes Initiative“. German Research Minister Anja Karliczek and  Health Minister Jens Spahn sign the declaration “Towards access of at least 1 million sequenced genomes in the EU by 2022” in Berlin. The aim of the initiative is to enable “safe and regulated access to at least one million complete genome sequences and other health data across national borders.”

January 21-24, 2020

At its 50th Annual Meeting in Davos, Switzerland, the World Economic Forum celebrates “STAKEHOLDERS for a Cohesive and Sustainable World“ and “Defining the DECADE of Delivery“.

January 22-23, 2020

Meeting of the WHO Emergency Committee in Geneva, Switzerland.

From the statement about the meeting:

“The Committee’s role is to give advice to the Director-General, who makes the final decision on the determination of a Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC).

Several members considered that it is still too early to declare a PHEIC, given its restrictive and binary nature. Based on these divergent views, the EC formulates the following advice: To WHO – The Committee stands ready to be reconvened in approximately ten days’ time, or earlier should the Director-General deem it necessary.”

January 29, 2020

The Institut Pasteur, which is responsible for monitoring respiratory viruses in France, sequenced the whole genome of the coronavirus known as “2019-nCoV”, becoming “the first institution in Europe to sequence the virus since the START of the outbreak”.

February 11-12, 2020

WHO holds a “Research and Innovation Forum” on COVID-19 in Geneva, Switzerland, attended by more than 400 experts and funders from around the world, which included presentations by George Fu Gao, Director General of China CDC.

The meeting was hosted in collaboration with “Global Research Collaboration for Infectious Disease Preparedness” (GloPID-R), a global network, launched in Brussels, Belgium, in February 2013. The members: Gates Foundation, Wellcome Trust, numerous international governmental organizations, the European Commission (secretariat) and, as observers, the WHOand CEPI.

The network’s mission: “GloPID-R is the only alliance of its kind to bring together research funding organizations on a global scale to facilitate an effective and rapid research of a significant outbreak of a NEW or re-emerging infectious disease with epidemic and pandemic potential.”

February 12, 2020

HEALTHINSIGHT UK’s article “Coronavirus: a reliable test is badly needed. We don’t have one“ talks about the Canadian Scientist David Crowe:

“Crowe describes the current response as a ‘rush to judgement, based on the rapid application of an unproven test, made worse by the use of powerful unproven drugs with toxic side-effects on those who test positive.’

False positives are dangerously misleading. For instance, even if an epidemic began to die out, public health officials would still be getting positive results from an unreliable test and insist that the epidemic was still a threat. Testing all of Wuhan’s 10 million inhabitants with a 99% accurate test would give you 100,000 false positives.

The original WHO guidelines for diagnosing 2019 Coronavirus said that a positive test was all that was needed. The person didn’t need to have symptoms or to have had recent contact with someone who was infected.”

Crowe about Chinese government’s new way of counting: “Now cases that were diagnosed without symptoms are being removed from the record of new cases if they don’t develop them. A recognition of the failings of the test that should make infection figures more realistic.

With the unreliable test, however, uninfected healthy people may be treated with toxic drugs, and unhealthy people, sick for some other reason, may also be treated with inappropriate drugs. Isolation, and other medical procedures such as invasive ventilation, also have their own side effects. This means that we cannot distinguish the dangers of testing positive from the dangers of the virus.”

February 27, 2020

From an article published in the German medical journal AERZTEBLATT: “According to the Robert Koch Institute (RKI), the NOVEL coronavirus Sars-CoV-2 is more deadly than the flu. The likelihood of dying from flu is 0.1 to 0.2 percent, said RKI President Lothar Wieler today.

According to the figures known to date, the rate for the Sars-CoV-2 virus is almost ten times higher – at one to two percent. Eighty percent of those infected had mild symptoms, but 15 percent were seriously ill with Covid-19 lung disease. “That’s a lot,” said Wieler.”

February 29, 2020

The Robert Koch Institute (RKI) is Germany’s national public health institute in the field of surveillance, control and prevention of diseases. It “evaluates, analyses and researches diseases that are very dangerous or very prevalent or of increased public or health-related political significance.”

RKI’s Arbeitsgemeinschaft Influenza (AGI) (Influenza Working Group) has established a so-called sentinel system, a representative network of doctor’s offices from allover the country (including more than 1% of Germany’s primary care physicians), who report their cases of acute respiratory diseases and send samples to the AGI to be tested for viruses. Since 2009, AGI publishes weekly reports about virus activities during the flu season.

From this day on, AGI will also examine the samples for SARS-CoV-2 viruses, with validated, officially approved tests.

March 2020

German Charité university receives a donation of almost $ 250,000 from the Gates Foundation. Purpose: “To develop diagnostics and virology tools to enable a RAPID response to the NOVEL 2019 coronavirus.”

March 10, 2020

The Gates Foundation, Wellcome Trust, and Mastercard commit up to $ 125 million in seed funding to “SPEED-UP the response to the COVID-19 epidemic by identifying, assessing, developing, and scaling-up treatments.”

March 11, 2020

Anthony Fauci, who has become the “face of America’s response to the coronavirus”, states that the Coronavirus is “10 times more lethal than the seasonal flu.“

March 11, 2020

Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, current WHO director, declares the next pandemic:

“… WHO has been assessing this outbreak around the clock and we are deeply concerned both by the alarming levels of spread and severity, and by the alarming levels of inaction. WE have therefore made the assessment that COVID-19 can be characterized as a pandemic.

Pandemic is not a word to use lightly or carelessly. It is a word that, if misused, can cause unreasonable fear, or unjustified acceptance that the fight is over, leading to unnecessary suffering and death. (…) We have NEVER BEFORE seen a pandemic sparked by a coronavirus. This is the FIRST pandemic caused by a coronavirus.”

March 11, 2020

AGI publishes the report for the 10th calendar week (29.2.- 6.3.2020), when the scientists detected the SARS-CoV-2 virus for the first time in one sentinel sample. The other positive tested samples of this week: 106 influenza viruses, 20 rhinoviruses, 17 hMP-viruses, 15 RS-viruses, 1 PIV (1-4) viruses.

Note: see table on page 4 of the report(s).

Note: Statistically, the numbers multiplied by 100 would be what to expect for the whole country.

March 13, 2020

Bill Gates steps down from Microsoft‘s and Berkshire Hathaway’s boards of directors to “dedicate more time to PHILANTROPIC priorities“.

March 13, 2020

According to the NYT and others, the Center for Disease Control (CDC) estimates that in a worst case scenario 214 Million US Americans would be infected and 1.7 Million dead.

March 16, 2020

Media briefing by Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus:

“…We have not seen an urgent enough escalation in testing, isolation and contact tracing – which is the backbone of the response. (…) WE have a simple message for all countries: test, test, test.

This is the defining global health crisis of our time. The days, weeks and months ahead will be a test of our resolve, a test of our trust in science, and a test of solidarity.”

March 16, 2020

Neil Ferguson, adviser of the British government and leader of the Imperial College COVID-19 Response Team, publishes his study about COVID-19:

“In total, in an unmitigated epidemic, we would predict approximately 510,000 deaths in Great Britain and 2.2 million in the US, not accounting for the potential negative effects of health systems being OVERWHELMED on mortality.”

Note: The same month the Imperial College receives a $ 79 million donation from the Gates Foundation.

March 16, 2020

Antony Fauci demands that “Americans must be ready to take more drastic steps.”

March 16, 2020

French President Emmanuel Macron announces the nationwide lockdown. “WE are at WAR“, Macron said several times during his TV speech.

March 17, 2020

Robert Koch Institute President Lothar Wieler increases the risk classification of the Coronavirus from “moderate” to “high“, in parts of the country even “very high“. He justifies this with the “great dynamics of the pandemic and the sharp increase in the case numbers.”

Note: It seems hardly credible that Wieler doesn’t know about the findings of the Arbeitsgemeinschaft Influenza (AGI) affiliated to the Robert Koch-Institute., which is subordinated to the RKI.

March 17, 2020

UK’s Prime Minister Boris Johnson states in a press conference:

“This is a disease that is so dangerous and so infectious that without drastic measures to check its progress it would OVERWHELM any health system in the world. (…) That is why WE announced the steps yesterday that we did – advising against all unnecessary contact – steps that are unprecedented since World WAR II.

WE must act like any WARTIME government and do whatever it takes to support our economy.”

March 17, 2020

Microsoft, Google, YouTube, Facebook and other social media platforms declare in a joint statement that “WE are combating fraud and MISINFORMATION about the virus, elevating authoritative content“ and “sharing critical updates in coordination with government healthcare agencies around the world.”

March 18, 2020

At a White House press conference, US president Donald Trump says about the fight against corona: “I view it – in a sense as a WARTIME president.”

March 18, 2020

AGI publishes the report for the 11th calendar week (07.-13.3.2020). Positive tested samples from the sentinel this week: 66 influenza viruses, 18 rhinoviruses, 14 hMP-viruses, 8 RS-viruses, 2 PIV (1-4) viruses, 1 SARS-CoV-2.

March 18, 2020

The German Federal Ministry of the Interior distributes an internal strategy paper to other German ministries. An excerpt:

“In order to achieve the desired shock effect, concrete effects of a spreading infection on human society must be communicated (…) Choking or not getting enough air is a primal fear for everyone. The situation in which there is nothing you can do to help relatives who are in danger of life, also. The pictures from Italy are disturbing.

Children will get infected easily, even with exit restrictions, e.g. from the neighboring children. When they infect their parentsafterwards and one of them dies painfully at home and they feel guilty because, e.g. they forgot to wash their hands after playing, it’s the most terrible thing a child can ever experience.

Consequential damage: Even if we only have reports on individual cases so far, they paint an alarming picture. Even those who seem to have healed after a mild course can apparently experience relapses at any time, which then suddenly end in death, due to cardiac infarction or lung failure, because the virus has unnoticed found its way into the lungs or heart. These might be isolated cases, but will always hover like a sword of Damocles over those who have been infected once.”

Note: The paper will be leaked in April.

March 19, 2020

Announcement on the website of the British government: “Status of Covid-19: As of 19 March 2020, COVID-19 is no longer considered to be a high consequence infectious disease (HCID) in the UK.”

March 20, 2020

The WHO guideline on “Implementation of global surveillance of COVID-19“ defines a “confirmed case“ as “a person with laboratory confirmation of COVID-19 infection, irrespective of clinical signs and symptoms.”

   20.03.2020

Yuval Noah Harari, Israeli history professor, author, and participant of the 2020 WEF meeting, writes about the corona crisis in the FINANCIAL TIMES: “Yes, the storm will pass (…) but WE will inhabit a DIFFERENT WORLD.”

March 20, 2020

Meeting of Chancellor Angela Merkel with the heads of the German federal states. From the protocol: “The rapid spread of the coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) in the past few days in Germany is worrying.” Drastic measures to limit social contacts are agreed, including restriction of fundamental civil rights like the right to demonstrate.

March 23, 2020

Britain’s Prime Minister Boris Johnson announces the lockdown.

March 24, 2020

In an interview with “TED Connects” Bill Gates states:

“WE don’t want to have a lot of recovered people. To be clear, WE’re trying – through the shut-down in the United States – to not get to one percent of the population infected. WE’re well below that today, but with exponentiation, you could get past that three million. I believe WE will be able to avoid that with having this economic pain.

Eventually what WE’ll have to have is certificates of who’s a recovered person, who’s a vaccinated person, because you don’t want people moving around the world where you’ll have some countries that won’t have it under control, sadly. You don’t want to completely block off the ability for people to go there and come back and move around. So eventually there will be this DIGITAL IMMUNITY PROOF that will help facilitate the global reopening up.”

Note: One week later, the last sentence was edited out of the official TED video.

March 25, 2020

AGI publishes the report for the 12th calendar week (14.-20.03.2020). Positive tested samples from the sentinel this week: 40 influenza viruses, 13 rhinoviruses, 14 hMP-viruses, 16 RS-viruses, 3 PIV (1-4) viruses, 3 SARS-CoV-2.

March 26, 2020

British Ex-Prime Minister Gordon Brown calls for a global government to handle the Corona crisis. “This is not something that can be dealt with in one country. There has to be a coordinated global response. (…) This is first and foremost a medical emergency and there has to be joint action to deal with that.”

March 27, 2020

The “American Association For The Advancement Of Science” (AAAS) publishes an interview with George Fu Gao:

“The big mistake in the U.S. and Europe, in my opinion, is that people aren’t wearing MASKS. (…) Many people have asymptomaticor presymptomatic infections. If they are wearing face masks, it can prevent droplets that carry the virus from escaping and infecting others.

And a really important outstanding question is how stable this virus is in the environment. Because it’s an enveloped virus, people think it’s fragile and particularly sensitive to surface temperature or humidity. But from both U.S. results and Chinese studies, it looks like it’s very resistant to destruction on some surfaces. It may be able to survive in many environments.

We shared the information with scientific colleagues promptly, but this involved public health and we had to wait for policymakers to announce it publicly. You don’t want the public to panic, right? And no one in any country could have predicted that the virus would cause a pandemic. This is the FIRST noninfluenza pandemic EVER.”

March 29, 2020

Larry Fink, founder and CEO of BlackRock, the largest money-management firm in the world, writes in his “Chairman’s letter to SHAREHOLDERS“: “When WE exit this crisis, the WORLD will be DIFFERENT.”

March 30, 2020

As Part of “Operation Warp SPEED“, that aims to deliver 300 million doses of vaccine for COVID-19 by January 2021, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) announced $ 456 million in funds for Johnson & Johnson’s candidate vaccine, with Phase 1 clinical trials set to begin this summer.

April 1, 2020

AGI publishes the report for the 13rd calendar week (21.-27.3.2020). Positive tested samples of this week: 13 rhinoviruses, 11 influenza viruses, 10 hMP-viruses, 8 RS-viruses, 3 SARS-CoV-2, 1 PIV (1-4) virus.

April 1, 2020

During a White House briefing, Antony Fauci says: “I think if we get to the part of the curve (…) when it goes down to essentially no NEW cases, no NEW deaths at a period of time, I think it makes sense that you gonna have to relax social distancing.”

Note: With an estimated false-positive rate of the PCR test between 1 and 5% and all positive tested  persons considered as “new cases”, it is statistically impossible to ever get to this point.

April 2, 2020

In an interview with the FINANCIAL TIMES, Bill Gates is asked if he sees

“a situation where the global economy could be virtually at a standstill for a year or even more”. He replies: “Well, it won’t go to zero, but it will shrink. (…) But in my lifetime this will be the greatest economic hit. But you don’t have a choice. People act like you have a choice.

There will be the ability, particularly in rich countries, to open up if things are done well over the next few months. But for the world at large, NORMALCY ONLY returns when WE‘ve largely vaccinated the ENTIRE global population.”［videoclip］

Note: Exactly 100 years ago, “Return to normalcy” was presidential candidate Warren G. Harding’s campaign slogan for the first US election after World WAR I in 1920. He was elected with 60,3% of the votes.

April 3, 2020

According to an EURONEWS article “more than 3.9 billion people, or half of the world’s population, have now been asked or ordered to stay at home by their governments to prevent the spread of the deadly COVID-19 virus.”

April 1, 2020

Henry Kissinger writes in the WALL STREET JOURNAL: “The Coronavirus Pandemic Will Forever ALTER THE WORLD ORDER.”

April 7, 2020

The WHO warns against too early easing of coronavirus restrictions.

April 8, 2020

AGI publishes the report for the 14th calendar week (28.03.-03.04.2020). Positive tested samples of this week: 8 rhinoviruses, 8 hMP-viruses, 3 SARS-CoV-2, 3 PIV (1-4) viruses, 1 influenza virus, 1 RS-virus.

April 8, 2020

Beate Bahner, German specialist lawyer for medical law, applies for an immediate suspension of all Corona restrictions at the Bundesverfassungsgericht, Germany’s highest court. On her homepage, she calls upon participation in a demonstration for fundamental civil rights on Easter Saturday.

Note: Next day Bahner’s homepage will be shut down by her internet provider.

April 9, 2020

German Chancellor Angela Merkel prepares the people for a “life with the virus”. “Even if the numbers get better one day, the pandemic will not go away until WE really have a vaccine with which WE can immunize the population.”

April 11, 2020

Swiss medical doctor Thomas Binder is arrested by a heavily armed police squad and brought to a closed department of a Psychiatric ward. Binder had criticized the government’s corona measures, claimed that there is only a simple flu virus around and called German virologist Christian Drosten a “clown” in a Twitter post.

April 15, 2020

While lawyer Beate Bahner is interrogated by the police in Heidelberg, between 150 and 200 demonstrators express their solidarity with her in front of the police station. The police forces on site do not intervene.

Later that day police headquarters in Mannheim establishes a twelve-head task force to identify the participants and bring them to prosecution.

April 15, 2020

AGI publishes the report for the 15th calendar week (04.-10.04.2020). Positive tested samples of this week: 1 SARS-CoV-2, 0 rhinoviruses, 0 hMP-viruses, 0 PIV (1-4) viruses, 0 influenza viruses, 0 RS-viruses. In this calendar week, SARS-CoV-2 is detected for the last time by the sentinel until now.

Later AGI will announce on its homepage that “The flu wave of the 2019/20 season ended with the 12th KW 2020.”(12th calendar week 2020, 14.-20.03.2020)

April 15, 2020

In a telephone conference German Chancellor Angela Merkel and the Heads of government of the federal states agree on the following: “Due to the high dynamics of the spread of the coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) in Germany in the first half of March, federal and state governments had to impose drastic restrictions on citizens in order to protect people from the infection and to avoid an OVERLOAD of the Health system.” It is agreed that the measures like social distancing remain in place.

“Germany has a high test capacity of up to 650,000 tests per week to determine corona infections (PCR tests).” It is agreed that the government guarantees the purchase of additional test kits and equipment.

“A fast achievement of immunity against SARS-CoV-2 in the population without a vaccine is not possible without OVERWHELMING the health system and the risk of MANY DEATHS. This is why vaccine development is of central importance. The Federal Government supports German companies and international organizations in advancing vaccine development as QUICKLY as possible. A vaccine is the key to getting back to NORMAL life. As soon as a vaccine is available, sufficient vaccine doses must be available as QUICKLY  as possible for the entire population.”

April 16, 2020

As Part of “Operation Warp SPEED“, the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) announces up to $ 483 millionin support for Moderna‘s candidate vaccine, which began Phase 1 trials on March 16 and received a fast-track designation from FDA.

April 21, 2020

The Rockefeller Foundation publishes its “National Covid-19 Testing Action Plan: Pragmatic steps to reopen our workplaces and our communities”.

The first step of the plan is a massive expansion of Covid-19 testing: 3 million US citizens tested weekly, with an increase of the number to 30 million per week within six months. The goal to be achieved within one year: the ability to test 30 million people a day. For each test, a “reasonable market price“ of $ 100 is estimated.

Note: Because of the 1% false-positive results, mathematically, 30 million tests per day would inevitably generate at least 9 million false-positive tested persons (subsequently quarantined) and costs of $ 90 billion per month, payed by taxpayer’s money.

Step two: The creation of a Covid Community Healthcare Corps (CCHC), “… at least 100,000 people and perhaps as many as 300,000 must be hired to undertake a vigorous campaign of test administration and contact tracing.” Also, “a national system to track Covid-19 status must be created.”

Step three: “Integrate and expand Federal, state, and private data platforms to cover the full range of data required to monitor the pandemic.”

In the appendix of the paper (page 28):

“We therefore propose the creation of a Pandemic Testing Board (PTB), akin to the WAR Production Board that the United States created in World WAR II, in order to massively scale up production and deployment of testing. The Pandemic Testing Board would consist of leaders from business, government, academia, and labor.

It would have authority to identify supply chain elements necessary for manufacturing, procuring, scaling, and deploying any items related to testing, the power to procure these materials via contracting with producers and servicers, and the power to mandate production or services, akin to authorities in the Defense Production Act.” Finally, if necessary, the PTB will also be “authorized to create a Pandemic Response Corps, comprised of tested civilians, to assist in the testing.”

April 21, 2020

Lars Schade, RKI‘s Vice-President, claims that “there is no end of the epidemic in sight, the number of cases may rise again. (…) As long as there is no vaccine, the restrictions must remain in place. Even if there are no NEW cases in Germany, the virus could come back into the country from outside.”

   24.04.2020

The Cologne District Court orders Beate Bahner‘s compulsory detention in the closed department in a Psychiatric ward. According to her testimony, she was repeatedly exposed to massive physical violence, “fixation” and multiple accommodation in an isolation room. She was also given forced medication. One month later she will be released.

April 30, 2020

A representative study, commissioned by the Austrian Government and carried out in the beginning of April, finds that (with a 95 percent probability) between 0.12 and 0.77% of the population in Austria would show a positive SARS-CoV-2 PCR test.

Note: This result corresponds to the estimated percentage of false-positive results of PCR tests.

May 4, 2020

Austria’s Chancellor Sebastian Kurz states in an interview: “As long as there is no vaccination or no effective medication, this disease will accompany us. And as long as that, the unrestricted freedom of travel as we have known it will not come back.”

May 12, 2020

The BRITISH MEDICAL JOURNAL publishes the article “Interpreting a covid-19 test result“:

“No test gives a 100% accurate result; tests need to be evaluated to determine their sensitivity and specificity, ideally by comparison with a “gold standard”. The lack of such a clear-cut “gold-standard” for covid-19 testing makes evaluation of test accuracy challenging.”

The researchers work shows that the “Pre-Test probability” (the likelihood a person has covid-19 based on their characteristics) has a decisive influence on the probability of a false-positive result. E.g. a Pre-test probability of 80% (using a PCR test with a standard sensitivity of 70% and a specificity of 95%) leads to one false-positive in 100 tests. If the influenza season is over, no significant virus activity left and therefore, for example, the Pre-test probability is assumed to be 5%, the number of false-positive test results raises to 5 in 100 tests.

May 15, 2020

A leaked paper of Germany’s Federal Ministry of the Interior “Internal evaluation of Corona crisis management” claims that an expert panel considers the dangerousness of Covid-19 was highly overestimated: “Probably at no point did the danger posed by the new virus go beyond the normal level. There is no evidence that this was more than a false alarm.

The people who die from Corona are essentially those who would statistically die this year, because they have reached the end of their lives and their weakened bodies can no longer cope with any random everyday stress (including the approximately 150 viruses currently in circulation).

The danger is obviously no greater than that of many other viruses. We are probably dealing with a global false alarm that has remained undetected for a long time.

The collateral damage (Note: of the lockdown measures) is now higher than the apparent benefit.”

May 21, 2020

A REUTERS article quotes Seth Berkley, CEO of GAVI, speaking at WHO‘s 73rd World Health Assembly in Geneva, Switzerland:

“Doubts about vaccines have spread across social media like a disease and FALSE INFORMATION that “KILLS people” should be taken down by the companies running digital platforms.” … “WE have to think about it as a disease. This is a disease“, Berkley said, “this spreads at the speed of light, literally.”

May 21, 2020

As Part of “Operation Warp SPEED“, the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) announced up to $ 1,2 billion in support for AstraZeneca’s candidate vaccine. The agreement is to make available at least 300 million doses of the vaccine for the United States, with the first doses delivered as early as October 2020 and Phase 3 clinical studies beginning this summer with approximately 30,000 volunteers in the United States.

May 27, 2020

Statement of German Chancellor Angela Merkel about easing the Corona measures:

“We are still living at the beginning of the pandemic. We don’t have a vaccine, we don’t have any medication yet. But WE have gained better control.” She is grateful to the citizens for that: “They are the ones who have made a significant contribution to this, and they are the ones who have the essential control that this will continue to be the case.”

June 9, 2020

Analyzing approximately 35,000 SARS-CoV-2 RNA sequences, British / Australian scientists have identified more than 100 different virus strains of SARS-CoV-2 until now. The “original” Wuhan virus is no longer detectable.

June 13, 2020

Researchers of the University Barcelona, Spain, detect the presence of the SARS-CoV-2 virus in samples of waste water in Barcelona, collected on 12.03.2019.

June 14, 2020

Jens Spahn, German Minister of Health, says: “Now we have to be careful that we don’t have too many false-positive results in the end, because of too extensive testing. Because the tests are not 100 percent accurate, they also have a small, but still existing error rate. And when, so to speak, the overall infection process continues to decrease, and you expand testing to millions at the same time, you suddenly have a lot more false-positives than true-positives.”

June 22, 2020

In a study of the University of Calgary, Canada, the researchers come to the conclusion that the SARS-CoV-2 virus “has likely possessed high affinity for human cell targets since at least 2013.”

June 23, 2020

In an interview with the “US Chamber of Commerce Foundation” Bill Gates is asked about his current concerns.

“This won’t be the last pandemic that we face. (…) WE‘ll have to invest in making sure that WE catch the disease sooner and that WE have platforms to make diagnostics, therapeutics, and vaccines very QUICKLY .

WE‘ll have to prepare for the next one. THAT… you know, what I would say is… WILL get attention this time.”［videoclip］

June 27, 2020

John Ioannidis, leading epidemiologist at Stanford University states in an interview with the GREEK REPORTER:

“I feel extremely sad that my predictions were verified. Major consequences on the economy, society and mental health have already occurred.

Globally, the lockdown measures have increased the number of people at risk of starvation to 1.1 billion, and they are putting at risk millions of lives, with the potential resurgence of tuberculosis, childhood diseases like measles where vaccination programs are disrupted, and malaria. I hope that policymakers look at the big picture of all the potential problems and not only on the very important, but relatively thin slice of evidence that is COVID-19.”

July 1, 2020

The Bulgarian Pathology Association publishes the article “COVID19 PCR Tests are Scientifically Meaningless“. The authors state: “Though the whole world relies on RT-PCR to “diagnose” Sars-Cov-2 infection, the science is clear: they are not fit for purpose.

Lockdowns and hygienic measures around the world are based on numbers of cases and mortality rates created by the so-called SARS-CoV-2 RT-PCR tests used to identify “positive” patients, whereby “positive“ is usually equated with “infected“.

But looking closely at the facts, the conclusion is that these PCR tests are meaningless as a diagnostic tool to determine an alleged infection by a supposedly new virus called SARS-CoV-2.”

July 2, 2020

Wellcome Trust‘s Director Jeremy Farrar, board member of the “Global Preparedness Monitoring Board” writes in the GUARDIAN:

“Forget any false sense of security: WE are still at the START of the global pandemic.“

Note: Make yourself a little more familiar with the Wellcome Trust here.

July 17, 2020

Klaus Schwab, WEF founder, presents “The Great Reset“, his vision of a post-COVID world.

“WE are at a turning point of humankind – WE should not underestimate the historical significance of the situation WE are in.”

Note: At WEF‘s “Strategic Intelligence” website one can explore all the connections between the topics of the Great Reset(activated java script necessary).

July 21, 2020

The EVENING STANDARD quotes Jeremy Farrar:

“Even, actually, if WE have a vaccine or very good treatments, humanity will still be living with this virus for very many, many years… DECADES to come.”

July 23, 2020

Antony Fauci tells CNN that life could return to NORMAL by sometime next year with sufficient coronavirus vaccine production:

“The timetable you suggested of getting into 2021, well into the year, then I can think with a successful vaccine – if WE could vaccinate the OVERWHELMING majority of the population – WE could start talking about real NORMALITY again.”

He added:

“But it is going to be a gradual process.”

Note: In his 2005 book “Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed“, the American evolutionary biologist Jared Diamond presented the concept of “Creeping normality” as a way, in which a major change will be accepted as a normal situation if it happens slowly through unnoticeable increments of change. If the change would take place in a single step or a short period, it could be rejected.

July 24, 2020

Statement on the homepage of the German Federal Statistical Office: “According to the preliminary death figures, the effects of the flu wave in 2020 were very slight compared to previous years.”

August 8, 2020

The Daily Situation Report of the Robert Koch Institute shows (Note: see page 9, table 5) that in beginning of June during 23rd calendar week 340,986 tests have been conducted, leading to 3,208 positive results (0,9%). Until beginning of August the number of tests was almost doubled. 32rd calendar week: 672,171 tests, 6,909 positive (1% of the tests).

August 13, 2020

From an article in the German newspaper RNZ: “On Thursday, the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) reported 1,445 NEW corona infections in Germany within 24 hours.”

Note: A accurate term would be “1,445 positive RT-PCR test results“. Also, a serious, respectable report would present the number of positive tested persons in proportion to the absolute number of conducted tests.

“The peak of the daily reported NEW infections was at more than 6000 in beginning of April. The number had tended to fall after the values still exceeded 1000 in May, and has been rising again since the end of July. A further worsening of the situation must be avoided at all costs, warns the RKI.”

August 19, 2020

Robert-Koch-Institute’s “Daily Situation Report” (Note: see page 9, table 5) shows that during the 33rd calendar week (08.-14.08.2020) no less than 875,524 RT-PCR tests (over 200,000 or 30% tests more than the previous week) in Germany had been necessary to manufacture the reported “1,445 new corona infections in 24 hours”. For the whole week, 8407 positive test results (0,96%) were recorded. This percentage equals the estimated false-positive rate of the RT-PCR test.

Note: In the German version of the reports the numbers of tests carried out are not mentioned at all.

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By strengthening the presence of warships from non-Black Sea NATO members in the Black Sea, the military bloc is attempting to demonstrate its dominance in the region and the Alliance’s desire to neutralize and pressurize Russia’s influence in the area. Moscow’s Black Sea influence significantly increased after Crimea’s 2014 reunification with Russia. NATO’s military presence in the Black Sea is significantly strengthening, especially as warships in the area increased by 33% from January to September compared to the same period time last year. In 40% of cases, these ships are equipped with high-precision long-range weapons. This can be seen as a NATO attempt to intimidate Russia.

NATO is undeniably trying to put pressure on Russia by demonstrating its power. However, another important goal of the Alliance is to conduct intelligence operations against Crimea and Russia’s south. The Alliance is trying to locate Russian facilities, communication links, navigation systems, electronic warfare systems and other related military assets. There is of course the additional goal of training by simulating a battle with the Russian military.

After the reunification of Crimea, Russia gained a huge strategic advantage in the Black Sea region as it prevented NATO warships from being able to go to Sevastopol and turning it into a powerful pivot point that hypothetically could block Russia’s access to the Sea of Azov in the event of war. The Sea of Azov is critical to the security of Russia’s south as it is the beginning of the Volga–Don Canal.

Officially, the increased presence of NATO warships is in support of the Ukrainian navy. They are constantly participating in manoeuvres, such as the “Sea Breeze” exercises held in July. The number of military exercises is even growing. Countries far from the region, such as Canada and the Scandinavian states, are appearing in the Black Sea. Even this year, despite COVID-19 and all the restrictions, a large number of NATO warships arrived in the Black Sea. The last recorded case of non-Black Sea navy ships entering the Black Sea was recorded on Sunday when a British torpedo destroyer sailed in.

Warships of non-Black Sea countries can only be in the Black Sea for a limited time in accordance to the 1936 Montreux Convention. Therefore, that Convention is actually an obstacle for NATO today. Without this treaty, American and British warships could be permanently stationed in the Black Sea. The significance of this convention is based on guaranteeing the free passage of civilian ships through the Black Sea during peacetime and restricting the passage of warships of non-Black Sea states. According to the Convention, countries that do not go out to the Black Sea are not allowed to keep their ships in the Black Sea region for more than 21 days. In addition, there are restrictions when it comes to the tonnage and number of warships belonging to non-Black Sea countries – no more than 30,000 tons and nine ships. This means that no aircraft carrier can enter the Black Sea, since they weigh between 45,000 to 100,000 tons.

Also, according to the Montreux Convention, Turkey must not close access to and from the Black Sea via the Bosporus and the Dardanelle Straits during peacetime. During a war in which Turkey does not participate in, the sea must be closed to the passage of warships of any country participating in the war. Turkey, as a Black Sea state and member of NATO, can stay in the Black Sea as long as it wants and send as many ships as it wants, and has always participated in NATO Black Sea manoeuvres.

Although NATO countries do not recognize Russia’s sovereignty over Crimea, this does not correspond with the reality on the ground and they know that the Russian Black Sea Fleet is in a state of combat readiness and will respond to any threat. This increasing pressure in Black Sea also corresponds with pressure against Russia in the seas in the Arctic, the Baltics and the Pacific. The presence of NATO warships in the Black Sea is just a show of strength and it is highly unlikely that this will intimidate the Russian military in the region or make it withdraw from Crimea. For now NATO are respecting the 1936 Montreux Convention but this has not subsided any pressure that is being applied against Russia.

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This article was originally published on InfoBrics.

Paul Antonopoulos is an independent geopolitical analyst. 

Featured image is from InfoBrics

The Kyrgyz government’s decision to annul the results of the latest elections which were exploited as the “trigger event” for the preplanned Color Revolution against it might be interpreted by some as submitting to that regime change operation even though the argument can also be made that it ‘s a pragmatic move for peace undertaken as a last-ditch effort to stave off a seemingly impending civil war.

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A UK court ruled that the administration of Boris Johnson’s position that Juan Guaidó is the legitimate ruler of Venezuela is far from equivocal, paving the way for over $1 billion of the country’s gold to be released.  

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AUnited Kingdom court has handed the Venezuelan government of Nicolas Maduro a major win today, overturning a previous ruling from a lower court that legitimized the British government’s decision to freeze Venezuelan government gold reserves held in the Bank of England. The English Court of Appeal ruled that the Conservative administration of Boris Johnson’s position that Juan Guaidó is the country’s legitimate ruler was far from equivocal, potentially paving the way for some $1.95 billion of the Central Bank of Venezuela’s gold to be accessed.

Following President Trump’s lead, in July, the U.K. government took the extraordinary step of derecognizing President Maduro in favor of the self-declared Guaidó, despite the fact that for nearly six months, he had not even been a member of his Popular Will party, let alone its leader. The move was labeled “highway robbery” by supporters of the Venezuelan government.

A nearly unheard of politician before his ascension to the role of head of the Venezuelan National Assembly (a post given out on a yearly rotational basis among all parties in the institution) in January 2019, Guaidó shocked the country by using his appointment to unilaterally declare himself president of the country. He then led a series of coup attempts throughout 2019 and 2020, the last of which involved paying Trump-linked American mercenaries to shoot their way into the presidential palace. However, the plan ended in complete disaster, with the Americans subsequently sentenced to 20 years of prison time.

Guaidó based his claim to power on Article 233 of the Venezuelan Constitution, which allows a president to be removed if he “abandons his position” or becomes “permanently unavailable to serve” for whatever reason. Maduro, however, had clearly not left his post. Regardless, if he had, Article 233 states that the vice-president would take charge until a new election by universal suffrage was held. Guaidó’s party was not even registered to stand in elections, having boycotted them the year previously under U.S. orders. The Trump administration had attempted to organize a total boycott from opposition parties, thereby undermining the process’ legitimacy, even threatening to sanction opposition presidential candidate Henri Falcón. Despite the partial boycott, turnout was relatively high. A larger percentage of the total electorate still cast their ballot for Maduro than Americans did for Trump in 2016 or Obama in 2012. The U.S. government is currently trying the same tactic in the upcoming December elections to the National Assembly, the State Department releasing a memo in September declaring that all opposition parties taking place were considered “puppet parties” participating in an “electoral charade,” and would therefore be sanctioned.

The United Kingdom and the United States have been leaders in a years-long economic and political campaign to oust Maduro from power, hitting the country with sanctions and attacking it politically. When Maduro attempted to use the impounded gold to buy humanitarian aid from the United Nations to deal with the coronavirus pandemic, the Johnson administration blocked it. Meanwhile, American sanctions, declared illegal by the U.N., have been responsible for over 100,000 Venezuelans’ death. The U.S. government is also continually provoking Venezuela militarily. Last week, it sent a warship — the U.S.S. William P. Lawrence — into the Caribbean, just 16 nautical miles from Venezuela’s coast. Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino described the action as “erratic and childish,” implying Trump was attempting to foment an “October Surprise” conflict to boost his reelection chances.

The U.S. has also funded and supported Guaidó throughout his coup attempts, grooming him since he was a student leader. Recently, they have been channeling money confiscated from the Venezuelan government to Guaidó so that he can personally pay every healthcare worker a huge stipend.

While the Maduro administration is very unpopular, the opposition has had little success shaking their image as elitists interested only in returning Venezuela to its former status as a U.S. client state. Guaidó is presented in Western media as a breath of fresh air and a break with that tradition. However, as the privately-educated son of an international airline pilot, and somebody who attended George Washington University (an impossible task for those who do not come from the elite), he has had little success persuading his countryfolk to get behind his vision for the country. A recent poll found that 3 percent of Venezuelans recognize him as president. Despite this, he has received virtually unanimous support in Washington and London. However, there is no doubt that today’s court ruling is a loss for him and a win for Maduro.

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Alan MacLeod is a Staff Writer for MintPress News. After completing his PhD in 2017 he published two books: Bad News From Venezuela: Twenty Years of Fake News and Misreporting and Propaganda in the Information Age: Still Manufacturing Consent. He has also contributed to Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting, The Guardian, Salon, The Grayzone, Jacobin Magazine, Common Dreams the American Herald Tribune and The Canary.

Featured image:Self-declared Venezuelan President Juan Guiado meets with UK PM Boris Jonson in London in January, 2020. Photo | Public Release

In a letter sent to the Norwegian Nobel Committee, the World Peace Council formally registered the candidacy of Cuba’s Henry Reeve International Contingent of Doctors Specialized in Disaster Situations and Serious Epidemics for the Nobel Peace Prize.

Emphasizing the great challenges that the COVID-19 pandemic has meant for humanity, and the essential role international solidarity plays in aiding those who suffer most during such emergencies, the letter draws attention to the work of the island’s health professionals, stating: “We see as the most sincere example of such international solidarity the work that the Cuban medical contingent “Henry Reeve” has been performing since much before the coronavirus outbreak was announced.”

In listing the dozens of countries in different regions of the world that have been assisted, the Council notes that this altruistic work is not a passing event, but “a long lasting Cuban tradition of humanist care for other peoples which is carried out even in the face of dire economic challenges for the Island, which suffers from the extremely harsh sanctions that, in a stark contrast with Cubans’ disposition, also lasts over six decades and impose grave hardships on the Cuban people.”

Sent on behalf of dozens of national committees for peace in approximately one hundred countries, the message notes that, before expanding support to nations that requested assistance in the COVID-19 battle, Cuban specialists had already collaborated to overcome the impact of 16 floods, eight hurricanes, eight earthquakes and four epidemics.

The Council’s nomination, dated September 22, states that the Henry Reeve Contingent has saved countless lives and shown “humane empathy and kindness for which they remain known wherever they have visited. This work is key in building peace amidst violent and structural conflicts and in setting conditions for people to have their most basic needs met in conditions of disaster and extreme impoverishment.”

In contrast to the slander campaign, financed by the United States, to discredit Cuba’s international medical collaboration, the formalization of the Henry Reeve’s candidacy reflects worldwide appreciation of the noble principles of Cuban medicine, whose professionals, as Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel recently stated before the United Nations, whether they receive the Nobel Prize or not, “they have been recognized for years by the peoples blessed by their health work.”

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Featured image: José Martí provided Cuba the guiding principle, “Homeland is humanity.” Photo: Juvenal Balán

This past Tuesday, October 6, Trump pulled the plug once again—a second time—on negotiations on a fiscal stimulus between House speaker, Pelosi, and his Treasury Secretary, Steve Mnuchin.

This past week Pelosi and Mnuchin had reportedly been quietly negotiating toward a compromise fiscal stimulus package and were making progress while Trump was in the hospital with his Covid infection. But as soon as Trump returned to the White House, one of his first moves Trump was to scuttle the negotiations. On Tuesday, October 6, he dramatically declared the negotiations were over. Furthermore, he added, there would be no stimulus until sometime after the November elections.

This was not the first time House speaker, Pelosi, and Mnuchin were growing closer to a deal and Trump abruptly intervened unexpectedly and scuttled it.

In an almost identical event earlier this past August Trump intervened and declared the negotiations over. Negotiating with Mnuchin in July and early August, Pelosi had reduced her original fiscal stimulus package costing $3.4 trillion—i.e. the Democrats ‘Heroes Act’ passed way back in late May—to a proposal costing $2 Trillion. That was a drop of $1.4 trillion. The Republican position at the time was the Republican Senate’s so-called ‘Heals Act’, with a cost of $1.5 trillion. Thus the parties were only about $500 billion apart and a deal looked possible in early August.

But once Pelosi-Shumer cut their offer by $1.4 trillion, to $2 trillion, Trump had his lead negotiator, chief of staff Mark Meadows, who had taken over as lead negotiator from Mnuchin, abruptly break off negotiations and walk out. That was done without making a counter-offer to Pelosi. In bargaining parlance, Trump had thus ‘sandbagged’ Pelosi with a cheap bargaining trick: namely, get your opponent to make a major move, then instead of countering, break off negotiations altogether. Should negotiations ever resume, your opponent then has to make a second move and concession while you consider only one.

In less than 24 hours after breaking off negotiations in early August, Trump quickly announced his four Executive Orders (EOs). That overnight response strongly suggests Trump had pre-planned to scuttle the August negotiations and had his four Executive Orders already in his pocket, ready to go. It was planned well in advance with the intent of Trump personally taking over the bargaining agenda and to deny Pelosi-Shumer any credit for any eventual stimulus.

Trump’s Executive Orders were largely smoke and mirrors. Clearly Trump wanted to be identified with the public as the guy who delivered the stimulus, and no one else—especially Pelosi and the Democrats. There would be no shared responsibility for delivering the stimulus benefits.

Here’s why Trump’s August EOs were more smoke and mirrors:

The first Executive Order recommendation that governors could, if they wished, extend the moratorium on rent evictions that was contained in the March 2020 Cares Act passed by Congress. Trump’s EO did not provide for a continuation of a moratorium; just a recommendation, and only if a governor wanted. And few would subsequently prove they wanted.

Trump’s second August EO provided a supplemental unemployment benefit of $300 a week, to replace the $600/wk. benefit that expired at the end of July. That $600 expiration meant $65 billion a month in income for consumption by households was taken out of the economy, in August and every month thereafter. In fact, when a standard fiscal multiplier effect is applied, it reduced potential GDP spending by $130 billion a month. With few states offering even half of that, the US economy lost nearly $100 billion a month, every month, in spending with Trump’s first EO.

But there was more ‘smoke’. Trump’s $300/wk. substitution benefit would apply only if a state threw in another $100. Many state unemployment benefit funds were broke or near busted and many states could not afford the $100, so their workers never got the $300.

More interesting still, the funding for the $300 was taken from the fund for disaster relief, which had only $50 billion or so in it. So the $300 was a transfer of funds—from the disaster relief fund to unemployment benefits. That offered no net fiscal stimulus to the economy. At only $50 billion, the fund was exhausted anyway in just six weeks, by mid-September. By October, moreover, the western fires season reached record levels and while southeast coast hurricane season recorded more hurricanes than there were names from letters of the available. But the disaster relief fund was now depleted as well as the six weeks of $300!

An even greater ‘bag of policy worms’ was Trump’s third EO. It called for a cut in workers’ payroll tax for social security and Medicare. Apart from the unconstitutionality of the Executive branch of government introducing a tax measure unilaterally—when such tax legislation may only arise in the US House of Representatives per the US Constitution—Trump’s payroll tax cut EO was not really a tax cut. It was a payroll tax deferral. (Note that business’s share of the payroll tax was already deferred to the end of 2021 by the March Cares Act). So workers, like businesses, have to pay double payroll taxes sometime in 2021 according to Trump’s payroll tax EO. Given that businesses are legally responsible for collecting and distributing workers’ share of the payroll tax to government, many businesses complained if they didn’t collect the payroll tax cut legally they might be liable for paying for both deferrals in 2021—i.e. their deferred tax share and their workers’ deferred tax. So many have since decided to not cut their workers payroll tax. To this date, little research is available summarizing how much payroll taxes for workers have actually been cut.

But Trump could and did still claim publicly during when campaigning in blue collar states that he’s cutting their taxes—not just deferring them. Most will not realize they will eventually have to pay double payroll taxes in 2021. When questioned about this possibility, Trump has replied he would later make the payroll tax deferral permanent, if he were re-elected. But that’s not likely without Congress approval (which is highly unlikely) and even more unlikely if he’s not elected.

The payroll tax EO is also an insidious way of undermining social security and Medicare—one of Trump’s, and Republicans’, major policy objectives: i.e. reduce the revenues necessary to make social security retirement benefits and Medicare payments for retirees in 2021. Then call for massive social security and Medicare benefit cuts to make up the difference.

A fourth EO extended payments by students on their government education debt until the end of December 2020. With record and rising levels of defaults on the $1.7 trillion current student debt, the extension only recognized the obvious: that debt payments wouldn’t be paid for the overwhelming majority of the unemployed anyway.

These four Executive Orders, issued in mid-August, represent Trump’s taking over control of the bargaining agenda for the fiscal stimulus. Pelosi-Shumer and company were cleverly set up and then ‘punked’, as they say. Trump looked like he had the real control over whether a fiscal stimulus would happen or not, and that he alone was powerful enough to deliver any stimulus. It would be his stimulus. The problem was, the four EOs amounted no stimulus at all!

