Global Research

The Brazilian government was shaken by a new controversy on Friday after the General Director of the Federal Police, Maurício Valeixo, was sacked by Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro. Following threats made on Thursday, the Minister of Justice and Public Security, Sergio Moro, responsible for the appointment of Valeixo, decided to leave the administration of Bolsonaro, giving a controversial farewell speech with serious accusations against the president.

According to Moro, Bolsonaro’s desire to change the command of the Federal Police was motivated by a desire to interfere politically in the institution, and to gain access to confidential content of investigations about the president’s allies and family members, including his own sons. The accusations made by Bolsonaro had a great impact on the local media, but none-the-less the Brazilian president denied the allegations later that day.

Speaking a little longer than usual, Bolsonaro tried to defend himself against Moro’s accusations by talking about several different issues, but, when he spoke about his former minister, he concentrated on damaging his image before the electorate, placing him as the new enemy of his government. This is a usual tactic by the Brazilian president who always seeks an enemy to legitimize his policies and popularity.

Bolsonaro who modelled himself as the “Tropical Trump” continuously took aim against local Leftists, Venezuela, Cuba, China and anybody else that U.S. President Donald Trump also did not like. By casting an enemy, he could galvanize the Brazilian people behind him. As expected, the president’s main strategy in his speech in response to Moro was to find a new enemy.

Bolsonaro’s statements to the press were divided into three parts: focused attacks on the reputation of his former minister, describing him as an egocentric person with electoral interests; highlighting the presidential prerogative of appointing the commander of the Federal Police; and, trying to focus on valuing his own profile, talking about the assassination attempt he suffered, resources he failed to spend and the importance of his position. So, what we perceive from the speech, essentially, is what was already expected – the attempted polarization to put public opinion against Moro, while at the same time minimizing his decision to interfere with the Federal Police.

A dichotomy between Moro and Bolsonaro is emerging on social media, and it appears that Moro is winning this battle on the internet. Even before Moro’s resignations, tens of thousands went to Bolsonaro’s Twitter and Facebook accounts to tell the president that they voted for him but will not support him anymore if Moro resigns.

Earlier this month, the popularity of Bolsonaro had dropped to 33% because of his handling of the coronavirus pandemic, which he described as a “fantasy” and a “minor flu.” Earlier this month it was also revealed that the military, in which Bolsonaro is a former Captain of and strongly advocated for during his election campaign, has now shifted their support and backing for Vice President Hamilton Mourao, a former general.

Everything indicates that Bolsonaro may fall in a matter of months, and it appears this scenario can come to fruition sooner with the resignation of the highly popular Moro who was a key player in prosecuting Brazil’s Leftist former President, Lula. It certainly means that the 33% approval rating has dropped significantly after the fall out with Moro.

In an investigation by the Supreme Court, the Federal police identified councillor Carlos Bolsonaro, son of Jair Bolsonaro, as one of the articulators of a criminal fake news scheme. According to Folha, Bolsonaro wanted Valeixo removed because he knew of the criminal acts Carlos was involved in. It is not reduced to just Carlos though, and rather all three of Bolsonaro’s politically active sons, along with his wife Michelle, have been implicated in corruption scandals.

One of the main appeals of Bolsonaro was his strong rhetoric of being against corruption, which is why he brought Moro into his administration because of his popularity after putting some Brazilian politicians behind bars because of their corruption. However, this has been proven to be a scam as not only are their major questions whether those prosecuted had engaged in corruption, but there are endless scandals and accusations of corruption levelled against the Bolsonaro family.

Bolsonaro modelled himself on Trump and followed him in nearly every major foreign policy agenda regarding not only Latin America, but also China and Israel. Despite Bolsonaro being the greatest advocate for American and Israeli relations the continent has seen in decades, it is highly unlikely that either Trump or Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will come out in support of Bolsonaro as he faces a very real impeachment. It now appears that all this time of pandering to the U.S. and its interests is beginning to crash down on Bolsonaro. Rather than serve the interests of his country in this new multipolar world, he wanted to maintain the hegemonic status of the U.S. and get away with corruption – now where is Trump?