More than a million and a half workers every week, from mid-August to early October, continued to file every week for first time unemployment benefits. As a million and a half applied for benefits for the first time, another million a week, every week, began exhausting the unemployment benefits they had been collecting since March-April. By October more than 20 million workers would be considered long-duration jobless, and thus unlikely to ever get their jobs back. More than 5 million workers dropped out of the labor force, giving up on getting jobs. Another 4.3 million in two paycheck families would have to quit work to manage their K-6 grade children struggling with remote education from home.

Tens of millions of working families would start being evicted from their rents, and hundreds of thousands of lower income family home owners would begin to default and go into foreclosure as well.

Meanwhile, millions of small businesses began go bankrupt by late summer, with millions by year end 2020. According to the National Federation of Independent Businesses (NFIB), a trade association for small businesses, no fewer than 21% of the approximate 30 million small businesses in the US had closed, or would close, in the coming months!

In other words, Trump’s feeble four Executive Orders had virtually no positive on the economy by September-October 2020—as jobs, unemployed, rent evictions, foreclosures, business closings all began to deteriorate by late 3rd quarter 2020.

Given these conditions, Pelosi-Shumer and Treasury Secretary, Steve Mnuchin, attempted one last time in early October to try to reach a deal on a stimulus bill before the November 3 elections. Mnuchin reportedly raised his offer from his late July $1.5 trillion to $1.6 trillion. Pelosi-Shumer position as of early October was $2.2 (having raised it slight from $2 trillion in response to Trump’s breaking off negotiations in August after the Democrats reduced their proposals to $2 trillion). Reportedly as well, however, they again considered $2 trillion.

With around only $400-$500 billion difference in terms of final cost of a fiscal package both parties—Pelosi and Mnuchin—were not so far apart they couldn’t reach an agreement. That is, until Trump abruptly intervened again and called off the Pelosi-Mnuchin negotiations.

In early October, as in August previously, the main sticking points to an agreement appeared to be the Democrats’ demand to bail out State and Local governments, which were soon to have to layoff hundreds of thousands of public employees due to tax revenue collapse. The Trump-McConnell position has always been to deny any funds for state-local government since, in their view, most would go to the larger ‘blue’ states. The other sticky qualitative issue was the Republican-Trump demand that businesses be absolved from all liability claims during the pandemic period. Democrats feared this blanket liability exclusion would allow businesses exemption from all liabilities for health and safety of their workers or the local communities in which they did business.

Despite both negotiating parties closing the gap toward a deal, Trump abruptly broke off the negotiations once again, a second time, on October 6 and declared the negotiations dead until after the election.

As in August, Trump again a second time personally took over control of the bargaining agenda on October 6. But by saying ‘no further negotiations until after the election’ he set off a shit storm of complaints from his business base. The stock markets, which had been hundreds of points up on October 6, after Trump’s theatrical return from the hospital to the White House, in late hours tanked hundreds of points into the red after Trump’s announcement of no stimulus until after the elections.

So Trump put on his twitter hat after the markets closed and slung out a series of tweets, including retracting his earlier announcement of no new negotiations until after November 3.

But that was not all. Further tweets challenged Pelosi-Shumer to agree to separate bills on the content of the Pelosi-Mnuching talks. He taunted Pelosi to agree to a bill just to bail out the airlines. Another just to provide a second round of $1,200 income checks. Another to provide more grants for small businesses. And so on. The not so clever intent here was obviously to suck Pelosi and Shumer to break up their package proposal, and negotiate directly with Trump, item by item. But to do so would concede all their bargaining leverage, as they say. Trump would be in a position to cherry pick and agree to the separate provisions he wants, and veto line by line the ones he doesn’t. It was evidence that Trump just can’t let any one else take credit for a deal. It has to be all his to brag about.

It will be interesting to see if Pelosi and the Democrats fall for Trump’s latest bargaining trick. He’s proven in the past not to be a trustful good faith bargainer. They enter Trump’s latest fools game at their risk!

But regardless whether they fall for Trump’s latest trick or not, Trump has once again grabbed control of the bargaining agenda. Whatever comes out of the latest developments, it will appear as if he delivered the deal—not Congress and Mnuchin. Trump’s the great negotiator. Knows the ‘Art of the Deal’. But that’s all Trump. Take the credit always, appear responsible for everything positive, and throw all others under the bus when anything fails! And never, never negotiate in good faith. That’s only for “suckers and losers”, in Trump parlance.

Like his obviously staged return from the hospital to the White House, Trump is all drama and theater. To borrow a well worn literary phrase, “there’s no there there”.

But the US economy now more than ever needs a real fiscal stimulus, not phony theater. It has entered the fourth quarter of 2020 with ominous negative economic signs on the horizon: large corporations are now announcing permanent layoffs (not furloughs) by the tens of thousands. Unemployment claims have begun to clearly rise again. Evictions and foreclosures and business closures are now escalating as well. A second Covid 19 wave is beginning to appear in the US, just as it has in Europe and elsewhere. That will mean more shutdowns, even if only partial. And more reluctance by consumers to spend on services like travel, leisure, hospitality, restaurants, movies, theater, entertainment, shopping at malls, buying gas, sports events, to name but the most obvious.

The combination of no fiscal stimulus and a Covid resurgence is ominous for the US economy. Even more ominous is the growing likelihood of major political instability erupting—institutionally and in the streets—around Trump’s oft-stated intent not to recognize the outcome of the November elections should he lose, driven by his unsubstantiated claim of fraudulent mail in ballot voting.

Trump has already begun moving his political chess pieces to challenge the election and refuse to leave office. Teams of his lawyers are filing hundreds of court injunctions against counting mail in ballots, in particular in the swing states. Pro-Trump red state legislators meanwhile are throwing hundreds of thousands of voters off the voting rolls, reducing polling locations in minority neighborhoods, eliminating drop boxes for ballots in some cases to one per city, sending ‘observers’ to intimidate voters at polling stations. Simultaneously, Mitch McConnell in the Senate is rushing to confirm Trump’s latest Supreme Court nominee, to ensure he has a 6-3 safe majority on the Court should it come down to the Supreme Court calling for a halt to counting mail in ballots, especially in swing states that will determine the election; or to legitimize other tactical moves by Trump lawyers trying to prevent mail in ballot vote counting.

A most likely scenario is the following: Trump lawyers in swing states get recent McConnell appointed pro-Trump district and appeals court judges to declare mail in ballots cannot be accurately counted for various reasons. With mail in ballot counting suspended, Trump lawyers then ask Republican controlled state legislators to pick the ‘electors’ for the electoral college, who would almost certainly vote for Trump. That way the Supreme Court may not have to directly ‘select’ Trump, as they did with George W. Bush in 2000. But they would indirectly, by enabling the state legislators to select the electors that then select Trump. (This was the way Senators used to be ‘elected’ before the US Constitution was amended to provide for direct election of Senators).

The more economic, political, and health crises and confusion there is around November 3 and after, the more likely the Courts will defer to the above scenario in the name of restoring social order.

So it just may be that Trump doesn’t really want a fiscal stimulus before November 3. Maybe his latest ‘line by line’ tweets are just that—a delaying tactic.

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Dr. Jack Rasmus writes on his blog site where this article was originally published. He is a frequent contributor to Global Research.

Featured image is from Shutterstock

“The further a society drifts from the truth, the more it will hate those who speak it.” George Orwell

Can we agree that there are two types of Covid-19?

The first type, is Covid-19 ,”The Virus”, which is a fairly mild infection that most people don’t even realize they’ve contracted. They remain either asymptomatic or have slight flu-like symptoms that go away after a week or so. A tiny sliver of the population– that are mainly-older, vulnerable people with underlying health conditions– can develop complications, become seriously ill and die. But, according to most analysis, the chances of dying from Covid are roughly between 1 in every 200 to 1 in every 1,000 people. (CDC-IFR- 0.26%)

In other words, Covid is not the Spanish Flu, not the Black Plague and the alleged Planetary Killer Virus it was cracked up to be. It kills more people than the annual influenza, but not significantly more.

The second type of Covid-19, is Covid “The Political Contrivance” or, rather, 

CODENAME: Operation Virus Identification 2019.

This iteration of the Covid phenom relates to the manner in which a modestly-lethal respiratory pathogen has been inflated into a perennial public health crisis in order to implement economic and societal changes that would otherwise be impossible.

This is the political side of Covid, which is much more difficult to define since it relates to the ambiguous agenda of powerful elites who are using the infection to conceal their real intentions. Many critics believe that Covid is a vehicle the World Economic Forum Davos Crowd is using to launch their authoritarian New World Order. Others think it has more to do with Climate Change, that is, rather than build consensus among the world leaders for mandatory carbon reductions, global mandarins have simply imposed lockdowns that sharply reduce economic activity across-the-board. This, in fact, has lowered emissions significantly, but at great cost to most of humanity.

Covid restrictions have triggered a sharp uptick in suicides, clinical depression, child abuse, domestic violence, alcoholism and drug abuse.

The list goes on and on. Also, it has left economies everywhere in a shambles, increasing unemployment and homelessness exponentially, while setting the stage for massive famines in undeveloped countries around the world. Even so, key players in the Covid crisis– like Bill Gates– continue to marvel at impact these onerous restrictions have had on emissions. Take a look at this excerpt from a recent post at the Microsoft founder’s blog:

“You may have seen projections that, because economic activity has slowed down so much, the world will emit fewer greenhouse gases this year than last year. Although these projections are certainly true, their importance for the fight against climate change has been overstated.

Analysts disagree about how much emissions will go down this year, but the International Energy Agency puts the reduction around 8 percent. In real terms, that means we will release the equivalent of around 47 billion tons of carbon, instead of 51 billion.

That’s a meaningful reduction, and we would be in great shape if we could continue that rate of decrease every year. Unfortunately, we can’t.

Consider what it’s taking to achieve this 8 percent reduction. More than 600,000 people have died, and tens of millions are out of work. This April, car traffic was half what it was in April 2019. For months, air traffic virtually came to a halt.

To put it mildly, this is not a situation that anyone would want to continue. And yet we are still on track to emit 92 percent as much carbon as we did last year. What’s remarkable is not how much emissions will go down because of the pandemic, but how little.

In addition, these reductions are being achieved at, literally, the greatest possible cost.

To see why, let’s look at what it costs to avert a single ton of greenhouse gases. This figure—the cost per ton of carbon averted—is a tool that economists use to compare the expense of different carbon-reduction strategies. For example, if you have a technology that costs $1 million, and using it lets you avert the release of 10,000 tons of gas, you’re paying $100 per ton of carbon averted. In reality, $100 per ton would still be pretty expensive. But many economists think this price reflects the true cost of greenhouse gases to society, and it also happens to be a memorable round number that makes a good benchmark for discussions.

Now let’s treat the shutdown caused by COVID-19 as if it were a carbon-reduction strategy. Has closing off major parts of the economy avoided emissions at anything close to $100 per ton?

No. In the United States, according to data from the Rhodium Group, it comes to between $3,200 and $5,400 per ton. In the European Union, it’s roughly the same amount. In other words, the shutdown is reducing emissions at a cost between 32 and 54 times the $100 per ton that economists consider a reasonable price.

If you want to understand the kind of damage that climate change will inflict, look at COVID-19 and spread the pain out over a much longer period of time. The loss of life and economic misery caused by this pandemic are on par with what will happen regularly if we do not eliminate the world’s carbon emissions.” (“COVID-19 is awful. Climate change could be worse“, Gates Notes)

Isn’t it curious that Gates has spent so much time calculating the impact lockdowns have had on carbon emissions? And look at how precise his calculations are. These are not “back of the envelop” type computations, but a serious bit of number-crunching. He even takes the number of people who have died of Covid worldwide (600,000) and painstakingly compares it to the projected “global mortality rates” (“on an annualized basis”) of people who will die from “increases in global temperatures”.

Does it seem to you that Gates might have more than a passing interest in these estimations?? Does it look like he might be more than just a neutral observer impartially perusing the data?

Let me pose a theory here: In my opinion, Gates’ interest in these matters is not merely speculative curiosity. He and his fellow elites are conducting an elaborate science experiment in which we– mere mortals– are the lab rats. They are deliberately using the Covid-scare to conceal their real objective which is to prove beyond a doubt that curtailing emissions by shutting down vast swathes of the global economy will NOT stave off catastrophic climate change.

So, let’s just assume for the sake of argument that I’m right. Let’s assume that other elites read Gates report and agree with its conclusions. Then what?

This is where it gets interesting, because Gates doesn’t really answer that question, but his silence gives him away.

Let me explain: Gates says, “The relatively small decline in emissions this year makes one thing clear: We cannot get to zero emissions simply—or even mostly—by flying and driving less.”

Okay, so we cannot stop climate change by doing what we are doing now.

Then Gates says: “Let science and innovation lead the way….Any comprehensive response to climate change will have to tap into many different disciplines…. we’ll need biology, chemistry, physics, political science, economics, engineering, and other sciences.”

Right again, we’ll follow the science.

Gates then says: “It will take decades to develop and deploy all the clean-energy inventions we need.”

Okay, so we have to move fast to avoid tragedy.

Finally, Gates says:

“Health advocates said for years that a pandemic was virtually inevitable. The world did not do enough to prepare, and now we are trying to make up for lost time. This is a cautionary tale for climate change, and it points us toward a better approach.”

Got that? So, on the one hand, Gates is saying ‘We must act fast and follow the science’, and on the other he is saying, ‘Shutting down the economy alone isn’t going to work.’

WTF? If it’s not going to work, then why bother? Why is Gates sending a mixed message?

Ahh, but there’s the rub. It’s not a mixed message and it is not a contradiction. What Gates is doing is leading the reader to draw the same conclusion that he has, (wink, wink) that is, if reducing economic activity isn’t going to work, then we have to find an entirely different solution, like reducing the size of the population. Isn’t that the only logical conclusion?

Yes, it is. So, the Great Lab Experiment of 2020 (Covid) has alot to do with population control; thinning the herd so our exalted Davos Overlords can ensure their blue-blooded offspring will have mild temps when they winter-over on their private islands in the Caribbean. But population control is just a small part of a much more ambitious plan to restructure the global economy, vaccinate everyone on the planet and dispose of those niggling civil liberties to which Americans have become so attached.

The elitist strategy has been dubbed the “Great Reset” which refers to the World Economic Forum’s Covid Action Platform, a program that aims at restructuring “economic and social foundations” in a way that best suits the interests of “stakeholder” capitalists. Here’s a clip from their press release:

“COVID-19 lockdowns may be gradually easing, but anxiety about the world’s social and economic prospects is only intensifying. There is good reason to worry: a sharp economic downturn has already begun, and we could be facing the worst depression since the 1930s. But, while this outcome is likely, it is not unavoidable.

To achieve a better outcome, the world must act jointly and swiftly to revamp all aspects of our societies and economies, from education to social contracts and working conditions. Every country, from the United States to China, must participate, and every industry, from oil and gas to tech, must be transformed. In short, we need a “Great Reset” of capitalism…

The level of cooperation and ambition this implies is unprecedented. But it is not some impossible dream. In fact, one silver lining of the pandemic is that it has shown how quickly we can make radical changes to our lifestyles. Almost instantly, the crisis forced businesses and individuals to abandon practices long claimed to be essential, from frequent air travel to working in an office….

Clearly, the will to build a better society does exist. We must use it to secure the Great Reset that we so badly need. That will require stronger and more effective governments, though this does not imply an ideological push for bigger ones. And it will demand private-sector engagement every step of the way.” (“The World Economic Forum’s Covid Action Platform“, WEF)

If it sounds like our illustrious leaders want to remake society from the ground-up, it’s because that’s exactly what they have in mind. And they’re not even trying to hide their real intentions. They say quite bluntly: “the world must act jointly and swiftly to revamp all aspects of our societies and economies, from education to social contracts and working conditions.”

That sounds alot like marching orders to me and, indeed, that’s exactly what they are; orders.

But how do they intend to affect these dramatic and revolutionary changes?

Why Covid, of course. They’re going to use Covid to make fundamental changes to the existing system, including accelerating privatization (“stakeholder capitalism”), merging governments into a unified global regime, intensifying the elements of social control (via mass electronic surveillance, intrusive contact tracing, security checkpoints, lockdowns, internal passports, biometric IDs etc) and taking whatever steps are required to introduce a tyrannical Brave New World.

It’s all there in black and white, they’re not even trying to hide it. In their own words, the “Great Reset” depends on the Covid Action Platform, right? In order to “build a better society” we need to “make radical changes to our lifestyles” including reductions in “frequent air travel to working in an office”. So just forget that trip to Italy next year Mr. and Mrs. WorkerBee. Ain’t gonna happen. Bill Gates says, “No.” And get used to working from home, too, because we don’t want your dog-eared Capri spewing carbon into our pristine-blue skies.

The statement also makes clear that the obliteration of millions of jobs and small businesses was not an accidental casualty of the Covid lockdowns, but the planned demolition of business and workers these Mucky-mucks consider ‘non-essential’.

And as far as who will participate in this new blueprint for Capitalist Valhalla? Well, everyone of course. According to the authors: “Every country, from the United States to China, must participate, and every industry, from oil and gas to tech, must be transformed.”

There it is from the horse’s mouth: The glorious Biosecurity Slave State is emerging right before our very eyes and we just thought we were in another Great Depression rounded off with a pandemic.

So, when we talk about Covid the “Political Contrivance”, we’re actually referring to the vehicle that elites have settled on to transition the country from its present condition to a full-blown “lock-down” police state. Covid is the smokescreen that’s being used to conceal the maneuverings of filthy-rich powerbrokers who want to implement their Grand Plan for humanity. So, if everything feels chaotic and upside-down at the present time, don’t be alarmed; it’s all by design. The more muddled and turbulent the world becomes, the easier it is to get people to submit to moronic activities like wearing a diaper on your mouth every time you leave the house or standing 6 feet apart at the grocery store so invisible pathogens don’t climb up your pant-leg and bite you. Psychologists know that –in a topsy-turvy world where uncertainty prevails — people are more apt to follow the directives of affable blockheads, like Tony Fauci, even though they may be abandoning their last-claim to personal freedom in the process.

Looking back to April of 2020, we probably should have anticipated where all this was headed, after all, Mr. NWO himself, Henry Kissinger, announced what to expect in an op-ed he posted in the Wall Street Journal. Here’s what he said:

“The reality is the world will never be the same after the coronavirus. To argue now about the past only makes it harder to do what has to be done…”(NOTE– Is Kissinger clairvoyant? How did he know the “world would never be the same again”?)

“Enlightenment thinkers (argued) that the purpose of the legitimate state is to provide for the fundamental needs of the people… Individuals cannot secure these things on their own. The pandemic has prompted an anachronism, a revival of the walled city in an age when prosperity depends on global trade and movement of people.” (NOTE– In other words: Globalism is good, Nationalism is bad. The same refrain we’ve heard for the last 30 years.)

While the assault on human health (from Covid) will—hopefully—be temporary, the political and economic upheaval it has unleashed could last for generations. (NOTE–Another peek into Henry’s crystal ball, eh?) No country, not even the U.S., can in a purely national effort overcome the virus. Addressing the necessities of the moment must ultimately be coupled with a global collaborative vision and program.” (“The Coronavirus Pandemic Will Forever Alter the World Order”, Wall Street Journal)

As Kissinger clearly states, globalization is still alive and well among the Davos heavyweights who now see a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to put their plan into action. Parts of Australia and New Zealand are already under de-facto martial law while PM Boris Johnson is adding another 2,000 cops in London to enforce his goofy Covid mandates. Everywhere in the western world, freedom is collapsing faster than a corrugated lean-to in a Kansas tornado. Meanwhile in panic-stricken America, fainthearted proles continue to hide behind their sofas waiting for the faux-plague to pass. Do they even see the train-wreck just ahead? Author Gary D. Barnett summed it up like this:

“At this moment in time we are standing on a precipice with the state attempting to push us over the edge. Once over that edge, there will be no coming back. This is why if the people fight back in mass, and withhold all support from the governing demons, we can awaken from this nightmare, and regain normalcy.” (“The State’s Covid Response Is a Cancer for the Freedom of Humanity”, Gary D. Barnett, Lew Rockwell)

Bravo, Mr. Barnett. That says it all.

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Featured image is from TUR

In less than four weeks a nation that loves nostalgia will be entertaining an election not unlike those a century ago. The election on 3 November 2020 will be fundamentally a “white man’s election”, the penumbra of protest notwithstanding.

Donald Trump captured the Republican nomination and the election four years ago by appealing to the populist elements that were opposed to what can actually be called the Bush-Clinton gang in the GOP. With the necessary money and a salesman’s astute sense of how to hawk, he overwhelmed the GOP establishment candidates and placed himself on the wave of those who rightly hated Clinton and certainly had no love for Obama.

Neither Hillary Clinton’s horrid personality nor her legacy could possibly appeal to anyone except party diehards, gravy train parasites and the academic faux gauche, i.e. those who bought the synthetic brand Obama in 2008 and became addicted to the product.

Mr Trump’s unexpected win– although not surprising for those who had a sober view of Clinton– caused considerable upset in the Establishment. As I have noted, but apparently few others have, while Donald Trump is unsurprisingly rich, he is in fact the first POTUS to be elected in at least a century who was not previously a senior civil servant, military officer or professional politician. That of course means that he was not been “trained” how to behave or instructed as to who really makes decisions for the White House. Although the mass media have focussed on his business career and his wealth, they conspicuously ignore the fact that he is also the first person in the White House since 1980 not controlled by the Bush family![1]

Since in the US no one likes to talk about power as it is really exercised and by whom, four years have been spent attacking a mediocre New York real estate gangster for stage performances that were largely spoiled by the crew behind the curtains. Never mind any virtues or defects of Donald Trump’s ostensible program or policies since these are not really important. The most serious problem has been that there was a policy and program adopted prior to his election that Ms Clinton was supposed to represent and failure to elect her meant this policy and program had to be pushed without her– against Mr Trump if necessary.

Donald Trump’s failure to cooperate with those who in fact make policy was manifest in the frequent changes to high office appointments. Since the only power Mr Trump actually has had– not unlike Jimmy Carter– is to appoint and dismiss cabinet officers and some other senior bureaucrats, this is what he did. Although his appointments did not give him more control over the relevant departments, they did cause considerable irritation throughout senior echelons of the federal bureaucracy. The most obvious disruption arises when people whose careers have advanced by following certain superiors in a given structure find that they have a new boss and perhaps even that they are transferred to some part of the organisation less favourable to their future promotion. For outsiders these changes are scarcely noticeable but for career civil servants at the higher management levels such disruption is taken very seriously. The programs that were dependent for their smooth implementation on continuity from the Obama-Clinton management were now subject to administrative delays or even budgetary obstacles. Thus layers of official Washington had reasons to aggravate the obstructions and contribute to the attack on Trump.

As the impeachment proceedings finally demonstrated, the principal objections to Donald Trump were nothing more than his frustration of the Establishment program to which the Bush-Clinton gang was committed. Every effort has been made to show that Donald Trump as POTUS is neither entitled nor competent to exercise executive authority. Nor is he allowed to change Establishment policy (in the form of initiatives under his predecessors). Yet the US Constitution does not name failure to adhere to the policies of a previous administration as a violation of the law or an impeachable offense. None of those who claim that Mr Trump is the “worst ever” POTUS seem to have any recollection of George W Bush, a semi-literate son of the ruling dynasty, re-elected by blatant election fraud with at least one illegal war to his credit, not to mention the demonstrable corruption in office. No matter how mediocre he may be, Donald Trump’s record is snow white compared to that of his predecessors.

Failing impeachment and removal from office, the immediate effects of the 2015 pandemic plan were then turned against Mr Trump in a last ditch attempt to show that he is incompetent, if not the cause of the faux pandemic.[2] Clearly a project, which under Ms Clinton would have been launched earlier (no doubt to profile her “leadership”), was now implemented in the hope that it would foil Donald Trump’s re-election chances. However that was not sticking either.

A serving POTUS rarely has to seek party re-nomination for a second term, the micro-convention held by the Republicans was therefore a formality. For years however the Democratic Party has had to contend with its dissident left wing (in the US sense of the word). Again Bernie Sanders was let into the bullring to take a few stabs at a Trump effigy to keep the restless in their seats until a suitable nominee could be appointed.

The lockdown—apparently supported mainly by Establishment jurisdictions– was bound to create a variety of social tensions. Hence the situation was ripe for some creative counter-insurgency work. It is no secret that police officers, especially but not only in urban forces, perform contract murders– frequently for those who run the drug business in the area. It takes little fantasy to imagine that Mr Floyd was assassinated for propaganda reasons. The rather unusual spread of simultaneous demonstrations following his murder was quicker than even the Ferguson or Charleston killings several years ago could trigger.[3] Moreover careful attention to the locations and the composition of the demonstrations ought to have raised suspicions.

The demonstrations in predominantly white cities like Portland, while forty years ago perhaps sensible venues, were selected for media-effectiveness. White folks demonstrating in cities, where Blacks form an insignificant portion of the population, that “Black lives matter” also makes sense. It is comparable to the US motivation for dropping atomic bombs on cities that had not yet been attacked. These demonstration venues also have advantages: The absence of any other distracting activity made the demonstrations the easy focus of cameras. There were no embarrassing Black neighbourhoods to film and maybe raise questions that did not fit the script. The scope of Black issues could be carefully defined without any real Blacks involved.

One of the tactics of counter-insurgency developed and refined from the Phoenix Program is the creation of armed propaganda teams that appear and behave like the enemy. BLM is such an organisation, as is Antifa. Remarkable about the conduct of these two groups—exhibiting traits of CANVAS coaching– is that they perform a mirror of what whites thought they saw in the 60s.[4] The propaganda team composed the language by borrowing heavily from “white” depictions of the Civil Rights movement protests. The point of the operations was not to mobilize Blacks– on the contrary. The primary aim of the operation is consolidation of white votes for the Democratic Party. Instead of dressing like the Klan to intimidate Blacks, they are costumed like Civil Rights protesters to intimidate Whites who might vote for Trump.

There is another aspect of this campaign that is even more provocative. As the escalation of sexual identity/ gender based politics has overwhelmed nearly all other opposition issues, the classical and wholly unresolved issues of economic justice, the plantation prison system, housing and education, not to mention the militarism that drives US foreign (and domestic policy) have been obscured. If one considers the positions taken by arguably the most radical Black American of his day, Malcolm X, there is nothing in any of his speeches that would justify or promote the conduct under the banners of BLM and Antifa.[5] Ironically– but I believe intentionally– the excited attention given to Black Lives Matter and its allies actually serves to suppress the fundamental issues of white supremacy upon which the US is based and that people like Malcolm X and Martin Luther King consistently raised.

Historically elections have been fought for marginal shifts in the allegiance of white voters. Since the 50s these shifts were occasionally magnified by whether Blacks were able to vote or not. One could say that Black votes became the “swing” constituency in presidential elections. This was always a source of conflict within the historically racist Democratic Party. The mobilisation of Black voters was so contentious that it had even split the party.

Barack Obama conspicuously avoided mentioning King’s name in any of his speeches during the 2008 presidential campaign. Yet his speeches were saturated with subliminals that surely triggered the name in the heads of liberal listeners. (I frequently had to show people the speeches afterwards to prove that he had never said “King”.) This practice continued throughout his two-terms. Surely he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize so quickly to consecrate his election as if he were “Martin Luther King”, without being him. At the same time the “right Black man” was finally given the prize.

Black Lives Matter consortium was invented and funded to promote virtual Black protest with subliminal messages aimed at white voters in the same way the Obama campaign was contrived. In the view of the Establishment, real Black Americans are too offensive to whites and too unreliable politically. Moreover there is a standing policy in the Democratic Party not to mobilize Blacks except under the most controlled conditions. Ideally these are the conditions under which what Black Agenda Report calls the “Misleadership Class” can manipulate them. So what we have in fact is the product of a long-standing practice of the historical Democratic Party, a Black movement without any Blacks. The core of this armed propaganda has modernised the minstrel show in a violent and destructive manner.

These Democratic Party covert operations are designed to smear Donald Trump without staining the Democrats themselves. It is another strategy for capturing the “swing vote” without any obligation to serve the constituency whose ballots it needs. It aims—like in elections a century ago—to stuff the ballots for a Southern racist (Biden) against a carpetbagger (Trump) and, regardless of who wins, leave everything else just as the Establishment wants it.

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Notes

[1] This author contends that essentially from the election of Ronald Reagan in 1980 until 2016, the Bush family has directly or indirectly controlled the White House. GHW Bush exercised this control as vice president for two terms, as POTUS for one. Bill Clinton was essentially co-opted into the Bush gang while governor of Arkansas when the state was being used as a hub for drug running by CIA assets. GW Bush then served two terms and was relieved by Barack Obama, a person with a long and intimate relationship to the US intelligence services with which the Bush family also enjoys a historically strong connection. Hence “bipartisanship” in the US has been based upon domination of both major parties by an alliance of the Bush family and the Clinton couple. However, were the same configuration to be identified in another country, e.g. the Soviet Union/ Russia, the conclusion would be reached immediately that the intelligence agencies or even criminal syndicates have undue control over the executive. For example, it has been commonplace to identify Russian President Vladimir Putin as a former KGB officer. It was very rare that US President GHW Bush was introduced as a former head of the CIA. By treating the entire US system as sui generis there is virtually no analysis of power relationships and structures pertaining to the USA in categories or concepts that permit comparison with other regimes. This is deliberate and not accidental, another aspect of so-called “exceptionalism”.

[2] Although the extent to which prior planning exercises occurred and public statements were made by various prominent individuals suggest that the conditions for the so-called pandemic in 2020 could have been man-made, any culpability remains deniable.

[3] On 9 August 2014, Michael Brown was murdered by a white police officer in Ferguson, Missouri, a town in Greater St. Louis. On 17 July 2015, nine parishioners were murdered in the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, SC, including the senior pastor, by one Dylann Roof.

[4] CANVAS, the Center for Applied Non-Violent Action and Strategies, is the successor organisation to OTPOR, a Serbian consultancy specialised in training for revolutions. It played a major role during the NATO war against Yugoslavia, coaching civilian opposition to the Serbian government. See http://www.canvasopedia.org and The Revolution Business http://www.journeyman.tv/film/5171

[5] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=auWA7hMh5hc Malcolm X delivered a speech at the Oxford Union, 3 December 1964

Featured image is from Sky News

As we approach the one year anniversary of the novel coronavirus outbreak, we find ourselves facing many unanswered questions.

We find ourselves worse off in many ways, in comparison to when the outbreak just began, as we receive signals from public health officials and the media to prepare for another lockdown.

It appears we are approaching what could to be a perfect storm. The US Presidential Elections, flu season, the arrival of the new experimental COVID vaccine and the prophesied ‘second wave’ of COVID.

The big news of the week of course, has been President Trump and the First Lady have both tested positive for COVID. The President has been hospitalized.

President Trump’s doctor, said that Trump’s diagnosis was confirmed using the PCR test. Just like virtually every other ‘confirmed case’ we hear reported.

But was PCR really developed with the intention of diagnosing infectious diseases? Is PCR capable of diagnosing infectious diseases? How could a test developed almost 40 years ago be used to diagnose a brand new disease found less than one year ago?

In this report, we examine this questions in addition to reviewing video clips of multiple doctors weighing in on the subject including the biochemist Kary Mullis who invented PCR and won a Nobel Prize in Chemistry for doing so has to say.

Why is understanding the test so important?

Because it is the driving factor in the fear campaign, that is being driven by the corrupt media and then used by the government to justify the restrictions imposed on our lives.

This is a must see report that may change the perception of you, or of someone you may know, regarding the crisis.

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Featured image: Coronavirus Disease 2019 Graphic. (U.S. Air Force Graphic by Rosario “Charo” Gutierrez)

They say, ‘Timing is everything’.  US President Trump fell ill with COVID-19 simultaneously as Armenian Prime Minister, Nicol Pashinyan, was waiting for a phone reply to his previous request for urgent help from the White House.

On Oct. 1 Pashinyan spoke by phone with Robert O’Brien, Trump’s national security adviser, asking: Why is nothing being done to stop the US ally, Turkey, from using American-made F-16 jets against Armenians in the region of Nagorno-Karabakh?

O’Brien had promised to set up a phone conversation between Pashinyan and Trump, but hope for American help for Armenia vanished just a few hours later when Trump announced that he had tested positive for COVID-19.

Iran as peacemaker

The Foreign Ministry of Iran said Monday it is working on a peace plan to ending the fighting between Armenia and Azerbaijan, both of which share a border with Iran.

Spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh said,

“Iran has prepared a plan with a specific framework containing details after consultations with both sides of the dispute, Azerbaijan and Armenia, as well as regional states and neighbors, and will pursue this plan.”

Since the beginning of the conflict, stray mortars have injured a child and damaged some buildings near the border with Azerbaijan, and Khatibzadeh warned both sides against enlarging the conflict zone onto Iran’s territory.

The current fighting

Fighting erupted on Sept. 27 and has killed dozens on both sides.

The breakaway enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh lies in Azerbaijan, but has been under the control of ethnic Armenian forces backed by Armenia since the end of a separatist war in 1994, and has seen many military flare-ups over the years; however, the current battlefield may erupt into a much bigger regional war, due to President Erdogan of Turkey actively participating in the conflict against the Armenians.

The International Committee of the Red Cross warned of attacks on populated areas which are taking a deadly toll on civilians.

PM Pashinyan calls the conflict a “civilizational front line”, referring to the Armenians who are Christians, and the Azerbaijanis who are Muslims and backed by Erdogan of Turkey, who has morphed his secular modern nation on the doors of Europe, into a new Turkey governed by the Muslim Brotherhood, an internationally banned terrorist group.

The Turkish danger

The former Ottoman Empire of Turkey killed an estimated 1.5 million Armenians by the end of World War I. The US Congress and many countries have declared that slaughter a “genocide.”

Erdogan has said of his support of Azerbaijan in the current conflict, “We must finish the work of our grandfathers,” which Armenians worldwide recognize as the Turkish national preoccupation with oppressing Christians. The Armenians of Kessab were not surprised that in 2014 Turkey was once again in bloody-thirsty pursuit of them.

Turkey is not only providing air support against the Armenians but also recruiting Syrian mercenaries from among the terrorists Turkey supports and protects in the terrorist occupied enclave at Idlib, Syria.  Erdogan is paying three thousand dollars per month to each terrorist he moves from Idlib to Azerbaijan.

The US, EU, and NATO have long objected to the Syrian and Russian campaign against the Al Qaeda terrorists in Idlib, who continue to hold 3 million civilians as human shields in Idlib.

Erdogan has already involved Turkey in fighting proxy wars in Syria, Libya, and now Azerbaijan.  His domestic audience is unable to voice opposition after Erdogan has jailed tens of thousands of activists and intellectuals, and Turkey is considered to be the largest prison for journalists on earth.

The NATO position

NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said recently while in Ankara that the 30-country military alliance is “deeply concerned by the escalation of hostilities,” in Nagorno-Karabakh, and urged Turkey to help end the fighting.

“I expect Turkey to use its considerable influence to calm tensions,” Stoltenberg said after talks with Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu.

History of the conflict

Nagorno-Karabakh was designated an autonomous region within Azerbaijan during the Soviet era, and it claimed independence from Azerbaijan in 1991, just three months before the Soviet Union’s collapse. 30,000 people were killed in a full-scale war in 1992, and by 1994 the war ended with Armenian forces holding Nagorno-Karabakh and substantial areas outside of the borders.

Turkey’s attack on Kessab 2014

At dawn on March 21, 2014, armed terrorists of Jibhat al Nusra, the Al Qaeda affiliate in Syria, and the US-supported Free Syrian Army (FSA) attacked the small village of Kessab, Syria which sits on the Turkish border.  The residents, landowners, and farmers are ethnic Armenians.

Rafi Der Jiboujian, an eye-witness said,

“Turkey opened the border, and the armed groups came into Kassab, shooting and firing missiles at us. One missile from Turkey hit the local police station. We evacuated the area because if we hadn’t left they would have butchered us, cut our heads off.”

US Ambassador Powers lies about Kessab

Representative Adam Schiff (D-CA) questioned the US Ambassador to the UN, Samantha Powers, in front of a Congressional hearing in April 2014 concerning the Kessab attack.  Schiff represents an area in the greater Los Angeles region which is home to a major Armenian American community, many of whom are the leaders of industry in Los Angeles.  Amb. Powers lied directly to Rep. Schiff, the US Congress, and the American people.  She said, “I would note that, unfortunately, the extremist group that appears to have taken hold of that town is not one that the United States and the United Nations overall has a great deal of leverage over. And so, our emphasis now is on supporting the moderate opposition in Syria that is taking on those extremist groups,” and she added, “So, it’s resources, it’s strengthening the moderate opposition which is taking on ISIL – the very group that appears to have taken over that town.”

Amb. Powers was fully aware that it was the US-supported FSA who participated in the attack alongside Jibhat al Nusra and were occupying Kessab when on April 1, 2014, the leader of the US-backed Syrian opposition, Ahmed Jarba, traveled to Kessab to meet with the FSA troops and congratulate them on the attack and occupation of a Christian village in Syria, which resulted in deaths, kidnappings, rapes and the permanent displacement of the majority of residents.

Amb. Powers was fully aware that ISIL was not part of the attack on Kessab, but it was the FSA, the “moderate opposition” that Obama and Sen. John McCain (R, AZ) had supported with billions of the US tax payer’s dollars in weapons, training, and payroll through the CIA office in southern Turkey.  In 2017 President Trump cut the CIA project.

On May 13, 2014, Ahmed Jarba was sitting in the Oval Office at the White House with US President Obama, Susan Rice, and John Kerry, having left the blood stained streets and homes of Kessab to fly to the US.

The Armenian American community

Hundreds of protesters took to the streets of Los Angeles recently, waving Armenian flags and holding up signs that demanded US media pay attention to the armed conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh. Today, the large and historic Armenian community of Fresno, dating back to 1880, are marching through their streets once famous as the Raisin Capital of the World.

Even though the US is home to the largest Armenian community outside of Armenia, the US government in the days of the Obama administration, and now during the Trump presidency, do not view Armenian suffering, death, and destruction as an important issue.  Trump was elected on an isolationist strategy: America first. Trump’s supporters commented that the recent protests in Los Angeles by local members of the Armenian American community, principally in Glendale, were a nuisance to traffic.  Trump’s base advised the Armenians of L.A., who have been American citizens for at least 3 generations, to “go to Armenia and fight!”, signaling they do not support ethnic communities in the US, but rather consider ‘real’ American citizens as a pure-strain, free of attachments to ancestral homes.

Trump administration ‘asleep at the wheel’

Trump has “simply not been paying attention and been completely disengaged,” said Thomas de Waal, a British expert on the region and author of a book on Nagorno-Karabakh, “Black Garden: Armenia and Azerbaijan Through Peace and War.”

If Armenia today is betting that the US will step-in with support, they may lose their bet, if they recall the US position after the attack on the Armenian village of Kessab, in Syria.

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This article was originally published on Mideast Discourse.

Steven Sahiounie is an award-winning journalist. He is a frequent contributor to Global Research.

Featured image is from VOA

The Armed Forces of Azerbaijan supported by Turkey continue their large-scale offensive to capture the contested Nagorno-Karabakh region from Armenian forces. Following the gains of the previous days, when Azerbaijani forces captured the towns of Talish, Jabrayil and Mataghis, they developed momentum in the Jabrayil district capturing the villages of Shikhali Agali, Sari jali, and Mezre, and several other hill tops, according to the country’s president Ilham Aliyev.

Currently, Azerbaijani forces are working to consolidate their gains and conduct artillery and air strikes on positions of the Armenians preparing for a further offensive. So, the Azerbaijani advance slowed down due to weather conditions. The bad weather in the area complicates the usage of combat drones and aviation.

Meanwhile, forces of the Armenian Nagorno-Karabakh Republic announced that they had carried out ‘powerful’ retaliation strikes on territory of Azerbaijan. Armenian sources insist that after the strikes, several hundred thousand residents of different cities of Azerbaijan have been fleeing in panic to Baku. The Armenian military claimed that Azerbaijan paid a heavy price for the recent gains. According to it, Armenian forces inflicted to the ‘enemy’ 3154 casualties and destroyed 368 armoured vehicles, 4 rocket launchers, 124 UAVs, 17 military planes and 14 helicopters. The Armenian side emphasizes that Azerbaijani forces have been extensively bombing civilian targets, including the largest Karabakh city, Stepanakert. Azerbaijan denounces these claims as blatant propaganda.

The ongoing Azerbaijani advance is not only supported by Turkey and involves Turkish military specialists, special forces and military equipment, but also became another case of the employment of Turkish-backed Syrian militants.

On October 5, Russia’s state-run news agency RIA reported citing its own sources that at least 93 Turkish-backed militants had been killed since the start of the war on September 27. The report added that at least 450 more militants were deployed to the combat zone last weekend. This was reportedly the third batch of Syrian militants deployed to the area.

The Turkish-Azerbaijani bloc has been taking an upper hand in the battle against Armenian forces. The decisive role belongs to the air dominance and the numerical superiority of the Azerbaijani side. The only current advantage of Armenian forces is the low quality of Azerbaijani infantry and Turkish-backed Syrian militants involved in the ground advance as well as the low planning and management skills of the ground phase of the Azerbaijani operation.

Azerbaijani infantry and motorized units marching towards fortified positions of Armenians become an easy target for counter-attacks, artillery and missile strikes. This reminds one of the approaches employed by Turkey in Syria and Libya, when Ankara was sending waves of cannon fodder (consisting of members of various militant groups) to capture positions of the ‘enemy’, while Turkish special forces, artillery and air power were doing the main job.

Meanwhile, the Armed Forces of Armenia are not employing all the variety of means and measures that they have to fight back the advancing Azerbaijani military. Despite the loud propaganda about the Armenian key role in resisting to the ‘terror alliance’ of Turkey and Azerbaijan, the Pashinyan government has no political will to recognize the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic and go for a full-scale war to defend Armenian population there.

Thus, the participation of the official Armenian military in supporting forces of the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic (as it remains a de-facto independent state with its own military forces) are limited as of now. This raises reasonable questions regarding the real goals of the Pashinyan government. Experts say that in fact what it aims is to achieve are the goals of his government’s foreign patrons in the Washington establishment thus losing Karabakh and using this as a pretext to break its remaining ties with Russia and push the country towards its integration with NATO.

On October 5, Pashinyan publicly admitted that the situation on the frontline is “complicated” and called on servicemen demobilized a year ago to rejoin the Armed Forces. The prime minister said that he was calling them not to a simple service, but to the battle “between life and death”. Pashinyan also declared that he is confident in Armenian victory.

Nonetheless, the mobilization of reservists showcases that the real situation is much more complicated than everyone wants to admit. Moreover, just fresh troops, without modern weapons, experienced commanders and instructors, will not be able to turn the tide of the conflict. In the worst case scenario, this may just increase casualties on the Armenian side.

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New guidance on immigration laws released Friday by the United States Citizens and Immigration Services (USCIS) makes it almost impossible for members of a Communist or similar party to be granted permanent residence or U.S. citizenship. 

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In a policy alert issued October 2, USCIS announced:

“In general, unless otherwise exempt, any intending immigrant who is a member or affiliate of the Communist Party or any other totalitarian party … domestic or foreign, is inadmissible to the United States.”

The policy amendment, supposedly “part of a broader set of laws passed by Congress to address threats to the safety and security of the United States,” effectively blocks members of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) from ever obtaining permanent residency or citizenship in the United States.

While the alert did not explicitly mention the CCP, which has more than 90 million members—and could impact millions more in Cuba, Vietnam, Laos, and elsewhere—the move adds a new dimension in Washington’s ongoing aggression against the Chinese government and people, and the Left more broadly.

The policy builds on laws dating back to 1918, which classified communists and anarchists as security threats, and to 1950 when the Internal Security Act excluded foreign members of Communist or “totalitarian” parties from becoming naturalized U.S. citizens.

This is far from the first time that the U.S. has weaponized immigration policy for the sake of anti-communism.

And we wonder why the Chinese diaspora is dominated by anti-communist voices ready to serve as mouthpieces for U.S. empire. https://t.co/CavHWRAiZl

— Qiao Collective (@qiaocollective) October 3, 2020

Claiming that any effort to separate the ruling CCP from the Chinese people was doomed to fail, Beijing slammed U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s congratulations to “the people of China” on China’s National Day, October 1. Earlier this year, US policymakers even considered banning entry into the United States for all CCP members, Reuters reported; the move was deemed too risky to follow through. However, like almost all Chinese government officials, most executives of state-owned enterprises and officials at public institutions are members of the CCP.

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Staff in Washington D.C.’s Blair House, where the U.S. president houses his V.I.P. foreign guests, report that they have begun counting towels and robes after visitors depart. Soap and shampoo resupply is also being closely monitored and a metal detector has been installed in the downstairs breakfast room to prevent silverware losses. The heightened security comes in the wake of revelations regarding the all-too-frequent visits by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has been accused of regularly arriving at Blair House with multiple suitcases and bags containing many months’ worth of his dirty laundry, all of which he has washed, dry cleaned and pressed at U.S. taxpayer expense. While most visitors choose to deal with their soiled linen as a private matter, Bibi evidently is quite happy to have his washed for him in Washington.

Apart from the Netanyahu behavior demonstrating his complete contempt for his hosts, the prime minister appears to have an established track record when it comes to questionable behavior. He and his wife Sara have been the targets of several long-running corruption investigations in Israel, some of which remain unresolved. It is the latest in a series of crimes involving Israeli leaders, which have included the rape conviction of former President Moshe Katsav.

But more to the point, it is difficult to avoid the belief that the Jewish state and its hundreds of front organizations operating in the United States are basically both corrupting and impoverishing the United States one bite at a time. My father used to have a typical New Jersey expression describing someone who is obnoxiously persistent in trying to taking advantage of you. He called such behavior “getting pecked to death by a duck.” Lacking a sharp beak, one hardly notices the duck’s endeavors until it kills you. Israel and its proxies are the duck that is bleeding the United States one peck at a time.

There are, of course, the big-ticket items that make the news briefly like the more than $4 billion in annual military assistance that Israel gets, mostly guaranteed for the next ten years. Israel is now seeking $8 billion more on top of that to thank it for making friends with the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain in a politically motivated White House ceremony. Israel enjoys a number of tax breaks, co-production arrangements and trade concessions that almost certainly amount to more than $10 billion annually in a one-way cash flow to America’s “best friend and greatest ally.” The 1985 United States free trade agreement with Israel alone has benefitted the Jewish state by $144 billion, which is the U.S. deficit on the trade between 1985 and 2015.

One might note in passing that Israel is quite capable of defending itself, to include a nuclear arsenal and the means to deliver it, while its Jewish citizens enjoy a European standard of living, to include free public education through college and state provided medical care that is in part funded by American taxpayers.

Ron DeSantis

But it is on the duck pecking level that the penetration and corruption of the United States becomes clearer. It seems that every week one notes a couple of articles here and there that reveal how Israel and its friends wield tremendous power at all government levels and also in the media. One that resonated in the past couple of weeks described how Ron DeSantis, Florida’s governor, has signed a bill authorizing the state’s department of motor vehicles to issue car license plates bearing the legend “Florida Stands With Israel.” The Israeli-American Council (IAC) immediately praised the “heartwarming expression of solidarity” which “affirms the strong bond between the State of Florida’s citizens and the Jewish State of Israel. This kind of warmth is why Florida has always been a leading destination for Israeli-Americans.”

Now, DeSantis is no novice when it comes to the sucking up to Israel game. He has been playing the Israel and anti-Semitism cards throughout his political career. In 2018, as a Congressman running for governor, he attacked his opponent Tallahassee Mayor Andrew Gillum during their gubernatorial race as not being a “friend of Israel.” Earlier, as a Congressman, DeSantis sponsored in 2013 the Palestinian Accountability Act which called for the withholding of U.S. aid to the Palestinian Authority until it recognizes Israel as a Jewish state. In 2017, he co-founded the Congressional Israel Victory Caucus.

When DeSantis ran for governor, he predictably promised to be the most pro-Israel governor in America and that the “first delegation [he] would lead would be to the state of Israel.” He then took his entire cabinet with him as part of a 75-person taxpayer funded delegation on a six-day boondoggle at the end of May 2019, meanwhile boasting that “Today I’m pleased to report that I’m keeping that promise. Our delegation will bring business, academic and political leaders to help strengthen the bond between Florida and Israel.” He held a meeting of his Cabinet in the American Embassy in Jerusalem during his visit, the first time that such a meeting has ever been held by a state government on foreign soil. During the meeting he ostentatiously signed a legislative bill “combating anti-Semitism.”

And now one can buy license plates extolling the parasitic relationship with Israel, surely a unique expression of dual loyalty not exhibited by any other state in the union. The Florida relationship is also a perfect example of how Israel’s friends go about setting up mechanisms that will benefit the Jewish state. Israel will be selling its products and services to Florida, enabled by a government in place that is promoting the process and will steer contracts in its direction. In return, Florida will get little or nothing as Israel is a tiny market and has no particular need of anything that the Sunshine State produces.

All such trade agreements are designed to enrich Israel. Another interesting example of how this works at the state level and the abuse that it can produce has recently surfaced in Virginia, where a so-called Virginia-Israel Advisory Board (VIAB) has actually been funded by the Commonwealth of Virginia taxpayers to promote and even subsidize Israeli business in the state, business that currently runs an estimated $500 million per annum in favor of Israel. Grant Smith of the Institute for Research: Middle Eastern Policy (IRMEP) has done considerable digging into the affairs of VIAB. He has observed how “VIAB is a pilot for how Israel can quietly obtain taxpayer funding and official status for networked entities that advance Israel from within key state governments.”

And then there is Congress, where a bill has been introduced that will enable Israel to block any U.S. arm sales to the Middle East that it does not approve of, a nearly complete surrender of American sovereignty to the Jewish state. And there is also the Congressman Brad Sherman of California story. Brad, who is Jewish, would very much like to replace recently defeated coreligionist congressman Eliot Engel as chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee. The committee, of course, deals with Israeli issues and Engel was widely regarded as one of the Jewish state’s staunchest friends in Congress. So what did Brad do? He approached a number of Jewish groups to help the process along. In a zoom event hosted by the Democratic Majority for Israel (DMFI) he confirmed that “You went to bat for Eliot Engel in a huge way, and demonstrated that you understood how important that chairmanship is… And I won’t compare myself to my good friend Eliot Engel, except to say that when it comes to having one’s heart in the right place, Eliot and I are in the exact same place.” If Brad succeeds, and he probably will, whose interests will he be serving in an important government office? Some might regard such behavior as treasonous.

Also out of California comes the story of some new legislation to combat the scourge of anti-Semitism, much in the media of late together with the shocking news that many Americans are unable to name even a single so-called Nazi death camp or to parrot alleged “facts” about the holocaust. What is described as “holocaust education” is already mandatory in a number of states where studying the American Revolution is apparently optional. Jewish groups have infiltrated boards of education to “advise” on suitable textbooks, which present a positive narrative relating to Israel while also depicting claimed Jewish victimhood. It is now also likely that holocaust education will become mandatory nationwide due to recent congressional passage of the Never Again Education Act.

At the end of August, California Assembly Bill 331 “took a major step toward [California] becoming the first state in the country to mandate completion of an ethnic studies course as a requirement for high school graduation.” Reports of “anxiety and outrage” in the Jewish community over the first draft of the bill had led the members of the 16 member California Legislative Jewish Caucus to quickly move to insert “guardrail” language into the text. The new language will “…prohibit the teaching of any curriculum that promotes bias, bigotry or discrimination, including against Jews or Israelis.”

The issue might seem relatively clear cut, but there was of course a hidden agenda, which was to block any consideration of the plight of the Palestinians or the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement (BDS), which, it was feared, would become part of the curriculum. And the inclusion of “Israelis” as a protected group pretty effectively prohibits any discussion of Israel at all, except, presumably, in positive terms. In California schoolrooms one can criticize the behavior of the United States or Mexico but anything negative about Israel will be forbidden. And California is not alone. Twenty-nine states currently either ban or otherwise punish the promotion of BDS, largely due to the effective lobbying by Israeli partisans at the legislative level in those states.

So everywhere anyone turns, there is Israel, Israel, Israel. So, what’s a little dirty laundry between the “best friends” in the whole wide world? Maybe. But alternatively, it just might be that we Americans are getting pecked to death and all the Trumps and Bidens do is grin and smile while our country is being systematically screwed by a foreign country aided by a domestic lobby that is only in the game to take whatever it can. Wake-up America!

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This article was originally published on The Unz Review.

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 https://councilforthenationalinterest.org, address is P.O. Box 2157, Purcellville VA 20134 and its email is [email protected]. He is a frequent contributor to Global Research.

Featured image is from TUR

At the UN Security Council, the US, UK, France and allies have blocked the testimony of Jose Bustani, the OPCW’s first Director General, on the chemical watchdog’s Syria cover-up scandal. The Grayzone has obtained Bustani’s prepared statement and is publishing it in full.

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Jose Bustani was invited to brief the Security Council on the OPCW’s cover-up of an investigation into an alleged chemical attack in Douma, Syria in April 2018. The US, UK, and France bombed Syria after accusing the Syrian government of dropping toxic gas in Douma. OPCW inspectors later found evidence that undermined the official narrative, but were censored by their superiors under US pressure.

As the OPCW’s first Director General, Bustani experienced first-hand the costs of challenging pro-war narratives. In 2002, he was personally threatened by John Bolton and ousted as OPCW chief after he facilitated inspections that stood in the way of the Bush administration’s drive to invade Iraq.

In his comments, Bustani voices support for the OPCW inspectors and urges the current Director General, Fernando Arias, to let them air their suppressed evidence in a transparent manner.

“At great risk to themselves, [the inspectors] have dared to speak out against possible irregular behaviour in your Organisation, and it is without doubt in your, in the Organisation’s, and in the world’s interest that you hear them out,” Bustani says. “Regardless of whether or not there is substance to the concerns raised about the OPCW’s behaviour in the Douma investigation, hearing what your own inspectors have to say would be an important first step in mending the Organisation’s damaged reputation. The dissenting inspectors are not claiming to be right, but they do want to be given a fair hearing.”

Full transcript below.

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On September 28, 2020, Meng Wanzhou, Chief Financial Officer of Huawei Technologies and permanent resident of Canada, was forced to make yet another appearance in court in Vancouver where she faces possible extradition to the USA. The charges she faces if extradited to the USA, according to the “superseding indictment” of January 24, 2019, includes seven counts of bank fraud, wire fraud, conspiracy to commit both, plus conspiracy to defraud the USA, all of which if proven carry possible sentences of more than one hundred years in a US federal penitentiary, plus heavy fines.

To date, Ms. Meng has been under house arrest in Vancouver for twenty-two months.

This judicial action against Meng is unjust, politically motivated by the USA, and contrary to the national interests of Canada. In fact, Meng’s arrest is being cynically used by the Trump Administration to drag Canada into a trade war and a new cold war with China. Canadians should be very concerned and should demand that the Trudeau Government of Canada drop the extradition proceedings against Meng and release her at once.

Trudeau’s Hypocritical Stance on Sanctions on Iran

Meng’s arrest was unjust because she committed no crime in Canada. Rather, her company stands accused by the USA of violating the country’s unilateral, and therefore illegal, economic sanctions against Iran. As the whole world knows, in 2018, it was the Trump Administration which abrogated the JCPOA (the Iran Nuclear Agreement). The Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action was several years in the making before becoming enshrined in 2015 as an international treaty in UN Security Council Resolution 2231. The Trudeau Government applauded the Agreement when it came into effect in 2016.

The importance of the ten-year Agreement was that it likely averted a pre-emptive military strike by the USA (supported by Israel) against Iran, while, at the same time, it provided the means by which to remove a regime of economic sanctions which had been imposed by the UN Security Council against the Islamic Republic over several decades. For its part, Iran pledged not to enrich uranium above the level of 5% and to submit to the most stringent inspections ever devised by the IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency). In this way, Iran’s partners in the agreement, which included the permanent five member states of the UN Security Council (Russia, China, the USA, the UK, and France) plus Germany, were satisfied that Iran’s nuclear program would remain strictly peaceful (as Iran had always maintained) and that it could not manufacture a nuclear weapon.

As a reward from the P5 + 1, the doors of international trade were to have been opened to the Islamic Republic of Iran, which had been progressively closed since the Islamic Revolution of 1979, and monies belonging to the Iranian government, which had been frozen in Western banks, would be returned to Tehran.

Donald Trump made it clear as early as the 2016 US election campaign that he did not like the JCPOA and thought he could wring more concessions out of Iran, particularly regarding disarming Iran’s conventional missile program. Following the presidential election, the Trump Administration failed to follow through on removing some of the US’s coercive economic measures against Iran, although the IAEA certified time after time that Iran was in compliance of its commitments under the JCPOA.

Finally, on May 8, 2018, Trump abrogated the treaty and announced that the USA would restore some of its previous economic sanctions and even impose further sanctions on Iran in what has today become a campaign of “maximum pressure” on the Islamic Republic.

Although the USA walked away from the Iran Nuclear Agreement, the remaining members of the P5 + 1 declared their profound disappointment and their determination that they would remain within the treaty. The European Union went so far as to create a financial instrument and a financial institution which it hoped would enable corporations resident in the EU to trade with Iran without facing penalties from the USA.

For its part, the Trudeau Government also expressed its regret about the US abrogation of the JCPOA and the hope that the agreement would carry on.

The problem for the USA is that reneging on international agreements (including several strategic arms limitation deals with Russia), walking away from membership in multilateral organizations such as the World Health Organization, and applying unilateral sanctions on Iran without the approval of the UNSC – and even increasing them during the Covid-19 pandemic – was simply not palatable to most countries of the world who were growing more and more alarmed about the untrustworthiness of the USA.

The problem for the rest of the world, however, is that the US regards itself as an exceptional state that is not subject to the rules of international law and routinely tries to apply the principle of extraterritoriality. For example, the USA has taken to court several European banks such as Deutsche Bank, the largest bank in Germany, and BNP Paribas of France, as well as corporations like the Chinese ZTE, all of which tried to skirt the US sanctions on Iran. The fines levied against them by the USA were enormous, thus making examples of them in front of the whole world. As a result, despite the EU’s specially-created financial instrument and financial institution to get around US sanctions on Iran, no European-based transnational corporations or banks are currently willing to break the de facto US blockade on the Islamic Republic.

The result for the people of Iran is severe: life savings vanish as the value of the national currency plummets, prices of basic commodities are rising dramatically, there’s widespread unemployment due to the lack of spare parts and markets, and medical supplies are scarce, despite supposedly being exempt from economic sanctions but which require international monetary transfers to arrange.

In effect, US sanctions are part of a hybrid war on the people of Iran and 38 other countries of the world that also includes conventional military/naval strikes, support for terrorist groups, cyberwarfare, fake news, lawfare, and foreign electoral intervention. The end goal in implementing coercive economic measures for the US (and Canada), then, – like medieval sieges – is regime change.

The US attempt to extradite Meng Wanzhou, however, is qualitatively different in that it marks the first time the USA has ever tried to extradite an executive of a corporation, rather than just fine the corporation which was seen by the USA to defy its unilateral and illegal economic sanctions on Iran.

The US indictment/arrest warrant against Meng was approved by a court in New York State on Aug 22, 2018, and the US tried unsuccessfully following that date to pressure many countries through which Meng travelled to arrest her. Every single country refused until Meng arrived in Vancouver on December 1, 2018 and Trudeau slavishly and hypocritically acceded to the allegedly “urgent” US extradition request, despite the fact that his government continues to support the JCPOA. The “urgent request” from the US came on November 30, 2018, exactly one day before a US delegation, led by President Trump, met for a working dinner about trade matters with a Chinese delegation, led by President Xi, on the sidelines of a G20 summit in Buenos Aires, Argentina, on December 1.

Timing of Meng’s Arrest

The timing of the arrest of Meng and the working dinner was not likely a coincidence. According to official US sources, Trump was unaware of the arrest. However, according to former US Secretary of State John Bolton’s book, The Room Where it Happened: A White House Memoir, claims he knew of Meng’s arrest before he sat down to that dinner. In any case, the two delegations left the meeting with a ceasefire in the US trade war on China.

Developments following the arrest of Meng confirm that her arrest was indeed politically motivated. On December 6, 2018, President Trump declared he might release Meng if he secured a favourable trade deal with China. He also told John Bolton that Meng was “a bargaining chip” in his negotiations in his trade war with China. In fact, in The Room Where it Happened, Bolton reveals that Trump privately gave Meng Wanzhou the nickname, “The Ivanka Trump of China”, a moniker illustrating that Trump understood he was asking Canada to take a high-value hostage in the person of Meng Wanzhou to be leveraged against the People’s Republic to get a trade deal favourable to the USA.

In addition, there is the underhanded attempt by the Five Eyes, which links five English-speaking remnants of the British Empire, namely the UK, the USA, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand, in a formal security and intelligence network, to exclude Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd., which is the crown jewel of the Chinese technology industry, from participation in the deployment of 5G internet networks in all of the Five Eyes countries. This underhanded attempt was clearly demonstrated in US Sentators and Select Intelligence Committee members Rubio and Wagner’s letter of October 11, 2018, written just six weeks before Meng’s arrest, advising Prime Minister Trudeau to exclude Huawei Technologies from the deployment of 5G technology in Canada:

“…Given the strong statements by former Canadian national security officials as well as similar concerns out of the US, Australia, and the United Kingdom, we hope that you will reconsider Huawei’s inclusion in any aspect of Canada’s 5G development, introduction, and maintenance. Should you have any questions about the threat that Chinese state-directed telecommunications firms pose to your networks, we urge your government to seek additional information from the US. Intelligence Community.”

The senators alleged that involving Huawei in Canada’s 5G network would compromise the security of the network and undercut the profitability of domestic US and Canadian tech firms. The fact that the senators furnished no proof that Huawei technology would provide spyware for China and Huawei firmly denies that proposition. And, on the other hand, since at least 2018, the US government has been pressuring its high tech firms routinely to build back doors for US intelligence agencies to access to their encrypted devices.

The arrest and extradition proceeding against Meng Wanzhou have contributed to a major deterioration in Canada-China relations. At various times following Meng’s arrest, China, which is Canada’s second-largest trading partner after the USA, banned importation of Canadian canola, pork, and lobsters. This has severely affected the livelihoods of thousands of Canadian farmers and fishers who depend on the export of these products to China. 30 per cent of Canadian exports go to China, but Canadian exports only account for less than 2% of China’s imports. So the potential of even more harm is possible. In addition, the promising Chinese-Canadian collaboration on a COVID-19 vaccine collapsed.

Canada and its people paid dearly so far and gained nothing from Trudeau’s slavish acceptance of Trump’s request to arrest and extradite Meng to the USA. Moreover, given the Trudeau government’s stated aim to diversify its trading partnership, if is counter-productive for Canada to pick a fight with its second largest trading partner. In what should have been the straw that broke the camel’s back, Trudeau failed to release Meng after Trump levelled a new 10% tariff on Canadian aluminum on August 6, 2020, despite the signing of the USMCA free trade deal this year. The tariff was removed a month later.

It’s also important to note that Huawei Technologies Canada employs 1300 very highly-paid workers in Canada and is very heavily invested in contributing its advanced, made-in-Canada, R&D expertise to Canada’s 5G network. In fact, Huawei recently moved its entire US R&D division en masse from Silicon Valley, California, to Markham, Ontario, due to deteriorating relations between the USA and China. All of these Canadian jobs, plus the several Huawei research and development centres at several locations across Canada, are threatened by deteriorating relations between Canada and China.

On June 23, 2020, nineteen former highly-ranking Canadian politicians and diplomats, including a former minister of justice, penned an open letter to Trudeau noting that, in the “Greenspan Opinion”, a leading Canadian lawyer had delivered an opinion that it was entirely within the rule of law for the minister of immigration unilaterally to end the extradition proceedings against Meng. They noted the harm being done to Canada by the continuing prosecution of Meng as well as the arrest and prosecution in China of the “Two Michaels” (Michael Spavor and Michael Kovrig). The nineteen signatories ended their open letter with a call for Meng’s release. However, the Trudeau government has not yet acceded to their recommendation at the time of this writing.

The Cross-Canada Campaign to Free Meng Wanzhou

Understanding that the Trump Administration is trying to draw the Trudeau government into its campaign to vilify China, to disrupt international cooperation, free trade, and multilateralism, all of which is rapidly leading to a new cold war and possibly to actual military hostilities; and recognizing now that it’s entirely within the discretion of Immigration Minister Medicino and in accordance with the rule of law for him to end extradition proceedings against Meng, the Hamilton Coalition To Stop The War announced on September 29, 2020 the start of a comprehensive, grass-roots, public campaign to free Meng, stating that it would like to see a positive reset of Canada-China relations.

In its statement, the Coalition made three demands of the Government of Canada:

1) cease extradition proceedings against Meng and release her immediately;

2) protect Canadian jobs by permitting Huawei Technologies Canada to participate in the Canadian deployment of a 5G internet network;

3) initiate a long-overdue foreign policy review to develop an independent foreign policy for Canada.

In the past week, the Coalition also launched a parliamentary petition to free Meng Wanzhou under the sponsorship of MP Niki Ashton of the New Democratic Party. According to the rules of the House of Commons, if the petition garners at least 500 signatures in 120 days, Ashton will formally introduce the petition in the House, forcing the Trudeau Government formally to respond.

To date, Parliamentary Petition e-2857 has garnered 280 signatures from Canadians and permanent residents of Canada, with 115 days to go.

According to the Hamilton Coalition To Stop The War, the campaign will also include virtual public meetings, virtual visits to MP’s office, letters to editors and op-ed pieces, and hopefully a Cross-Canada Day of Action on December 1, 2020, the second anniversary of Meng’s arrest.

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This article was originally published on The Canada Files.

People who interested in supporting this campaign are urged to contact the writer at [email protected].

Ken Stone is a long-time antiwar, environmental, social justice, labour, and anti-racism activist. He is currently Treasurer of the Hamilton Coalition To Stop The War.

Featured image is from TCF

The old idiom says, “possession is nine-tenths of the law”, but in the case of the dispossessed Palestinians, occupation represents one hundred per cent of the law after their land was usurped due to Israel’s creation some 82 years ago. Other Arab territories have been annexed in a succession of wars that followed too.

Justice is further away than ever with the UAE and Bahrain formally becoming the latest Arab countries to sell out their Palestinian brethren by normalising relations with Israel, despite Israel’s continued illegal military occupation of Palestinian land and the expansions of illegal settlements and destruction of Palestinian homes.

Both Arab dictators proceeded to formally sign agreements to normalise relations with Israel at a ceremony hosted by President, Donald Trump, the most pro-Israel US leader since Harry Truman who presided over the recognition of Israel in 1948.

Trump has torn up so many international conventions and norms by moving the US embassy to Jerusalem, despite its special status, as well as handing over Syria’s Golan Heights that have been illegally occupied by Israel for over half a century.

The move by the UAE and Bahrain to the Israeli camp is also a shift to realign the Middle East against Iran, described by Benjamin Netanyahu as Tel Aviv’s biggest enemy. Tehran was one of just a few countries to publicly condemn the normalisation of relations, describing it as “shameful” and a “humiliating act.”

Trump has tried to turn the rest of the world against Iran by trying to destroy the landmark nuclear deal by unilaterally withdrawing. According to Middle East Eye Editor, David Hearst, the new alliance in the Middle East could also be targeted against Turkey’s influence in the region.

The deal was brokered by Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner and former British PM, Tony Blair, who called the deal “a massive and welcome opportunity to recast the politics of the region.”

The former envoy to the Middle East Quartet has spent much of his forced retirement time trying to encourage Arab countries to build cooperation with Israel based on a “shared outlook.”

He is credited with turning the accepted formula of “peace with the Palestinians before normalisation” on its head by effectively relegating their legitimate aspirations for a viable state to the back of the queue.

Perplexingly, apart from dangling the prospects of more US military sales, the UAE is reported to have received a pledge from Netanyahu that Israel will temporarily suspend its plans to annex parts of the occupied West Bank, not to carry out the usurpation of territories already illegally seized for decades.

The new alliances are a further trampling of Palestinian rights by Israel’s incessant illicit encroachments. The theft of their land is a legacy of British colonialism and placing a special responsibility on the UK to put right before might.

The latest Arab alliance, which some suspect comes ahead of Saudi Arabia following suit, is a sad day, not just a more betrayal and as such sets a precedent that there is little sense of justice left in the world.

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Trump Needs Accomplices at Every Level of Government to Pull Off a Coup

By Prof. Marjorie Cohn, October 06 2020

The Trump campaign is mobilizing “an army for Trump,” calling on “all able-bodied men and women to stop the election from being stolen by Democrats.” Although it’s unclear just what this army is being recruited to do, a coalition of progressive organizations has mobilized more than 6,000 “election defenders.”

Julian Assange’s Extradition Hearing: The Only Just Outcome Is His Freedom

By Margaret Flowers, October 06 2020

Under conditions that violated Assange’s rights and his ability to defend himself, his legal team made a clear case that for multiple reasons the only just solution is to free Assange. However, Judge Baraitser has not ruled favorably for him in her past decisions or even in this hearing.

Medical Doctor Warns that “Bacterial Pneumonias Are on the Rise” from Mask Wearing

By John C. A. Manley, October 06 2020

“A group is suing Tulsa Mayor G.T. Bynum and Tulsa Health Department Executive Director Bruce Dart, saying the city’s mask mandate is harmful to healthy people,” reports Activist Post. The group includes business owners and two doctors.

Billionaires’ Media: The Smearing of Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

By Joyce Nelson, October 06 2020

Israel Lobby Will Face Blowback, Eventually

By Yves Engler, October 06 2020

The ruthlessness of the Israel lobby is remarkable. Recently they’ve convinced Zoom to cancel a university sponsored talk, a prominent law program to rescind a job offer, a public broadcaster to apologize for using the word Palestine and companies to stop delivering for a restaurant.

Towards a New Gold Standard? Or a Currency War with China?

By Peter Koenig, October 06 2020

Rumors have it that the remaining months of 2020 may bring explosive changes in the world’s financial system. But such “doomsday” rumors have been floating around during the last few years. Why? – The US dollar is getting weaker and weaker.

“Material Ecology”: Neri Oxman at the New York Museum of Modern Art

By Prof. Sam Ben-Meir, October 06 2020

As Oxman observes, “The group considers all living creatures as equals.” The aim is “to shift human-centric design to a design culture focused on conserving, improving and augmenting the natural environment through novel technological developments.”

Cuba: A Model for Healthcare Reform from a Surprising Place

By Keith Preston, October 06 2020

Cuba is widely regarded by Americans as an impoverished “Third World” nation. Yet, Fitz’s Cuban Health Care: The Ongoing Revolution describes how Cuba’s approach to healthcare during the six decades since the 1959 revolution has produced rather extraordinary results.

Japan’s Economy of the Post-Abe Era. Powerless Fiscal and Monetary Policy

By Prof. Joseph H. Chung, October 06 2020

The huge negative impact of the corona-virus crisis on the Japanese economy is difficult to estimate at this moment. However, it could hurt severely the economy which had barely survived the decades-long stagflation. Thus, Suga is facing very challenging task of saving the economy he has inherited.

John Lennon at 80: One Man Against the Deep State ‘Monster’

By John W. Whitehead, October 06 2020

President Bashar al-Assad gave an interview to the Russian Zvezda TV Station, following is the full text.

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Journalist: Mr. President, thank you very much for giving us this opportunity and meeting with us. We are here in Syria on the fifth anniversary of the start of Russian military operations on the territories of your country, the operation which aimed at liberating Syria from terrorism. That’s why we want to discuss with you and sum up the outcomes of these events.

President Assad: You are welcome in Syria. It’s my pleasure to meet you today and to give this interview to your respectable TV station.

Question 1: Mr. President, if we look back at the events which happened five years ago, how do you describe the situation which existed in Syria in 2015? Did you hope to get outside help then?

President Assad: In order to sum up the position at that time, I can say that it was very dangerous.  The terrorists were advancing in different regions of Syria and occupying cities, with direct support from the United States, France, the UK, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia; in addition to the indirect support from other Western countries.

This dangerous situation in Syria was the subject of discussions between us and the Russian military and political leadership, particularly after 2014 when ISIS started operating and occupying large areas in the Syrian steppe.  We were hoping, of course, to receive help for a number of reasons.  First, the political position of Syria is important, and consequently any disturbance in this region will spread throughout the Middle East and also affect other regions.  The struggle for Syria dates back to prehistoric times because of its importance, this is nothing new.  The other reason is that the terrorism, which Syria is fighting, is the same terrorism which kidnapped the children of the Beslan school in 2004, and it is the same terrorism which attacked the Moscow theater and killed innocent people.  This is a global terrorism and therefore it is in Russia’s interest, first to strike at this terrorism in Syria, and second to preserve this stability which might affect other countries’ interests, including Russia’s own.

Question 2:  If we compare the situation that existed five years ago with the situation now, what is your assessment of what Russia is doing, the role of the Ministry of Defense, and what the Russian troops are doing, operating here for the past five years on the frontline in the war on terrorism?

President Assad:  There is no doubt that the Russian Army is highly advanced technically, this has been proven and has become evident during the war.  It is also highly professional, in terms of identifying its goals accurately and proceeding with determination to achieve them.  With regards to the Russian military personnel that we have engaged with at all levels from officers to soldiers, they have worked incessantly; for example, when the battles were fierce, Russian pilots would start their air raids at three in the morning, before sunrise, and would sometimes continue late into the night.  They had no time to rest.  The Russian Army has of course made sacrifices, some of its members have been martyred on Syrian territory.

The Russian Ministry of Defense – which is the umbrella under which these fighters operate – in its military and political capacity, has shown a great degree of credibility.  It would have been difficult to carry out these joint military operations between our two armies, had it not been for the credibility of the Russian Defense Ministry which was made evident by their transparency, clarity and integrity in everything that we agreed and implemented together during the past five years.  This sums up the impressions of many Syrian military personnel in their relations with their Russian counterparts.  I would like to add a final point: The Russian people have always been proud of their army, but after all these battles, they have every right to be even prouder of its great achievements.

Question 3:  Thank you very much for these words. Let’s go back to the cooperation between the Russian and the Syrian armies. Since we have talked about this, the Syrian Army has also changed a lot during the past five years. What are the areas of expertise which the Syrian experts, the Syrian military, have acquired through their interaction with the Russian military and the Russian Defense Ministry?

President Assad:  There is no doubt that the Russian Army possesses a wide range of expertise.  This dates back to the Great Patriotic War during which it acquired military expertise in a conventional war, in addition to the expertise it acquired during the Chechen War.  That was an unconventional war and similar to the one we are fighting today, in the sense that it was supported by foreign powers in order to weaken Russia and perhaps even with the objective of dividing it.  It involved terrorist groups which appeared in different forms as sleeper cells; everything in the Chechen War was unconventional.

We also have a lot of experience, albeit different.  Our experience in fighting terrorism dates back to the second half of the 1970s and continued into the early 1980s; it was also a fight against extremist terrorist groups.  However, the war we are currently fighting is similar to the Chechen War in that it is unconventional and they are being supported by foreign powers; they are less than an army but more than sleeper cells.

Therefore, merging the Russian and Syrian expertise in dealing with terrorism was undoubtedly very important, especially since during this time (past five years), the terrorists have developed their techniques in ways which are outside of our expertise.  This means that there are lessons for both armies to learn from in dealing with terrorism.  It is safe to say that militarily it was a very rich experience; and since terrorism has not ceased, there are always new lessons to learn, especially since no battle is the same.  No doubt that bringing together the vast experience and expertise of both the Syrian and Russian Armies proved to be very useful, especially for us in Syria.

Question 4: You know that in the end there are similarities between our two countries in many ways. Syria has for many centuries been at the crossroads of the interests of different countries, or let’s say different powers. Russia, too, throughout its history, has fought many wars. But we have never started a war. The enemy has always come to us. Since you have touched on this subject, our country celebrates this year the 75th anniversary of victory in the Great Patriotic War. In that war, which had a horrible impact on the Russian people, the turning point was the battle for Stalingrad, after which the offensive started westward. We were able to expel (excuse me for the expression) the fascists from our country. Can we compare that to what happened to the Syrian people, I mean the battle for liberating Aleppo, which is often described as the Syrian Stalingrad. What is the impact of liberating Aleppo on the process of liberating Syria from terrorism?

Image on the right: Russian military inspect suspected chemical weapons workshop in Aleppo, November 14, 2016 © / Ruptly

President Assad: You are asking about a very important juncture in the Syrian war – the battle for Aleppo.  The comparison you are making is familiar to Syrians because Aleppo was besieged for more than two years.  During most of that time it was a complete siege, and so if it was possible to bring in foodstuffs or basic necessities, it was done at a high risk through corridors that were constantly under terrorist fire with no certainty of delivery.  There was no electricity, no water, no basic supplies; nevertheless, the people of Aleppo were steadfast throughout the battle.

So, I believe that the importance of the comparison lies first in the siege and also in the steadfastness of the people.  When you referred to Stalingrad, you highlighted the steadfastness of the people before you mentioned the military victory; in other words, without the steadfastness of the people of Stalingrad, the Russian army wouldn’t have been able to launch a great offensive.  The same also applies to Syria; without the steadfastness of the people of Aleppo, it wouldn’t have been possible for the Syrian Army to prepare for such a major battle.

Coincidentally, a further comparison is that in Stalingrad, the army kept moving west until the end of World War II.  In Aleppo too, the army moved west; and to continue the process of liberation towards Idleb, we must also continue to move westward.

Both Aleppo and Damascus are the two largest Syrian cities, and so Aleppo has a political, economic, and military importance.  There is no doubt that in terms of strategic outcomes, the battle of Aleppo was very important, regardless of the surface area or the number of fighters.  Its outcome was decisive and changed the course of the war in Syria; and therefore, I believe that militarily and politically, the situation after the battle of Aleppo, was very different to that before the battle.  So, the comparison you have made is correct, after taking into account of course the difference in surface areas between the two countries.

Question 5: This battle had great dimensions for Syria, and also incurred huge losses. It played an essential role in changing the course of events. Mr. President, based on the agreement which was signed between Russia and Syria in your country, today there are two Russian military bases, Hmeimim and Tartous. In your opinion, what is the role that these two bases will play in providing security in Syria today? And what is the role that they will play in the future?

President Assad:  The Russian military role in Syria –particularly the role of military bases – can be viewed from two perspectives; the first is fighting terrorism, which we call international terrorism.  This will end one day or at least it will be weakened as a result of the continuing battles to eliminate it; so, what comes after this terrorism? The other perspective is related to the role of Russia in the world. Today, we live in an international jungle; we do not live under international law.  The reason why we live in this jungle is that for a quarter of a century there has been no international balance.  International balance requires a Russian role: politically – in international organizations, and militarily – through military bases.

How do we benefit from this situation?  Syria, as a small country and like many small countries, and possibly even most countries around the world, will all benefit from this international balance.  In that sense, Syria will benefit indirectly from this new balance.

Therefore, we shouldn’t have a narrow view of the Russian presence to only fighting terrorism, because the time frame of the base, or the agreement, is 45 years.  Terrorism will not continue to exist for 45 years, so what comes after terrorism?  There is an important Russian role necessary for international balance in which military presence in different parts of the world plays an essential part.  Of course, when the West abandons the use of military force to create problems around the world, Russia might not need these bases, but for now, Russia and the world need the balance that I have mentioned.

Question 6: Mr. President, let’s talk about those who constantly violate and ignore international law, and you know who I’m talking about. You are the elected President of the Syrian Arab Republic. You led the war on terrorism. The law is on your side, and the people are behind you; nevertheless, we constantly hear some Western leaders making bad statements such as: “Assad must leave.” We remember very well how Barack Obama talked about this. Unfortunately, the same is being repeated now by Donald Trump. Recently, a book was published in the United States, Fear: Trump in the White House, by famous American journalist Bob Woodward, in which he states that in 2017, after the missile attack on Syria, Trump wanted to assassinate you, and I quote: “Let’s kill him! Let’s go in. Let’s kill the lot of them.” How do you comment on that? What did you do? Why do they demonize you?

President Assad:  First of all, regarding the statements which always call for the removal of the president: The United States is used to having presidents – let’s say, as American agents, in the sense that it appoints them – and consequently it tells them: now you stay.  And when their role comes to an end, it tells them: go.  They are used to that.  I am not one of those (presidents), and consequently all the statements they make do not concern us at all.  They do not bother us, and we do not care about them.  This is an American discourse directed at the Americans themselves.

Question 7: Aren’t you vexed by the West’s disregard for its relationship with you, which can sometimes be rude?

President Assad: No, no, because it is less important than warranting one’s concern about it and I’ll tell you why.  If we look at Trump’s recent statements quoted in the book you mentioned, they are neither surprising nor new.  The American policy since the Cold War, and even since the end of World War II up until today, is a policy of hegemony, of coup d’états, of assassinations and wars.  So, this is normal, Trump hasn’t said anything new.

On the contrary, we have to recognize that Trump has an important merit, which is exposing the American regime.  For us, it was already exposed, but it was hiding behind some pretty masks – like democracy, human rights, and other similar things.  Trump is frank.  He says, “this is what we do.”  So even if Trump doesn’t say it, we must know that it is part of their policy and part of their thinking.  The United States does not accept partners in the world, and consequently does not accept independent states, including in the West.  The West is a satellite of the United States, not its partner.  They are not independent.  The Americans do not accept an independent individual or an independent state.  They do not even accept Russia, which is a superpower, to be independent.  They do not accept you even in history; they even deny your role in eliminating Nazism, as if Russia had no role in that.

So, if they haven’t accepted Russia in the past, why would they accept it in the present?  And if they haven’t accepted the large Russian state as independent, would they accept Syria, a smaller country, as an independent state?  This is the problem with the Americans: they do not accept any individual who acts in the best interest of his country, any individual who respects himself, or maintains an independent national decision.

Question 8: Yes, this is another similarity between our two countries. Well, can we talk about the process of granting amnesty to members of the armed groups. How is the process of reconciliation between the opponents going? In July, parliamentary elections were held in which the ruling coalition won. We congratulate you on that, but it is clear that the problem of the opposition is still there.

I still remember when the Geneva talks were conducted, representatives of the government and the opposition were brought into the meeting halls from different doors, so that they do not fight among themselves. How is this process going now? What is new about the constitutional committee? What is the role of the international mediators in this process? The role of the United Nations? What is the role of Russia? And whom do you personally trust in this process?

President Assad: Concerning the negotiations, Russia and Iran play an important role in supporting these negotiations and moving them forward in order to try and achieve something, albeit partially – because the negotiations will take a long time.  But let’s be frank.  When we talk about another party which we call “the opposition” – and you have opposition in your country – a prerequisite of the opposition is that it should be patriotic, and it should come from within the Russian people and represent at least part of them.  However, when you, as a Russian citizen, know that this opposition, or this individual, is linked to a foreign intelligence agency, you do not call them opposition, because opposition is linked to patriotism.

With regards to what is happening in the negotiations, there is a party supported by the Syrian government because it represents its views.  However, there is another party which has been chosen by Turkey, which is not a Syrian party.  Turkey, and those countries behind it, like the United States and others, have no interest in reaching any genuine results in the deliberations of the committee.  They are seeking to weaken and dismantle the state; this is exactly what has happened in other regions where the United States interferes and imposes a constitution that leads to unrest and chaos instead of stability.

This is something we do not accept and we will not negotiate over things which undermine Syria’s stability.  That’s why if we really want the negotiations to produce results, all those individuals need to take their cue from what the Syrian people, in their different sections and political affiliations, want.  I believe that the coming rounds of negotiations will show this more clearly.  If the dialogue is Syrian-Syrian, it will succeed.  But as long as there is foreign interference, the negotiations cannot succeed.

Question 9: If you don’t mind, I would like to ask you a number of personal questions which have to do with the past in one way or another. Can you please tell us if you have thought, throughout all the horrible events that you and your country have experienced throughout the war, that you are hanging between life and death? Have you thought about that at any point in time?

President Assad:  If you had come to Damascus before 2018, for instance, we would have been sitting here with shells falling around us from time to time.  Death was a probability for any citizen, anyone walking in the street or riding a bus, in their car, going to work or going anywhere.  They could have been hit by shells that could have caused death or injury.  That was a probability during the war.  But I think that humans, by nature, are capable of adapting to this situation, in any country or any place in the world.  That’s why life carried on in Damascus, and I personally went to work every day, never stopped at any time, even under the shelling.  There was no other choice.  One cannot hide; otherwise the terrorists would have achieved their objectives.  Our strength is that life continued.  That’s why I think that with the passing of time, you stop thinking about it.  Maybe, it becomes part of your subconscious mind, but not part of your daily thinking; it becomes something you get used to.

Question 10: Looking at your life today, as president of a state leading the fight against terrorism, is that the life you dreamt of at a certain point in time when you had a different type of life?

President Assad:  This terrorism we are experiencing today has been attacking us since the 1950s.  At every stage, it developed its techniques.  In the 1950s it created chaos but it wasn’t armed, in the 1960s it started to become armed.  In the 1970s and 80s it became organized, and today this same terrorism has developed its tactics and gained political support, with backing from countries and banks.

Our fate with terrorism has existed even before I, and most Syrians, were born and therefore it should always remain in our minds.  Even if we defeat this terrorism, we should always think that it could come back.  For the simple reason that first and foremost, it is not about individuals in as much as it is about ideology; as long as the West continues to take reference from its colonial past and continues to think of hegemony, it is inevitable that it will continue to bring this terrorism back to life in other forms.  We must think realistically that even if it was eliminated, it could appear later in different forms.  That’s why the battle for us, is against terrorist ideology before it is a battle against terrorists as individuals; when this ideology is eliminated, the West and Syria’s enemies, will no longer have the tools to resurrect it.

Journalist: Do you think so?

President Assad:  I do think so, because the West will not change in the foreseeable future.  And also, because the intellectual war is more difficult than a military war and it takes longer to rehabilitate and equip new generations with the right kind of thinking: with non-extremist thought, non-fanatic thought, with open-mindedness.  Just as this terrorist ideology has been developed since the 1960s; it took 50 years to reach the stage we are at.  It does not appear and spread throughout the world overnight.  Hundreds of billions have been spent to establish it and the West has been supporting it since the days of British rule, even before the American presence.  They have supported religious extremism since the beginning of the 20th century; so, fighting it needs time.

Journalist: We hope for the best, and that with the help of God, and with open-mindedness, we will win together. Mr. President, thank you for meeting with us, and for the time that you have taken to answer our questions. Allow us to wish you and your family good health and well-being, and to wish Syria peace and prosperity. Thank you.

President Assad:  Thank you; and I would like to take this opportunity to send my regards, through your programme, to the families of the Russian fighters in Syria.  As I mentioned at the beginning, the Russian people are proud of what their army has achieved in Syria, but these families certainly have the right to be even prouder, than any other citizen, of the great achievements made by their sons in Syria; they have not only protected the Syrian people, but they have also protected their own families and their Russian compatriots.

Once again, you’re welcome in Syria, and thank you.

Journalist: Thank you very much for these kind words.

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Featured image is from SANA

Azerbaijan is slowly but steadily gaining an upper hand in the war with Armenia for the contested Nagorno-Karabakh region.

As of October 5, the Azerbaijani military, supported by Turkish military advisers, specialists and intelligence, captured the towns of Jabrayil, Mataghis and Talysh after heavy clashes with Armenian forces. Azerbaijani sources also report the control over multiple villages including Ashagi Abdulrahmanli, Mehdili, Chakhirli, Ashagi Maralyan, Sheybey and Kuyjagh. On the other hand, the Armenian side confirmed that it lost ‘some positions’ but did not provide details claiming that the situation on the frontline has been rapidly changing.

Stepanakert, the capital of the self-proclaimed Nagorno-Karabakh Republic, other populated areas and civilian targets in the region have become a target of regular rocket, artillery and drone strikes. The Azerbaijani military extensively uses cluster munitions, heavy artillery, rocket launchers and even Israeli LORA theater quasiballistic missiles while simultaneously accusing Armenia of intentionally striking civilian targets in Azerbaijan.

For example, on October 4, the government of the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic announced that Armenian forces had destroyed the military air base near Azerbaijan’s Ganja. This air base, according to the Armenian side, hosted F-16 fighter jets from Turkey. Azerbaijan indirectly confirmed the incident but insisted that Armenian strikes hit Ganja city only. In its own turn, the Armenian military denounced the Azerbaijani claim saying that only the military base that was hit.

In the comments from October 4, Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev claimed that Azerbaijani forces are “chasing” Armenians like “dogs” and demanded the full withdrawal of Armenian forces, the Armenian recognition of Karabakh as a sovereign Azerbaijani territory and an official apology from Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan to the Azerbaijani nation.

On top of this, Aliyev emphasized that a military solution of the Nagorno-Karabakh question is on the table and criticized 28 years of unsuccessful negotiations. In his remarks, Aliyev apparently cosplayed Turkish neo-Ottomanist President Recep Tayyip Erdogan that over the past years has been used to employ rhetoric of this kind and provide a hard power-based realpolitik in the Greater Middle East. Turkey is a natural strategic ally of Azerbaijan and extensively backs it in its war with Armenia.

A day earlier, on October 3, the Prime Minister of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan made his own address regarding the war saying that Nagorno-Karabakh has been fighting against “an Azerbaijani-Turkish terrorist attack, the volume and scale of which is unprecedented.” He said that the Azerbaijani operation is controlled by “150 high level Turkish military officers” and claimed that the end of the current conflict can only be victory on the Armenian side. As for now, it does not look that this forecast is realistic.

The ongoing Armenian-Azerbaijani war has likely become the first military conflict of such a scale between two state actors of a comparable power. After the first week of war, it was already clear that the final number of casualties will be counted in the thousands.

While so far the Azerbaijani side has not demonstrated any miracles in ground warfare, it has once again demonstrated a successful employment of the concept of the wide-scale usage of unmanned aerial vehicles: reconnaissance, aerial targets, loitering munitions and drones carrying bombs and missiles. This allows the Azerbaijani side, with an apparent help from Turkey, to successfully detect, uncover and strike Armenian artillery and fortified positions. Regardless the reality of Armenian claims about the supposed usage of Turkish F-16 jets to cover the employed UAVs, the Azerbaijani side has gained full control over the air dimension.

In its own turn, Armenia had time to conduct extensive engineering work preparing a wide network of fortified positions across the region. This allows Armenian forces to keep their positions in many areas despite the air dominance of Azerbaijan. Up to 80% of casualties on both sides are a result of rocket, artillery or air strikes.