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This article was originally published on InfoBrics.

Paul Antonopoulos is an independent geopolitical analyst.

U.S. policy towards Venezuela has been a head-spinning series of contradictions lately, with no end in sight. From placing a bounty on the heads of President Nicolas Maduro and a dozen current and former Venezuelan officials, to upping sanctions and sending the largest fleet ever to the Southern hemisphere to stop drug trafficking from Venezuela, the U.S. appears to be pursuing an inexorable path towards regime change.

But at the same time, U.S. officials have announced they don’t seek a “coup” against Maduro, that the U.S. Naval deployment doesn’t seek his ouster, and that the United States wants Maduro to agree to a power-sharing deal, despite the bounty they’ve placed on his head.

An examination of the timeline reveals the last month of U.S. policy towards Venezuela has been nothing if not chaotic.

At the end of March, the United States indicted Venezuela’s President Nicolas Maduro and a dozen former and current officials on corruption, narco-terrorism and drug trafficking charges. The State Department announced that the U.S. will pay $15 million for information leading to Maduro’s arrest and conviction.

A day later, Elliot Abrams, reportedly chosen as the U.S. Special Envoy for Venezuela by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo for his expertise on coups, announced the “Democratic Transition Framework for Venezuela.” The framework calls on Maduro’s government to embrace a power-sharing deal. The plan doesn’t explain how Venezuelan leaders with bounties on their heads could come to the table and negotiate with Juan Guaido, whom the U.S. recognizes as Venezuela’s legitimate leader.

Meanwhile, the Trump administration increased sanctions on Venezuela and announced with much fanfare that U.S. Naval warships were on their way to the Caribbean to prevent “corrupt actors” and drug cartels from smuggling narcotics into the U.S.

“The goal is to replace [President Nicolas] Maduro’s illegitimate dictatorship with a legitimate transitional government that can hold free and fair elections to represent all Venezuelans. It is time for Maduro to go,” said Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.

A few days after that, and eighteen years after the U.S. supported a coup against Hugo Chavez, Abrams warned that if Maduro resisted the organization of a “transitional government” his departure would be far more “dangerous and abrupt.” Yes, this is the same Abrams who only days earlier had recommended a power-sharing arrangement. To many, Abrams’ aggressive rhetoric looked a lot like the U.S. “effectively threatening him with another assassination attempt” like the one the U.S. “tacitly supported in 2018.”

But then, the head of U.S. Southern Command Admiral Craig Faller rhetorically reversed course four days ago.

Faller said the U.S. buildup in the Caribbean is not aimed at ousting Maduro. The decision to double anti-narcotics assets in Latin America was not directly tied to Maduro’s indictment, and “economic and diplomatic pressure — not the use of military force — remain the U.S.’s” preferred tools for removing Maduro from power, said Faller.

Despite the fact that he’s leading the largest ever U.S. Naval deployment in the Southern hemisphere, and the biggest deployment since the invasion to remove Gen. Manuel Noriega of Panama, Faller contends that his operation is “not an indication of some sort of new militarization in the Caribbean” and that “this is not a shift in U.S. government policy.”

So, the Trump administration’s real aims in Venezuela remain elusive, if not confusing.

“Certainly the timing of the deployment, coming as it does on the heels of the DOJ’s indictment of Maduro on narco-terrorism charges and the placement of a bounty on his head, looks suspicious,” said Dr. Alejandro Velasco, associate professor of Modern Latin America at New York University, in an interview with TAC. “While there may not be a causal relationship between the deployment and the administration’s regime-change policy, there is a strong correlation between the two.”

“To the extent that DOJ has indicted Maduro et al on narco-terrorism charges, and the Navy operation is geared at disrupting drug cartels, then it follows that, at the very least, the aim of the deployment is to squeeze Maduro,” said Velasco. “The issue is that Maduro’s primary (or even secondary or tertiary) source of revenue isn’t narcotics, it’s minerals like oil and gold.”