Nonetheless, forces of the Nagorno-Karabakh Republics and Armenian units (which Erevan calls ‘volunteers’) are an underdog in the event of a large-scale prolonged conflict with the Azerbaijani-Turkish bloc, even if Armenia openly enters the conflict. Therefore, the outcome of the war will significantly depend on the ability of Azerbaijan (with help from Turkey and its mercenaries/militants) to use its air and numerical advantage to develop the advance and make some gains while the regional diplomatic situation allows this. The balance of power could also change if some third party would intervene in the conflict to put an end to the violence. Such an action could become a response to some irrefutable evidence of ethnic cleansing of the Armenian population in the areas of Azerbaijan or the increasing deployment of members of various Middle Eastern terrorist groups to the region.

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Rumors have it that the remaining months of 2020 may bring drastic and explosive changes in the world’s financial system. But such “doomsday” rumors have been floating around every beginning of fall during the last few years. Why? – The US dollar is getting weaker and weaker. It is not quite on a free fall, but still remains a major trading currency and a key world reserve currency. And for many economists that’s difficult to understand.

However, it is unlikely that that the collapse of the dollar will come from one day to the next. That would not be good for the world economy, as still too many countries depend on the dollar.

Facts are,

i) China’s foreign exchange reserves have just increased to US$ 3.112 trillion equivalent, of which about US$ 1.3 trillion denominated in US-dollars – and in general forex-reserves continue to grow;

ii) within short, possibly by the end of 2021, the Chinese yuan, or renminbi  (RMB) could become the world’s third largest reserve currency, after the US-dollar and the euro, surpassing the Japanese yen and the British pound, reported by CNBC;

iii) according to Morgan Stanley , at least 10 regulators (i.e. Central Banks and similar forex regulating institutions) added the yuan to their reserves in 2019, bringing the total to 70 – and rising; and

iv) according to the FED, the US economy could lose in excess to one third of its GDP up to the end of 2020 or mid-2021, while China’s economy is expected to grow by 1.3% (IMF) in 2020, and by China’s own estimate up to 3.5%.

Given the dismal covid-related world economy collapsing, and with China being the only major economy expected to grow this year, the number of yuan reserve holders may increase drastically by the end of 2020 and especially through 2021, suggesting that central banks around the world realize that for their financial stability, they must increase their yuan holdings significantly in the foreseeable future. This means shedding other reserve currencies, like the Japanese Yen, the British Pound, but especially the US-dollar. For example, Russia has dumped the dollar, reducing her dollar debt-holdings by 96%.

The Russian Trade Minister, Denis Manturov, called on his BRICS colleagues to increase their trading in local currencies instead of US dollars. Trade in national currencies is a key aspect of cooperation of the five-nation alliance that includes Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa and it is an effective way to dedollarize their economies.

China and Russia and many of the Shanghai Cooperation (SCO) countries are trading for many years already in their local currencies, or in yuan, especially cross-border trading, but they are also promoting currency swap arrangements with other countries, eager to escape the iron fist of sanctions of the United States.

In an interview with MarketWatch, senior fellow Stephen Roach at Yale University and former chairman of Morgan Stanley Asia, says coronavirus may cause a dramatic decline of the US dollar in the near future – “In a Covid era, everything unfolds at warp speed.” Roach also predicted an up to 35% drop of the dollar against major international currencies. He adds, given today’s economic outlook, this might happen rather quickly.

Indeed, while western economies are struggling keeping afloat, China is preparing to launch a new international currency, the digital, gold-backed, possibly crypto-RMB as an international payment and reserve currency, completely outside the dollar-dominated SWIFT system. The new digital RMB money is currently tested in several Chinese cities with positive results.

The People’s Bank of China – China’s Central Bank – recently revealed plans to have its sovereign digital currency ready in time for the 2022 Winter Olympics. The international rollout could actually happen much earlier, possibly in 2021, or earlier if warranted by international monetary events. In any case, the new trading currency may very likely find an astounding attraction by many countries that are eager to dedollarize and get out from under the boot of threats of sanctions by Washington.

It is clear that any money or legal tender that will grow into a major international trading and reserve currency needs to be backed by a strong economy. Backing of a strong economy is fully commensurate with the yuan. China’s economy today in real – and solid – output and long-term stability can easily be assessed as the world’s strongest. Comparing for example the Chinese GDP with the US GDP is like day and night: The Chinese GDP consists of more than two thirds of tangible and solid production and construction of infrastructure, housing, transport, energy and so on; while the US GDP is almost the reverse, more than half is consumption and service industries. Most hard production is outsourced. This undoubtedly distinguishes the yuan or RMB from fiat currencies, as are the dollar and the euro – which are backed by nothing. Simply put, China’s economy and her currency attract a lot of international trust and confidence.

Unfortunately, these differences are not (yet) reflected by the undistinguished linear accounting of GDP, but they are recognized by international economic observers and analysts, including nations’ treasurers around the world.

These are good reasons for the new digital RMB or yuan to grow fast as a primary trade and reserve asset for many countries. It will most likely far outrank Bitcoin, which is often heralded as possibly the “new gold”, or reserve currency.

Not only would the number of countries holding the Chinese currency in their reserve coffers increase rapidly, but the total amount of yuan reserve holdings might skyrocket faster than analysts expect, signaling clearly the end of the US-dollar hegemony. This might undoubtedly shift the global balance of economic power.

“Looking back years later, the two defining historic events of 2020 would be the coronavirus pandemic, and the other would be [China’s] digital currency,” Xu Yuan, a senior researcher with Beijing’s University’s Digital Finance Research Centre, told recently the South China Morning Post.

These developments are not ignored by Washington. The US will not so easily give up its dollar hegemony which means largely control over the world’s economy and financial flows. Although the times of total dollar-control of the world economy are irreversibly gone, Washington intends to slow down the power shift as long as possible. Though a hot war is not excluded, more likely is a currency war.

In line with the Great Reset announced by the World Economic Forum (WEF) and, in parallel, the IMF prediction of the Great Transformation (see this and this), a kind of currency revolution might be initiated, possibly introducing a major instrument for launching the Great Reset, alias Transformation.

As a hypothesis, Washington could, via the IMF, return to some kind of a gold standard. It could take the form of a digital SDR-type currency-basket intended to replace the dollar and the emerging digital yuan / RMB as trading and reserve currency. The current composition of the SDR contains the five major international forex currencies, US dollar (41.73%), euro (30.93%), yuan (10.92%), yen (8.33%), and British pound (8.09%).

Although the yuan is vastly undervalued, especially as compared with the US-dollar and the euro, the yuan is finally present in the basket since 2017 and has thereby become an official international exchange and reserve asset. The respective weights in the SDR basket have last been set in 2016 and are valid for 5 years, meaning they are up for renegotiation and readjustment in 2021.

Continuing with the hypothesis of the new gold standard, it might well be that in the hypothetical new SDR-like currency, gold would take a prominent role, one that overshadows the weakness of the US dollar. However, as was the case with the 1944 gold-standard, Washington-Treasury-FED would insist on the value of gold in the basket being linked to the dollar – which would de facto disproportionately increase the respective weight of the dollar in the basket.

If such a hypothetical deal would be accepted by the majority of countries – the US has still the sole veto right in the two Bretton Woods Institutions, IMF and World Bank – the hypothetical gold-based “SDR” would be a serious contender to the emerging internationalized digital yuan / RMB.

To forego such a situation, a possible currency war, China, as a holder of large direct and indirect gold reserves, may consider establishing a “gold commodity” market priced in yuan / RMB – and invite other large gold producers, like Russia, Venezuela, South Africa and others not in the US orbit, to join in an alternative currency, i.e. a yuan-denominated gold market, or a weighted average gold value of, say, the three major participants of the alternative gold commodity market.

This alternative currency denominated gold would be strengthened by the power of the respective economies which would back it.

In the end – as is already demonstrated today – international trust in the respective economies and their currencies – gold backed or not – will determine the outcome of a possible currency confrontation. China, already engaged in cross-border trading in local currencies and expanding yuan-trading arrangements internationally, for example, with currency swap measures in place with Russia, Iran and Venezuela, would be well placed to break the US-currency hegemony.

Finally, the goal is not to have one hegemon to replace another domineering power, but to establish a balanced world with several regional hubs or financial centers which would promote a monetary equilibrium that would gradually accompany progress of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), the bridge that spans the world (see this), with increasingly equal access to vital resources for building peacefully a World Community with a Shared Future for Mankind.

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This article was originally published on New Eastern Outlook.

Peter Koenig is an economist and geopolitical analyst. He is also a water resources and environmental specialist. He worked for over 30 years with the World Bank and the World Health Organization around the world in the fields of environment and water. He lectures at universities in the US, Europe and South America. He writes regularly for online journals such as Global Research; ICH; New Eastern Outlook (NEO) and more. He is the author of Implosion – An Economic Thriller about War, Environmental Destruction and Corporate Greed – fiction based on facts and on 30 years of World Bank experience around the globe. He is also a co-author of The World Order and Revolution! – Essays from the Resistance. He is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization.

New Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga has inherited from Abe Shinzo an economy in bad shape. The arrow of fiscal policy has made itself powerless, the arrow of monetary policy flooded the country with money which has lost its direction, The arrow of the structural adjustment has never left the bow. The long shadow of corona-virus is threatening the Japanese economy.

Abe Shinzo is the unique Japanese prime minister who has ruled Japan for nine years, one year in 2007-2008 and eight years, 2012-2020. This is a remarkable achievement in terms of the length of the prime minister’s mandate. But, the people’s expectation for national leaders is correlated with the length of the leader’s being in power. So, one asks if Abe has done something which is commensurate with length of governing.

Perhaps, the most important criterion for judging Abe’s policy achievements is his economic policy which may be grouped in to two policies: Abenomics and CORONA-19 policy.

What I am trying to argue in this paper is this. First, the Abenomics has not been a big success given the injection of enormous resources. This is attributable to wrong diagnosis of the problem of post-bubble Japanese economy. Second, the delayed emergency measures taken by Abe against the COVID-19 have made the recovery of the Japanese economy more difficult.

1. Abenomics 

The malaise of the Japanese economy began with the real estate bubble burst of 1989. But, who made the bubble in the first place? Japan enjoyed unprecedented economic boom for three decades before the bubble. GDP increased by more than 10% a year. Such prosperity was due to the Korean war, the Dodge Plan, the Cold War and the Japanese people’s remarkable ability to import foreign know how – especially the technology of the U.S.- and japanize it.

However, the Japanese miracle was attributable primarily to the Japan Inc. led by the golden triangle composed of highly motivated and competent politicians, business leaders and the bureaucrats.

The success of the golden triangle led to the trilateral collusion, which became a powerful oligarchy and ruled the economy. Real estate speculation was the fastest way of making quick money and it is more than possible that the oligarchy and other rich people were the chief source of the asset bubble.

In 1988, a year before the drama of the bubble burst, in Ginza (Tokyo) area, one-square-meter land was worth US$ 149,000. The territory of Japan was 37% of that of the U.S. But the value of real estate in Japan was 4 times that of the U.S. real estate. In the Tokyo stock market, the value of stocks was 69% of GDP in 1988; it jumped to 152% in 1989. It is hard to understand how such bubble is possible. One possible reason was the fact that the Japanese elite groups were little concerned with the health of the national economy; they were more interested in making quick bucks.

Then, in 1989, the bubble exploded without noise. But it was as devastating as large earthquakes. The value of real estate in Tokyo fell by 80%; the stock index in the Tokyo Stock market fell from 30,000 to 15,000. This created a panic among policy makers. The Bank of Japan ( BoJ) reacted in a disturbing way; it jacked up, in 1990, the interest rate from 2% to 6%. This was too much; it created uncertainty; it reduced consumption; it slowed down production of goods and services. The recession began.

To fight the recession, the BoJ reduced the interest rate to zero per cent by1994. This was too drastic and too late. The recession did not stop. What was more worrisome was the danger that this policy of the BoJ made the traditional monetary policy powerless in recovering the economy from recession. To recover the economy from the recession,   interest rate should go down, but it could no longer go down below 0%. Here, Japan was trapped in so called the liquidity trap. Therefore, the BoJ had to use another monetary policy tool, namely the quantity easing policy (QE) in addition to two other policies comprising the fiscal policy and the structural adjustment policy.

In this way, Japan picked three policies: the QE policy,   fiscal policy and the structural adjustment policy. These three sets of policies became Abenomics adopted in 2012, the year when Ave became prime minster for the second time.

The QE policy is a monetary policy which does not rely in the interest rate, rather, it consists in expanding liquid funds to the financial institutions which can finance consumer expenditures and business activities including investments and exports of goods and services. The fiscal policy consists in expanding tax income or government debts in order to bail out firms in trouble or expand consumption expenditure through subsidies or tax incentive measures. Of these three policies, the structural adjustment policy was the most difficult, because to implement it, the government was forced to discipline large corporations and people and institutions which were parts of the oligarchy.

One wonders why Abe picked arrows to identify economic policies. It is unusual to name economic policy with war weapons such as arrow. Abe took arrows to show his strong wish to carry out these policies. In fact, his policies were bulldozer policies of pushing through no matter what. Such strategy may have merits in speeding up the policies. But, it is not wise to handle in this way such a complex reality as the economy.

Anyway, we have three arrows designed to kill the enemy, the stagflation of the Japanese economy which was, once, strong enough to challenge even the American economy. In this way Abe, got himself three arrows: the monetary arrow, the fiscal arrow and the structural adjustment arrow. Unfortunately, none of the three arrows have hit the target, the recovery of the dynamism of the Japanese economy.

The fiscal arrow ended up with astronomic government debt representing 250% of GDP in 2019. This was the highest public debt rate in the developed countries. This presents serious problem. Some people say that it is not a problem, because the creditors are Japanese citizens and they do not force the government to pay back the debt. But, sooner or later, the government must honour its debt and to do so, it has to find needed funds, more taxes, which means burden on the future generation of citizens.

The more important question is whether or not the fiscal arrow has hit the target, that is, the freeing the economy from decades-long stagflation. Unfortunately, the fiscal arrow has not hit the target. Even with government debt representing 250% of GDP, it was not enough to hit the target. It could not go through the tall wall of the structural ailment of the Japanese economy. The fiscal arrow was broken.

Much of the funds generated by the public debt should have been used for enforcement of productive firms, not the bail out of insolvent large corporations which were, in fact, the source of the structural ailment of the Japanese economy.

The monetary arrow did fly far, but it was also broken before hitting the target of saving the Japanese economy. The BoJ literally flooded the financial market with US$ 923 in billion in 2013, US$ 1,056 billion in 2014 and US$ 656 billion in 2015 amounting to a total of US$ 2,835 billion. There were other QE measures giving total money supply of US$ 12 trillion representing 2.4 times the Japan’s GDP of US$ 5 trillion in 2019.

So, money supply had no limit. But, was there any demand for the money? By and large, the demand for money comes from the consumer and the businesses. The income distribution has become more and more unequal, because the income of the vast majority of the Japanese people stopped to increase for years. Under such circumstance, it is no wonder that few people went to banks to borrow money, for the simple reason that they had no means to pay back the debt. The businesses did not go to banks either, because there was no demand for their products. So, the banks ended up with mountains of money which was, in fact, a burden in a situation of zero per cent interest rate.

What banks did was to finance the bailout of firms in trouble, make loans to pay old debts of consumers and businesses and even invest in foreign countries. One thing sure was that the QE was no longer the solution to the stagflation of the Japanese economy. In this way, the monetary arrow was also broken. It could not pierce the thick wall of the structural defects of the Japanese economy.

The failure or the limited success of the fiscal and the QE arrow was, perhaps, due to a wrong diagnosis of the aliment of the Japanese economy. It is possible that the ailment of the Japanese economy was not something that could be cured by fiscal or monetary policies. At least, there was a limit to what the two arrows could do.

The real nature of the problem was structural ailment of the economy. Therefore, what Japan needed was the structural reform of the economy. There were surely many structural problems. But, as far as the stagflation of the economy is concerned, two problems may be identified: demographic problem and the low productivity of large corporation.

Japan is one of the countries which suffer much from demographic problem. The absolute number of the population of Japan will decrease from 126.5 million habitants in 2019 to 100 million in 2050. The speed of aging of the population is such that the population of 65 years old plus which counted for 17.4 % in 2000 now represents 28% of the population. On the other hand, the active population of age group of 15-64 years old which represented 67.5% in 2013 now represents 59.3%.

The demography is perhaps one of the most important determinant factors of the potential growth of the economy. It determines the quantity and the quality of the labour force; it determines the size of the domestic market. The declining population is the common challenge of all the developed countries. The obvious solution is immigration. But Japan is the most anti-immigration country among the developed countries In average, in OECD countries, immigrants account for 12.2 % of total population against 1.2 % in Japan.

The main reason for the absence of immigrants in Japan is obviously the racism. Under the centuries-old Shintoism, the Japanese believe that they are the Yamato-race meaning the emperor’s race, hence superior to all other races. Even now, discrimination against foreigners is a common phenomenon in Japan. There are about one million Koreans most of whom still remain Korean citizens poorly integrated into the labour market. Suga, the new prime minister, has to assure massive immigration to survive economically. But, to do so, Japanese must stop thinking that they are superior to all other races.

There is another factor which is responsible for the stagflation in Japan. It was the loss of global competitiveness of large corporations, members of the Keiretsu (assembly of big corporations). These corporations were once the pride of Japan and the envy of the world. However, since the bubble burst followed by stagflation, they lost the support of the domestic market as well as the global market.

In the period, 1995-2011, the global share of Toyota car production fell from 51% to 41%. The world share of Honda car production went down from 39% to 29%. In the period from 1995 to 2007, the global share of DRAM memory chip production dropped from 42% to 9.2%. This is incredible. The global share of Japanese production of navigator had free fall from 100% to 0 %. As for the profit of Japanese firms, in the period, 2001-2011, the profit of the Mazda decreased from 4.3% to 2.5%, while that of Toyota dropped down from 9.5% to 1.9%.

The implication of these figures is that the real cause of the Japanese stagflation was the losing competitiveness of Japanese large corporations in the global market. Therefore, the real structural adjustment policy was not the balling out of these corporations. The priority should have been given to SMEs. True, large corporations have made great contribution to the Japanese economic development by making GDP grow. However, as labour-saving technology developed further, the capacity of large corporations to create jobs became marginal.

The large corporations were also responsible for the concentration of income and assets in the hands of a small group of people. This has invited unequal income distribution leading to shrinking consumer demand and declining GDP growth.

In fact, Abe’s third arrow of the structural reform should have consisted in not bailing out non-viable large firms; it should have helped competitive large corporation; it should have allocated more resources to the development of SMEs. But there was no one to promote and pursue such policy. In other word, the third arrow did not have its archer.

Abenomics has failed. If it is a success, it was surely very limited success. It is true that since 2012, the minus GDP growth became relatively rare; the jobs increased in number, mainly low paid jobs; the stagflation was dealt with some success. But this cannot be regarded as success, given the injection of fiscal resources and quantity easing which amount to almost 5 times GDP. The failure of Abenomics is largely due to the lack of Abe’s political will to impose structural reform of Japan’s industrial structure on the one hand and, on the other, the absence of effective immigration policy.

2. Haunting COVID-19 Crisis

Thus, Suga has inherited the economy which was still facing the danger of stagflation. To make the matter worse, Suga is given the economy further devastated by Abe’s poor management of corona-virus crisis. The Japanese economy had barely survived the decades-long stagflation. Now, the shadow of the corona-virus is cast over the sky. Nobody knows the degree of devastation created by the virus crisis. However, Abe’s poor management of the virus crisis could have worsened the negative impact on the Japanese economy. Abe lost the golden time in stopping the virus propagation so that he could protect his friends’ investments in the Summer Olympics.

Undoubtedly, it is rather early to assess the impact of the virus crisis on the economy, because even the first wave of the pandemic is not over. It is possible to have, soon, a second wave. But, already some of available data suggest that the damage of the economy caused by the pandemic seems very grave. For instance, in the second quarter of 2020, the Japanese GDP has fallen by almost 28 % compared to the same period of 2019. For the entire year of 2020, the GDP is expected to decrease by 6%. This is serious. For the entire period of Abe’s rule from 2012 to 2020, the annual growth rate of the Japanese GDP was, in general, a little, below 1 %. The fall of 6% in 2020 is indeed a big blow.

There are already 500 bankruptcies of small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) of which 69 were food and beverage business; 53, hotel business; 54, apparel business. The consumer spending has shrunk by 14% as of July 2020. The major fall of consumer spending took place for travel (-58%), entertainment (-38), department stores sales (-29%) and transport (-28%) There is no doubt that they were the SMEs which suffer the most from the pandemics. This is the problem, because, in Japan, 70% of all jobs are created by the SMEs. Moreover, we should not forget that the vast majority of Japanese earn their butter and bread from working for the SMEs.

Abe has provided a set of emergency funds to cope with the devastating outcome of the lockdown. His government has provided as much as US$ 2 trillion, which may look like a large amount. It is. In addition, Abe has provided a series of fiscal and monetary incentives for the production and the consumption of goods and services as well the exports of goods and services.

Perhaps, the most important policy measure taken by Abe is the access to bank loans. However, the trouble is this. In all probability, the bulk of benefits of these measures will go to large corporations for two reasons. First, the trilateral collusion of politics-corporations-bureaucracy has always favoured large corporations in policy making. Second, what counts in the long run is bank loans, but they are difficult for SMEs to have access because of prejudice and weak collaterals.

It is a well known fact that the global economy had hard time to recover from the global financial crisis of 2007-2008. The main reason was the fact that the QE money was spent for the survival of unhealthy large banks and corporations at the expense of the development of the SMEs. Don’t forget. The results of the anti-SMEs policy is rising jobless and shrinking consumer demand. In Japan, the consumer spending accounts for 60% of GDP.

To sum up, Abenomics has done some good to the Japanese economy. But, Abe Shinzo has injected more than US$ 20 trillion of money and fiscal funds to free the Japanese economy for persistent stagflation. So, one would have expected better results, given the amount of money spent to save the economy of the country of rising sun. This is an amount of money large enough to expect a victory over the ailing Japanese economy.

But, we cannot say that it is a success. It has failed to put new breath into the economy; it has failed to attenuate the suffering of ordinary Japanese people. In fact, according to a survey, 70% of the respondents said that they had received no or little benefits from Abenomics.

The huge negative impact of the corona-virus crisis on the Japanese economy is difficult to estimate at this moment. However, it could hurt severely the economy which had barely survived the decades-long stagflation. Thus, Suga is facing very challenging task of saving the economy he has inherited.  We all wish him good luck, but it is hoped that he would consider the following policies.

First, the government should not rule the people. it should serve the people. The master of the country is not the government but the people.

Second, the government should stop its decades-long pro-large corporation policy and, instead, invest heavily in SMEs which are the center of economy.

Third, the new government of Suga should find the archer of the third arrow; Suga must become himself the archer. He should boldly undertake the structural adjustment of large companies. If history says anything, Korea could have had stagflation, if President Kim Dae-jung did not go through the extensive structural adjustment of large corporations during the Asian Financial Crisis of 1997-1998. President Kim closed insolvent Chaebols; he forced healthy Chabols to specialize; he forced to make their accounting system more transparent; he induced hem to cooperate with SMEs to create productive value chain.

Fourth, this is difficult. Japan should stop thinking that they are superior to other races. The demographic problem and the problem of shrinking labour force can be solved only through immigration. Immigrants will not come, unless the racial discrimination is solved in Japan. But, it should be pointed out that the immigration policy is one of the most difficult government policies. Japan should learn much from Canada which has a very successful immigration policy.

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Professor Joseph H. Chung is professor of economics and co-director of the East Asia Laboratory (OAE)-the Study Center for Integration and Globalization (CEIM), Quebec University in Montreal (UQAM). He is Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG).

Featured image: Suga announcing the new imperial era name “Reiwa” on 1 April 2019 (CC BY 4.0)

The sudden outbreak of Color Revolution unrest in the historically unstable Central Asian country of Kyrgyzstan following recent parliamentary elections in this Russian CSTO mutual defense ally intensifies the US’ Hybrid War “containment” of Russia when seen in the context of the ongoing regime change efforts in fellow ally Belarus as well as CSTO-member Armenia’s dangerous efforts to provoke a Russian military intervention in support of its illegal occupation of universally recognized Azerbaijani territory.

On Monday, after three days of hospitalization for reported Covid illness, Trump was discharged.

He returned to his White House residence away from staff to continue recovering.

Is he ill from Covid infection, seasonal flu/influenza, or something else?

Diagnostic PCR tests are notoriously unreliable. A positive result may not indicate Covid illness.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC):

“Detection of viral RNA may not indicate the presence of infectious virus or that 2019-nCoV is the causative agent for clinical symptoms.”

The above means that a positive for Covid test result does not necessarily confirm illness from the disease.

It may indicate seasonal flu/influenza or a common cold — in both cases ranging from mild to more severe.

It begs the question: Why are unreliable tests used that are unrelated to accurate disease diagnosis?

Why is the medical community using and relying on them?

Is their widespread use all about creating mass hysteria fear-mongering — establishment media part of the diabolical scheme?

Ordinary people in the US and abroad were manipulated into accepting mandatory or voluntary house arrest.

It wrecked economies, their livelihoods and welfare.

It potentially harmed their emotional and perhaps physical health — while transferring enormous amounts of wealth to super-rich interests.

Independent health experts are unsure whether official reports about Trump’s illness are accurate or otherwise.

On October 1, he tweeted having contracted Covid illness. White House doctor Sean Conley said it was detected 72 hours earlier.

If the timeline is accurate, he became ill eight days ago as of Tuesday October 6.

If seriously ill from Covid disease, he shouldn’t have been discharged.

According to Thailand Medical News, Covid disease by age group 70 – 79 is as follows:

• 5.6% of all reported cases.
• 17.2% of hospitalizations.
• 27% of deaths.

Mixed messages on Trump’s health status leaves unanswered whether his illness is serious, mild, or something in between.

It’s unclear precisely what illness he contracted.

Reportedly on Friday, he experienced a high fever and low blood oxygen level, prompting his medical team to order hospitalization.

According to medical experts, oxygen levels below 94 may indicate severe Covid illness.

On Friday and Saturday, Trump’s reported oxygen level dropped to 93, why reportedly he was given supplemental oxygen.

His experimental drug regimen is potentially hazardous to human health, especially for someone his age (74) and obesity (around 240 pounds).

He’s on remdesivir shown to cause kidney disease.

According to nephrological experts, including Johns Hopkins University researchers, over half of seniors in their mid-70s or older have mild or more advanced kidney disease.

It’s part of the aging process. Body parts wear out gradually over time.

National Kidney Foundation president Dr. Beth Piraino explained that “we lose kidney function” with aging, why regular screening is essential to minimize risk of kidney failure.

Trump’s use of redemsivir that’s unrelated to curing Covid illness — if reports about his drug regimen are accurate — is playing Russian roulette with his kidney functioning and overall health.

He’s also reportedly on Regeneron Pharmaceuticals’ experimental neutralizing antibody cocktail — another experimental drug with no proved efficacy.

Dr. Conley said Trump was given dexamethasone on Saturday, perhaps Sunday as well.

It’s a steroid drug used for patients diagnosed seriously ill from Covid disease.

It’s highly atypical for patients with mild Covid symptoms.

In July, the New England Journal of Medicine published a mixed assessment of the drug.

It can be beneficial in treating severe Covid illness. It works by suppressing abnormal immune responses that can damage bodily organs. It doesn’t cure Covid disease.

At the same time, its side effects are potentially harmful to human health — why the drug should only be administered in extreme cases.

Commenting on Trump’s reported illness, an unnamed infectious disease doctor said the following:

“Dexamethasone is the most mystifying of the drugs we’re seeing him being given at this point” — if reports are accurate.

“The steroid is normally not used unless the patient’s condition seems to be deteriorating.”

“It raises the question: Is (Trump) sicker than we were told, or are the doctors overreacting in a way that could be potentially harmful?”

As of Monday, Trump is back at the White House around a week after reportedly falling ill.

Criticized by Dems and hostile establishment media for saying don’t “be afraid” of Covid illness, perhaps he’s right.

There’s a thin line between Covid disease and seasonal flu/influenza — the latter not accompanied by mass hysteria, fear-mongering, lockdowns and economic collapse.

What’s going on this year is an instrument of social control, repression, and transferring wealth to the nation’s privilege class at the expense of most others.

A steady drumbeat of fear-mongering reports drown out alternative views.

Community Health Sciences and Surgery Professor Joel Kettner earlier said the following in response to what’s going on in the US:

“I have never seen anything like this, anything anywhere near like this.”

“I’m not talking about the pandemic because I’ve seen 30 of them, one every year. It is called influenza.”

Epidemiologist Hendrik Streeck stressed:

“The new pathogen (Covid disease) is…less dangerous than Sars-1.”

Outbreaks in 2003 affected about 8,000 people, reportedly in 29 countries.

Less than 800 died from the illness. Since 2004, no further cases were reported anywhere.

At the time, the CDC said: “SARS is no longer a threat in the world today.”

Founding director of Yale University’s Prevention Research Center David Katzm said the following about SARS-CoV-2 that produces Covid disease:

“I am deeply concerned that the social, economic and public health consequences of this near-total meltdown of normal life — schools and businesses closed, gatherings banned — will be long-lasting and calamitous, possibly graver than the direct toll of the virus itself.”

“The unemployment, impoverishment and despair likely to result will be public health scourges of the first order.”

What’s gone on throughout 2020 confirmed his worst fears.

A Greater Depression is unfolding in real time. Things may worsen ahead and be long-lasting for ordinary Americans and others elsewhere.

Trump may or may not be ill from Covid disease. He may or may not recover fully from what ails him.

According to a JTN/RMG poll conducted from 10/1 – 10/3, at least two days after Trump’s reported illness, Biden is ahead by 8 points.

Whatever the results of US November elections, harder than ever hard times affect most ordinary Americans.

Things are most likely to be long-lasting and greatly detrimental to their health, welfare and futures — no matter which wing of US duopoly rule runs things.

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Award-winning author Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago. He can be reached at [email protected]. He is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG)

His new book as editor and contributor is titled “Flashpoint in Ukraine: US Drive for Hegemony Risks WW III.”

http://www.claritypress.com/LendmanIII.html

Visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com.

New York’s Museum of Modern Art is currently exhibiting Material Ecology, a tantalizing sample of the truly astounding and path-breaking work of Neri Oxman and her team, Mediated Matter group, at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Oxman is an American-Israeli architect and designer – yet these designations conspicuously fail to capture the utterly novel field which Oxman’s work is exploring, defining and re-defining. Every item in the show may be viewed as a “demonstration of new materials and new processes, as a door into a new way of designing and making.” Her inter-disciplinary work bridges engineering, biology and computer science – while addressing itself to both timely and timeless epistemological and ethical issues.

Oxman’s epistemic interventions testify to, welcome, and embrace a new concept of what knowledge is and how it emerges: “Knowledge can no longer be ascribed to, or produced within, disciplinary boundaries, but is entirely entangled.” In other words, Oxman’s work – both theoretically and materially – lies at the very forefront of human understanding: Oxman and her team are inventing not only new kinds of objects, and the technologies which makes such objects possible – they are inventing a new, holistic field altogether, re-making the very boundaries of human disciplines. In the process, they are creating new, interdependent modes of knowledge; new forms of experience and new ways of living or being in the world.

Neri Oxman and her team at MIT refer to the field which they have created as Material Ecology: an “emerging field in design denoting informed relations between products, buildings, systems, and their environment.” Hence, Oxman’s push towards “universal synthesis” – material ecology’s integrating, harmonizing, and tapping into multiple disciplines in its approach to design – remains conscious of the ethical entanglement with our environment. Their work consistently emphasizes “environmentally informed digital design and fabrication.”  These often visually stunning designs can take the form of extrusions – materials that have been thrust out by an animal or machine; or intrusions – 3D-printed objects engineered to be infused with organic material, such as melanin or bacteria.

Oxman’s posits a nevalogue – a kind of moral shorthand that clarifies the ethical commitments of Material Ecology. A few of these principles are of special significance. For the practicing material ecologist, the client is always first and foremost nature itself: “The natural environment at large constitutes the ‘client’ for every commissioned project, as well as its ‘site’ and material source.” We can and must take Oxman at her word here: in a certain sense her designs are meant to let nature realize its own inherent telos, its own intrinsic ends, and its own interests.

Consider, for example, the Silk Pavilion – on display at the exhibition – that employed 17,000 silkworms in its fabrication, a thoroughly astonishing example of inter-species collaboration. Oxman positively envisions the partnership with other species as part of the repertoire of sustainable construction methods as we enter a new era of ecologically conscious architecture and design. Silk Pavilion is remarkable both because Oxman and her team were able to modify the worms’ spinning patterns, so that they spun in sheets rather than cocoons, and because they did not utilize the traditional method of boiling the larvae alive in their cocoon to extract the silk thread. Rather, their process allowed the silkworms to pass through the entire cycle of metamorphoses and live out their lives unharmed.

Many of the “demos” on display in this show are full of a weird and wonderful beauty. But what is most striking is that they represent a vision of the future, novel ways of designing our environments.  At the same time, this radically new material ecology is anchored throughout by an ethical awareness – inseparable from an ethic of interanimality and interspecies cooperation. Oxman and her team are collaborating with living nature, the living material world, in the creation of what are ultimately new, transcendentally beautiful, and environmentally sustainable structures with the potential for large-scale applications. Their work also presents us with the fruits of a holistic conception of the organism as inherently expressive, valuable, and tending towards creative and ontological expansion.

Another principle of Material Ecology is that it prioritizes integration over segregation. Consider the traditional facade of a building: it is constructed out of discrete parts each of which serves a distinct function. Hard, rigid materials make for the exterior shielding or shell; while supple and yielding materials serve for comfort and insulation; and, finally, translucent materials allow the structure to communicate with the environment. Human skin, by contrast, utilizes generally the same material constituents over the entire body: smaller pores and thicker skin act as a barrier; larger pores and thinner skin for filtering, such as on the face. Distinct functions, in other words, are integrated rather than segregated, unified into “a single material system that can at any point respond and adapt to its environment.”

This ideal façade – able to modify itself in response to changes in the environment – is the motivation behind the “Totems” installation which utilizes melanin (the compound in skin pigmentation). Oxman envisions melanin’s use in architecture to produce optical variations in a building’s façade, depending on the time of day or season. The Totems demo, produced by injecting liquid melanin into a 3D-printed transparent block to manifest flesh-colored curls and plumes, is like so much in the exhibition, captivating, wonderful and strange.

Material Ecology seeks to produce “smart objects that respond to their environment and function more like bodies than manufactured entities, accommodating multiple functions rather than just one.” The “Armour” demo is a case in point: it is Oxman’s answer to the classic I-beam, a ubiquitous and fundamental component in modern architecture and an unmistakable symbol of the Industrial Revolution. The exhibition offers us only a small-scale prototype, but the idea is clear enough: Oxman’s Armour is effectively a beam designed to function as both skin and structure simultaneously. “Stiff structural components are embedded in a soft skin” – so that the design is capable of carrying vertical, horizontal, and rotational loads, while the beam’s sectional profile and structural thickness can be modified according to the anticipated load.

Material Ecology represents an approach to design that is non-human centered. This principle carries many implications, but it is central for grasping the ethical achievement of Oxman and Mediated Matter. As Oxman observes, “The group considers all living creatures as equals.” The aim is “to shift human-centric design to a design culture focused on conserving, improving and augmenting the natural environment through novel technological developments.” In short, material ecology breaks decisively with the kind of anthropocentrism which has led to untold environmental devastation and the irretrievable loss of countless species, and instead adopts a lateral rather than hierarchical relationship to non-human others.

Oxman’s approach to design is ultimately an embrace of “co-culture over single organism culture.” This fundamental ethical principle requires not only the recognition of biodiversity but underscores our entanglement and the ineliminable inter-dependency among individuals and species. Material Ecology offers us a way into the future that answers some of our deepest needs, and the needs of the countless species with which we share this planet. It posits a way of addressing some of our gravest environmental concerns – and does so by harnessing the creative energy that unites all Life. The mutual, inter-species collaboration which Oxman envisions has the potential to transform the face of our cities and communities, and to imbue them with an almost other-worldly yet natural beauty. As we hurtle towards an uncertain future, Oxman’s vision suggests a way of interacting with and reshaping our world that we need now more than ever.

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Sam Ben-Meir is a professor of philosophy and world religions at Mercy College in New York City.

Featured image is from moma.org

How much is too much? When will Israeli nationalists in North America completely discredit themselves by overusing their power to crush those defending Palestinians?

The ruthlessness of the Israel lobby is remarkable. Recently they’ve convinced Zoom to cancel a university sponsored talk, a prominent law program to rescind a job offer, a public broadcaster to apologize for using the word Palestine and companies to stop delivering for a restaurant.

A week ago Israel lobby groups convinced Zoom to cancel a San Francisco State University talk with Palestinian resistance icon Leila Khaled, former South African minister Ronnie Kasrils, director of women’s studies at Birzeit University Rula Abu Dahou and others. It is thought to be the first time Zoom has ever suppressed a university-sponsored talk.

Last month the Israel lobby pressed the University of Toronto’s law school to rescind a job offer to head its International Human Rights Program. The pressure to block the hiring committee’s candidate, Valentina Azarova, came from judge David Spiro, who was a former Toronto Co-chair of the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs (CIJA) and whose uncle Larry Tanenbaum owns the Toronto Raptors and grandmother Anne Tanenbaum financed the University of Toronto’s centre for Jewish studies. While Spiro’s efforts were covert, B’nai B’rith has openly called on University of Toronto administrators to block the hiring committee’s decision.

CBC’s The Current recently apologized for employing the word “Palestine”. On August 18 guest anchor Duncan McCue introduced graphic artist Joe Sacco by referencing his work in Bosnia, Iraq and Palestine (Sacco has a work called Palestine). At the beginning of the next day’s edition McCue apologized for having mentioned Palestine and Honest Reporting Canada boasted about their efforts to pressure the public broadcaster from employing the P word.

As part of a bid to bankrupt a small left-wing Toronto restaurant that has a “I love Gaza” message in its window the CIJA and B’nai B’rith successfully campaigned to shutter Foodbenders delivery services, institutional contracts and social media accounts. They allied with the far-right Jewish Defense League and others who vandalized the restaurant in July.

In an August Walrus story titled “Objectivity Is a Privilege Afforded to White Journalists” former CBC journalist Pacinthe Mattar describes a senior editor stepping in to suppress an interview from Jerusalem with Ahmed Shihab-Eldin, an Emmy-nominated journalist of Palestinian descent. Many months later Mattar was blocked from an expected promotion by the “director who had decided not to run the 2017 interview from Jerusalem” who “had expressed concerns that I was biased and therefore should not be promoted, an opinion shared by some of the other committee members. And that was that.”

Anti-Plaestinian organizations are waging an aggressive campaign to have Facebook adopt the ‘stop criticizing Israel’ International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s (IHRA) definition of antisemitism. The explicit aim of those pushing the IHRA’s definition of antisemitism is to silence or marginalize those who criticize Palestinian dispossession and support the Palestinian civil society led Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement.

The Israel lobby cancel machine rolls along in spite of evermore overt Israeli racism, conquest and rights violations. Many of those targeted in the above-mentioned incidents have suffered emotionally and career wise yet the impacts on them are insignificant compared to the daily indignities Palestinian suffer. The Israeli state continues to steal Palestinian land in the West Bank, oversee a punishing blockade of Gaza and allow Toronto Jews to emigrate while Palestinians driven from their homes in 1948 can’t even visit, let alone emigrate.

The Israel lobby is a unique political force. Rooted in European colonialism and the US empire’s regional interests, it is backed by many zealous billionaires and a substantial portion of a generally influential ethnic/religious community. It also crassly exploits victimhood. As John Clark recently posted on Facebook, “Zionism is the only political ideology I know of that claims that disagreement with it is a hate crime.”

Fortunately, every cancel and smear campaign it wages alienates some new people and opens others’ eyes. Unfortunately, many more well-meaning individuals will suffer emotional and financial consequences before the Israel lobby cancel machine is stopped.

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The spokesperson for the Houthi-supported Yemeni army, Brigadier Yahya Saree, revealed yesterday details of the links between Israel and former Yemeni President the late Ali Abdullah Saleh. Such links, he said, go back at least to the year 2000.

During a press conference in the capital Sanaa, the senior official cited official documents and stated that Saleh’s government had secret relations with Tel Aviv which included visits by officials on both sides. According to Saree, normalisation between the two countries peaked in 2007, when Israeli diplomat Bruce Kashdan arrived in Sanaa to meet Yemeni military and security officials who were relatives of Saleh.

الإيجاز الصحفي لمتحدث القوات المسلحة العميد يحيى سريع بشأن علاقة النظام السابق بالكيان الصهيوني والتدخلات الإسرائيلية في الشأن اليمني.https://t.co/fYkQ0dRY5L

— العميد يحيى سريع (@army21ye) October 4, 2020

“The Israeli official left Sanaa International Airport on 16 July, 2007,” said Saree. “The visit had been arranged by Yemeni officials, and the UAE played a leading role in it. The Israeli diplomat had earlier visited Yemen on 2 February, 2005.”

During the visit, security in the Red Sea and Bab Al-Mandab was discussed in addition to commercial cooperation and allowing Israeli produce to enter the Yemeni market.

Al-Masirah reported that the document also mentioned the signing of an agreement that allowed Israeli civilian flights to use Yemeni air space.

Another document, purportedly issued by the UAE Embassy in Sanaa, noted that a Jewish delegation visited Yemen and asked officials to naturalise approximately 60,000 Israelis with Yemeni nationality, 15,000 of whom had US citizenship. The Emirati ambassador in Sanaa, Hamad Saeed Al-Zaabi, in a memorandum to the UAE Foreign Minister in 2004, noted that the “Yemeni-Jewish normalisation” is part of a larger scheme drawn up by the US.

Saree insisted that Israel has constantly meddled in Yemeni affairs and continues to do so.

“Yemen has long been the main target of US-Israeli plots and the ongoing onslaught clearly proves this. The Armed Forces call upon Yemenis from all walks of life to raise their awareness about the real intentions of foreigners. Our struggle is nothing but a fateful battle for liberation and independence.”

The army spokesperson also claimed that further information about Israel’s involvement in the Yemen war will be disclosed. “We have other evidence of the Israeli military participation in the aggression, and it will be revealed in due course.”

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The issue of healthcare reform is one that is consistently identified by opinion polls as being among the most important to Americans. The United States continues to be the only fully industrialized nation that lacks a public healthcare system, a feature of modern “democracy” that is taken for granted in most developed countries. Most American proponents of healthcare reform typically cite the models utilized by Canada, Western Europe, or Australia as the most appropriate guides for the implementation of universal healthcare in the United States. However, Don Fitz, a Green Party activist, provides a comprehensive overview of a model for reform that originates from what many would consider to be a surprising place. Cuba is widely regarded by Americans as an impoverished “Third World” nation. Yet, Fitz’s Cuban Health Care: The Ongoing Revolution describes how Cuba’s approach to healthcare during the six decades since the 1959 revolution has produced rather extraordinary results.

The overview of Cuban healthcare begins with an examination of the challenges that Cuba faced immediately following the revolution. Previously, healthcare in Cuba had been almost entirely private. After the revolution, Cuba lost approximately half of its physicians with most of these becoming émigrés to the United States in search of a more lucrative place to practice medicine. Only about three thousand Cuban physicians remained and those who stayed did so out of a commitment to their profession. The methods of funding healthcare before the revolution typically relied on either fee-for-service relationships between physicians and patients or “mutuals” that functioned as a kind of private insurance system operating on a semi-cooperative basis. The very limited healthcare that was available to the poor was mostly provided by the state.

An innovative reform that was implemented following the revolution involved the creation of “polyclinics” organized on the basis of a structural framework described as “centralization/decentralization.” Under this model, small teams of healthcare professionals were assigned to serve individual communities, with each healthcare team having a collection of families under their care, usually numbering in the range of 120 to 150 family groupings, with the families including 600 to 800 persons. Clinicians would often visit patients at home. The polyclinics functioned within a centralized meta-level framework that was based on a single system of healthcare provision. The individual teams providing healthcare to particular communities were the decentralized component of the system. It was not the provision of health care that indicate decentralization but rather the ability to decide how to do it locally.

Over time, Cuban healthcare practices experienced a series of innovations. The initial community-based polyclinics eventually evolved into a system of family doctors that were able to provide personalized care in a way that included the cultivation of physician-patient and physician-community relationships. The achievements of Cuba in the area of healthcare are particularly astounding when it is considered that Cuba is an island nation with approximately the same population size as New York City. Clearly, the Cubans have been highly capable of successfully managing their own affairs in spite of the hardships the country has faced in the post-revolutionary era. The obstacles faced by Cuba have largely been due to the hostility of the United States and the Americans’ persistent attempts to undermine the achievements of the Cuban revolution.

An important aspect of Cuban healthcare has been the role of Cuba’s military doctors in providing health services to insurgent movements in Africa, a process that began when Cuba began offering support to anti-colonial resistance forces on the African continent in the 1960s. Cuban physicians involved in Africa often traveled clandestinely in order to avoid detection by Western intelligence services or those of colonial and neo-colonial governments on the continent. African resistance leaders often preferred that Cuba send black doctors so that the Cuban physicians would more easily blend in with the local population. The role of Cuban doctors in establishing healthcare services in impoverished African nations such as Angola, which was involved in an intense anti-imperialist struggle in the 1970s and 1980s, attests to the quality of the Cuban healthcare system and its exportability to other nations. Cuba faced a predictable crisis after the fall of the Soviet Union, which occurred during a time when the AIDS crisis was also presenting challenges to Cuba’s healthcare system.  Cuba responded to the economic crisis of the post-Cold War era through the implementation of changes reminiscent of those adopted by Lenin during the period of the New Economic Policy.

Aside from the interesting overview of the history of post-revolutionary Cuban healthcare provided by Fitz, the discussion of medical education in Cuba is also quite fascinating. Fitz’s examination of Cuban medical training is based in part on his daughter’s experience as a student at the ELAM, or Latin American School of Medicine. ELAM was established by the Cubans and provides opportunity for students from around the world to study medicine on the condition that ELAM graduates serve as healthcare workers in an underserved part of the world upon the completion of their studies. Such a concept could theoretically be transplanted to the US where the medical education of students could be publicly funded in return for medical service in underserved communities.

Fitz provides an interesting profile of 13 students attending ELAM and their activities, including the participation of ELAM students in disaster relief activities such as the Haitian earthquake of 2010. During the first two decades of the 21st century, Cuban healthcare has continued to face a range of challenges. For example, dengue fever and mosquito-borne illnesses are common to Cuba’s tropical environment. Fitz describes the efforts of Mariela Castro, daughter of Fidel’s brother Raul to challenge discrimination against women, gender, and sexual minorities in Cuba. He likewise describes his own participation in Cuba’s March Against Homophobia in 2012. Post-revolutionary Cuba has a regrettable history of discrimination and repression directed toward sexual preference which the nation has fortunately made bold efforts to overcome in more recent years. Cuba has continued to provide much needed assistance to African nations in response to challenges such as the Ebola crisis in West Africa in 2014.

Clearly, Cuba’s achievements in the development of its healthcare system in the decades since the revolution have been remarkable. Fitz’s discussion of these achievements is not only thorough but well-documented from appropriately cited source material. The analysis of Cuban healthcare that Fitz provides is based on a synthesis of both scholarly research drawing from the relevant literature, including both English language and Spanish language sources, and the experiential research of Fitz and members of his family. If nothing else, Cuban Health Care: The Ongoing Revolution is an excellent representation of mixed method scholarship which includes painstaking documentation of the claims being made concerning the accomplishments of Cuban healthcare. Perhaps the most compelling aspect of the book is the statistical data that Fitz provides for the purpose of supporting his claims.

Astonishingly, Cuba has in recent decades managed to outperform the United States in a range of critical areas pertaining to general public health. As of the early 2000s, 45% of Cuban physicians were family doctors living in the same neighborhoods as their patients. The typical patient wait time at a clinic was 15 minutes. In the year 2000, Cuba’s infant mortality rate was 6.3 per 100,000 births compared with 7.1 for the United States. By the year 2017, infant mortality in Cuba had dropped to 4.1 per 100,000 births as opposed to 5.7 for the United States. Cuba has made comparable progress regarding life expectancy. In 1960, shortly after the revolution, Cuba’s average life expectancy was 64.2 years compared to 69. 8 years in the United States. By 2016, Cuba had slightly passed the United States with an average life expectancy of 79 years compared to 78.5 years for the United States.

A reasonable standard with which a society’s healthcare system can be evaluated is the combination of infant mortality rates and life expectancy that is experienced. One of the great achievements of modern civilization is the dramatic increase in life expectancy. During the height of its empire, ancient Rome’s life expectancy was only 48 years. In many historic societies, life expectancy was only in the range of 30 years. Low life expectancy rates were partially rooted in high rates of infant mortality and deaths from childhood diseases. In many families, a third to a half of the children would not survive until adulthood. Indeed, it was during the era of rising living standards at the dawn of modernity that the status of children began to increase dramatically with practices such as infanticide, child slavery, and child labor experiencing a significant decline.

Within the context of American political discourse, American healthcare is often touted as being “the best in the world” as opposed to supposedly backward nations of the Global South or “socialist” countries supposedly hampered by the ills of bureaucratization and inefficiency. However, Don Fitz describes how Cuba has been able to provide higher quality healthcare to its citizens than the United States in spite of the fact that Cuba spends only 4 to 5 percent per individual on healthcare compared to the United States. Indeed, some of the voluminous facts that Fitz provides would be comical if they were not so tragic. For example, an average hospital stay in Cuba costs $5.49 per day as opposed to $1,944 in the United States. It has been widely documented that medical bankruptcy is the leading cause of bankruptcy in the US. Fitz manages to marshal a vast range of evidence in support of his thesis that US healthcare is largely an elaborate corporate-perpetrated scam that frequently pales in comparison to Cuban healthcare, which often produces superior results at a tiny fraction of the costs.

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Keith Preston is a self-identified “anarcho-pluralist” who has published six books, including Attack the System: A New Anarchist Perspective for the 21st Century (2016). Keith resides in Richmond, Virginia, United States. He received degrees in Religious Studies, History, and Sociology from Virginia Commonwealth University. He is the founder and chief editor of AttacktheSystem.Com. He has been interviewed on numerous radio programs and internet broadcasts, and appeared as a guest analyst on Russia Today, Sputnik, Press TV, and the BBC.

For months, Donald Trump has been mounting a preemptive strike against the democratic election process. He signals his intent to manipulate — indeed, steal — the presidential election in the event that Joe Biden wins. With no evidence to support him, Trump repeats the mantra “voter fraud” to lay the groundwork for political, legal and extra-legal challenges to a Biden victory. In an unprecedented move, Trump refused to commit to a peaceful transfer of power as he orders right-wing militias armed with assault weapons to “stand back and stand by.”

Now that Donald Trump has tested positive for COVID-19, all bets are off. After months of recklessly discouraging social distancing and mask wearing, the chickens have come home to roost. Trump has tried mightily to change the subject away from the coronavirus and his criminal responsibility for more than 207,000 deaths and over 7 million people in the United States who have the virus. But with Trump’s infection, that strategy is now dead.

The timeline of Trump’s positive diagnosis is unclear. Trump remains hospitalized at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center and the White House has issued conflicting and contradictory reports about his condition. Doctors say we may not know the course of Trump’s illness for a week to 10 days.

If Trump’s symptoms worsen, he could temporarily hand over the presidential reins to Vice President Mike Pence under the 25th Amendment. In the event that Trump becomes very ill and refuses to put Pence in charge, the 25th Amendment allows Pence and a majority of the cabinet, or a body Congress lawfully designates, to declare Trump unable to discharge the duties of the presidency. Pence would then take over. If Trump tells Congress that “no inability exists,” two-thirds of the members of the Senate and the House of Representatives could decide that Trump is still unable to discharge his presidential duties, and Pence would remain acting president until after the election. He could become the GOP nominee or the Republican National Committee could select a new nominee. Ballots already cast for Trump in early voting would be transferred to his replacement. Each state would decide how to proceed as there is probably insufficient time to print ballots with the name of a new nominee. If Trump dies, Pence would become acting president and if he is unable to serve, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is next in line.

The election will not be decided on November 3. Since there are an unprecedented number of people voting by mail-in ballots due to the pandemic, it could take weeks to finish resolving challenged ballots and counting the votes. Nevertheless, Trump, mindful that mail-in ballots generally tilt toward Democratic candidates, has insisted that the winner be declared on November 3.

Trump could order postal inspectors to impound mail-in ballots by claiming forgery or foreign fraud, so they might not be counted.

The Trump campaign is mobilizing “an army for Trump,” calling on “all able-bodied men and women to stop the election from being stolen by Democrats.” Although it’s unclear just what this army is being recruited to do, a coalition of progressive organizations has mobilized more than 6,000 “election defenders.”

Are we doomed to suffer a coup d’état and four more years of Trump’s bullying, racism, misogyny, cruelty, lying and xenophobia? Or can his assault on the very essence of democracy be stopped?

A Looming Constitutional Crisis

As Biden has been leading in the polls, Trump confirmed at a September 25 rally in Virginia that if he loses the election, “We’re not going to stand for it.” Reiterating his false claim of voter fraud from mail-in ballots, Trump told the crowd, “We’re not going to lose this except if they cheat.”

According to the Transition Integrity Project (TIP), “Trump is likely to contest the result by both legal and extra-legal means, in an attempt to hold onto power.” The bipartisan group of experts, which conducted a series of election crisis scenario exercises, warns, “The potential for violent conflict is high, particularly since Trump encourages his supporters to take up arms.”

TIP’s report says “there is a chance” that “Trump will attempt to convince legislatures and/or governors to take actions — including illegal actions — to defy the popular vote.”

The election is actually multiple elections. Each state controls its own election process. Harvard professor Daniel Carpenter described a scenario in which Biden “wins a plausible victory and Republicans move to undermine it.” He posed a hypothetical situation in Arizona or North Carolina where Biden wins a state majority but the state legislature decides to give their delegates to Trump.

Barton Gellman reported in The Atlantic that “the Trump campaign is discussing contingency plans to bypass election results and appoint loyal electors in battleground states where Republicans hold the legislative majority.”

If states refuse to certify or report slates of electors to the Electoral College, that will result in “underpopulation” and force the election into the House of Representatives, according to Carpenter. “[I]f the Electoral College is underpopulated and the courts don’t intervene, or maybe even if they do, the election is thrown to the House,” he said. The states would then vote by delegations. The Democrats have a majority of members, but the Republicans have a majority of delegations because each state has equal voting power and there are more red states than blue states.

The electoral votes are to be opened before a Joint Session of Congress on January 6, 2021. But the Electoral Count Act, which governs the counting of electoral votes, is rife with ambiguities.

A constitutional crisis could result if the legislature of a state submits a vote certificate that is different from that which the state’s Democratic governor submits, and the GOP-controlled Senate disagrees with the Democratic-controlled House. The conflict would invariably end up in the Supreme Court.

“I would hope that the Supreme Court would make the winner of the Electoral College the President if it came to that,” Erwin Chemerinsky, dean of Berkeley Law School, told Truthout. “If not, theoretically it could depend on the military. I am skeptical that state governors and governments could do much.”

Trump wants Amy Coney Barrett on the high court to resolve just such a dispute in his favor. Barrett did research and provided assistance with briefing for Bush v. Gore, in which a 5-4 majority of the Supreme Court overturned the Florida Supreme Court’s order of a statewide manual recount in a very close election.

Barrett, who helped install George W. Bush as president, would likely be a loyal foot soldier in Trump’s army as well.

But Senate Majority Leader McConnell’s plan for a rushed Senate confirmation of Barrett by October 26 could be derailed by the loss of his slim Republican majority. The GOP has a 52-48 majority in the Senate. Thus far, two Senate Judiciary Committee members, Sens. Mike Lee (R-Utah) and Thom Tillis (R-North Carolina), have tested positive for coronavirus. Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wisconsin) also had a positive test. Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) has indicated she would vote against Barrett’s confirmation and Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) opposes filling Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s seat before the election. With five GOP senators not voting for confirmation, Barrett would not be confirmed.

Trump and Biden have unequal power to challenge the results of the election. Rosa Brooks, co-founder of TIP, contrasted Trump’s “awesome coercive powers” with Biden’s lack of power to contest the election results. “Joe Biden can call a press conference; Donald Trump could call on the 82nd Airborne,” Brooks told Geoffrey Skelley at FiveThirtyEight.

Will the Military Facilitate or Halt Trump’s Coup?

But would the 82nd Airborne help Trump illegally overturn the election results?

Service members have a duty to obey lawful orders. But they also have a duty to disobey unlawful orders and a law that violates the Constitution or a federal statute is an unlawful order.

Indeed, Pentagon officials said in late September that top military leaders could resign rather than take on protesters in the streets in the event of election unrest.

On June 1, Trump threatened to invoke the 1807 Insurrection Act and deploy active-duty troops to quell Black Lives Matter protests. In response to Trump’s deployment of National Guard troops to Washington, D.C., and his threats to deploy federal troops more widely, 89 former defense officials wrote on June 5, “We are alarmed at how the president is betraying [his] oath [to support and defend the Constitution] by threatening to order members of the U.S. military to violate the rights of their fellow Americans.” They said that Trump gave governors “a stark choice: either end the protests that continue to demand equal justice under our laws, or expect that he will send active-duty military units into their states.” The former defense officials urged Trump “to immediately end his plans to send active-duty military personnel into cities as agents of law enforcement, or to employ them or any another military or police forces in ways that undermine the constitutional rights of Americans.”

Although some congressional Republicans have pushed back against Trump’s suggestion that the winner of the election may never be known, it remains to be seen whether they will resist his attempted coup. Thus far, they have walked in near unanimous lockstep with Trump, notably during his impeachment proceeding and his Supreme Court nomination of Barrett even as votes are being cast.

Although Trump’s COVID-19 outbreak is the wild card here, the prospects for a peaceful transition to a Biden administration if Trump is in charge are dubious.

Ian Bassin, executive director of Protect Democracy, is optimistic, however. “For those worried that Donald Trump could single-handedly defy the election results and hold on to power, fear not — he cannot do that,” Bassin wrote in an email to Truthout. “In order to do that, he’d need accomplices at every level, throughout the country — in the executive branch, in the Congress, in the courts, in state legislatures, in the media.” But a landslide in favor of Biden could make potential accomplices feel less confident in supporting Trump if he were to claim that the results are ambiguous or fraudulent.

Voting is absolutely critical for democracy. But at the end of the day, stopping a coup attempt will depend on far more than the ballot, and will require creative and courageous acts of civic and political engagement from all of us.

Let’s get to it!

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Copyright © Truthout. Reprinted with permission.

Marjorie Cohn is professor emerita at Thomas Jefferson School of Law, former president of the National Lawyers Guild, deputy secretary general of the International Association of Democratic Lawyers and a member of the advisory board of Veterans for Peace. Her most recent book is Drones and Targeted Killing: Legal, Moral, and Geopolitical Issues. She is a frequent contributor to Global Research.

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The testimony portion of the extradition hearing of Julian Assange, taking place in the United Kingdom, concluded after four weeks. Judge Vanessa Baraitser, who presided over the hearing, will not announce her decision until January. Until then, Assange will remain in detention in Belmarsh Prison.

Under conditions that violated Assange’s rights and his ability to defend himself, his legal team made a clear case that for multiple reasons the only just solution is to free Assange. However, Judge Baraitser has not ruled favorably for him in her past decisions or even in this hearing.

At the start, Assange’s lawyers requested a delay until January because they had not been able to meet adequately with him. Their request was denied. During the hearing, Assange was forced to sit in a glass box without access to his lawyers.

Over the past four weeks, people demonstrated their support for Julian Assange outside Old Bailey, where the hearing was held, and around the world. Almost 200 lawyers and politicians from 27 countries, including 13 past and present heads of state, demanded his immediate release.  We must continue to raise awareness and public pressure to free Assange.

Press Freedom Under Attack

The persecution of Julian Assange matters to all of us because this is bigger than Assange. He is being targeted and tortured for doing what every honest journalist and publisher does – reporting the truth and informing the public about what is being done by their governments and corporations.

Many media outlets, especially if they conduct investigative journalism, provide tools and information for people to leak information to them. The difference with Assange is that he created a tool, Wikileaks, that could be used by everyone around the world to leak information anonymously and to read information that had been leaked. Wikileaks verified the information and redacted portions that could result in personal harm, but other than that the information was freely available to the public. Assange is a strong believer in transparency and our right to know.

This is what outraged the power structure. They could not control access to information. They could not stop people from learning about their war crimes and corruption. So they have been waging a war on Assange ever since in multiple nefarious ways and so far he has survived. But this is too much for one person to have to bear. That is why we need to rally around Assange. One way to do that is to support the fund created by his partner, Stella Morris.

Kevin Zeese, the now-deceased co-director of Popular Resistance, was a supporter of Julian Assange. He served as an adviser to the board of the Courage Foundation, which runs Defend Wikileaks. In this 2018 interview with Elizabeth Lea Vos, Kevin explains why Assange’s case is critical:

“Julian Assange’s case is the John Peter Zenger case of the twenty-first century. John Peter Zenger was a publisher who was prosecuted before the American Revolution because he published articles that were critical of the British-appointed governor of New York. They weren’t false, they were just critical. In those days, there was no defense to slander as far as telling the truth goes. You say something bad about the government or the king, you get punished for it. Zenger’s lawyers decided to use a defense that had not been used before, which was to go right to the jury, avoid the judge and show that Zenger was publishing the truth. Zenger was found not guilty by the jury very quickly after having been held in jail for eight months and undergoing abuse. People see that case as where a lot of our freedom of the press rights come from and the concept that truth is a defense. Julian Assange is revisiting that issue now in the twenty-first century when we have a lot of different technology that allows for truth to be told. Wikileaks is a major breakthrough in how journalism works and what information we are allowed to see. It is unacceptable that the most important publisher in this century is silenced. Whether or not you like Assange personally, the work he has done is critical to our future.”

Assange Supporters at the White House, June, 2018. Gateway Pundit.

Why Julian Assange Must be Freed

During the extradition hearing, multiple reasons for freeing Assange and dropping the charges against him were explained. Any one of them should be enough to stop this persecution, but taken together, they demonstrate undeniably that extradition to the United States would violate Assange’s rights and that he has not committed a crime.

1. Julian Assange has been denied his right to a fair trial. While in prison, Assange had limited access to his lawyers. They were only able to speak occasionally over the phone and with a bad connection. Assange’s lawyer, Mark Summers, argued that Assange “alone has the knowledge to build a defense.” And, Assange had not been able to read new charges made against him nor had his lawyers had time to prepare a defense to those new charges. And his hearing was structured so the public and press had extremely limited access. This is unacceptable for a case of such significance. Similarly, Assange would not have a fair trial if he were extradited to the US.

2. Assange did not commit a crime. The United States argued that Assange was not a journalist and therefore not protected under the First Amendment, but experts testified that he was engaged in ‘journalistic activity,’ and that is what matters. Journalists routinely ask sources for access to private information and publish such information. This is all that Assange did. If he is found guilty, then other journalists and media outlets that published material from Wikileaks should also be found guilty. Finding Assange guilty of publishing the truth would have a chilling effect on the willingness of journalists anywhere in the world to similarly expose war crimes and corruption.

3. Assange’s case is political, not criminal. Testimony exposed that the case against Assange is purely political. The judge admitted it herself by stating that she would issue her decision after the election. A witness revealed that the Trump administration, acting through former Congressman Dana Rohrbacher and German Ambassador Richard Grenell, offered to not prosecute if Assange would reveal his sources. When Assange refused, the administration started the process of investigating and charging him. Also, the United States directed the Ecuadorian government to turn Assange over to police.

4. The United States violated Assange’s privacy. In the final week of the hearing, employees from US Global, a Spanish security firm that was spying on Assange through video and audio while he was living in the Ecuadorian embassy in London and providing it to the CIA, testified that they were pushed to do more. One witness said the company wanted to install live stream that would be fed directly to the CIA but he stopped it. The witnesses added that their company was pushed by the CIA to leave a door open at the embassy so Assange could be kidnapped and to poison him.

5. Extradition to the United States puts Assange’s health and safety at great risk. The United States has no regard for Julian Assange’s life. Doctors and experts testified that Julian is in poor health and suffers depression and suicidal thoughts. If he were extradited to the United States, where he faces 175 years in prison, not only would he have a unfair trial but he would be held in torturous conditions, in a tiny isolation cell, which would worsen his condition and risk his life. It is illegal to extradite a person to a place that endangers their life. That is why Assange originally sought asylum in the Ecuadorian Embassy and it was granted by the Correa government.

The United States lawyers tried to paint Assange as a different person than what he is and bullied and degraded the defense witnesses. They did that because the facts are not on their side. A major argument by the US is that Assange helped Chelsea Manning get the data from a computer, but a cyber security expert demonstrated that was false. The only just solution is to free Julian Assange now.

The Fight to Free Assange Continues

The extradition hearing is over but the fight is not over. This is the time to escalate our pressure to free Assange. Public opinion matters and influences courts, whether they admit it or not.

We need to continue to raise awareness of the injustice and unconstitutionality of what the United States is doing to Assange, the illegality of risking his life and the impact this extradition and prosecution in the United States will have on press freedom and our right to know around the world.

Continue to talk about this, write about this, speak about this, organize web forums, like this one, write letters of solidarity, and protest for Julian Assange. Be creative. Check out the Defend Wikileaks website and the orange and gray graphic above for ideas. The only way we will surely lose is by not trying.

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Nell’aeroporto militare di Ghedi (Brescia) stanno iniziando i lavori per realizzare la principale base operativa dei caccia F-35A dell’Aeronautica italiana armati di bombe nucleari. La Matarrese spa di Bari, che si è aggiudicata l’appalto con un’offerta di 91 milioni di euro, costruirà un grande hangar per la manutenzione dei caccia (oltre 6000 m²) e una palazzina che ospiterà il comando e i simulatori di volo, dotata di un perfetto isolamento termoacustico «al fine di evitare rivelazioni di conversazioni».

Verranno realizzate due linee di volo, ciascuna con 15 hangaretti al cui interno vi saranno i caccia pronti al decollo.  Ciò conferma quanto pubblicammo tre anni fa (il manifesto, 28 novembre 2017), ossia che il progetto (varato dall’allora ministra della Difesa Pinotti) prevedeva lo schieramento di almeno 30 caccia F-35A.

L’area in cui verranno dislocati gli F-35, recintata e sorvegliata, sarà separata dal resto dell’aeroporto e top secret. Il perché è chiaro: accanto ai nuovi caccia saranno dislocate a Ghedi, in un deposito segreto che non compare nell’appalto, le nuove bombe nucleari statunitensi B61-12.

Come le attuali B-61 di cui sono armati i Tornado PA-200 del 6° Stormo, le B61-12 saranno controllate dalla speciale unità statunitense (704^th Munitions Support Squadron della U.S. Air Force), «responsabile del ricevimento, stoccaggio e mantenimento delle armi della riserva bellica Usa destinate al 6° Stormo Nato dell’Aeronautica italiana». La stessa unità dell’Aeronautica Usa ha il compito di «sostenere direttamente la missione di attacco» del 6° Stormo.

Piloti italiani vengono già addestrati, nelle basi aeree di Luke in Arizona e Eglin in Florida, all’uso degli F-35A anche per missioni di attacco nucleare sotto comando Usa.

Caccia dello stesso tipo, armati o comunque armabili con le B61-12, sono dislocati nella base di Amendola (Foggia), dove hanno già superato le 5000 ore di volo. Vi saranno, oltre a questi, gli F-35 della U.S. Air Force schierati ad Aviano con le B61-12.

Il nuovo caccia F-35A e la nuova bomba nucleare B61-12 costituiscono un sistema d’arma integrato: l’uso dell’aereo comporta l’uso della bomba.  Il ministro della Difesa Guerini (Pd) ha confermato che l’Italia mantiene l’impegno ad acquistare 90 caccia F-35, di cui 60 di modello A a capacità nucleare.

La partecipazione al programma dell’F-35, quale partner di secondo livello, rafforza l’ancoraggio dell’Italia agli Stati uniti. L’industria bellica italiana, capeggiata dalla Leonardo che gestisce l’impianto degli F-35 a Cameri (Novara), viene ancor più integrata nel gigantesco complesso militare-industriale Usa capeggiato dalla Lockheed Martin, la maggiore industria bellica del mondo, costruttrice dell’F-35.

Allo stesso tempo l’Italia – Stato non-nucleare aderente al Trattato di non-proliferazione che gli vieta di avere armi nucleari sul proprio territorio – svolge la sempre più pericolosa funzione di base avanzata della strategia nucleare Usa/Nato contro la Russia e altri paesi.

Dato che ciascun aereo può trasportare nella stiva interna 2 B61-12, solo i 30 F-35A di Ghedi avranno una capacità di almeno 60 bombe nucleari. Secondo la Federazione degli scienziati americani, la nuova bomba «tattica» B61-12 per gli F-35, che gli Usa schiereranno in Italia e altri paesi europei dal 2022, essendo più precisa e in posizione ravvicinata agli obiettivi, «avrà la stessa capacità militare delle bombe strategiche dislocate negli Stati uniti».

Vi è infine la questione, ancora indefinita, dei costi. Il Servizio di ricerca del Congresso degli Stati uniti, nel maggio 2020, stima il prezzo medio di un F-35 in 108 milioni di dollari, precisando però che è «il prezzo dell’aereo senza motore», il cui costo è di circa 22 milioni. Una volta acquistato un F-35, anche a prezzo minore come promette per il futuro la Lockheed Martin, inizia la spesa per il suo continuo ammodernamento, per la formazione degli equipaggi e per il suo uso.

Un’ora di volo di un F-35A – documenta la US Air Force – costa oltre 42000 dollari. Ciò significa che solo le 5000 ore di volo effettuate dagli F-35 di Amendola sono costate alle nostre casse pubbliche 180 milioni di euro.

Manlio Dinucci

US President Donald Trump will need all the points he can score in the run up to next month’s presidential elections where he will face off against Democrat candidate Joe Biden. Events such as war or threats to a national leader have a psychological effect on a populace and unites people. It is still not clear at the moment whether voters sympathize with Trump after it was announced on October 2 that he and First Lady Melania Trump had contracted COVID-19. However, any person’s illness naturally invokes a certain level of sympathy, even when we completely disagree with them politically.

Despite two weeks of necessary quarantine, it is unlikely that this will weaken Trump’s re-election campaign. It is well known that he is an avid Twitter user. We can expect him to not only write more on Twitter, but also increase his appearances on television. In addition, the president can increase livestream speeches as he did in the spring when domestic travel was restricted because of COVID-19.

The latest survey by “John Zogby Strategies/EMI Research Solutions” showed that Biden “holds on to a two-point lead over President Donald Trump, 49% to 47% with 4% not sure,” which is the Democrat candidate’s smallest advantage in the polls so far. The research also shows that the chances for Trump’s re-election as head of the White House has increased.

This is a sign that Trump’s infection and noisy performance in the first debate with Biden did not harm his chances for re-election. The research challenged the media narrative that Biden had strengthened his leadership over Trump. 47%, according to the John Zogby data, is actually one point higher than the percentage of votes he received in 2016 (46.1%).

According to John Zogby, Trump “appears to have consolidated his base of Whites, parents, conservatives, men, and his own party’s voters. Joe Biden looks as if he is on his way to doing the same with his base. His numbers among Hispanics are respectable but not quite at the 66%-67% he really needs. The same with Blacks. His 86% is better than our last poll but he needs to hit 90%.”

With this, Biden is likely to continue his campaign as planned. Trump’s infection still has not managed to fully distract Americans from the first debate that was mired and criticized for its rude nature. However, even after the debate, the results show that Trump is certainly gaining on Biden. The Democrat candidate had a solid advantage in the past two polls, showing that the race is intensifying. In the poll conducted on July 8, Biden led Trump with 49% to 42%, and in the last poll, published on August 29, Biden had an advantage of 6 points, 48% against 42%.

Yesterday, Trump made a tweet that created controversy, saying:

“Don’t be afraid of Covid. Don’t let it dominate your life. We have developed, under the Trump Administration, some really great drugs & knowledge. I feel better than I did 20 years ago!”

Many social media users were quick to highlight that there are about 7.5 million total infections in the US that has resulted in over 210,000 deaths because of his continuous lacklustre response to the pandemic. Yet, despite social media outrage, it must be remembered that platforms like Twitter only represent a small segment of the voting population.

CNN claims that such tweets “plays right into Biden’s strategy of offering the nation a calm, sensible and presidential alternative by simply acknowledging reality.” However, this has not been reflected in the polls as Trump continues to gain on Biden, showing that just as in 2016, there is a huge divide between the reality of voter feelings and mainstream media claims.

As said before, it is natural for humans to sympathize with those who are sick. Trump has presented himself with a strong and decisive image in the face of the deadly disease, especially given the American president’s age (74) and obesity (110.7kg), which puts him in a high-risk range. By continuing to campaign, albeit via untraditional methods, does not only keep Trump in the race against Biden, but has actually strengthened his position by hitting sympathy cords with swing voters and presenting a strong image to his voter base.

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This article was originally published on InfoBrics.

Paul Antonopoulos is an independent geopolitical analyst.

Featured image is from InfoBrics

First published on August 30, 2020

At the outset of the pandemic, the CDC had been instructed to change the methodology regarding Death Certificates with a view to artificially inflating the numbers of “Covid deaths”. This is confirmed by the H. Ealy, M. McEvoy study quoted below.

The latest CDC report does not acknowledge a 94% “error” in the data pertaining to “Covid deaths”, It nonetheless confirms that 94% of the deaths attributed to Covid have “comorbidities”,(i.e. deaths dues other causes).

For 6% of the deaths, COVID-19 was the only cause mentioned. For deaths with conditions or causes in addition to COVID-19, on average, there were 2.6 additional conditions or causes per death. The number of deaths with each condition or cause is shown for all deaths and by age groups.

When the Covid data is reported, the other causes of death are simply not mentioned. It should be understood that the RT-PCR test used to “identify” Covid  (PCR positive cases) is totally meaningless. A positive PCR does not confirm that the patient has the Covid disease.

A careful review of the CDC report remains to be established. The situation regarding data collection and reporting regarding cause of death remains unclear.

An earlier report published by Global Research confirmed the following:

“The 2003 guidelines for establishing death certificates had been cancelled. “Had the CDC used its industry standard, Medical Examiners’ and Coroners’ Handbook on Death Registration and Fetal Death Reporting Revision 2003, as it has for all other causes of death for the last 17 years, the COVID-19 fatality count would be approximately 90.2% lower  than it currently is.”

For further details see:  Covid-19: Questionable Policies, Manipulated Rules of Data Collection and Reporting. Is It Safe for Students to Return to School? By H. Ealy, M. McEvoy, and et al., August 09, 2020

The unspoken objective of this methodological change was to inflate the Covid death statistics and sustain the fear campaign.

For more details on the CDC Report, read Jack Davis’ article (WesternJournal.com) below

Michel Chossudovsky, Global Research, August 31, 2020

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CDC Now Says 94% of COVID Deaths Had an Underlying Condition

by Jack Davis

WesternJournal.com

August 30, 2020

A new report from the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shows that in 94 percent of the cases of those who died from COVID-19, another disease was also at work on the victim.

“For 6% of the deaths, COVID-19 was the only cause mentioned,” the CDC stated in its report, under the heading “Comorbidities.”

“For deaths with conditions or causes in addition to COVID-19, on average, there were 2.6 additional conditions or causes per death,” the report continued.

The report showed that in 18,116 of 42,587 deaths in the 75-84 age group, the individual who died also had the flu or pneumonia, while in 15,100 cases the underlying condition was respiratory failure.

Overall, of the 161, 392 deaths covered by the report, 42 percent (68,004) of those who died also had the flu or pneumonia while 34 percent (54,803) had an underlying condition of respiratory failure.

[This is not surprising: The RT-PCR test used in relation to Covid-19 is identical to that used in relation to seasonal influenza, M.C.]

Underlying conditions like diabetes mean greater risk for getting or transmitting COVID-19 within the home, finds a CDC study. Learn more: https://t.co/pN20Dpfd22 pic.twitter.com/3N1Ju9vO3K

— CDC (@CDCgov) August 18, 2020

Diabetes was an underlying condition in 16 percent of the deaths (25,936 people) while various heart-related conditions including cardiac arrest, ischemic heart disease (also known as hardening of the arteries), cardiac arrhythmia and heart disease (58,687 people) were found in 36 percent of those who died.

In June, the CDC listed as high-risk individuals for COVID-19 those who had chronic kidney disease; COPD (chronic obstructive pulmonary disease); obesity (BMI of 30 or higher); immunocompromised state (weakened immune system) from solid organ transplant; serious heart conditions, such as heart failure, coronary artery disease, or cardiomyopathies; sickle cell disease; Type 2 diabetes.

Although the CDC’s initial guidance suggested those over 65 were at high risk, the CDC later revised that to note than risk increases with age and that there is no single age at which risk suddenly rises.

In comments released at the time, CDC Director Dr. Robert Redfield said risk “is a continuum.”

If you have certain underlying medical conditions, you are at increased risk of severe illness from #COVID19, no matter your age. Find tips to protect yourself: https://t.co/0go5iZGIQf pic.twitter.com/hPJRXRUYbY

— CDC (@CDCgov) June 29, 2020

“Based on what we’ve learned, we now understand that as you get older, your risk for severe disease, hospitalization, and death increases.  We also updated the list of underlying health conditions that can put you at higher risk for severe disease, hospitalization, and death, based on the latest review of scientific evidence to date,” he said.

“A key point is that we want to make sure that people know that as your numbers of underlying medical conditions increase, your risk of severe illness from COVID also increases,” he said.

As of Sunday afternoon, the coronavirus had infected almost 6 million Americans, according to the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center, and roughly 25 million worldwide.

As of Sunday, 843,826 people had been reported as killed by the virus, with 182,909 of those being Americans.

Spread of the disease resulted in mass lockdowns across the country.

Risk is one of the factors that will go into distributing COVID-19 vaccines once those that are now in trials are ready for the market, according to CNBC.

“At first, there will likely be a limited supply of one or more of the Covid-19 vaccines, because limited doses will be available,” Redfield said Friday, CNBC reported. “It’s important that the early vaccines are distributed in a fair, ethical and transparent way.”

The list of those to be vaccinated will include health care workers, those considered essential workers at the time a vaccine is ready for distribution, and those considered at high risk due to age and underlying health conditions, according to the CDC.

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Jack Davis is a freelance writer who joined The Western Journal in July 2015 and chronicled the campaign that saw President Donald Trump elected. Since then, he has written extensively for The Western Journal on the Trump administration as well as foreign policy and military issues.

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“You gotta remember, establishment, it’s just a name for evil. The monster doesn’t care whether it kills all the students or whether there’s a revolution. It’s not thinking logically, it’s out of control.”—John Lennon (1969)

John Lennon, born 80 years ago on October 9, 1940, was a musical genius and pop cultural icon.

He was also a vocal peace protester and anti-war activist, and a high-profile example of the lengths to which the Deep State will go to persecute those who dare to challenge its authority.

Long before Julian Assange, Edward Snowden and Chelsea Manning were being castigated for blowing the whistle on the government’s war crimes and the National Security Agency’s abuse of its surveillance powers, it was Lennon who was being singled out for daring to speak truth to power about the government’s warmongering, his phone calls monitored and data files illegally collected on his activities and associations.

For a while, at least, Lennon became enemy number one in the eyes of the U.S. government.

Years after Lennon’s assassination it would be revealed that the FBI had collected 281 pages of files on him, including song lyrics. J. Edgar Hoover, head of the FBI at the time, directed the agency to spy on the musician. There were also various written orders calling on government agents to frame Lennon for a drug bust. “The FBI’s files on Lennon … read like the writings of a paranoid goody-two-shoes,” observed reporter Jonathan Curiel.

Confidential (here declassified and censored) letter by J. Edgar Hoover about FBI surveillance of John Lennon (Public Domain)

As the New York Times notes, “Critics of today’s domestic surveillance object largely on privacy grounds. They have focused far less on how easily government surveillance can become an instrument for the people in power to try to hold on to power. ‘The U.S. vs. John Lennon’ … is the story not only of one man being harassed, but of a democracy being undermined.”

Indeed, all of the many complaints we have about government today—surveillance, militarism, corruption, harassment, SWAT team raids, political persecution, spying, overcriminalization, etc.—were present in Lennon’s day and formed the basis of his call for social justice, peace and a populist revolution.

For all of these reasons, the U.S. government was obsessed with Lennon, who had learned early on that rock music could serve a political end by proclaiming a radical message. More importantly, Lennon saw that his music could mobilize the public and help to bring about change. Lennon believed in the power of the people. Unfortunately, as Lennon recognized: “The trouble with government as it is, is that it doesn’t represent the people. It controls them.”

However, as Martin Lewis writing for Time notes: “John Lennon was not God. But he earned the love and admiration of his generation by creating a huge body of work that inspired and led. The appreciation for him deepened because he then instinctively decided to use his celebrity as a bully pulpit for causes greater than his own enrichment or self-aggrandizement.”

For instance, in December 1971 at a concert in Ann Arbor, Mich., Lennon took to the stage and in his usual confrontational style belted out “John Sinclair,” a song he had written about a man sentenced to 10 years in prison for possessing two marijuana cigarettes. Within days of Lennon’s call for action, the Michigan Supreme Court ordered Sinclair released.

What Lennon did not know at the time was that government officials had been keeping strict tabs on the ex-Beatle they referred to as “Mr. Lennon.” Incredibly, FBI agents were in the audience at the Ann Arbor concert, “taking notes on everything from the attendance (15,000) to the artistic merits of his new song.”

The U.S. government, steeped in paranoia, was spying on Lennon.

By March 1971, when his “Power to the People” single was released, it was clear where Lennon stood. Having moved to New York City that same year, Lennon was ready to participate in political activism against the U. S. government, the “monster” that was financing the war in Vietnam.

The release of Lennon’s Sometime in New York City album, which contained a radical anti-government message in virtually every song and depicted President Richard Nixon and Chinese Chairman Mao Tse-tung dancing together nude on the cover, only fanned the flames of the conflict to come.

The official U.S. war against Lennon began in earnest in 1972 after rumors surfaced that Lennon planned to embark on a U.S. concert tour that would combine rock music with antiwar organizing and voter registration. Nixon, fearing Lennon’s influence on about 11 million new voters (1972 was the first year that 18-year-olds could vote), had the ex-Beatle served with deportation orders “in an effort to silence him as a voice of the peace movement.”

Then again, the FBI has had a long history of persecuting, prosecuting and generally harassing activists, politicians, and cultural figures. Most notably among the latter are such celebrated names as folk singer Pete Seeger, painter Pablo Picasso, comic actor and filmmaker Charlie Chaplin, comedian Lenny Bruce and poet Allen Ginsberg.

Among those most closely watched by the FBI was Martin Luther King Jr., a man labeled by the FBI as “the most dangerous and effective Negro leader in the country.” With wiretaps and electronic bugs planted in his home and office, King was kept under constant surveillance by the FBI with the aim of “neutralizing” him. He even received letters written by FBI agents suggesting that he either commit suicide or the details of his private life would be revealed to the public. The FBI kept up its pursuit of King until he was felled by a hollow-point bullet to the head in 1968.

Recording “Give Peace a Chance” during the Bed-In for Peace at the Queen Elizabeth Hotel, Montreal (CC BY 2.5/Roy Kerwood)

While Lennon was not—as far as we know—being blackmailed into suicide, he was the subject of a four-year campaign of surveillance and harassment by the U.S. government (spearheaded by FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover), an attempt by President Richard Nixon to have him “neutralized” and deported. As Adam Cohen of the New York Times points out, “The F.B.I.’s surveillance of Lennon is a reminder of how easily domestic spying can become unmoored from any legitimate law enforcement purpose. What is more surprising, and ultimately more unsettling, is the degree to which the surveillance turns out to have been intertwined with electoral politics.”

As Lennon’s FBI file shows, memos and reports about the FBI’s surveillance of the anti-war activist had been flying back and forth between Hoover, the Nixon White House, various senators, the FBI and the U.S. Immigration Office.

Nixon’s pursuit of Lennon was relentless and in large part based on the misperception that Lennon and his comrades were planning to disrupt the 1972 Republican National Convention. The government’s paranoia, however, was misplaced.

Left-wing activists who were on government watch lists and who shared an interest in bringing down the Nixon Administration had been congregating at Lennon’s New York apartment. But when they revealed that they were planning to cause a riot, Lennon balked. As he recounted in a 1980 interview, “We said, We ain’t buying this. We’re not going to draw children into a situation to create violence so you can overthrow what? And replace it with what? . . . It was all based on this illusion, that you can create violence and overthrow what is, and get communism or get some right-wing lunatic or a left-wing lunatic. They’re all lunatics.”

Despite the fact that Lennon was not part of the “lunatic” plot, the government persisted in its efforts to have him deported. Equally determined to resist, Lennon dug in and fought back. Every time he was ordered out of the country, his lawyers delayed the process by filing an appeal. Finally, in 1976, Lennon won the battle to stay in the country when he was granted a green card. As he said afterwards, “I have a love for this country…. This is where the action is. I think we’ll just go home, open a tea bag, and look at each other.”

Lennon’s time of repose didn’t last long, however. By 1980, he had re-emerged with a new album and plans to become politically active again.

The old radical was back and ready to cause trouble. In his final interview on Dec. 8, 1980, Lennon mused, “The whole map’s changed and we’re going into an unknown future, but we’re still all here, and while there’s life there’s hope.”

The Deep State has a way of dealing with troublemakers, unfortunately. On Dec. 8, 1980, Mark David Chapman was waiting in the shadows when Lennon returned to his New York apartment building. As Lennon stepped outside the car to greet the fans congregating outside, Chapman, in an eerie echo of the FBI’s moniker for Lennon, called out, “Mr. Lennon!”

Lennon turned and was met with a barrage of gunfire as Chapman—dropping into a two-handed combat stance—emptied his .38-caliber pistol and pumped four hollow-point bullets into his back and left arm. Lennon stumbled, staggered forward and, with blood pouring from his mouth and chest, collapsed to the ground.

John Lennon was pronounced dead on arrival at the hospital. He had finally been “neutralized.”

Yet where those who neutralized the likes of John Lennon, Martin Luther King Jr., John F. Kennedy, Malcolm X, Robert Kennedy and others go wrong is in believing that you can murder a movement with a bullet and a madman.

Lennon and Ono performing at the John Sinclair Freedom Rally in December 1971 (Public Domain)

Thankfully, Lennon’s legacy lives on in his words, his music and his efforts to speak truth to power. As Yoko Ono shared in a 2014 letter to the parole board tasked with determining whether Chapman should be released: “A man of humble origin, [John Lennon] brought light and hope to the whole world with his words and music. He tried to be a good power for the world, and he was. He gave encouragement, inspiration and dreams to people regardless of their race, creed and gender.”

Sadly, not much has changed for the better in the world since Lennon walked among us.

Peace remains out of reach. Activism and whistleblowers continue to be prosecuted for challenging the government’s authority. Militarism is on the rise, with local police dressed like the military, all the while the governmental war machine continues to wreak havoc on innocent lives across the globe.

For those of us who joined with John Lennon to imagine a world of peace, it’s getting harder to reconcile that dream with the reality of the American police state.

Meanwhile, as I point out in my book Battlefield America: The War on the American People, those who dare to speak up are labeled dissidents, troublemakers, terrorists, lunatics, or mentally ill and tagged for surveillance, censorship, involuntary detention or, worse, even shot and killed in their own homes by militarized police.

As Lennon shared in a 1968 interview:

“I think all our society is run by insane people for insane objectives… I think we’re being run by maniacs for maniacal means. If anybody can put on paper what our government and the American government and the Russian… Chinese… what they are actually trying to do, and what they think they’re doing, I’d be very pleased to know what they think they’re doing. I think they’re all insane. But I’m liable to be put away as insane for expressing that. That’s what’s insane about it.”

So what’s the answer?

Lennon had a multitude of suggestions.

“If everyone demanded peace instead of another television set, then there’d be peace.”

“War is over if you want it.”

“Produce your own dream…. It’s quite possible to do anything, but not to put it on the leaders…. You have to do it yourself. That’s what the great masters and mistresses have been saying ever since time began. They can point the way, leave signposts and little instructions in various books that are now called holy and worshipped for the cover of the book and not for what it says, but the instructions are all there for all to see, have always been and always will be. There’s nothing new under the sun. All the roads lead to Rome. And people cannot provide it for you. I can’t wake you up. You can wake you up. I can’t cure you. You can cure you.”

“Peace is not something you wish for; It’s something you make, Something you do, Something you are, And something you give away.”

“If you want peace, you won’t get it with violence.”

And my favorite advice of all:

“Say you want a revolution / We better get on right away / Well you get on your feet / And out on the street / Singing power to the people.”

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This article was originally published on The Rutherford Institute.

Constitutional attorney and author John W. Whitehead is founder and president of The Rutherford Institute. His new book Battlefield America: The War on the American People  is available at www.amazon.com. Whitehead can be contacted at [email protected].

On Sept. 17, Toronto-based The Globe and Mail newspaper published an extraordinary and very lengthy article vilifying Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and calling him “a top voice of misinformation on social media.” The headline for the piece summarizes its range: “How a Kennedy became a ‘superspreader’ of hoaxes on COVID-19, vaccines, 5G and more”. [1]

For more than a decade, Kennedy Jr. has raised issues about vaccine safety through the organization he founded, Children’s Health Defense.  The Globe and Mail piece stated:

“Like other conspiracy theorists, [RFK Jr.] has gained popularity during the COVID-19 pandemic by adapting his anti-vaccine messages to fit the crisis, firing off false allegations against Microsoft founder Bill Gates [on COVID-19 vaccines, and other issues] and about the safety of 5G telecom networks. Since February, Mr. Kennedy Jr.’s social media support has tripled from 229,000 followers to 665,000 today.”

Screenshot from The Globe and Mail

At the end of what can only be called a smear piece, the print edition of The Globe and Mail stated, “This article was originally published by Tortoise, a different kind of newsroom committed to a slower, wiser news. To try Tortoise, Globe readers can get a 30-day free trial and a special half price offer…”

Strangely, the article made no mention of Children’s Health Defense, or of Kennedy’s Jr.’s August 29 speech in Berlin, where he addressed a huge rally. He told them that the COVID-19 pandemic is a “crisis of convenience for the elites” who are “destroying the middle class,” “using the quarantine to bring 5G into our communities” for “surveillance and data-mining”, and shifting us all “to digital currencies” and a cashless society that will benefit “the billionaires.”

Similarly, the Tortoise article didn’t mention that on August 17, Children’s Health Defense filed a lawsuit against Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg and three fact-checking companies, charging them with censoring truthful public health information. [2]

So what (or who) is Tortoise Media?

“Slower, Wiser News”?

Tortoise Media was launched in April 2019 by three people: James Harding, former editor at Rupert Murdoch’s Times newspaper, and subsequently head of BBC News until resigning in October 2017;  Matthew Barzun, former US ambassador to the UK; and Katie Vanneck-Smith, former president of The Wall Street Journal and Dow Jones.

Initial financial backing for London-based Tortoise was provided by banker Bernie Mensah, Global Head of Emerging Markets for Bank of America Merrill Lynch, tech investor Saul Klein, and two anonymous backers. [3]

The Tortoise Media website now lists Harding as Editor; Vanneck-Smith as Publisher; Matthew Barzun as Chairman; and Ceci Kurzman (former founder of Nexus Management) as Independent Director. The website also currently lists 27 major funding partners, including the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board, Edelman, Facebook, Google, and the Rockefeller Foundation. [4] This article will focus on the Gates Foundation, and Edelman – considered one of the largest public-relations firms in the world, with some 67 offices worldwide.

Tortoise Media used a November 2018 Kickstarter campaign to launch a drive for a membership boutique –  a “redistributive model” for news funding by which expensive membership tiers provide funding for less expensive (or free) memberships.

By June of 2019, Tortoise Media had 8,000 members, with 40 per cent of them under the age of 30. Businesses are funding memberships to be distributed by charitable organizations, academies, and other groups in order to “fill Tortoise’s demographic gaps, such as those outside London, teenagers, the elderly, and the working class.” [5] Press Gazette also noted that only three months after the April 2019 launch, seven major brand names “including Santander bank and PR firm Edelman” had signed up to fund memberships. [6]

A Tortoise membership costs from 5 pounds sterling per month (or 50 pounds per year) for someone under-30, to 24 pounds per month (for other individuals) and 250 pounds per month (for businesses and wealthy sponsors). The first 5,000 founding student members receive free membership. By November 2019, Tortoise Media was claiming “nearly 20,000 members,” with numbers climbing rapidly because of widespread corporate support subsidizing memberships. [7]

Tortoise hosts frequent “ThinkIns” (editorial meetings and conversations) between partners and members, between partners and stakeholders, and between partner companies and their employees. “We believe in opening up journalism,” their website states, “so we can examine issues and develop ideas for the 21^st Century. We want to do this with our members and with our partners. We want to give everyone a seat at the table.” Tortoise calls its members “family.”

The Tortoise Media website stresses that “we don’t take ads…Instead, our journalism is funded by our members and our partners. We establish partnerships with businesses willing to back a new form of journalism, enable the public debate, share their expertise and communicate their point of view.” But Tortoise hastens to add: “Our partners, of course, know that we are a journalistic enterprise. Our independence is non-negotiable. If we ever have to choose between the relationship and the story, we’ll always choose the story.”

With regard to the September 17 piece smearing RFK Jr., Tortoise Media didn’t have to choose between the relationship with two of its funding partners (the Gates Foundation, Facebook) and “the story” because all three were nicely aligned.

Billionaires’ Media

Back in autumn 2018, when buzz was circulating about the upcoming launch of Tortoise Media, Emily Bell, the director of a digital journalism center at Columbia University’s graduate school of journalism, wrote an opinion piece for The Guardian. Bell called the Tortoise venture “mysterious,” but noted that mainstream media is under financial “pressure” and may be in need of a “redistributive model of news funding,” such as that being created by Tortoise. [8]

“There is an acceptance that billionaires might be the answer after all,” wrote Bell in her praise for the Tortoise approach, citing examples such as Apple founder Steve Job’s widow Laurene Powell Job’s purchase of The Atlantic; Salesforce founder Mark Benioff’s purchase of Time magazine; and Amazon head Jeff Bezos’ buy-up of the Washington Post. [9]

What Bell glaringly omitted is the fact that over the past decade, Facebook, Google, etc. have taken major ad revenues away from the mainstream media, enriching the firms’ executives and shareholders while gutting newsrooms across the globe. As thousands of journalists have been jettisoned, billionaires have stepped in to become media owners, furthering their control of information and public discourse on key issues.

Tortoise Media’s funding partners include two of the wealthiest billionaires on the planet: Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg.

Of course, that should remind Canadian readers that The Globe and Mail (which published the Tortoise Media piece) is owned by the richest family in Canada, the Thomsons, “who have seen their fortune increase by nearly $9 billion during the pandemic, up to $50.6 billion from $41.7 billion in March.” [10]

Strangely, The Guardian’s Emily Bell expressed hope that Tortoise would “encourage a rush of 1% wealth into more deprived areas of [news] coverage,” such as “income inequality, racism, the health service, climate change, the march of authoritarianism, the inexorable rise of misogyny, the challenges of artificial intelligence and the collapse of democratic institutions.” [11] This a very naive position, as though news coverage of such issues has nothing to do with how they are covered, but only that they are covered.

Indeed, the loss of so many professional journalists means that mainstream news outlets increasingly rely on corporate press releases, think tank reports, corporate pundits, and spin – the very backbone of PR firms like Tortoise funding partner Edelman, which exist to manage such issues for their clients. In fact, PR Watch has called Edelman “the world’s largest PR company, synonymous with astroturf-style front groups and dirty tricks.” [12]

Event 201

Shortly after Tortoise Media was launched, two of its funding partners participated in a global-pandemic exercise called Event 201, which was held in New York City in October 2019 and involved 15 lead participants.

Independent journalist Rosemary Frei, who has written extensively about COVID-19, told me by email that Event 201 “simulated a novel-coronavirus pandemic – and eerily reflected what started to roll out in the real world shortly after that, including measures against the virus causing the markets to crash.” Frei told me, “One of the event’s main sponsors was the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation,” and “a representative from the foundation was among the 15 lead participants. Another lead participant was Matthew Harrington, the Global Chief Operating Officer at Edelman.”

According to Frei, citing video footage from Event 201 that she’d mentioned in her March 29 blog entry (rosemaryfrei.ca/blog), “One of the central predictions in Event 201 was ‘overwhelming amounts of dis- and misinformation circulating over the internet’.  [Edelman’s] Harrington opined at the roundtable that, in response, social-media platforms [Facebook, Google, Twitter, etc.] must recognize they are broadcasters and partner “with the scientific and health communities to counterweight [misinformation], if not flood the zone, [with] accurate information.”

Frei told me, “Harrington also said ‘there needs to be a centralized response around the communications approach, that then is cascaded to informed advocates representing the NGO communities, the medical professionals, etc.’ and ‘centralized on an international basis’.”

With Edelman and the Gates Foundation worried about dis- and misinformation circulating over the internet, these two Tortoise partners appear to have joined forces with Tortoise partners Facebook and Google, which during the pandemic lockdown have been censoring public health information from a variety of websites. A Facebook spokesperson recently told The Guardian that “we have removed 7m [million] pieces of Covid-19-related misinfo between April and June…” [13]

One of the perks that Tortoise provides to its members is a “daily news feed” of selected articles from other sites, along with its own pieces. It looks like Tortoise Media is intended to be a “centralized response” on “an international basis”. With Edelman’s help, and its 67 offices worldwide, that is potentially possible.

Gates & Media

That may help explain Tortoise Media’s Sept. 17 article expressing concern that “Since February, Mr. Kennedy Jr.’s social-media support has tripled from 229,000 followers to 665,000 today.” [14]

Ironically, those numbers come nowhere close to the millions of people reached through the media by Bill Gates, who has been pouring hundreds of millions of dollars into mainstream news outlets across Europe and North America.

In a feature article for the Columbia Journalism Review (August 21, 2020), Tim Schwab stated: “As philanthropists increasingly fill in the funding gaps at news organizations – a role that is almost certain to expand in the media downturn following the coronovirus pandemic – an underexamined worry is how this will affect the ways newsrooms report on their benefactors. Nowhere does this concern loom larger than with the Gates Foundation, a leading donor to newsrooms and a frequent subject of favorable news coverage.” [15]

Schwab examined “nearly twenty thousand charitable grants the Gates foundation had made through the end of June [2020] and found more than $250 million going toward journalism.” Recipients included the BBC, NBC, Al-Jazeera, ProPublica, National Journal, The Guardian, Univision, Medium, the Financial Times, The New York Times, The Atlantic, the Texas Tribune, Gannett, Washington Monthly, Le Monde, the Seattle Times, the Center for Investigative Reporting, Participant, the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting, the National Press Foundation, the International Center for Journalists, and the American Press Institute.

Schwab called the list incomplete because the Gates Foundation doesn’t have to report everything it funds.

Schwab stated: “In the same way that the news media has given Gates an outsize voice in the pandemic, the foundation has long used its charitable giving to shape the public discourse on everything from global health to education [favouring charter schools] to agriculture [pro-GMOs] – a level of influence that has landed Bill Gates on Forbes’ list of the most powerful people in the world.” [16]

Germany’s major newspaper Der Spiegel recently reported that, like other news outlets, it has received “around 2 – 3 million euros over three years” from the Gates Foundation, and noted that this raises “questions about a covert agenda to influence the news.” [17] Gates responded that for any news outlet funded by him, “what they actually write in those articles is totally up to them.” [18]

But according to CJR’s Tim Schwab, “When Gates gives money to newsrooms, it restricts how the money is used – often for topics, like global health and education, on which the foundation works – which can help elevate its agenda in the news media.” [19]

Noting that critical coverage of Gates is “rare,” Schwab stated that “a larger worry is the precedent the prevailing coverage of Gates sets for how we report on the next generation of tech billionaires-turned philanthropists, including Jeff Bezos and Mark Zuckerberg.” [20]

But that’s where a site like Tortoise Media comes in, with its courting of the under-30 age group, its ThinkIns, its free subscriptions for the disadvantaged, its daily news feeds for members, its consideration of members and partners as “family”, and its partnership with a major PR firm.

“Dirty Tricks”

When PR Watch called Edelman “synonymous with astroturf-style front groups and dirty tricks” in August 2014, it was referring to past scandals such as the revelation in 2008 that the firm had created fake “grassroots” bloggers for a digital astroturfing campaign assisting its client Walmart during a battle with unions. PR Watch could not have known that, just months later in November 2014, another scandal would erupt that would expose Edelman’s PR tactics in detail.

In November 2014, Greenpeace released documents that revealed Edelman’s internal PR advice for its client TransCanada Corp. in an effort to win the Canadian public’s support for a tar sands pipeline called Energy East. Greenpeace called the advice “dirty tricks”.

The documents unveiled Edelman’s plan for a “permanent campaign” to turn Canadians into “champions” for the pipeline, which would move tar sands bitumen across six provinces.

As CBC News reported:

“It starts with getting people to simply click on an Energy East project website to request more information about the project. Edelman says it can turn the ‘average citizen into issue activists’. ‘Using targeted messaging and behaviour tracking to directly appeal to the individual’s trigger points and develop them from a supporter to an activist to a champion,’ said one of the documents… It says advocacy can develop from people simply signing a petition and develop into testifying at public meetings or lending their personal stories for ads and promotions. ‘They provide us with a rich base of advocates who passionately understand and support our cause and are willing – more often than not – to do what’s asked of them’.” [21]

Edelman further recommended that “Third-party voices must also be identified, recruited and heard to build an echo chamber of aligned voices” in the media. In order to “neutralize risk,” Edelman suggested “detailed background research on key opposition groups” such as Council of Canadians, Equiterre, the David Suzuki Foundation, Avaaz, and Ecology Ottawa. They also advised: “Add layers of difficulty for our opponents, distracting them from their mission and causing them to redirect their resources.” [22]

Even the mainstream media called these “creepy tactics,” with one columnist referring to “communications black ops, phony grassroots campaigns, squadrons of dutiful Twitter trolls and search-and-destroy missions on opponents…rooting out skeletons in the closets” of opponents. [23] TransCanada Corp. had to distance itself from Edelman’s advice, and later cancelled the Energy East pipeline project.

This background on Edelman’s PR tactics does make one wonder to what extent Tortoise Media is adopting a somewhat similar strategy.

Cashless Society

Readers of the smear piece on RFK Jr. may have been wondering what the “and more” part of the “hoaxes on COVID-19 vaccines, 5G and more” headline refers to. Quite likely, it refers to Kennedy Jr.’s comment in Berlin about the billionaires shifting us all into “digital currencies” to their benefit.

The Gates Foundation is part of the “Better Than Cash Alliance,” which in 2016 allied with USAID and pushed India’s Norenda Modi government to remove several banknotes – the 500 Rupee and the 1,000 Rupee – from circulation. That would be like suddenly removing all ten-dollar and 20-dollar bills from circulation in North America and declaring that holders of those notes would have to deposit them in a bank by a certain deadline or they would be worthless. [24]

Besides the Gates Foundation and USAID, the “Better Than Cash Alliance” includes Mastercard and Visa, the Ford Foundation, Omidyar Network (EBay), banking giant CitiGroup and others. [25]

USAID and its corporate partners knew in advance that only 55% of India’s population had a bank account, and 95% of all transactions were conducted in cash. So the sudden change had a huge affect on India’s poorest, working in the informal sector for cash. As a result of this decree, there was massive famine and thousands of people died because they had no way to buy food. Furthermore, thousands of small businesses went under. [26]

In Der Spiegel’s recent interview with Bill Gates, he expressed concerns about poor countries and insisted “Our foundation is about saving lives.” [27] But that certainly wasn’t true in India in November 2016.

As Columbia Journalism Review’s Tim Schwab stated: “Bill Gates has shown how seamlessly the most controversial industry captain can transform his public image from tech villain to benevolent philanthropist. Insofar as journalists are supposed to scrutinize wealth and power, Gates should probably be one of the most investigated people on earth – not the most admired.” [28] But if Tortoise Media and its “family” of partners and members have their way, that’s how things will remain.

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Joyce Nelson is a freelance writer and author. She can be reached via www.joycenelson.ca

Notes

[1] Alexi Mostrous, “How a Kennedy became a ‘superspreader’ of hoaxes on COVID-19, vaccines, 5G and more,” The Globe and Mail, September 17, 2020.

[2] Julia Woodford, “Woodford Files,” Vitality Magazine, Fall 2020.

[3] Emily Bell, “Can James Harding’s Tortoise be more than a rich person’s club?” The Guardian, October 22, 2018.

[4] www.tortoisemedia.com/partners/

[5] Charlotte Tobitt, “’Slow News’ venture Tortoise creates ‘inclusive’ members’ model with potential to partner with local publishers,” Press Gazette, June 28, 2019.

[6] Ibid.

[7] Freddy Mayhew, “Tortoise claims nearly 20,000 members as it eyes move into podcasting,” Press Gazette, November 8, 2019.

[8] Bell, op. cit.

[9] Ibid.

[10] Derrick O’Keefe, “COVID sucks, unless you’re a billionaire. Canada’s richest have raked in $37 billion since March,” Ricochet, September 17, 2020.

[11] Bell, op. cit.

[12] Nick Surgery, PR Watch, “Edelman Makes a Climate Change Pledge, but Forgets About ALEC,” Truthout, August 17, 2014.

[13] Niamh McIntyre and Ben Quinn, “Engagement with anti-vaccine Facebook posts trebles in one month,” The Guardian, September 19, 2020.

[14] Mostrous, op. cit.

[15] Tim Schwab, “Journalism’s Gates keepers,” Columbia Journalism Review, August 21, 2020.

[16] Ibid.

[17] Veronika Hackenbroch and Marc Pitzke, “Bill Gates on COVID-19: ‘It’s Mind-Blowing That We’re Not Further Along,” Der Spiegel, Sept. 16, 2020.

[18] Ibid.

[19] Schwab, op. cit.

[20] Ibid.

[21] Margo McDiarmid, “Energy East pipeline ‘advocates’ targeted in TransCanada PR move,” CBC News, November 18, 2014.

[22] Suzanne Goldenberg, “Revealed: Keystone company’s PR blitz to safeguard its backup plan,” The Guardian, November 18, 2014.

[23] Jeffrey Jones, “PR trickery tarnishes oil patch’s credibility,” The Globe and Mail, November 19, 2014.

[24] Joyce Nelson, “Resisting the Push for a Cashless Society,” Bypassing Dystopia: Hope-Filled Challenges to Corporate Rule, Comox: Watershed Sentinel Books, 2018, pp. 48-50.

[25] Ibid.

[26] Ibid.

[27] Quoted in Hackenbroch and Pitzke, op. cit.

[28] Schwab, op. cit.

One measure of success in politics is the degree enemies imitate you, even if done insincerely and without flattery. Insincere imitation has become the preserve of a whole panoply of Donald Trump’s critics stretching from the money, corporate side of the Democrats to the sandalled warriors who believe in environmental eschatology.  Most importantly for Joe Biden and fellow travellers of the Donkey Party, they remain incapable and uninterested in identifying and confronting their devastating loss in 2016.  There is only one program in the works, the mission that matters: removal and elimination.  Get Trump out, and all will heal.

This makes political conversation insensible and torturously imbecilic.  Trump’s wand waving has had such an impact on his opponents that they mimic, unconsciously, his own tropes.  They ape and bark to his beat.  They speak of conspiracy, exclaim and splutter about fakery.  They talk of the improbability of reality.  Trump, for instance, could not have actually contracted the novel coronavirus.

Since October 2, Trump become the subject of eager medical experimentation.  He has received an intravenous dose of the dual antibody REGN-COV2, a drug yet to satisfy all stages of approval.  The combination features a B cell from a human who had recovered from a SARS-CoV-2 infection and yet another one of those heroic mice whose immune system was engineered to resemble the human immune system.  “Experiments in both golden hamsters and rhesus macaques that were intentionally infected with SARS-CoV-2 showed the cocktail could reduce viral levels and disease pathology,” writes Jan Cohen in Science.  Speculation (can it be anything else?) abounds as to whether Trump was also taking, as one of his physician’s claims, “zinc, vitamin D, famotidine, melatonin and daily aspirin”.

Much of this is of less interest to Trump sceptics than the fact that it is even taking place.  They share, with mild discomfort, similar ground to the QAnon group, who impute to Trump a strategy to outwit the Democrats, who they claim operate a global human trafficking empire.  While QAnon insist that Trump is playing the Democrats in pretending to have COVID-19, some liberals have also taken of the same sauce.  Jon Ehrens, a producer for WHYY radio in Philadelphia, claimed that “90% of listener emails/comments are very insistent that the diagnosis is a lie.” Common conspiracy theories included “finding an excuse for why he will lose the election” to proving “that the coronavirus is no big deal.” 

The president’s illness, when announced on October 2, did not merely issue an open invitation to conspiracy; it unleashed a tsunami of gloating enthusiasts. There were curses to enchant the polyglots.  There were homicidal fantasies skipping along social media platforms.  Within hours of the announcement, Merriam-Webster noted that searches for that supremely useful word “schadenfreude” had risen by 30,500 percent.  Yolanda Pierce, dean of Howard University’s divinity school, refused to “perform false politeness in the presence of evil.”

A good portion of the media stable long mocked by Trump for being the great news counterfeiters were themselves incapable of believing the president.  They had become the ideologues of disbelief, the mirrors of the fake.  “The sad truth is that we really can’t trust at face value what comes out of the White House on this,” political reporter Jonathan Karl explained on the ABC’s “The View”.  Reporters “have to ask the questions” and would accordingly verify the information. (Good of Karl to state what should be the reporter’s natural mission.) “But there’s been so much misinformation that has gone out about the virus, about the pandemic, about things like voter suppression – it’s really hard to know what to believe.”  

As for the general issue of verisimilitude, pity the doctors, as well, charged with such a mission as conveying a message both medically sound yet politically sanitised.  Historically, such White House physicians are paid to diagnose the leader patient.  The job prescription also entails a bit of mendacity, if required, prompting the rather cynical observation by Aaron Seth Kesselheim, professor of medicine at Harvard, that care for the US president has been marked, at stages, by “incompetence, secrecy and downright deception.” 

Author and Guardian columnist Simon Jenkins is even resigned on this score. “Doctors have never known how to handle sick leaders.”  Trump’s situation, he is reminded, is much like that of the British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who also contracted the virus in March.  The doctors initially claimed he was “just fine and cheerful”. “When this proved untrue he was said to be dying.  Bulletins merged into bullshit.  Nothing was believed.  Johnson had to bitterly protest his health only this weekend.”

In lowering the tone of what was already the bankrupt political conversation of the republic, Trump also lowered the bar of believability.  There is no higher plateau of political grace to seek.  Everyone’s in for a mauling.  We are in the gutter, and we are going to stay there, eyes averted, from the stars. And the truth. 

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Dr. Binoy Kampmark was a Commonwealth Scholar at Selwyn College, Cambridge.  He lectures at RMIT University, Melbourne. He is a frequent contributor to Global Research and Asia-Pacific Research. Email: [email protected]

Featured image: U.S. President Donald Trump arrives at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center by helicopter after the White House announced that he “will be working from the presidential offices at Walter Reed for the next few days” after testing positive for the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), in Bethesda, Maryland, U.S., October 2, 2020.  REUTERS/Joshua Roberts/TPX IMAGES OF THE DAY

As readers know, I do not think that the Covid virus itself is a hoax.  From the beginning I have taken the virus seriously.  I reported the available information that the ability of the virus to spread threatened hospital capacity and could overwhelm the medical system.  I supported limited closedowns in order to reduce the rate at which the infection spread. 

I reported that Vitamin C and D3 together with zinc and NAC strengthened the immune system against the virus.

I reported that the masks people are wearing are not N95 masks and thereby do not prevent inhalation and exhalation of the virus.  Some medical professionals have concluded that the masks do harm and no good.

As more information became available, I reported that the virus attacked in a different way than assumed and that ventilators rather than the virus itself were killing people. 

When doctors discovered the HCQ cure, I reported that an inexpensive and safe cure was available.  I defended with evidence and expert testimony the effectiveness and safety of the cure from public health officials and other Big Pharma shills who intentionally discredited the cure in the interest of Big Pharma’s hopes to develop an expensive and mandatory vaccine. For Fauci and Big Phama shills, profit took precedence over public health and safety. 

As more information comes available, we see that that the argument for another lockdown based on a second wave is based on increased testing using a test that produces false positives.  A test that experts know to be unreliable is the basis for the effort to renew the lockdown, mandate vaccination, and wear ineffectual masks to keep the fear alive.  

Whereas I do not think the virus itself is a hoax, it is obvious that interest groups are serving their agendas by creating hoaxes around the virus. 

One agenda is to maintain a high level of fear so that people will submit to the vaccinations that will mean tens of billions of dollars in profit for Big Pharma.

Another agenda is to blame Covid on Trump for calling for an end to lockdowns, not always wearing a mask, and supporting reopening of the economy. Democrats think this will boost their presidential chances.

Another agenda is to condition the pubic to accept control measures, like the ones in the movie, V for Vendetta, that destroy civil liberty and constitutional protections.  This enhances the power of the deep state over us all.

It is certainly the case that power and profit interests have dominated public health concerns.

One can understand why many view the Covd pandemic  as an orchestration.  The reports of Wuhan in China were frightening.  The lockdown and massive number of cases, the mortality of which were not known.  Despite the warning, the public health authorities in the entirety of the Western World were slow to take any measures and permitted the virus to infect the West..  No airline flights from infected countries were cancelled until after the virus was imported. Cruise ships continued to operate. No N95 masks were available. Measures, except in Sweden, were imposed that  themselves were harmful and perhaps caused more harm than Covid itself. 

Big Pharma using its paid experts, whose research it finances, and NIH, CDC, WHO, and other allegedly “independent” agencies financially connected to Big Pharma, exaggerated the threat, ruined the economy with closedowns, and now uses a defective Covid test to orcherestrat a second wave of Covid.  This past week NPR had on air a former Obama official who said we are doomed unless we lockdown 90% of the economy and all wear masks at all times.  NPR’s “expert” did not know the difference between masks that protect and those that don’t.

 And neither does most of the American medical profession. I have just completed my annual physical checkup.  Everywhere required a mask for entrance.  I wore a surgical mask and took with me a N95.  I told every nurse, every technican, every doctor, none of whom were wearing a N95 mask, that the masks they were wearing were useless, and I showed them the mask they needed if they were concerned about becoming Covid infected.

They were dumbfounded.  They had not a clue.  One doctor, a female from India, said, yes, you are correct, but we wear masks to reassure the patients who have been indoctrinated by the American media.

Covid is a danger, but so is life.  Why wreck the economy and civil liberty over this one danger, especially as the danger has been exaggerated?  Hardly anyone has died from Covid except people with co-morbidities.  These deaths are concentrated in the older age groups for the simple reason that the longer a person lives, the more morbidity the person has accumulated by poor health habits such as diet, smoking, alcohol, and lack of exercise.  These are the same morbidities that result in flu deaths.

Americans need to recover from their gullibiity.  Too many Americans believe the presstitutes and believe pubic authorities.  Too few Americans understand that every crisis, real or manufactured, is an opportunity for an interest group’s profit and power.  

The explanations that Americans get are controlled to serve power and profit.  If the public doesn’t catch on, America is doomed.

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Dr. Paul Craig Roberts writes on his blog, PCR Institute for Political Economy, where this article was originally published. He is a frequent contributor to Global Research.

Featured image is from The Freedom Articles

Armenia and its supporters are waging a five-phase infowar strategy against Azerbaijan which selectively relies on international legal claims, wrongly blames Turkey for sparking the Nagorno-Karabakh Continuation War, decontextualizes the unverified reports about Ankara allegedly sending Syrian fighters to the battlefield, tries to pit Russia against Turkey, and falsely portrays the conflict as a so-called “clash of civilizations” between Christianity and Islam.

Millions of people around the World are victims of the fear campaign. Panic prevails. Day after day, the persistent impact of media disinformation concerning  the Killer Virus is overwhelming. 

Fear and panic, coupled with outright lies prevent people from understanding the logic of these far-reaching economic and social policies.  

An international network of lawyers is intent upon launching a class action Lawsuit. Dr. Reiner Fuellmich, a prominent lawyer presents the details of this project. (video below)

After nine months of research and analysis, we can confirm that the data and concepts have been manipulated with a view to sustaining the fear campaign. The estimates based on the RT-PCR test are meaningless: The RT-PCR test does not identify/detect the Covid-19 virus. What it detects are fragments of several viruses.

Confirmed by prominent scientists as well as by official public health bodies Covid-19 is not a dangerous virus.

Amply documented, the COVID-19 Pandemic has been used as a pretext to trigger a Worldwide process of economic, social and political restructuring which has resulted in mass poverty and Worldwide unemployment. It is destroying people’s lives. 

(Michel Chossudovsky, Global Research, October 5, 2020)

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VIDEO 

Presentation by Dr. Reiner Fuellmich, prominent lawyer.

Earlier and related (shorter) presentation (August 2020) focussing on the Class Action Law Suit

In September, former New York mayor Mike Bloomberg announced plans [1] to spend at least $100 million in the battleground state of Florida to help elect Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden.

Between November and March, Bloomberg, having a personal net worth of $50 billion, spent more than $1 billion on his failed bid for the Democratic nomination, including about $275 million on ads that criticized Trump. When he endorsed Biden, he announced that he would “work to make him the next President of the United States.” Bloomberg subsequently received a prime speaking slot on the final night of the Democratic convention this year.

Bloomberg made the decision to focus his final election spending on Florida after news reports that Trump had considered spending as much as $100 million of his own money in the final weeks of the campaign.

Though Trump personally contributed $66 million to his 2016 campaign, it would be unprecedented for an incumbent president to put his own money toward winning a second term.

According to a Bloomberg report [2], Trump’s re-election effort, including the Republican National Committee, has spent more than $800 million so far, while Biden and the Democratic National Committee spent about $414 million through July.

But Biden and the DNC raised $365 million in August, shattering a previous record one-month record of $193 million set by Barack Obama in 2008. Biden had $294 million in cash on hand at the end of July, about $6 million less than Trump’s re-election effort.

The principal fault in democracy, as it is practiced all over the world, is the election campaign funding part, because individuals and corporations that finance election campaigns always have ulterior motives: they treat political funding as investments from which they expect to make profits by influencing executive policy and legislation.

Pakistan

In Pakistan’s political system, there are three major structural faults. A representative and democratic political system weeds out corrupt and inept rulers in the long run. But Pakistan’s democracy was derailed by three decade-long martial laws and every time it got back to square one and had to start anew.

Democracy works like the trial-and-error method: politicians who fail to perform are cast aside and those who deliver are retained through election process. A martial law, especially if it is decade-long, gives a new lease of life to the already tried, tested and failed politicians.

The second major fault in Pakistan’s political system is the refusal of mainstream political parties to hold genuine intra-party elections. How can one champion democracy on a national level when one refuses to ensure representation within political parties?

Nevertheless, democracy evolves over time. Instead of losing faith in political system, one must remain engaged in repetitive electoral process, which delivers in the long run through scientifically proven trial-and-error method.

The abovementioned imperfections in democratic system, however, are only Pakistan-specific. Even when we take a look at stable democracies, like India for instance, even their politicians are not representative of the masses, because they work in the interest of moneyed elites rather than for the benefit of the underprivileged masses. This fact begs some further analysis of democracy as it is practiced in the developing world.

Politics is the exclusive prerogative of the ultra-rich in the developing world: the feudal landlords, industrialists and big businesses. The masses and members of the middle class cannot take part in elections, because election campaigns entail huge expenses.

If individual candidates have to spend money from their own pockets on their election campaigns, then how can one expect from such elected representatives that they will not use political office for personal gains in order to raise money for their expensive election campaigns for the next elections?

In the developing countries, politics works like any other commercial enterprise: individual candidates of political parties make an investment on their election campaigns and reap windfalls when they get elected as lawmakers in legislatures or as ministers in cabinets.

In the developed Western countries, on the other hand, individual candidates generally don’t spend money from their own pockets on election campaigns; instead, political parties raise funds from electoral donations which are then spent on election campaigns of political parties and their candidates.

But this practice is also subject to abuse, because donors of electoral funds, especially corporations, when they donate money to a particular political party’s election campaign; in return, they demand a say in the policymaking of governments of such political parties. Such governments are beholden to their financiers and hence cannot pursue independent policies in the interests of the masses.

A much better practice for generating election-related funds has been adopted in some developed countries, such as Canada and Germany, where state allocates funds from its national budget for political parties’ election campaigns if they manage to obtain a certain percentage of popular vote in elections.

Although this practice may sound onerous for impoverished developing democracies, if we take a look at all other governance-related expenses, it would appear feasible. Take the cost of maintaining large federal and provincial bureaucracies for instance, paying the salaries of bureaucrats, maintaining federal and provincial public service commissions, and academies etc.

Bureaucracy only constitutes the mid-tier of governance structure; the top-tier is comprised of politicians who formulate state policy. Paying for election-related expenses of political parties would require expenditure from national exchequer only once in four or five years, but its benefits can be enormous, and it would also avoid all the pitfalls of taking contributions from shady individual and corporate donors.

More to the point, in the developed Western democracies, a distinction is generally drawn between power and money. If we take a cursory look at some of the well-known Western politicians, excluding a handful of billionaires like Donald Trump, others like Barack Obama, Bill Clinton, Tony Blair and Francois Hollande were successful lawyers from middle class backgrounds before they were elected as executives of their respective countries. Some Western executives even go back to their previous jobs and private practices once they retire from politics.

The Republican and Democratic parties in the US and the Conservative and Labor parties in the UK accept political contributions which are then spent on the election campaigns of their nominees, which generally are the members of the middle class.

Excluding this year’s US presidential elections, nowhere in the developed and politically evolved West it is expected of individual candidates to spend money from their own pockets on election campaigns, because instead of a political contest, it would then become a contest between the bank accounts of candidates.

Therefore, Western politicians typically are genuine representatives of their electorates, whereas the politicians of the developing world generally belong to the insular and detached elite classes and hence they don’t have much in common with the electorates they are supposed to represent.

Although money does influence politics even in the Western countries, that happens only through indirect means, such as the election campaign financing of political parties, congressional lobbying and advocacy groups etc.

In the developing democracies, like India and Pakistan, however, only the so-called ‘electable’ landowners, industrialists and billionaire businessmen can aspire for political offices due to election campaign-related expenses, and the masses are completely excluded from the entire electoral exercise.

This makes a sheer mockery of democratic process, because how can one expect from wealthy elites to protect the interests of the middle and lower classes? They would obviously enact laws and formulate public policy which would favor the financial interests of their own class without any regard for the interests of disenfranchised masses.

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Nauman Sadiq is an Islamabad-based attorney, columnist and geopolitical analyst focused on the politics of Af-Pak and Middle East regions, neocolonialism and petro-imperialism. He is a regular contributor to Global Research.

Notes

[1] Mike Bloomberg to spend at least $100 million in Florida:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/bloomberg-money-florida-biden/2020/09/12/af51bb50-f511-11ea-bc45-e5d48ab44b9f_story.html

[2] Trump Weighs Putting Up to $100 Million of His Cash Into Race:

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-09-08/trump-weighs-putting-up-to-100-million-of-his-cash-into-race

Featured image is from Flickr

Image: India unemployment at record high

Millions of people around the World are victims of the fear campaign.  Panic prevails. Day after day, the persistent impact of media disinformation concerning  the Killer Virus is overwhelming. 

Fear and panic, coupled with outright lies prevent people from understanding the logic of these far-reaching economic and social policies.  

On March 11, 2020 the WHO declared a Worldwide pandemic, requiring the lockdown and closure of the national economies of 193 member states of the United Nations, with devastating economic and social consequences: unemployment, poverty, despair.

These authoritarian measures imposed on millions of people were accepted outright. Public opinion was led to believe that the measures were a solution to combating the “Killer Virus”. 

The Second Wave 

And now, seven months later, a  Covid-19 “Second Wave” has been announced.  The proposed solution to combating the “killer virus” is to prevent and postpone the reopening of the national economy, coupled with the enforcement of social distancing, the wearing of the face mask, etc.

Needless to say: at the outset of this Second Wave, the global economy is already in a state of chaos. While the reports fail to reveal the depth and seriousness of this global crisis, the evidence (which is still tentative and incomplete) speaks for itself.

The “Real Economy” and “Big Money”

Why are these Covid lockdown policies spearheading bankruptcy, poverty and unemployment?

There is an important relationship between the “Real Economy” and “Big Money”, namely the financial establishment.

What is ongoing is a process of concentration of wealth, whereby the financial establishment, (i.e. the multibillion dollar creditors) are slated to appropriate the real assets of both bankrupt companies as well as State assets.

The “Real Economy” constitutes “the economic landscape” of  real economic activity: productive assets, agriculture, industry, services, economic and social infrastructure, investment, employment, etc.

The real economy at the global and national levels is being targeted by the lockdown and closure of economic activity. The Global Money financial institutions are the “creditors” of the real economy.

The closure of the global economy has triggered a process of global indebtedness. Unprecedented in World history, a multi-trillion bonanza of dollar denominated debts is hitting simultaneously the national economies of 193 countries.

Under the so-called “New Normal” Great Global Reset put forth by the World Economic Forum (WEF), the creditors (including billionaires) will eventually buy out important sectors of the real economy as well as take over bankrupt entities. The creditors will also seek to acquire ownership and/or control of  “public wealth” including the social and economic assets of the State through a massive indebtedness project.

“Global Governance” 

A system of  “Global Governance” controlled by powerful financial interests including corporate foundations and Washington think tanks oversees decision-making at both the national and global levels. The late David Rockefeller defined global governance as “Supranational Sovereignty of an intellectual elite and bankers”.

The Global Governance scenario imposes a totalitarian agenda of social engineering and economic compliance. It constitutes an extension of the neoliberal policy framework imposed on both developing and developed countries. It consists in scrapping “national autodetermination” and constructing a Worldwide nexus of pro-US proxy regimes controlled by a “supranational sovereignty” (World Government) composed of leading financial institutions, billionaires and their philanthropic foundations. (Michel Chossudovsky, August 2020)

In the sections below we briefly review the dramatic impacts of the closure of the global economy focussing on bankruptcies, poverty, unemployment, the outbreak of famines and education. Most of the figures quoted below are from UN sources, which tend to understate the seriousness of the global crisis.

The Wave of Bankruptcies

The wave of bankruptcies triggered by the closure of the World economy affects both Small and Medium Sized Enterprises (SME) as well as large Corporations. The evidence suggests that small and medium sized enterprise are literally being wiped out.

According to a survey by the International Trade Centre, quoted by the OECD, pertaining to SMEs in 132 countries:

two-thirds of micro and small firms report that the crisis strongly affected their business operations, and one-fifth indicate the risk of shutting down permanently within three months. Based on several surveys in a variety of countries, McKinsey (2020) indicates that between 25% and 36% of small businesses could close down permanently from the disruption in the first four months of the pandemic. (OECD Report, emphasis added)

In the US, the bankruptcy process is ongoing.  According to a group of academics in a letter to Congress:

“we anticipate that a significant fraction of viable small businesses will be forced to liquidate, causing high and irreversible economic losses,. “Workers will lose jobs even in otherwise viable businesses. …

“A run of defaults looks almost inevitable. At the end of the first quarter of this year, U.S. companies had amassed nearly $10.5 trillion in debt — by far the most since the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis began tracking the figure at the end of World War II. “An explosion in corporate debt,” Mr. Altman said” (NYT, June, 16, 2020).

With regard to small businesses in the US:

almost 90% of small businesses experienced a strong (51%) or moderate (38%) negative impact from the pandemic; 45% of businesses experienced disruptions in supply chains; 25% of businesses has less than 1-2 months cash reserves.“ (OECD)

The results of a survey of over 5 800 small businesses in the United States:

… shows that 43% of responding businesses are already temporarily closed. On average, businesses reduced their employees by 40%. Three-quarters of respondents indicate they have two months or less in cash in reserve. … (OECD)

Mass Unemployment is Now Worldwide

Global Unemployment

In an August report, the International Labour Organization (ILO) confirms that:

The ILO does not focus on the political causes of mass unemployment, namely the actions taken by the governments, allegedly with a view to resolving the Covid pandemic.

Moreover, the ILO tends to underestimate both the levels as well as the increase in unemployment.

Unemployment in Latin America

In Latin America, the average unemployment rate was estimated at 8.1 per cent at the end of 2019. The ILO states, that it could rise by a modest 4 to 5 percentage points to 41 million unemployed.

In absolute numbers, these rates imply that the number of people who are looking for jobs but are not hired rose from 26 million before the pandemic to 41 million in 2020, as announced by ILO experts…

These estimates of the ILO and the World Bank are misleading. According to the Inter American Development Bank (IDB), the increase in unemployment for the Latin American region is of the order of 24 million, with jobs losses in Colombia of the order of 3.6 million, Brazil, 7.0 million and Mexico 7.0 million.

Even these figures tend to underestimate the dramatic increase in unemployment. And the situation is likely to evolve in the months ahead.

According to a Survey conducted by the Instituto Nacional de Estadística y Geografía (INEGI) the increase in unemployment in Mexico was of the order of 12.5 million in April, i.e. in the month following the March 11, 2020 lockdown and closure of the national economy.

Unemployment in the US

In the US, “more than 30 million people, over 15% of the workforce, have applied for unemployment benefits… ” (CSM, May 6, 2020)

Nothing remotely like what’s gone on since January ever happened before in the US.

For the 27th straight week, over one million working-age Americans filed claims for unemployment insurance (UI).

Numbers for the past week include 870,000 who applied for regular state UI, along with another 630,000 applying for Pandemic Unemployment Assistance (PUA) — the federal program for workers not eligible for UI. (Stephen Lendman, September 25, 2020)

Unemployment in the European Union (EU)

“Unemployment across the whole of the European Union is expected to rise to nine percent in 2020, in the wake of the Coronavirus pandemic and subsequent lockdowns enforced by national governments”.

According to official EU figures:

Greece, Spain and Portugal … have once again seen large rises in youth unemployment since the start of the pandemic. Greece saw a surge from 31.7 percent in March to 39.3 percent in June, while Spain and Portugal had similar increases, from 33.9 percent to 41.7 percent and 20.6 percent to 27.4 percent, respectively.

The Outbreak of Famines

Famines have erupted in at least 25 developing countries according to UN sources. According to the FAO July 17, 2020

The UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and World Food Programme (WFP) identifies 27 countries that are on the frontline of impending COVID-19-driven food crises, as the pandemic’s knock-on effects aggravate pre-existing drivers of hunger.

No world region is immune, from Afghanistan and Bangladesh in Asia, to Haiti, Venezuela and Central America, to Iraq, Lebanon, Sudan and Syria in the Middle East to Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Liberia Mali, Niger, Nigeria, Mozambique, Sierra Leone and Zimbabwe in Africa.

The joint analysis by FAO and WFP warns these “hotspot countries” are at high risk of – and in some cases are already seeing – significant food security deteriorations in the coming months, including rising numbers of people pushed into acute hunger.

Nutrition and food insecurity is not limited to developing countries. In the US, according to Stephen Lendman:

“Around one in four US households experienced food insecurity this year — over 27% of households with children.

A Northwestern University Institute for Policy Research study estimates the number of food insecure households with children at nearly 30%.  Black families are twice as food insecure as their white counterparts. Latino households are also disproportionately affected.”

Education: The Impacts on Our Children

The very foundations of civil society are threatened. UNICEF estimates that 1.6 billion children and adolescents are affected by the closure of schools Worldwide.

“As the COVID-19 pandemic has spread across the globe, a majority of countries have announced the temporary closure of schools, impacting more than 91 per cent of students worldwide… Never before have so many children been out of school at the same time…

Colleges and universities are also paralysed. Students are denied the right to education. While UNESCO confirms that more than one billion learners are affected, it offers no concrete solution or critique. The official narrative imposed by the so-called “private/public partnership” which is imposed on national governments is adopted at face value.

Closures have been implemented in 132 countries. See diagram below.

click map to access UNESCO report.

Let us be under no illusions: People’s lives are being destroyed

And this not due to the V the Virus. It’s a political decision by corrupt governments, acting on behalf of dominant financial institutions.

The Second Wave

And now, the financial establishment has instructed governments to implement what is tantamount to a second bankrupcy program using the pretext and justification that the number of Covid positive cases has increased.

All forms of social activity are affected including family reunions, weddings and funerals, public gatherings, not to mention the closure of schools, universities, museums, sports and cultural events. Police state measures are now being applied to enforce compliance. And people accept!

At the outset of the Second Wave, postponing the reopening of the global economy will indelibly contribute to wiping out (regional and local) small and medium sized enterprises worldwide, while also precipitating the bankruptcy of entire sectors of the World economy including airlines, hotel chains and the tourist industry.

The fear campaign has once again gone into high gear.

Official statistics based on faulty and manipulated estimates of so-called “confirmed” Covid positive cases constitute the basis for justifying these diabolical measures.

V the virus is presented as the Threat. But the Virus has no direct impact on key economic variables.

What is at stake is unprecedented: It’s a global neoliberal agenda carried out by corrupt governments on behalf of the financial establishment.

“The New Normal” and the Great Global Reset

Let us be under no illusions. Due the string of bankruptcies, the destruction of the informal urban sector, not to mention abysmal poverty and the collapse of purchasing power, it is unlikely that mass unemployment will be resolved under the “new normal”, particularly in view of the neoliberal policies which are slated to be imposed by the global creditors.

The World Economic Forum (WEF) is now calling upon the adoption of a Great Global Reset, which will be managed by the global creditors.

According to Peter Koenig The Great Global Reset consists in:

“shoveling of more assets from the lower echelons to a small elite, through debt enslavement – shifting from consumer capitalism to Green (consumer) capitalism – and all with an allure of friendliness towards the environment and the world population. …    

[According to] WEF founder and executive chairman Klaus Schwab, (June June 3, 2020):

“The world must act jointly and swiftly to revamp all aspects of our societies and economies, from education to social contracts and working conditions… Every country, from the United States to China, must participate, and every industry, from oil and gas to tech, must be transformed. In short, we need a ‘Great Reset’ of capitalism.” 

“You notice, the Great Reset is about preserving capitalism… ”  (emphasis added)

The fear campaign has become a political instrument, a mechanism of social subordination. People across the land, nationally and internationally have reluctantly accepted the official consensus, which is a big lie.

It is unfortunate that many progressive intellectuals who have an understanding of politics and the workings of global capitalism have endorsed the official corona narrative. The closing down of the national economy leading to poverty and mass unemployment is a derogation of  workers’ rights.

Common sense tells us that the closure of the global economy destroys people’s lives.

Disrupting the fear campaign constitutes the first step towards reversing the tide.

The war in Artsakh, or more commonly known as Nagorno-Karabakh, is becoming increasingly internationalized as foreigners are arriving to fight on both sides of the conflict. Artsakh, despite being internationally recognized as a part of Azerbaijan, has had a de facto independence since 1994 when Armenian forces won a decisive victory. On September 25, it was first revealed that Syrian militants were being transferred to Azerbaijan via Turkey. This was denied by the Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry on the same day. It must be noted that the war in Artsakh began only two days after it was exposed Syrians were being transferred. Yet, despite photographs, videos, documents and testimonies made by Syrian militants themselves, the Azerbaijani government maintains the position that there are no foreign mercenaries fighting alongside the Azerbaijani army and that it is Armenian propaganda. All major international outlets have reported that these Syrians are not motivated by jihad, but rather money.

In given testimonies, a Syrian militant said “Jihadi, I swear by Allah don’t come, […] we have been deceived, everything is a lie. This is not a war, this is a meat grinder, people are dying, they cannot get the corpses.” Another Syrian militant said “Two days after the start of the war, everybody wants to return but they do not let us and […] they make us stay here.” This was in reference to Turkish military handlers lying to the transferred Syrian militants about the situation in Artsakh and forcing them to stay and fight.

At the same time though, Armenians from across the diaspora, including those in Greece, the Netherlands and the U.S., have already left or a preparing to go and fight in Artsakh, meaning that citizens of Western countries will be embroiled in this conflict. This also comes as it was revealed that ethnic Greeks are volunteering to go and fight in Artsakh, with one source telling Greek City Times that the first batch of volunteers amount to 30 men, while a former non-commissioned officer claimed to Sputnik Hellas that the number is as high as 500. Whatever the truth may be, it is being widely reported in Greek media that tens if not hundreds of volunteers from Greece are going to Artsakh, motivated by religion and solidarity with Armenians, and without receiving a salary. It has also been revealed that the Greek minority in Armenia, mostly descendants of Greek Genocide survivors, are fighting alongside the Armenian army.

This sets a dangerous precedent as this war is becoming increasingly internationalized and threatens to embroil the entire region in conflict if it cannot be contained. The First Artsakh War (1988-1994) saw Greek and Russian volunteers fight alongside the Armenians. Chechens, Afghan Mujahedeen’s, Turkey’s Gladio Gray Wolves, Ukrainian Far Right militants fought on the side of Azerbaijan in the First War. Foreign fighters in Artsakh is not a new phenomenon. With Armenian-Greeks and ethnic Greeks fighting in Artsakh against Turkish-sponsored Syrian militants and the Azerbaijani military, Athens could potentially be dragged into the conflict unwillingly.

Hikmet Hajiyev, aide to Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev, told reporters on Friday that Greeks were fighting in Artsakh, describing the volunteers as “mercenaries.” The Greek government has not responded to the statement made by Hajiyev and most likely will not as relations between the two countries remain tense. While accepting the credentials on September 4 from Greece’s newly appointed ambassador to Baku, Nikolaos Piperigos, Aliyev directly told the diplomat:

“I can tell you, and it is no secret, that Turkey is not only our friend and partner, but also a brotherly country for us. Without any hesitation whatsoever, we support Turkey and will support it under any circumstances. We support them [Turkey] in all issues, including the issue in the Eastern Mediterranean.”

The comments by Aliyev are unprecedented when considering the usual formalities of a head of state accepting the credentials of a new ambassador. With these diplomatic tensions already existing between Athens and Baku weeks before Azerbaijan began its offensive against Artsakh, it is unlikely that Greece will try and prevent volunteers from going to Armenia. Some Greek sources claim that many of the volunteers are ex-special forces, meaning it is likely that the Greek military will be indirectly involved to some extent. This also comes as Greek and Cypriot Members of the European Parliament are leading efforts to try and impose sanctions on Azerbaijan for launching a war.

The internationalization of the Artsakh War because of the influx of foreigner fighters, especially the Syrian militants, would be a major concern for both Iran and Russia who would be feeling uncomfortable having such radical forces on or close to their borders. The internationalization of the war has the potential to spark conflict across the Caucasus as militants from North Caucasia, particular Dagestan, Ingushetia and Chechnya, could travel to Azerbaijan to fight, and gain invaluable experience to take with them on their return to Russia. Although Russia and Iran have called for a ceasefire and an end to hostilities, they have not made strong efforts to try and end the war, which if not contained and ended soon, could potentially spill over into the North Caucasus or Iran’s northern provinces which is overwhelmingly ethnic Azeri.

The war could also potentially become a part of the wider Greek-Turkish rivalry that already exists in the East Mediterranean, Cyprus and Libya. Greece will not be directly militarily involved, but it is highly probable that there would be constant communication between the Greek military and the volunteers. This comes as Turkey is directly involved in the Artsakh War, not only by transferring Syrian fighters and arms to Azerbaijan, but also using its air force when we remember one of its F-16 fighter jets downed an Armenian Su—25 aircraft last Tuesday.

Without being contained and the front lines having an influx of foreign fighters, there is a real possibility that the internationalization of the conflict through these forces could set the entire region into conflict if a ceasefire agreement is not made quickly.

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Paul Antonopoulos is an independent geopolitical analyst.

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After 15 years divided and in constant conflict of interest, the main Palestinian political forces, Hamas and Fatah, finally reached an agreement to hold new elections in Palestine. According to Hamas spokesman Saleh al-Arouri, there was a real consensus between the two parties and there is no longer any interest in pursuing divisions in Palestinian domestic politics. The negotiations were mediated by Turkey and the agreement signed in Istanbul. A commission has been created to establish the electoral calendar. Apparently, legislative elections will be held within six months. Then a date will be set for the presidential elections and for the Palestinian National Council. Another commission was also established in order to unify the popular struggle, creating a unified Palestinian national leadership.

The last legislative elections held in Palestine took place in 2006, when Hamas had an unexpected and significant victory. At the time, Fatah entered into a coalition with Hamas to govern the country, but international non-recognition of the election results harmed the alliance and the national unity. Hamas is considered a terrorist group by many western countries, which have promoted a boycott against Palestine, with sanctions and economic blockade. Since then, Palestine has had two parallel governments: one in the Gaza Strip, led by Hamas, and the other in the city of Ramallah, in the occupied West Bank, led by Fatah.

Although Palestine has almost 30 different political parties, only Hamas and Fatah are organizations with real political strength, capable of mobilizing armed paramilitary groups and facing Israeli occupation, forming parallel governments and semi-governments in areas under foreign domination. This is why, in order to create a Palestinian political unity, it is of vital importance that these parties are united in an agreement, even though they preserve their differences.

However, many difficulties may still arise with the implementation of the agreement. The elections are scheduled to take place across the Palestinian territory, including Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip, which are areas under occupation. Ensuring the security of the election will be a great challenge. Israeli troops are currently blocking traffic between Gaza and the West Bank, which not only prevents Palestinians from moving, but, above all, hampers a vote-counting process.

The only way to guarantee a democratic, legitimate and multi-party process in Palestine, with voting power for all citizens, regardless of their location, is through strong international cooperation. The United Nations, in order to avoid conflicts and the increase of ethnic violence between Israelis and Palestinians, must inspect the functioning of the elections in a politically impartial way, taking care only for the legality of the election and for peace. But is this kind of action really possible?

With Hamas being considered a terrorist group (as well as some Fatah’s militias) by the West and with the growing proximity between Israel, France and the Arab world, the situation seems far from any peaceful solution. It is important to note that an agreement between Hamas and Fatah was only possible due to the actions of Turkey, which has recently become a pivotal country in the management of conflicts in the Middle East. With the wave of peace agreements between Arab countries and Israel, Palestine has lost some of its greatest historical allies against Israeli occupation. This was precisely why the Palestinians in recent years have invested in strong cooperation with Turkey, a country that is considered a greater threat to Arab interests than the State of Israel itself. Istanbul has now become the Palestinians’ only hope.

Turkey mediated the negotiations with the clear objective of building Palestinian national unity, for which reconciliation between Hamas and Fatah is an inevitable step. Istanbul has an interest in consolidating Palestinian unity to rival Israel and its new Arab allies, but it has no interest in policing the functioning of the elections, as this could lead to a direct confrontation. Therefore, Turkish mediations will be fruitless and Palestinian national unity will probably be merely figurative.

Iran, a country that has also increased ties with Turkey and that shares a mutual rivalry against the State of Israel and the pro-Western Arab nations, could be a hope for countering Israeli aggressiveness. But, specifically in relation to the elections, Tehran would hardly risk itself in any involvement, as the general tendency is to avoid any possibility of direct confrontation.

Considering that Israel has not yet abandoned its West Bank annexation plan, expectations for the near future in the Middle East are the worst. Perhaps the approach to the Turks was a serious strategic mistake on the part of the Palestinians, without which the other Arab countries would not have joined diplomacy with Israel.

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Lucas Leiroz is a research fellow in international law at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro.

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On Saturday a small, socially distanced vigil of 18 people for Julian Assange at Piccadilly Circus was broken up by twice that number of police and one elderly man arrested and taken into custody.

The little group of activists have been holding the vigil every week. I had just arrived to thank them and was astonished to see eight police vans and this utterly unnecessary police action.

There could not be a clearer example of “Covid legislation” being used to crack down on unrelated, entirely peaceful political dissent.

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I was myself questioned by a policeman who asked me where I lived, how long I had been in London and why, what I had been doing at the Assange trial and when I was going back to Edinburgh. (You can see me very briefly at 10mins 30 secs trying to reason with a policeman who was entirely needlessly engaging in macho harassment of a nice older lady).

Later in the evening I had dinner with Kristin Hrafnsson, editor-in-chief of Wikileaks. I returned to my hotel about 11pm, did my ablutions and went to bed. Just after midnight I was awoken by an insistent and extremely loud pounding at the door of my room. I got naked out of bed and groped my way to open the door a chink. A man dressed like the hotel staff (black trousers, white shirt) asked me when I was checking out. I replied in the morning, and pointed out the hotel knew I was leaving the next day. Why was he asking in the middle of the night? The man said “I was asked to find out”. I closed the door and went back to bed.

The next morning I complained in the strongest possible terms, the hotel refunded me one night’s accommodation. The duty manager who did this added “It was not our fault” but said they could not tell me any more about why this had happened.

The person at my door had a native English accent. I had been staying in the hotel over four weeks and I think I know all of the customer facing staff – not a single one of them has a native English accent. I had never seen that man before. This was a four star hotel from a major chain. I suspect “do not get sleeping guests out of bed after midnight to ask them what time they are checking out” is pretty high on their staff training list. I cannot help but in my mind put it together with my encounter with the police earlier that day, and their interest in when I was returning to Edinburgh, but there seems no obvious purpose other than harassment.

The hotel incident may just be in the strange but unexplained category. The busting of the Assange vigil earlier is of a piece with the extraordinary blanking of the hearing by corporate media and the suppression of its reporting on social media. These are dangerous times.

I am now safely back home in Edinburgh.

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The following is part of the text of my thoughts about the comments posted at my YouTube Channel in regard to a newsreel I uploaded over four months ago which was a 1977 report on the training and activities of the Rhodesian Army Special Forces unit known as the Selous Scouts.

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The Content of the Newsreel

The original source gives very little details except to name the news reporter, identify Major Ronald Reid-Daly and provide short descriptions of what is happening in the reel. The title of upload and the brief elaborations within the text are my creation.

I will go into details later about the allegations of Selous Scouts involvement in False Flag operations. Needless to say, some comments here which have dismissed this as anti-Rhodesian “BBC Marxist Death Cult Propaganda” are wide of the mark. The ITN report gives a sympathetic portrayal of the Selous Scouts. Any rational person can hear the allegations regarding the massacre of the missionaries to Major Reid-Daly and his denial. I uploaded a short interview with Reid-Daly conducted by another news agency and the same question was put to him, and the same denial was issued. There was good reason for him to be asked based on circumstantial evidence. What is more the subsequent failure of a Selous Scout operation involving the bombing of churches in Salisbury in 1980 and to which I alluded to in the description box vindicates that line of questioning.

If anyone simply sees this newsreel as merely “anti-Rhodesian” then it speaks of an inflexible and ineradicable mindset of indoctrination -the very mindset which such people accuse both their real and perceived opponents of having.

Rhodesia: A Colonial Settler Project Against Which Rebellion Was a Perfectly Natural Reaction

Rhodesia was a colonial settler project. This involved subjugation, land expropriation and the imposition of a caste system within which the subjugated Black Africans were exploited by Whites of mainly British descent.  The social and economic system may have appeared a benign one to the Rhodesians who favourably compared it (and still do so) to the Apartheid system in neighbouring South Africa, but it was nonetheless a system based on the Whites monopolising access to the country’s natural resources and keeping the Africans whose lands they acquired by force in their place.

Judging by many comments made by supporters of the late Rhodesia on this upload, it may come as a shock to more than a few, but human history is replete with societies who have rebelled against such a state of affairs. This was the case with Algeria, Palestine, the Slavic lands of Eastern Europe, and Kenya. And where the native populations who were looked upon variously as “Untermensch” or “uncivilised” (the White Nationalist term today would be “low I.Q.” peoples), avoided extermination, they fought back to reclaim their native lands.

The Black Africans of what came to be the territory of Rhodesia were no different from Catholic Irish resisting British colonisation; the Muslim Algerians resisting French domination, the Black African Kenyans resisting the British or the Palestinians resisting the militias of the Jewish Agency in Palestine and the State of Israel once it was established.

This allusion to Marxist-thinking as the root of the evil which stimulated Black Africans to fight against the Rhodesian “paradise” is as absurd as it is lazy in its construct. The fact that the Soviet Union and China gave aid and support to liberation movements in Africa and Asia, and to some extent in Latin America, was more an accident of history. Resistance against any colonial settler entity such as Rhodesia, is an ineluctable facet of the human psyche.

The Poles and other Slavs who were referred to as subhuman by the Nazis were not concerned about Hitler’s assertion that Germany’s Slavic neighbours owed all the achievements in culture to the German race. The Irish who were lampooned as ape-like, rowdy, and prone to fecundity did not care too much about British-English civilisation which under Cromwell had massacred them. It was under British rule after all that the devastating famine took place. Today, this mentality persists in Irish Republican communities who perceive Israel as an unjust and oppressive colonial settler state and support the Palestinian cause, while the Unionists take the opposite view.

The Kenyans correctly wanted their land back, as did the Algerians and as do the Palestinians. Why do Old Rhodesians resent the idea that the Blacks would want their land back? As with the aforementioned peoples, the Black African resented the paternalistic and oppressive system, and resisted.

Cecil Rhodes, the man who gave the country its name, was at the heart of the system through which Black African workers were brutally exploited. If such a statement strikes any one as being somehow “Marxist”, it proves the point of the distorted lens through which some Old Rhodesians choose to view the world. The massacres of Ndebele people prior to and after the Rudd Agreement using maxim guns was a deliberate cruelty which went further than the prosecution of war. It was genocide.

Land expropriation, labour exploitation, and genocide: that was the foundation of Rhodesia.

The Insurgency in Rhodesia: False Flags, Black Propaganda and Psychological Warfare

I note comments relating to the news reporter’s reference to the murder of European Roman Catholic Missionaries in 1977 as having possibly been an operation carried out by the Selous Scouts have been met by disbelief and recourse to the tired mantra of the “biased Marxist media”. As I wrote in the description box, the Scouts specialised in irregular warfare with its methods including “infiltration, assassination, abduction, torture, sabotage and blackmail”.

For those who are ignorant of the concept of the “False Flag” operation i.e. the carrying out of a mission designed to discredit the opposition, I would simply ask you to find out about “Operation Susannah”, an operation conducted by Israeli Military Intelligence in 1954. Known as “The Lavon Affair”, it was a botched attempt by the Israelis to disrupt closer relations between Nasser of Egypt and the Americans and the British. The Israeli attack on the USS Liberty was part and parcel of this sort of playbook. You are also invited to find out about “Operation Northwoods”, a diabolical plan approved by the Pentagon which sought to stage terror attacks on American soil to blame on Cuban Communists in order to present an opportunity to invade and overthrow the government of Fidel Castro. Again, read up on the Anni diPiombo (or “Years of Lead”) in Italy from the late 1960s to the middle 1980s when NATO’s Gladio network enabled Fascist-sympathising militias to murder innocent civilians in order to blame Marxist and Anarchist groups. The bombs in Piazza Fontana (1969) and Peteano (1972) provide examples of this diabolical “Strategy of Tension” (“La Strategia della Tensione”). The Bologna bomb in 1980 was also an example although there was no question from the outset that it was the responsibility of a neo-Fascist group.

Now interestingly, Major Reid-Daly served in Malaya where Frank Kitson, the exponent-in-chief of the counter-insurgency doctrine of the British Army, was developing (after his experience in Kenya) his methods which encompassed the aforementioned specialisms of the Selous Scouts, added to which was the use of “Black Propaganda”. Kitson used his colonial experiences in Northern Ireland against the Irish Republican Army. Feel free to search for information on the activities of the Military Reaction Force (MRF) which apart from assassinating suspected Republican guerrillas, murdered innocent civilians in order to blame the IRA.

Anyone who researches the murder of the missionaries will find out that it was not an open and shut case for affixing responsibility to any of the parties. As in all wars, a propaganda war was being fought, and Rhodesia was no exception. Using the dark arts of false flag operations was evidently part of this. In fact, as I mention in the description box, two Black African members of the Scouts who were involved in planting explosives in churches in Salisbury in February 1980, were themselves accidentally blown up by one of their bombs. The aim of this Selous Scouts operation was to make it seem that operatives working for the military wing of Robert Mugabe’s ZANU-PF organisation had planted the bombs (ZANU literature was left at the various locations) because as a Marxist, Mugabe (the Jesuit Marxist) was “against” Christianity. This was an attempt to discredit Mugabe’s political party in the run up to the elections in what was to become Zimbabwe.

Therefore, it is not inconceivable that Black members of the Selous Scouts disguised as African guerrillas were used to conduct the massacres of the missionaries in order to present the African militias as anti-clerical.

At least one comment refers to the “savageness” of the guerrillas when dealing with “uncooperative” African villagers. I do not know the ins and outs of every single facet of the Bush War in Rhodesia, but that commentator and others reading this should be aware of cruelties practised by the Rhodesian side. There is a film I have yet to upload about a British mercenary hired to combat poaching. This man was allowed to shoot at Black Africans at once a 6PM curfew came without considering whether his target was a poacher or late getting home. And to claim his bounty, he did not have to produce a dead body, only the right ear from it.

The Selous Scouts acted with savagery, killing innocent civilians in neighbouring countries -not by mistake i.e. the euphemistic “collateral damage”, but as a means of psychological warfare. A good example of this was in the Scouts raid on a ZANLA camp, situated at Nyadzonya-Pungwe, Mozambique in August 1976. They got to the camp by disguising their armoured vehicles in the colours of the Mozambique Army (a classic False Flag tactic) and, according to Major Reid-Daly, massacred up to a thousand.

It was seemingly an impressive tally, except that the Selous Scouts had shot many guerrillas who were unarmed as they stood in formation for a parade. The camp was formally registered as a refugee camp with the United Nations. Guerrillas were present, but the Scouts raiding party saw fit to set fire to the camp hospital following which all the patients were burned alive.

The thinly veiled racism among some of these comments seek to promote the idea of savagery being the preserve of Africans while forgetting European-originated depravity. It is interesting how the brutalities inflicted on Africans by European colonial powers prefigured those visited on their fellow Europeans including Jews during the period leading up to World War 2 and of course during the war itself: the genocide against the Namaqua and Herrero by Kaiser-era German colonisers, and the use of bodily parts in experiments are just two. The Boer has not forgotten the British concentration camps and neither have the Ethiopians who endured Italian camps in Somaliland and who were massacred by Black Shirts in Addis Ababa in 1937.

In the case of Rhodesia, how can the facts of the brutal counter-insurgency campaign employed in the 1970s be ignored? Bulldozers and flamethrowers were used to defoliate 54,000 square miles of countryside. The “Free Fire Zones” set up by the Rhodesian Army meant that any Black African found within them would be shot on sight. There were curfews imposed on the Black population (effectively martial law) and there was internment and forced resettlement.

There was a campaign of terror which did not stop with killing Black African guerrillas – many of whom were not killed in action but tortured prior to being murdered- it also extended to Black African civilians.

The Insurgency in Rhodesia: A Lost Cause

Some of the commentators on this page are Black. They have objectively stated that the Selous Scouts were a formidable fighting force. I have acknowledged this fact in the description box. But they were fighting a lost cause. The frequent references to being “betrayed” by the British (and the Americans) has a hollow ring to it. It is redolent of the “stab in the back” rationale popularised by German Nationalists in the aftermath of World War 1.

The war in Rhodesia, as was the case with the wars in Angola and Mozambique, came at the tail end of the decolonisation of Africa. The Selous Scouts doubtlessly had many victories, but so did the French military in Algeria, the British in Kenya and Aden and the Portuguese in southern Africa.

Rhodesia would have collapsed without the support of the British whose kith and kin policy essentially held sway right to the end. They did not invade Rhodesia after UDI. The British bypassed sanctions by supplying Rhodesia with oil through Mozambique until the Portuguese withdrew.

Modern Day Racial Warfare & Identity Politics

It seems to me that those who yearn for old Rhodesia have fused their ideological raison d’etre with the present-day manifestations of identity politics. They are White Nationalists or in the parlance of many on the mainstream political left, “White Supremacists”. The use of the term White Supremacist is in many ways an objective one. White Rhodesians after all enjoyed a great amount of privilege; real, tangible privilege. Not the asinine expressions utilised in today’s “Culture wars” where terms such as “White Privilege”, “Black Privilege”, “Jewish Privilege” and so on are frequently used. They enjoyed a standard of living which owed a great deal to the subjugation and exploitation of the indigenous Black African population. The linkage with White Supremacy comes from the use of the old Rhodesian Flag as a source of militant White identity as was the case with the mass murderer Dylann Roof. There was also the case of the Alberta-based Canadian soldiers who were discovered to be selling White Nationalist-Supremacist flags, badges, and literature.

Conclusion

The truth is that Rhodesia was no beacon of democracy which offered its Black African population a vision for the future. Rhodesia collapsed under the weight of its contradictions. Some such as quite a number of commentators on this post can gloat about the failings of the political leaders of Zimbabwe, but the truth is that they are living in denial about the nature of the system and the fact that that system was doomed to failure. And as was the case with the French-Algerian Pieds-Noir and the Boer, they must face up to this.

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Adeyinka Makinde is a writer based in London, England. This article was originally published on his blog site.

Featured image is CC BY-SA 3.0

The Armenian missile strike on Azerbaijan’s second largest city of Ganja outside the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict zone shows that the landlocked state is going for broke out of desperation to internationalize the war as soon as possible since it knows how much it stands to lose if it can’t successfully generate more support.

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One of the US prosecution’s key medical witnesses in the Julian Assange hearing, who claimed that Assange’s risk of suicide is ‘manageable’ if extradited to the US, works for an academic institute that is funded by the UK Ministry of Defence and linked to the US Department of Defence, it can be revealed.

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Dr Nigel Blackwood, a reader in forensic psychiatry at King’s College London (KCL), told the extradition hearing in London last week that Julian Assange was suffering only “moderate” depression.

Giving evidence as an expert witness for the US prosecution, Dr Blackwood rebutted other experts’ findings on the seriousness of Assange’s condition, adding his suicide risk was “manageable”. He told the court: “Mr Assange has proved himself to be a very resilient and very resourceful man, and he has underplayed that.”

At the request of US prosecution lawyers, Dr Blackwood examined Assange during two meetings in March. In his written submission to the court, he said that it would “not be unjust” to extradite Assange to the US.

Declassified has discovered that Dr Blackwood’s professional work at KCL is linked to a cluster of academic groups which are funded by or associated with the British and American militaries.

Declassified has seen a contract showing that the Ministry of Defence (MOD) provided more than £2-million to KCL’s Institute of Psychiatry for the years 2013-16 for a project which KCL is forbidden to mention in public without MOD approval. It is likely the contract has been renewed and is still active.

The £2.2m contract between King’s College London’s Institute of Psychiatry and the UK Ministry of Defence. Click here to read the document.

The project is managed “on behalf of the Secretary of State for Defence” and is for Phase 4 of a “wellbeing” study of veterans of Britain’s recent military campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan. Seeking to “inform MOD decision-making”, the project began in 2003.

The value of the first three phases of the contract is not known but if the Institute of Psychiatry received a similar level of funding for Phase 4 as they had previously, the total contract value would be more than £8-million. A spokesperson for the institute refused Declassified’s request to divulge the amount of funding from the MOD.

Dr Blackwood works in the Department of Forensic and Neurodevelopmental Sciences, which is part of KCL’s Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience. He told Declassified he was aware of MOD funding the institute in which he works, but said he had never personally worked on an MOD contract.

Asked by Declassified if he declared any conflicts of interest to the hearing, Blackwood responded, “I had no conflicts to declare.”

However, Declassified has found that the Forensic Research Group (FRG) that Dr Blackwood heads at KCL — and which “explores the complex relationship between mental disorders and crime” — is conducting research which uses data from Phase 3 of the MOD-funded project.

In addition, the FRG works “in collaboration” with the King’s Centre for Military Health Research (KCMHR), which is part-funded by the MOD and was “originally funded by the US Department of Defence”. A KCMHR webpage, which is undated, states that “latterly” the centre is being funded by the Department of Defence “again”.

US Department of Defence

The King’s College website states that the KCMHR is “the leading civilian UK centre of excellence for military health research and independent of the UK Ministry of Defence”. The centre notes that it also “collaborates” with the UK Ministry of Justice and the US Department of Defence.

The KCMHR is a “joint initiative between the Institute of Psychiatry and the Department of War Studies and makes significant contributions to UK military personnel policy”, the university website states.

KCL’s Departments of War Studies and Defence Studies “have a number of contracts/agreements with various departments within government, including the Cabinet Office, the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, and the Ministry of Defence”, according to a response to a Freedom of Information Act request sent to KCL by Declassified.

However, “more specific information” on the contracts themselves was withheld by KCL because “the majority of contracts are listed as classified under UK security legislation. This means we are not permitted to disclose details, since they predominantly involve areas either directly or pertaining to the UK security services.”

The university also said disclosure would damage its commercial opportunities. “Two of the largest contracts [with the UK government] are due for renewal in the next 12 months and will go to open tender,” it explained.

US Defence Secretary Leon Panetta visited King’s College War Studies Department in 2013, saying: “I deeply appreciate the work that you do to train and to educate our future national security leaders, many of whom are in this audience.”

Panetta, who also served as director of the CIA from 2009 to 2011, recently said in an interview that the purpose of prosecuting Assange was to stop other journalists from revealing information about the US government: “All you can do is hope that you can ultimately take action against those who were involved in revealing that information so you can send a message to others not to do the same thing.”

One of the two co-directors of the KCHMR, which collaborates with Dr Blackwood’s FRG, is Nicola Fear, a professor of epidemiology and a former MOD staffer who is on the study team working on the MOD “wellbeing” project.

According to the centre, Professor Fear “leads several studies… which have been awarded funding from the UK Ministry of Defence and the US Department of Defence”.

One recent project led by Professor Fear for the KCHMR, which was funded by the US Department of Defence, studies how the military deployments of parents affect children’s emotional development.

King’s College London rejects a Declassified Freedom of Information Act request for its UK government contracts “since they predominantly involve areas either directly or pertaining to the UK security services”.  Click here to read the document.

A biography of Professor Fear notes that “Nicola frequently briefs senior government officials and military leaders on the work of KCMHR and the impact of service life on personnel, veterans and families”. From 2014-15, she worked on a US army contract.

Declassified has also discovered other KCMHR projects funded by the US Department of Defence. Different KCL researchers have received funding from the US Office of Naval Research for a project which “examined the political, social and the strategic dimension of cybersecurity”.

The KCMHR’s other co-director is the vice-dean of Academic Psychiatry, Professor Sir Simon Wessely, who is one of the “approved” researchers on the MOD “wellbeing” contract.

The KCHMR has been developing data-sharing links with colleagues in the US, according to the university’s webpage. “We want to make increasing use of the possibilities of electronic data linkage, reflecting the fact that the UK and US have been fighting the same war,” Professor Wessely is quoted as saying.

Wessely and Fear are two of the four members of the “senior team” of KCL’s Academic Department of Military Mental Health (ADMMH) which, according to KCL’s website, appears to be funded solely by the MOD. The ADMMH “works directly” with the KCMHR, with which it shares a research policy, and has“both academic and military personnel seconded to the unit”.

The other two senior members of the ADMMH, Lieutenant Colonel Norman Jones and Major Amos Simms, are both serving UK military personnel.

The ADMMH says its “mission is to act as the uniformed focus for military mental health research” for the UK military. It adds: “The centre aims to gather, assess and report on information that will enhance the health and operational effectiveness of the United Kingdom’s Armed Forces.”

A slide from a presentation by Professor Nicola Fear, the co-director of the King’s Centre for Military Health Research, advertising the centre’s US Department of Defense-funded study on the children of military personnel.

Forensic research

Dr Blackwood told Declassified he had never personally worked with the KCMHR, adding that his “colleague” has “worked with” the centre examining Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) in the ex-service population.

That colleague, Dr Deirdre MacManus, is the co-team leader with Dr Blackwood of the FRG and — according to the KCL website — a member of the KCMHR team. She is also part of the study teamworking on the MOD “wellbeing” contract.

MacManus, a clinical senior lecturer in forensic psychiatry, has been funded directly by the UK military to produce research. MacManus also appears to have published a number of outputs produced from the MOD “wellbeing” contract alongside academic papers co-authored with, among others, a serving member of the British army.

Dr MacManus and Dr Blackwood co-authored an academic paper in September 2019 on the subject of PTSD in prisons, which “identified significant associations between PTSD and suicidality”. This was a subject on which Blackwood gave evidence to the Assange hearing.

Intelligence training

The War Studies Department at KCL, which co-founded the KCMHR with the Institute of Psychiatry, is also linked to the UK and US intelligence community.

The department was in the mid-2000s commissioned by the “professional head of intelligence analysis” — working within the Cabinet Office’s Intelligence and Security Secretariat — “to develop a course for experienced [intelligence] analysts” in order to “enhance the analytic capability of the United Kingdom’s intelligence community”.

A study titled “Teaching Intelligence Analysts in the UK” and published in the US Central Intelligence Agency’s (CIA’s) in-house journal, notes that: “Exposure to an academic environment, such as the Department of War Studies at King’s College London, can add several elements that may be harder to provide within the government system.”

Co-written by David Omand — a former director of the UK’s largest intelligence agency, GCHQ, who teaches on KCL’s War Studies course — the article notes that “the CIA had recognised as early as 1960 how beneficial it would be to use universities as a means of intelligence training”.

The paper continues by noting that KCL “offers a containing space in which analysts from every part of the [intelligence] community can explore with each other the interplay of ideas about their profession”.

The Department of War Studies is currently home to a number of personnel connected to the US militaryand intelligence community.

The university also runs a cross-department centre — called the Academic Centre of Excellence in Cybersecurity Research — which brings King’s College academics together to look at the “sociotechnical aspects of cybersecurity”. The body runs “in association” with the National Cybersecurity Centre, an arm of GCHQ.

Consent of the MOD

The contract seen by Declassified is made out between the “Secretary of State for Defence” and the “Institute of Psychiatry, King’s College London”. Worth £2.17-million, Phase 4 of the project ran from February 2013 to January 2016. Earlier phases were renewed in 2006 and 2010.

The Institute for Psychiatry refused to disclose to Declassified the total level of funding provided by the MOD, saying that the university’s “web pages are very comprehensive and should help with your queries”. KCL’s website does not appear to provide such details.

The contract stipulates that KCL cannot “without the prior written consent of the [MOD], advertise or publicly announce that work is being undertaken for the [MOD]”. It adds that KCL researchers “may not communicate on these matters with any communications media representatives” unless they are granted written permission by the MOD.

Declassified searched the British government’s contract database and could find no other contract between the MOD and a department of psychiatry in the UK.

The contract states that “the Ministry of Defence did not expect, and was unprepared for, the criticism that arose some years after the 1991 Gulf conflict over the so-called Gulf War Syndrome”. The project’s purpose is to “have early warning of any similar problem arising from the invasion of Iraq in 2003, and to be in a position to respond appropriately with targeted medical research”.

Excerpts from the contract between King’s College’s Institute of Psychiatry and the UK Ministry of Defence.

Funding of the Forensic Research Group

Dr Blackwood told Declassified his FRG at King’s College had never received funding, directly or indirectly, from the MOD.

The group does, however, receive funds from organisations associated with the British military. One of its six listed funders is Help for Heroes, which supports wounded military personnel. The organisation receives funds from the Armed Forces Covenant Fund Trust, an MOD-funded charity that was until 2018 based inside the ministry.

Another funder of the FRG is the Forces in Mind Trust (FIMT), which supports former British military personnel. The chair of FIMT’s board, Hans Pung, is President of RAND Europe and a former US army officer.

Other directors include Major General Martin Rutledge, who served in UK military headquarters during the Iraq campaign, and General Sir John McColl, a former deputy commander of Nato.

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Matt Kennard is head of investigations and Mark Curtis is editor of Declassified UK, an investigative journalism organisation that covers the UK’s role in the world. 

Featured image: US Secretary of Defence Leon Panetta speaks at Kings College in London, England, 18 January 2013. (Photo: DoD / Erin A. Kirk-Cuomo

“U.S. President Donald Trump’s condition is improving as he is being treated for COVID-19 at a military hospital…” so says the media pundits’ drone on.

Yet does he really have COVID-19? This ever devolving disease seems to acquire a broader and broader definition every month. Soon enough merely breathing will be a sign that you have COVID-19.

Back in December 2019, it was only people with pneumonia who were classified with this disease. The journal Cellular & Molecular Immunology says COVID-19 was first called “Wuhan pneumonia.” Chinese scientists later renamed the virus “novel coronavirus-infected pneumonia (NCIP).”

So we went from the disease being defined by life-threatening pneumonia to a definition now so broad to include a headache, chills and a loss of taste, confirms the CDC.

Dr. Gerald Evans, head of Queen’s University’s infectious diseases division, told the National Post:

“That fact that [Trump] has worrisome features like high fever and hypoxemia (low blood-oxygen levels) early in his illness, suggests the possibility that a more severe second course may yet be in the future.”

Hypoxia? According the Mayo Clinic, Trump would need to dip under 90% before he deserved that label; yet the CNN reports that his oxygen level only went as low as 93%.

93% is not really all that low. I have to wonder if Trump’s medical staff have been regularly checking his oxygen levels prior to his diagnosis (in order to have a baseline). My oximeter shows my oxygen levels go as low 96% (at rest) on a regular basis. I’m a little more than half Trump’s age and complete a 7km run each day (with my mouth closed). So if a highly stressed 74-year-old man’s oxygen saturation dips to only 3% less than mine, I’m not going to sound the COVID alarm.

Despite popular belief 99% or 100% blood saturation level may be a sign of ill health.

“An oxygen saturation of 100 percent would suggest that the bond between red blood cells and oxygen molecules is too strong, reducing the blood cells’ ability to deliver oxygen to muscles, organs and tissues,” writes world-renown breathing specialist Patrick McKeown in his book The Oxygen Advantage. “We need the blood to release oxygen, not hold on to it.”

In other words, a drop in blood O₂ is often a sign that your cells are absorbing more oxygen, not always necessarily that your lungs are delivering less. The fact that some people can maintain a 99% reading is actually more alarming to me. It’s a sign that their cells may not be absorbing enough oxygen from their bloodstream.

Therefore, if Trump is holding only 93% he doesn’t have hypoxia, pneumonia or a severe respiratory condition. At this time last year, if someone was infected with a coronavirus and was short of breath, do you know what we would have said they had?

The common cold.

Goldman’s Cecil Medicine, Expert Consult Premium Edition says that 15% of colds are caused by the coronaviruses. But the common cold doesn’t kill people, does it?

Yes, it does. “Most people recover within about 7-10 days,” says the CDC in Common Colds: Protect Yourself and Others. “However, people with weakened immune systems, asthma, or respiratory conditions may develop serious illness, such as bronchitis or pneumonia.”

Sound familiar?

COVID-19 is quite possibly a frightening new name for the common cold (which sometimes becomes deadly). History may look back at all this sensationalism over a president having a cold and get a good belly laugh. My guess is Mr. Trump will soon be back in the Oval Office polarizing America one Tweet at a time.

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John C. A. Manley has spent over a decade ghostwriting for medical doctors, as well as naturopaths, chiropractors and Ayurvedic physicians. He publishes the COVID-19(84) Red Pill Briefs – an email-based newsletter dedicated to preventing the governments of the world from using an exaggerated pandemic as an excuse to violate our freedom, health, privacy, livelihood and humanity. He is also writing a novel, Brave New Normal: A Dystopian Love Story. Visit his website at: MuchAdoAboutCorona.ca. He is a frequent contributor to Global Research.

Featured image is a screenshot from a CBC video

One of the more diabolical aspects of the protracted COVID ‘crisis’ in countries like the United Kingdom, the United States and Australia, is the intellectually dishonest claim that Coronavirus in their countries is somehow different from the Coronavirus in other western countries. 

It’s like there are two parallel universes now. While the Anglosphere continues to ramp-up its emergency ‘pandemic’ measures and mandatory mask and quarantine policies, their Scandinavian counterparts like Sweden, Norway or Denmark have already returned to life as normal; no masks on public transport (although Norway just introduced a new rule today advising masks on crowded carriages), no obsessive social distancing rules, no snap lockdowns, and certainly no draconian laws and threats of £10,000 fines made by government leaders, or holding the country hostage until a wonder vaccine arrives in the spring. The contrast couldn’t be more extreme.

Sweden’s success should be obvious to the UK and other lockdown adherents by now, but you wouldn’t know it watching the political coverage in the media. Since when did normal life become so threatening to certain western governments and their media adjuncts?

Sweden today , no masks , life as normal .. Lovely to see .. The energy is great .. Sorry if this upsets people .. #anotherway #sheepnomore pic.twitter.com/7GauzSGAjP

— Sean collins (@SeanCollins66) September 24, 2020

Why has normality not returned to the US and UK?

Perhaps the worst aspect of the new hypochondriac culture being aggressively promoted in the US and UK is how the state bureaucrats and schools are now targeting children and young adults with a relentless regime of restrictive and nonsensical health and safety policies. One of the main drivers of the school chaos in the UK has been the teachers/public service unions, who have seized on the crisis in order to leverage political power and carve out a platform in the national spotlight. Union officials repeated the fallacious claim that schools were no longer safe unless a whole new raft of new rules, regulations and government assurances were put into place. The list of issues and concerns keeps growing by the day and is now threatening to bring normal education to a grinding halt.

As a result of this over-the-top fear-based approach to risk mitigation, the lives of students and their families across the UK have been unnecessarily disrupted. In just the first few weeks of school, many thousands of students have already been removed from school and sent home and placed under under 14 day house arrest-quarantine order by school administrators – all because another student in school or a teacher had tested PCR positive for COVID.

Many schools are also ordering all primary, secondary and high school students to remain under house arrest at home over their half-term break, supposedly to “stop the spread of the virus.”

British authorities have even gone so as to demand that university students remain on campus over the Christmas break in order “stop the spread of COVID to their families back home.”

All of this is taking place at a time where hospitalisations and deaths due to COVID have dropped to near zero in the UK. In other words: the ‘pandemic’, if it ever was one, is now over.

GRAPH: Since May, hospitalisations in the UK have plummeted, as have deaths attributed to COVID19.

Still, neither school or government health officials will readily admit the fact that young people at statistically at near zero risk of any complications due to COVID. Likewise, nearly all teachers fall well below the well-established elderly age-bracket risk zone. In addition to this, UK officials still refuse to acknowledge that the PCR test is not only unreliable as a diagnostic tool for COVID, it also cannot rightly identify whether a positive PCR test is indeed a ‘case’ or even an ‘infection.’  This means that the entire mass-testing effort championed by governments is fatally flawed at source. This is not up for debate, it is a scientific reality.

By contrast, from the very beginning of the crisis, Sweden never closed its schools and only required its university-aged students to temporarily migrate to remote teaching online. The results for Sweden have been impressive – minimal or no interruption for millions of students nationwide during such a crucial stage in their formative educational years.

Unfortunately, the opposite path has been pursued in the US and UK, and the results have been catastrophic.

‘Normal life’ – a scene from Amagertorv Strøget in Copenhagen, Denmark (Source: Wikicommons)

Unlike in the UK, the Danish Teachers Union did not take to the media to try and hold government and schools hostage by threatening to strike if the State could not guarantee all schools were”safe” for teachers. Instead, there were sane and measured discussions, and genuine cooperation between the government and the teachers’ unions. Interestingly, both parties allowed the schools to be the final authority on how to conduct the business of managing schools and education.

During a recent discussion with CBC, Dorte Lange, VP of the Danish Teachers Union described the type of practical, common sense approach which appears to have escaped the educational brain trust in Britain and US – realising that it’s “very much is up to the schools to see what’s the best way forward for us with our kids.”

While some social distancing measures were put into place early on when schools were opened in April and May, most of the major precautionary measures have since been lifted because Danish educators and administrators rightly recognised that you cannot carry on with mass-panic and an open-ended state of emergency; the masks, the endless quarantines and the bizarre social distancing – without jeopardising, and eventually ruining their students’ education experience.

Again, the fundamental question still remains: if it’s the same virus everywhere, then why have Scandinavian countries taken a completely different approach?

Putting aside the very real possibility that all of this is part of a massive state and corporate power grab in the UK, US, Australia and elsewhere, there is another fundamentally democratic issue at play here. The marked difference in policy demonstrates how the social contract between citizens and government is still alive and healthy in Scandinavia. In other words: their governments still desire a mutual arrangement with the people.

Has this same social contract been abandoned in the UK, US and Australia?

CBC reports from Denmark…

Ålholm headmaster Soren Vith said getting close to students comes with risk, but he wants the school experience to be as normal as possible. (Lily Martin/CBC)

Every seat in Jens Rodgaard’s Grade 5 class is full — there is no physical distance at all. 

When a student raises their hand with a question, Rodgaard is by their side in an instant and leans in to help.

“You have to be around them and help them, help them with spelling, help them make choices, and for proper teaching we can’t do that with the distance,” Rodgaard said.

Students must sanitize their hands every time they enter the school and the grades aren’t supposed to mingle with each other. But there isn’t a mask in sight.

This is what Phase 2 of school reopening looked like at Ålholm public school in Copenhagen, Denmark, this week, a month into the second semester.

“Right now we are trying to make things as normal as possible, [to] not scare any kids,” said Rodgaard, who has taught at Ålholm for 28 years.

The school’s goal is to make the experience of education as normal as possible during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Other schools have more rules in place. At this stage, Denmark is allowing each school to come up with its own COVID-19 safety plans.

Right now, the country’s strategy of containing the coronavirus seems to be working. Countries around the world, including Canada, have looked at the Danish model in designing their own school plans… Continue this report at CBC

Now, after six months of pandemia, it’s now clearer than ever how COVID has simply revealed a steady drift towards fascism in parts of the West – a trend previously obscured by endless cycles of media and political rhetoric and platitudes about democracy, and convoluted by constant fearmongering about a non-existent Russian threat to something vaguely referred to as ‘our way of life.’ It’s time for the high-minded guardians of democracy in the ‘free’ West to take a long hard look in the mirror.

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This article was originally published on 21st Century Wire.

Author Patrick Henningsen is an American writer and global affairs analyst and founder of independent news and analysis site 21st Century Wire, and is host of the SUNDAY WIRE weekly radio show broadcast globally over the Alternate Current Radio Network (ACR). He has written for a number of international publications and has done extensive on-the-ground reporting in the Middle East including work in Syria and Iraq. See his archive here.

People around the world are watching as U.K. Judge Vanessa Baraitser hears arguments and decides whether or not to extradite Wikileaks founder Julian Assange to the U.S.

While the Obama administration chose not to charge Assange, wary of the precedent it might set in criminalizing journalism, the Trump administration indicted him with 18 criminal charges that may land Assange in one of the U.S.’s most notorious prisons for 175 years.

Assange’s Wikileaks has won numerous journalism awards and has never had to retract a single publication despite releasing more than 10 million documents exposing, among other things, U.S. war crimes. Former CIA Director Leon Panetta recently indicated that the ongoing persecution of Assange is meant to “send a message to others not to do the same thing.”

As the world debates whether Assange is a hero or a traitor, Children’s Health Defense takes a step back to examine some of the things his organization has revealed for those fighting for health and environmental justice.

1. U.S. diplomatic efforts to overturn resistance to GMOs at the behest of Monsanto

Wikileaks published hundreds of diplomatic cables exhibiting attempts by the U.S. to quell opposition to genetically modified organisms or GMOs. As reported by The Guardian, “the cables show U.S. diplomats working directly for GM companies such as Monsanto.”

In a 2007 cable, Craig Stapleton, then U.S. Ambassador to France, advised the U.S. to prepare for economic war with countries unwilling to introduce Monsanto’s GM corn seeds. He recommended the U.S. “calibrate a target retaliation list that causes some pain across the E.U.”

Another dispatch, this one from 2009, demonstrated that the U.S. funded a GMO workshop in Mozambique that, according to the authors, helped advance biotech-friendly policies in the country.

In another cable from 2009, a U.S. diplomat stationed in Germany relayed intelligence on Bavarian political parties to several U.S. federal agencies and the U.S. Secretary of Defense, telling them which parties opposed Monsanto’s M810 corn seed and tactics that the U.S. could impose to resolve the opposition.

One cable from Hong Kong shows a State Department employee requesting $92,000 in U.S. public funds for “media education kits” to combat a growing popular movement calling for the labeling of GMO foods in Hong Kong. The cable indicates a desire to “make it much more difficult for mandatory labelling advocates to prevail.” The State Department’s Anita Katial, who wrote the cable, also recalled a time when her office facilitated the sending of pro-biotech and bio-agriculture DVDs to every highschool in Hong Kong.

According to Food & Water Watch Executive Director Wenonah Hauter, the trove of cables “really gets down to twisting the arms of countries and working to undermine local democratic movements that may be opposed to biotech crops, and pressuring foreign governments to also reduce the oversight of biotech crops.”

2. Multinational commodities trader dumping toxic waste in West Africa

In 2006, Trafigura, the world’s second largest oil trader, illegally discharged more than 500 tons of highly toxic oil waste near the Port of Abidjan in the Ivory Coast. Some of the dump sites were near agriculture fields or water supplies, and the UN estimates that more than 100,000 people sought medical treatment due to the incident. Wikileaks would later call this incident “possibly the most culpable mass contamination incident since Bhopal.”

Trafigura’s lawyer commissioned a confidential study that listed what the environmental and health impacts of the dumping incident would be after people living near the port started flooding hospitals.

The report explained that contact with the offloaded compounds could lead to eye damage, lung damage, skin burns, headaches, breathing difficulty, permanent skin ulceration, coma and death. The report also states that the chemical compounds would have a “severe and negative effect” on the environment.

As recently as 2016, residents were complaining about the smell of the waste, headaches, breathing problems and skin problems.

Wikileaks published the classified report in 2009, the first time the public could see the company’s true negligence.

3. Gates Foundation sees environmental activists as a threat

In 2008, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation hired an intelligence firm called Stratfor to put together a “threat assessment report” and determine current and future threats to the foundation.

Stratfor’s report saw environmental activists, indigenous farming groups, and peasant political parties in Asia and South America, as “potential threats” to the foundation.

“Threats to the foundation are likely to be directly related to the public association between the foundation and a controversial issue such as GMOs, animal testing, clinical trials and reproductive rights,” the report reads.

Stating that the primary threat to the foundation’s agriculture program comes from its work promoting GMOs, the report notes the rise of anti-GMO campaigning in developing countries, including a “staunch opposition to GMOs in India.” It even names specific activists, such as the U.S.-based anti-GMO campaigner Jeffrey Smith.

The report also mentions the work of large organizations like Greenpeace and PETA as well as alternative media outlets like the Center for Public Integrity, Mother Jones, AlterNet and the LA Times, which had just published a series accusing the foundation of “reap[ing] vast financial gains from investments in companies that contribute to the human suffering in health, housing and social welfare.”

Wikileaks published the threat assessment as part of its release of more than 5 million Stratfor emails in 2012.

4. Pharma intel and espionage operation

In 1996, Pfizer, one of the world’s largest pharmaceutical companies, conducted clinical trials in Nigeria for an antibiotic called Trovan. The results were devastating, as Nigerian officials reported more than 50 children died in the experiment and dozens became disabled.

In 2006, a Nigerian government panel concluded that Pfizer violated international law and called the experiment “an illegal trial of an unregistered drug.” In 2007, Nigerian state and federal authorities sued Pfizer for $7 billion, alleging the company did not have proper consent from the children’s parents.

A 2009 U.S. diplomatic cable published by Wikileaks revealed that while the case was in federal court, Pfizer had hired a private intelligence firm to get blackmail on Nigerian Attorney General Michael Aondoakaa.

According to the cable, “Pfizer’s investigators were passing this information to local media,” who published articles on the attorney general’s “alleged” corruption. “Aondoakaa’s cronies were pressuring him to drop the suit for fear of further negative articles,” it reads.

A few months after the negative articles, the Nigerian ministry of justice signed a settlementwith Pfizer.

5. U.S. is a climate bully

Cables disclosed by Wikileaks in 2010 present the U.S. using what The Guardian called “spying, threats and promises of aid” to get international support for the 2009 Copenhagen Accord — an industry-friendly international climate deal with non-binding agreements to lower emissions. (Climate activist Naomi Klein described, at the time, the accord as “nothing more than a grubby pact between the world’s biggest emitters”.)

The State Department sent a secret cable to foreign embassies seeking human intelligence, or “dirt,” on UN diplomats regarding climate policy. And, as reported by Democracy Now!, the cables also indicated that the U.S. cut funding to Bolivia and Ecuador after both governments opposed the accord.

Bill McKibben, founder of the climate organization 350.org, said the cables exposed that “the U.S. was both bullying and buying countries into endorsing their do-little position on climate.”

6. International organizations consulting with Big Pharma

In 2009, Wikileaks revealed documents that the International Federation of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers & Associations (IFPMA) gave its members a report by the UN’s World Health Organization(WHO)’s Expert Working Group on research and development financing.

IFPMA members include pharmaceutical giants like Bayer, Johnson & Johnson, Merck, Novartis, Pfizer and Sanofi, and the organization represents these entities when dealing with the UN. What makes the Wikileaks document dump significant is that the working group gave IFPMA access to these documents months before their scheduled public release, suggesting that the UN’s health expert group was more accountable to the pharmaceutical industry than to its own member states.

“The compilation of documents shows the influence of ‘Big Pharma’ on the policy making decisions of the WHO,” Wikileaks commented when publishing the files.

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Featured image is from CHD

A second Iranian convoy of tankers is arriving in Venezuela this week with over 800,000 barrels of gasoline.

Forest, Faxon and Fortune ships will be discharging the fuel shipments in the El Palito and Paraguana refinery ports over the coming days at a moment when the nation’s gasoline supply finds itself in a critical state.

Last May, a flotilla of five Iranian vessels made a first delivery of 1.5 million barrels of gasoline and fuel additives, as well as parts for refineries.

Another shipment destined for Venezuela with an estimated 1.1 million barrels was seized in international waters in August in a US civil forfeiture case. The fuel will allegedly be auctioned and the funds destined to the US Victims of State Sponsored Terrorism Fund.

With US sanctions targeting the Caribbean country’s oil industry as well as crude-for-fuel swap deals, fuel shortages have become widespread in recent weeks throughout the country. Caracas has turned to Tehran for assistance with both fuel cargoes and restarting the country’s refining industry. The El Palito and Cardon refineries are currently producing 55,000 barrels per day (bpd), well below maximum capacity and short of meeting demand.

The new Iranian fuel shipment saw the Venezuelan government unveil a new fuel rationing system based on license plate numbers which will begin next Monday. President Maduro announced that new cargoes have been secured but that the country needs to meet its gasoline and diesel demand with domestic production.

Fuel shortages, as well as a deterioration of public services, have generated protests in a host of states in recent days. Local authorities deployed riot police, with an unconfirmed number of arrests thus far.

On Tuesday, the Maduro government announced a new initiative to tackle the effects of US sanctions by submitting an “anti-blockade” bill at the National Constituent Assembly. The legislation is claimed to provide the Venezuelan state with new institutional and legal capacities to face the US blockade.

In his speech presenting the bill, Maduro highlighted the harmful effects of the US Treasury measures on the oil industry and the difficulties they created in sustaining social programs.

“In five years, the blockade cut off financing to the country, preventing the state from having the foreign exchange to purchase food, medicine, supplies and essential raw materials for economic activity,” he emphasized.

Maduro explained that the new law will look to stimulate economic activity by creating better and more flexible conditions for private sector investment. This will reportedly entail creating labor and tax benefits for businesses.

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Featured image: Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro presented a new “anti-blockade” law before the National Constituent Assembly. (Prensa Presidencial)

“Re-infesting” the White House with a Mixture of Far Right-wing Political Extremists,

White Supremacists, Right-wing Big Corporate Lobbyists and Christian Theocrats

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Important Quotations

“What Christians have got to do is take back this country, one precinct at a time, one neighborhood at a time and one state at a time. I honestly believe that in my lifetime, we will see a country once again governed by Christians … and Christian values. … I want to be invisible. I do guerilla warfare. I paint my face and travel at night. You don’t know it’s over until you’re in a body bag. You don’t know until election night.” 

( Ralph Reed – Christian Coalition Executive Director during the 1990s)

“Our Glorious Leader (Trump) has ascended to God Emperor. Make no mistake about it: we did this. If it were not for us, it wouldn’t have been possible. … The White race is back in the game. And if we’re playing, no one can beat us. The winning is not going to stop.” 

(A revealing quote from the Neo-Nazi, White Supremacist website Daily Stormer, which claims to be the “#1 Alt-Right” website, following Donald Trump’s election in 2016)

(Stormfront’s motto is: “White Pride Worldwide”)

Trump November 2016 Election Victory. KKK Statement

KKK ex-Grand Wizard David Duke couldn’t help but celebrate the part that his White Supremacist movement had in electing Trump”. Duke proclaimed the day after the election:

“make no mistake about it, our people played a HUGE role in electing Trump!… You arrogant, unthankful, degenerate pieces of sh**t no longer have absolute power.”

And the image below makes clear one of the reasons that southern white supremacists and southern states rights’ advocates have had so much power since the South’s humiliating defeat 150 years ago in the War Between the States.

The hard core among them actually doesn’t think that the “godly” cause of white Christian supremacy over non-whites and non-Christians was actually lost back then. Trump has given hope to them. And theocracy-minded Christian Fundamentalists seem to have developed a cozy relationship with the KKK, White Supremacist groups and Neo-fascist groups within the Trump-supporting camp.

The 2016 Election Campaign

During the 2016 campaign for President, Hillary Clinton unwisely made the now-infamous statement saying that half of Donald Trump’s supporters were what she libelously characterized as “a basket of deplorables”.

She was speaking at the “LGBT for Hillary” gala in New York City 2 months before election day. In the speech, Clinton went on to explain the phrase by saying that many of Trump’s supporters were “racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic and Islamophobic.”

Hillary could have legitimately expanded on her argument by adding to her list of anti-democracy hate groups some of the following groups of ardent Trump supporters like the Ku Klux Klan; far right-wing activists like David Duke; White Supremacists; neo-fascist groups like the Proud Boys; pro-Trump hate groups that wanted to “Make America White Again”; and the hundreds of well-armed neo-fascist paramilitary vigilantes across America (as listed in the Southern Poverty Law Center’s archives here).

Included in the list above could have been included some of the following elite, wealthy, white collar Wall Street and War Street predatory capitalist and investor groups who thrive – no matter who in in the “Swamp”. This elite group feeds at the “Corporate Welfare Trough” and are responsible for 1] the endlessly wasteful military spending, 2] the immoral desire to expand the American Empire, 3] the attempts to privatize Social Security, the postal service and health care and 4] keeping the for-profit prison system privatized and profitable for investors.

There are many antidemocratic American groups that have emerged, since the Trump era began, and they are perennial Washington insider “swamp-dwellers” and non-Washington outsider “swamp-dwellers” who have become energized Trump sycophants because of his vote-getting “promises”, most of which were not kept.

Giving the Middle Finger to the Establishment

However, most Trump voters aren’t crypto-fascists or even racists. They voted for him because they wanted to give the middle finger to the establishments of both major political parties, neither of which had been very responsive to their needs for generations.

Many Trump voters, even if they couldn’t articulate it, also wanted to say “F… You” to the hundreds of predatory corporations that have kept all middle and lower class voters in perennial consumer debt, credit card debt, college student loan debt, mortgage debt, and healthcare debt – not to mention dependent on the multitude of addictive consumer products (including their medications and time-consuming entertainment) that they can’t stop purchasing or swallowing. The list of legal addictive psychiatric drugs, illegal addictive street drugs, nicotine, caffeine, spectator sports, videogaming, entertainment and pornography all come to mind.

Why So Many Bernie Supporters Didn’t Vote for Hillary

Prior to having the Democratic Party nomination for President stolen from him twice, Bernie Sanders energized a substantial number of the lower 90% of middle class, minority and oppressed populations (both white and non-white, some of whom naturally also wanted to give the finger to the Democratic Party establishment that had repeatedly ignored them for  all those years). Bernie particularly resonated with young people because he was exposing a lot of the establishment’s corruption that those voters had suspected but had not heard articulated so powerfully.

So when Bernie was cheated by the Democratic National Committee for the first time in 2016 many of those young voters naturally became disillusioned and some of themtdidn’t vote at all or even voted for Trump, symbolically saying “F… You” to both of America’s Two parties, both of which are corporate-controlled and enablers of the bankrupting military-industrial complex And so the enthusiasm that Bernie had generated for the Democratic Party went to waste.

I take no pride in saying “I told you so” to the misbegotten Hillary campaign insiders who dissed and cheated Bernie and his supporters (and offered no apologies), but I agree with many political pundits that Bernie would have beaten Trump in either 2016 or 2020.

I attach below portions of my (prophetic?) June 14, 2016 Duty to Warn column that was published soon after Hillary became the Democratic Party nominee. The column was titled:

“Why Many Bernie Supporters Will Soon be Abandoning the Democratic Party”,

and the pertinent subtitle was

“Why Hillary Clinton’s Campaign Organizers and her Democratic Party Super-Delegates Will Some Day Regret Sabotaging Sanders’ Candidacy”.

“The 2016 Democratic primaries have been frustrating for many progressives who have had their political juices awakened and energized by the nonviolent political revolution of Bernie Sanders, his New Deal/Fair Deal politics, his democratic socialist candidacy and his support for oppressed and discriminated-against minorities (including Latinos, African-Americans, Native Americans, Palestinians, Muslims and the LGBT community, among others).

“But the Democratic Party, once the mortal enemy of fascism, corporate monopolies, governmental rule by wealthy elites and fraudulent elections, has sabotaged, through any number of backroom deals (and with the willing help of the corporate-controlled media), Sanders’ highly respected, altruistic candidacy. The center-right Democratic national leadership has unfairly denied him the well-deserved nomination. Because of the intransigency of their pro-Wall Street, pro-War Street, wealthy insiders in the party hierarchy, they will soon regret what they have done as much as the GOP may eventually regret the choice of the xenophobic, sociopathic, paranoid, narcissistic megalomaniacal Donald Trump as their party’s leader.

“Both political parties have had their agendas shaped by billionaire corporate and militaristic plutocrats and Wall Street tycoons who have purchased large numbers of mercenary lobbyists, lawyers and federal and Supreme Court judges and also the loyalties of the vast majorities of elected legislators (both at the state and national levels) via massive amounts of campaign cash.  The classic truism of “whoever pays the piper, calls the tune” still holds in 2016.

“It is truly rare to find altruistic politicians in America who are capable of igniting the imaginations and hopes of millions of folks, especially minorities and the younger generations, who have been “feeling the Bern”.

“The Wall Street/War Street NeoCons (now tragically in total control of the GOP and in positions of power in the Democratic Party) have been somehow allowing a small minority of idealistic politicians to exist in America, I suppose partly for window-dressing. As Rush Limbaugh once proclaimed (after the GOP started feeling its oats in DC in the mid-90s): “I tell people don’t kill all the liberals. Leave enough so we can have two on every campus—living fossils—so we will never forget what these people stood for.”

“But there have been other American idealists throughout history that have also felt something resembling ‘the Bern’. Such people-power movements have happened only a handful of times over the past American century. Each movement’s progressive leadership has been ‘disappeared’, snuffed out or ‘suicided’, either by intimidation, assassination, smear campaigns or some other political intrigue such as imprisonment (as in the case of democratic socialist and labor union leader Eugene Debs, who – in 1918 – was convicted and sentenced to 10 years in prison for his antiwar activism [where he continued his run for president on the American Socialist Party ticket, garnering nearly a million votes]).

“History tells us about the brief appearances of past progressive movements that promised to benefit the ‘common man’, like ‘Fighting Bob’ LaFollete’s Progressive Party era, Eugene Debs’s persecuted Socialist Party, FDR’s New Deal era, the antiwar, liberal efforts of JFK, RFK and MLK, Eugene McCarthy, Paul Wellstone’s people’s campaign, Ralph Nader’s Green Party candidacy, Occupy Wall Street’s efforts, the disappearing democratic wing of the Democratic Party and, most importantly, all those millions of eager progressive-minded college-age Bernie supporters who so clearly see the dire need for a true political revolution.”

Draining the Swamp, but Protecting Many of the Far Right-Wing Swamp-dwellers

One of Donald Trump’s sure-fire applause lines in 2016 – besides pledging to “make America great again”, pledging to put Hillary Clinton behind bars, and forcing Mexico to pay for his multi-billion dollar border wall – was his pledge to “drain the swamp” in Washington. Un-appreciated by most of his true believers, Trump’s transition team and appointees were heavily populated with swamp creatures who were already mired in Washington.

Trump’s supporters, cabinet members, White House staff and other assorted partners in crime included white collar corporate bigwigs from both Wall Street’s Big Banks, billionaire CEOs from Big Pharma and War Street’s Big Weapons industries.

These elite swamp creatures were behind-the-scenes multimillionaires/billionaire campaign contributors (all of whom expected – and received – handsome returns on their “investments”). The very same investment “experts” also funded right-wing think tanks, anti-environmental activist groups, climate change deniers, oil, war and drug industry lobbyists, former federal bureaucrats, the Federalist Society, pro-industry academics, corporate lawyers, internet trolls, and assorted special-interest lobbyists.

Here is a helpful list of individual GOP “donors” from 2016 and their conflicts of interest. The information came from this site.

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Dr Kohls is a retired physician from Duluth, MN, USA. He writes a weekly column for the Reader, Duluth’s alternative newsweekly magazine. His columns mostly deal with the dangers of American fascism, corporatism, militarism, racism, malnutrition, psychiatric drugging, over-vaccination regimens, Big Pharma and other movements that threaten the environment or America’s health, democracy, civility and longevity. Many of his columns are archived at http://duluthreader.com/articles/categories/200_Duty_to_Warn and at http://www.globalresearch.ca/author/gary-g-kohls.

Recently, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain signed the “Abraham Accord” with Israel.  More Arab countries are rumored to be willing to also sign an alliance with Israel.  Analysts agree that the common perceived threat they share is Iran. “The enemy of my enemy is my friend,” is the glue which cements the once unthinkable alliances.  In an effort to better understand the various issues between Iran, the US, Israel and the region, Steven Sahiounie of MidEastDiscourse reached out to Dr. Javad Heirannia, a Middle East expert and director of international relations at Tahlil Bazaar News Agency. 

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Steven Sahiounie (SS):  The Obama administration signed a nuclear deal with Iran, but President Trump pulled out of the deal, and now he is saying that if he is re-elected he will make a new deal. In your opinion, will the Iranians be willing to sign a new deal with Washington, and will they ask for new conditions?

Javad Heirannia (JH):  The reason for Trump’s withdrawal from the JCPOA was that he wanted to negotiate a new agreement with Iran. In fact, he wanted to link Iran’s missile issues and regional policy to Iran’s nuclear issue. Note that the JCPOA is only about the Iranian nuclear issue, and the other sides in 5+1 knew that linking other issues to the nuclear issue would complicate the negotiations and would not work out.

Accordingly, linking issues such as the Iranian missile issue and regional issues to the Iranian nuclear issue is not desirable and makes it difficult to reach an agreement. Iran is not particularly willing to talk about missiles.

SS:  The US has started a new package of sanctions against Iran.  Why would Trump do that if he is promising to negotiate with Tehran?

JH:  At the same time, Trump is pursuing a carrot-and-stick policy toward Iran. On the one hand, by raising the issue of negotiations with Iran, he intends to present himself to the public as a peace-loving person who believes in diplomacy. Especially in the months leading up to the US presidential election, in order to convince American public opinion that he believes more in diplomacy than his rival, Joe Biden. So Trump has talked to Iran and reached an agreement within a week. In fact, this is his trick to win the votes of some people in America.

But on the other hand, by imposing the sanctions against Iran, Trump is trying to tell his supporters (voters) that the campaign of maximum pressure on Iran has not come short. This is also to the liking of the lobby of AIPAC and Israel and countries like Saudi Arabia to show that they will not fall short in any way against Iran.

SS:   Since the assassination of General Soleimani, the tension between Tehran and Washington has been on the highest level and sometimes close to war. Do you see a possible war between the two, or just a cold war?

JH:  In recent months, the United States has sought to provoke Iran into launching a limited war against Iran. But Iran consciously thwarted the US conspiracy. Iran has declared that the beginning of any war means the mother of all wars. In other words, if the United States wants to start a limited war, but Iran will not limit it and will pull the war toward all the positions of the United States and its allies in the region. Therefore, this issue is not in Trump’s favor, especially in the run-up to the elections. Iran is also reluctant to go to war because of the economic situation in the country.

Therefore, at present, the possibility of war and conflict is low.

SS:  The Israeli occupation, supported by the US, is building up a coalition against Iran, and several Arab countries are included.  Do you think that the resistance path from Gaza to South Lebanon to Syria to Iraq and to Tehran is ready for the next stage of this conflict that the Israeli occupation is preparing for?

JH:  The normalization of Israel’s relations with Arab countries is a kind of coalition against Iran and draws Israel to the borders of Iran. This will be a dangerous move by countries such as the UAE and possibly in the future by Bahrain and Saudi Arabia. Because the presence of foreign agents in the Persian Gulf region leads to more insecurity and security dilemma. Especially the presence of Israel in the region, which has a problem with Iran and is Iran’s main enemy. Therefore, Iran takes this presence seriously. Iran has stated that it has exposed itself to the resistance front with the presence of Israel in the region and near the borders of Iran. Given the actions of Lebanese Hezbollah, the Hamas movement, and the resistance forces in Syria, Israel’s presence near the Iranian border would also put them in direct confrontation with Iran and groups such as Yemen’s “Ansar Allah,” (Huthis) or perhaps the Iraqi Al-Hashd al-Shaabi.

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This article was originally published on Mideast Discourse.

Steven Sahiounie is an award-winning journalist. He is a frequent contributor to Global Research.

Featured image: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu delivers a speech on Iran’s nuclear programme at the defence ministry in Tel Aviv on 30 April 2018 (Source: MEE)

“Federalist” co-founder Sean Davis reports that CIA Director Gina Haspel is personally blocking the release of documents that will show “what actually happened” with Russiagate.

“This isn’t just a scandal about Democrat projection, this is a scandal about what was a coup planned against the incoming administration at the highest levels and I can report here tonight that these declassifications that have come out,” Davis told FOX News host Tucker Carlson on Wednesday. “Those weren’t easy to get out and there are far more waiting to get out.”

“Unfortunately those releases and declassifications according to multiple sources I’ve talked to are being blocked by CIA director Gina Haspel who herself was the main link between Washington and London,” Davis said. “As the London station chief from John Brennan’s CIA during the 2016 election. Recall, it was London where Christopher Steele was doing all this work. And I’m told that it was Gina Haspel personally who is blocking a continued declassification of these documents that will show the American people the truth of what actually happened.” (Fox News)

Click the photo to watch the video.

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Featured image is from Strategic Culture Foundation

The US has much to gain from Navalny’s illness.

Most obvious is its aim to block Nord Stream 2’s completion.

If Russia’s gas pipeline to Germany becomes operational next year, it will double what Gazprom can supply Germany and other Western countries.

If the project is suspended or halted altogether, it will advantage US LNG producers — despite the much higher cost of this energy supply.

Republicans and Dems have greater aims.

They want Russia harmed economically, geopolitically and strategically.

They want the country marginalized, weakened, and isolated.

The above objectives have been US policy throughout the Cold War and after its aftermath to the present day — no matter which right wing of its one-party state runs things.

Post-WW II, containing Russia became official US policy.

US diplomat/envoy to Soviet Russia/presidential advisor George Kennan (1904 – 2005) was “the father of containment.”

He was a core member of so-called foreign policy “wise men” in Washington.

His 1946 “Long Telegram” from Moscow and 1947 “Sources of Soviet Conduct” claimed its government was inherently expansionist.

In February 1948, his “Memo PPS23” said the following:

“(W)e have 50% of the world’s wealth but only 6.3% of its population. (It makes us) the object of envy and resentment.

“Our real task in the coming period is to devise a pattern of relationships (to let us) maintain this position of disparity without positive detriment to our national society.”

“We need not deceive ourselves that we can afford today the luxury of altruism and world benefaction…”

“We should dispense with the aspiration to ‘be liked’ or to be regarded as the repository of a high-minded international altruism.”

“We should (stop talking about) unreal objectives such as human rights, the raising of the living standards, and democratization.”

“The day is not far off when we are going to have to deal in straight power concepts.”

“The less we are hampered by idealistic slogans (ideas and practices), the better.”

In July 1947, his so-called “X” article on the “Sources of Soviet Conduct urged countering it “effectively.”

The US “can never be on Moscow’s side,” he stressed.

In March 1948, NSC 7 detailed “The Position of the United States with Respect to Soviet-Directed World Communism,” saying:

“(A) defensive policy cannot be considered an effective means of checking the momentum of Soviet expansion.”

“Defeat(ing)” communism was considered “vital to the security of the United States.”

NSC 68 (April 1950 — issued weeks before Harry Truman’s preemptive war on nonbelligerent North Korea) officially inaugurated anti-Soviet Russia containment.

It called the country an enemy “unlike previous aspirants to hegemony…animated by a new fanatic faith, antithetical to our own (wishing to) impose its absolute authority over the rest of the world.”

Ignored was the scourge of Nazi Germany and imperial Japan — or that WW II devastated Soviet Russia, requiring years of rebuilding.

Its government posed no threat to the US — not then, notably not now.

After Soviet Russia’s dissolution in December 1991, capitalism replaced its communist system.

It remains Russian Federation policy today.

Because Moscow is independent of US control, made-in-the-USA adversarial relations continue.

No Russian threat to US/Western interests exists so it was invented, notably since Vladimir Putin became president.

Bipartisan hostility toward Russia in Washington is all about wanting the country transformed into a US vassal state.

It’s about gaining control over its vast resources and population, along with eliminating a strategic rival — whose overtures for normalized relations are consistently spurned.

The Trump regime is using the Navalny incident to further its strategic interests.

It’s pressuring Germany and the EU to punish Russia for an incident no evidence suggests it had anything to do with.

Last week, German Foreign Minister Heiko Mass said that if the chemical watchdog OPCW — an imperial lapdog serving Western interests — says Navalny was poisoned by novichok exposure, “I am convinced that (EU) sanctions will be unavoidable” on Russia, adding:

“(S)uch a grave violation of the International Chemical Weapons Convention cannot go unanswered.”

Earlier, a German military lab and facilities in France and Sweden claimed that the deadly nerve agent caused his illness.

Unmentioned by these countries was that exposure to novichok — the deadliest known toxin — causes death in minutes.

Navalny is very much alive over a month after falling ill.

Discharged from hospitalization in Berlin, German doctors expect him to recovery fully or near-fully.

If poisoned by novichok, he’d have died before boarding a flight from Tomsk, Russia to Moscow.

What’s obvious is suppressed in the West by hostile-to-Moscow political officials and media.

Heroic efforts by Russian doctors in Omsk that saved Navalny’s life was erased from the EU’s historical record.

So was their biological analysis — finding no toxins in his blood, urine, liver, or elsewhere in his system.

According to former German diplomat Frank Elbe, Europe is “making a giant step backwards – back to the Cold War” by allying with US hostility toward Russia instead of normalizing relations, adding:

US policymakers are furious about an alliance by Germany and other EU countries with Russia to construct Nord Stream 2, “pursu(ing) their own independent policy.”

Elbe urged Europe to break from the US when their interests diverge — to uphold their sovereign independence.

Most often, European countries bend to Washington’s will — even  when harming their interests.

So far, opposing the Trump regime’s pressure to abandon the landmark JCPOA nuclear deal is an exception to the rule — if it sticks.

Will Nord Stream 2 be another?

Will Germany support its completion or shoot itself in the foot by allying with US interests against its own?

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Award-winning author Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago. He can be reached at [email protected]. He is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG)

His new book as editor and contributor is titled “Flashpoint in Ukraine: US Drive for Hegemony Risks WW III.”

http://www.claritypress.com/LendmanIII.html

Visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com.

Featured image is from Wikimedia Commons

In remarks to the UN Security Council, The Grayzone’s Aaron Maté details the OPCW’s Douma cover-up scandal and urges UN members to support the chemical watchdog’s inspectors whose evidence was suppressed.

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At an Arria-Formula Meeting of the United Nations Security Council, Aaron Maté of The Grayzone delivers remarks on the OPCW’s ongoing Syria scandal.

Veteran OPCW inspectors who investigated an alleged chemical attack in Douma, Syria in April 2018 say that their probe was censored and manipulated. Under direct US government pressure, the OPCW concealed evidence that pointed to the incident being staged on the ground, and instead released a report that suggested Syrian government culpability. The allegation against Syria led to the bombing of Syria by the US, France, and UK just days after the alleged Douma incident. In his remarks, Aaron calls this “one of the most important, and overlooked, global stories in recent memory” and urges the UN and OPCW to let the OPCW inspectors air their concerns, and present the evidence that was suppressed.

Other briefers participating in the UN session were former OPCW inspector Ian Henderson, a member of the Douma team; and award-winning physicist Ted Postol, MIT professor emeritus and former Pentagon adviser.

The full video of the UN session can be viewed here.

Full transcript follows.

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Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen,

My name is Aaron Maté. I am a journalist with The Grayzone, based in the United States. It’s an honor to speak to you today about what I think is one of the most important, and overlooked, global stories in recent memory.

The OPCW — the world’s top chemical weapons watchdog — is facing a serious scandal. Leaks from inside strongly suggest the OPCW has been severely compromised. The implications of this are grave.

It would mean that the OPCW was exploited to accuse the Syrian government of a chemical weapons attack in the city of Douma in April 2018. It would also mean that the OPCW was used to retroactively justify the bombing of Syria by several member states, just days after the alleged Douma incident. In short, it appears the OPCW was compromised to justify military strikes.

There are also indications that the OPCW has retaliated against two veteran officials who were part of the Douma investigation and challenged the censorship of the Douma evidence.

These two OPCW officials are highly regarded scientists with more than 25 years of combined experience at the organization. Yet instead of being protected, and given the chance to air their concerns, these two scientists have seen their reputations impugned by the OPCW leadership.

There is substantial evidence to back all of this up. I will summarize the key details.

The OPCW’s Fact-Finding Mission, or FFM, deployed to Syria and what is known as Country X to investigate the Douma incident in April 2018. They interviewed scores of witnesses and visited several key sites. They examined gas cylinders found at the scene, took chemical samples and hundreds of photos, and conducted detailed measurements.

Upon their return from Syria, the FFM team drafted an extensive and detailed report of their findings. But what the investigators found in Douma is not what the OPCW released to the world. And that is because the investigators who were on the ground in Syria were overruled, and had their findings censored.

The key facts about this censorship are, to my knowledge, undisputed:

1) The investigators’ initial report, which was due for imminent publication, was secretively re-edited to produce a version that sharply deviated from the original. Both versions – the original and the altered report – have been published by Wikileaks.

Comparing both reports we see that key facts were removed or mis-represented. Conclusions were also rewritten to support the allegation that a chlorine gas attack had occurred in Douma.

Yet the team’s initial, original report did not conclude that a chemical attack occurred. In fact, their report had presented the possibility that victims in Douma were killed in an incident that was “non-chemical related.” Though unstated, the reader could easily infer from this that the militants who controlled Douma at the time had staged the scene to make it falsely appear that a chemical attack had occurred.

2) Then there is the toxicology assessment. Four experts from an OPCW and NATO-member state conducted a toxicology review.

They concluded that observed symptoms of the victims in Douma, “were inconsistent with exposure to chlorine, and no other obvious candidate chemical causing the symptoms could be identified.”

This finding was kept secret, and are inconsistent with the conclusions of the final report.

3) There were also chemical tests of the samples collected in Douma. These samples showed that chlorinated compounds were detected at what amounted to trace quantities in the parts-per-billion range.

Yet this finding was also not disclosed. Furthermore, it later emerged that the chemicals themselves did not stand out as unique: most, if not all, could have resulted from contact with household products such as bleach — or come from chlorinated water or wood preservatives.

Crucially, the control samples collected by the inspectors to give context to the analysis results were never analyzed.

4) Because of other leaks, we now know that this censorship was protested from the inside. The chief author of the initial report, identified by the OPCW as Inspector B, was among those who deployed to Syria for the entire Douma mission. Records show he was also, at the time, the OPCW’s top expert in chemical weapons chemistry.

On June 22nd, 2018 Inspector B protested the secretive redaction in an e-mail expressing his “gravest concern.” I will quote him:

“After reading this modified report, which incidentally no other team member who deployed into Douma has had the opportunity to do, I was struck by how much it misrepresents the facts.”

5) After that e-mail of protest, and just days before a substitute, stop-gap interim report was published on July 6, something very unusual occurred. A U-S government delegation met with members of the investigation team to try to influence them. The US officials encouraged the Douma team to conclude that the Syrian government had committed a chemical attack with chlorine. It is worth noting here that the US delegation promoted this chlorine theory despite the fact that it was still not publicly known that no nerve agents had been found in Douma.

The Douma investigators reportedly saw the meeting as unacceptable pressure and a violation of the OPCW’s declared principles of independence and impartiality. Under the Chemical Weapons Convention, State Parties are explicitly prohibited from seeking to influence the inspectors in the discharge of their responsibilities.

6) Inspector B’s intervention thwarted the imminent release of the doctored report.

But at that point, the OPCW officials began to manage the issuance of a new negotiated report, namely, the so-called interim report that was released on July 6 2018.

Although this interim report no longer contained some of the unsupported claims that senior OPCW officials had tried to insert, it still omitted key facts found in the original, uncensored report.

7) Around that time, the investigation saw a drastic change. The protesting Inspector B – who had written the original report — was sidelined from the investigation. OPCW executives then decreed that the probe, from that point forward, would be handled by a so-called “core team.”

This new “core” team made formal the exclusion of all of the inspectors who had conducted the investigation in Syria, except for one paramedic. It was this so-called core team—and not the inspectors who had signed off on the original report—that generated the OPCW final’s report of March 2019.

8) That final report sharply differed from what the OPCW inspectors reported in the suppressed initial report. The final report concluded that there were “reasonable grounds” to believe that a chemical weapons attack occurred in Douma and that “the toxic chemical was likely molecular chlorine.” Many crucial facts and evidence redacted from the original report continued to be omitted.

9) The final report also saw a major discrepancy when it comes to witness testimony. The witnesses interviewed offered sharply contrasting narratives – yet only those witnesses whose testimony supported the use of chemical weapons, were used to inform the report’s conclusions.

It is also worth noting the imbalance in witness locations: although the alleged chemical incident took place in Syria, twice as many witnesses were interviewed in Country X.

10) One inference drawn from the OPCW’s final report was that gas cylinders found in Douma likely came from military aircraft. But a leaked engineering assessment assigned to a sub-team of the FFM found otherwise.

The OPCW leadership has yet to offer a substantive explanation for why such critical evidence was excluded and why the original report was radically altered.

The OPCW Director General Fernando Arias justified the conclusions of the final report and excused alleged fraudulent scientific behavior by incorrectly stating that “the FFM undertook the bulk of its analytical work” during the last seven months of the investigation – or after the interim report that was published in July 2018.

A close review of the final report demonstrates that this is far from the case. As the dissenting inspectors have noted, by the time the interim report was released, 31 of the 44 samples were analyzed, 34 of the 39 interviews had been conducted and analyzed, and the toxicological study was already done but the conclusions excluded.

In the nearly eight months after the Interim Report was released, only 13 new samples were analyzed along with 5 additional interviews.

Comparing the text of the final report to the original report is also instructive. The final report copy and pastes much of the text of the original report – the one difference is that inconvenient evidence was removed, and un-supported conclusions were added.

But even if it were true that the bulk of the analysis was done after the interim report, the fact the OPCW would have conducted the bulk of its work after July 2018 would not in any way explain or justify the alleged scientific fraud committed before it. In fact, it would only raise the possibility that more fraud occurred.

Instead of addressing the discrepancies and cherry-picked facts, the OPCW Director General Fernando Arias has also denigrated the two members of the Douma fact-finding mission team who challenged the manipulation of facts and evidence.

The Director General has falsely portrayed them as rogue actors, with only minor roles in the investigation and incomplete information.

Yet these two inspectors are unlikely candidates to suddenly go so rogue. Inspector A has been identified as Ian Henderson – he is here today. The second inspector is known only as Inspector B. They served with the OPCW for 12 and 16 years, respectively.

Internal OPCW appraisals of their job performance offer effusive praise. In 2005, a senior OPCW official wrote that Henderson has consistently received “the highest rating possible.… I consider [him] one of the best of our Inspection Team Leaders.”

In 2018, an OPCW superior wrote that Inspector B, “has contributed the most to the knowledge and understanding of Chemical Weapons chemistry applied to inspections.” Another manager described B as “one of the most well regarded” team leaders, whose “experience of the organisation, its verification regime, and judgment are unmatched.”

It is important to also stress that the internal concerns go beyond Douma team members. Earlier this year, I heard from an OPCW official who voiced outrage at the treatment of Henderson and Inspector B. I quote this person now:

“It is quite unbelievable that valid scientific concerns are being brazenly ignored in favour of a predetermined narrative. The lack of transparency in an investigative process with such enormous ramifications is frightful. The allegations of the two gentlemen urgently need to be thoroughly investigated, and the functionality of the organisation restored.”

Now fortunately, the two inspectors involved in this Douma controversy have offered a path to transparency and to resolving this scandal. Earlier this year, they each wrote letters to the OPCW Director General asking for their concerns to be heard.

The inspectors have received support from several prominent figures, including the OPCW’s First Director General, Jose Bustani. In October 2019, Bustani took part in a panel that heard an extensive presentation from one of the Douma investigators.

Mr. Bustani wrote:

“The convincing evidence of irregular behaviour in the OPCW investigation of the alleged Douma chemical attack confirms doubts and suspicions I already had. I have always expected the OPCW to be a true paradigm of multilateralism. My hope is that the concerns expressed publicly by the Panel, in its joint consensus statement, will catalyse a process by which the Organisation can be resurrected to become the independent and non-discriminatory body it used to be.”

I hope that Mr. Bustani’s words will be heeded. As a first step, the OPCW can simply do what it has refused to do so far: meet with the entire Douma team, and let them present the evidence that was censored. It is very concerning that despite the allegations here, the OPCW Director General has never met with members of the Douma team – not just the two dissenting inspectors that are known, but the entire team. If the OPCW is confident in its conclusions, then it should have no issue with at least hearing a dissenting point of view.

The importance of addressing this issue extends far beyond repairing the OPCW’s reputation. Syria is a country that is now trying to rebuild from a devastating, nearly decade-long proxy war that caused massive suffering, destruction and death. But as Syria is trying to rebuild, it now faces a new kind of warfare in the form of crippling economic sanctions. In justifying the sanctions, the US government has cited, among other things, allegations of chemical weapons use by the Syrian government. The US government also says that the Syrian government is the target of these sanctions. But it is the Syrian people who feel the pain. The UN rapporteur on sanctions says that, “unilateral sanctions applied to Syria have visited untold sufferings on ordinary people.” The World Food Program warns that Syrians living under economic blockade now face “mass starvation or another mass exodus.”

The use of the OPCW to justify warfare on Syria – whether in the form of military strikes in 2018 or economic strangulation today in 2020 – is additionally tragic in light of the OPCW’s own history. It was just seven years ago that the OPCW was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for its work eliminating chemical weapons, including in Syria. That was a towering achievement, and a hopeful moment for those who seek a world at peace. How unfortunate then, to see the world’s top chemical weapons watchdog now potentially being comprised to lodge unproven allegations against Syria and justify warfare against it.

The OPCW inspectors who have been silenced and maligned are trying to defend their organization’s noble legacy from political exploitation. It is my hope that they will be heard. Thank you.

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Aaron Maté is a journalist and producer. He hosts Pushback with Aaron Maté on The Grayzone. He is also is contributor to The Nation magazine and former host/producer for The Real News and Democracy Now!. Aaron has also presented and produced for Vice, AJ+, and Al Jazeera.

The discussion about mining the Moon resembles that of previous conquests: the division of territory; the grabbing of resources; language of theft and plunder.  All of this is given the gloss of manifest destiny and human experiment.  Such language is also self-perpetuating: the plunderer is only as good as the amount taken; success is dependent on constant replenishment and expansion.

A presentation from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory sports the message that would sit comfortably with any empire builder in history.  “Across history, human development has relied upon the finite resources of the Earth.”  An unfortunate state of affairs, but never fear: “the moon – a seemingly barren rock – may actually be a treasure trove of rare resources vital to Earth’s future.  And now, nations are looking upwards to a potential lunar gold rush.”

Such NASA promotions tend to be tinselled with confidence and brio.  They anticipate the Cassandras and naysayers who fear that humans are merely going to deplete the next resource, causing yet another catastrophe of incalculable proportions.  “The moon has a mass of 73q tons,” claims the colourful JPL presentation.  After a few “back-of-the-envelope calculations” (always reassuring), taking one metric ton from the moon each day would take a mere “220m years to deplete 1% of the moon’s mass.”  There would be no change of orbit, or to the gravitational force that affects the Earth’s tides.  Gradual predation never hurt anybody.

The Moon had been spared such proposed rushes at least till 2008, when the Chandrayaan-1 probe from the Indian Space Research Organisation crashed into the Shackleton Crater in the lunar south pole.  It seemed to have discovered water-ice, a point confirmed by NASA in a 2018 publication that can barely conceal the delight of its authors.  “These ice deposits might be utilized as an in situ resource in future exploration of the moon.”

This has caused a rash of interest. The European Space Agency could only be encouraged, having already mentioned the idea of a Moon Village in 2015.  “A Moon Village shouldn’t just mean some houses, a church, and a town hall,” explained the newly appointed Director General of ESA, Johann-Dietrich Wörner.  “This Moon Village should mean partners from all over the world contributing to this community with robotic and astronaut missions and support communication satellites.”  Manifest destiny can also be collaborative.

With this has come the lure of private capital.  Space agencies are hungry for sources other than the tax payer.  Bidders are being sought for commercial payload deliveries; lunar bases are being touted as staging grounds for lucrative business, including mining asteroid belts.  On the Moon itself, there is the promise of such metals indispensable in electronics: yttrium, samarium and lanthanum.  Helium-3, a gas for nuclear fusion, tantalises investors. 

The incitement to aggressive competition and conflict, reminiscent of the wars fought between European powers over colonies and trade routes, seems inevitable.  The US Space Command’s “Vision for 2020”, released in 1997 but still troublingly pertinent, notes that the rise of sea commerce saw nations building “navies to protect and enhance their commercial interests.”  The brutal conquest of the American interior (described with benign reflection as “the westward expansion of the continental United States”), saw the use of military outposts and cavalry to protect wagon trains, settlements and railroads.  “Likewise, space forces will emerge to protect military and commercial national interests and investment in the space medium due to their increasing importance.” 

Last month, NASA administrator Jim Bridenstine announced that collecting moon material would form part of the agency’s Artemis lunar exploration program established in 2019.  The intention of that program is to land US astronauts on the moon by 2024 and enable them to “live off” it, as it were, a prelude to bigger and better things.  Bridenstine insisted with testosterone fuelled confidence that NASA was “working aggressively to meet our near-end goal of landing the first woman and next man on the moon by 2024” with the aim of establishing “a safe and sustainable lunar exploration architecture.”

These are the weasel words of this new exploration. Artemis will be “sustainable”, while also being “innovative”. It will also keep the budget watchers happy, as it will be “affordable”.  Specialists of space law will also be satisfied.  The dream, then, is one of facilitating space capitalism.  “We know a supportive policy regarding the recovery and use of space resources is important to the creation of a stable and predictable investment environment for commercial space innovators and entrepreneurs.”

Companies, according to Bridenstine, are being solicited “to provide proposals for the collection of space resources.”  A nod to space law is made: that actions regarding these proposals will comply “with the Registration Convention, Article II and other provisions of the Outer Space Treaty, and all our international obligations.”  Companies will collect Moon “dirt” from any part of the lunar surface, furnish “imagery” to NASA of the collection process and the material, along with data on where the material was collected and “conduct an ‘in-place’ transfer of ownership of the lunar regolith or rocks to NASA.”  That material will become the property of NASA.  But the agency promises to fork out for the “lunar regolith”, with awardees receiving 10 percent at award, 10 percent upon launch and remaining 80 percent on completing the mission.

Such remarks have an express purpose: to douse the nagging suspicions of space entrepreneurs and devotees of commercial space endeavours.  National space agencies have historically been seen as unwarranted shackles to boisterous space capitalism.  The editor and publisher of The Space Review, Jeff Foust, puts it down to a stubborn “libertarian streak”.  Historically, such space advocates eschewed government influence over their space programs “often as part of broader political beliefs”.  Others feared a competitor in the form of the space agency, a threat to “private ventures, particularly in launch.”  Modern exponents of such thinking can be found in Peter Lothian Nelson and Walter E. Block’s Space Capitalism, a libertarian work of such cranky polemic it even questions the space ventures of Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos and Richard Branson as unduly compromised by state involvement.

On Earth, capitalism as a system is being given a pasting by exponents of sustainability who argue that it is doomed and dooming.  The age of the Anthropocene, the outgrowth of human dependence upon fossil fuels, has proven to be, and is proving to be an experiment of calamitous consequence.  But whatever the terrestrial changes to be made – be they to renewable infrastructure, adjustments in growth, or the development of ecological wisdom – the predatory streak of conquest and colonisation is obstinate.  The lure of lunar mining, messy lunar conquest and lunar battles, is a very real one.

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Dr. Binoy Kampmark was a Commonwealth Scholar at Selwyn College, Cambridge.  He lectures at RMIT University, Melbourne. He is a frequent contributor to Global Research and Asia-Pacific Research.  Email: [email protected]