“The fact is, there is a government in Venezuela that the U.S. government does not like, and the U.S. has been citing and bolstering [Maduro’s rival] the interim president Juan Guaido, funding him and spearheading an effort to get him to either—initially it was to take office, now it’s to negotiate,” said Dr. Eduardo Gamarra, a professor and expert on Latin American politics at Florida International University, in an interview with TAC.

“It’s curious, because on the one hand, our government has indicted Maduro and set a bounty on his head… we’ve labelled Maduro a drug trafficker whom we want to extradite, but then the following week, we said we want to negotiate with him.”

One thing is for certain—the Trump administration’s stated intention, of deploying the U.S. Navy to interdict narco-trafficking, is nonsensical, said Gamarra.

“Most of my research has been on drug trafficking trends, and if you look at those, and the U.S. has done these kinds of anti-trafficking exercises many times in the past, we’ve had very little impact on the flow of drugs northward,” said Gamarra. “There’s a balloon effect, where if we squeeze the Caribbean, then most drugs come through Mexico … Eighty three percent of cocaine that comes into the U.S. enters through Mexico, currently aided by Mexican cartels.”

Drug traffickers don’t need to transport drugs through the Caribbean when there’s a relatively unguarded land route via the U.S. southern border, he said. Of course, as coronavirus ravages the globe, the flow of all goods have declined, so “we will probably see a decline in drugs too.” But the fact is that the majority of drugs that enter the U.S. do so through the Pacific, not the Atlantic coast.

The Trump administration may have its eyes on domestic political prizes rather than long-term foreign policy goals, suggests Velasco. There are big pockets of Venezuelan and Cuban Americans in swing-state Florida that eagerly greeted the news of the U.S. deployment, only to be let down by the subsequent lack of action and contradictory administration statements, Gamarra points out.

“As time passes, they get the sense that they’ve again been duped,” said Gamarra. “How long has it been since this administration told Venezuelans ‘all options are on the table?’ Maduro is still there, not weaker but stronger. [On Thursday] in at least four states, there were massive lootings, the state has essentially collapsed, but still the government doesn’t fall, and the virus has actually helped strengthen its position … what is the U.S. waiting for?”

Roger Noriega, AEI fellow and former ambassador, said the mobilization of assets off the coast of Venezuela “is a very tangible sign that the U.S. is losing its patience” with Maduro, who agrees with the administration’s aggressive approach.

“The costs are getting rather high, right on our doorstep,” he said. “Maduro’s regime is destabilizing the rest of the region, including our key ally Colombia, and aiding and abetting narco-trafficking and presiding over a humanitarian disaster.”

“Sooner rather than later, I think Trump’s going to have to consider being much more forceful in dealing with this. That could mean carving out a no-fly zone, territory for humanitarian aid, or getting authority from Congress to conduct clandestine operations against bad guys at the head of the regime. So far, they have been far from creative in dealing with this threat, which has been worsening on their watch.”

Noriega doesn’t think “too many people would blame” Trump “if he went in with a small force to take care of this festering criminal regime in the way we did with Noriega” in the ’80s, but if it comes to that, it will be because “there’s been a real failure here of U.S. intelligence, and a complete and utter lack of creative thinking from the career diplomats. They’re the ones who wrote the ridiculous framework for a diplomatic transition.”

“The State Department’s approach is completely out of sync with what the president ostensibly wants to do,” he said. “When his DOJ indicts these guys, when the DoD deploys these additional forces to deal with the criminal threat, when the Treasury Department is heaping on sanctions, and then the State Department comes out with this rather surrealistic plan that essentially blesses a narco-trafficking framework to stay in power, it shows a profound lack of understanding about the dynamics within the region.”

Not everyone would agree with Noriega, who has been a hawk on the region since his days as Assistant Secretary for Western Hemisphere Affairs under George W. Bush. With a pandemic competing for the full attention (and resources) of the federal government it may be likely that Trump’s anti-interventionist instincts win over. One thing is clear: the administration’s muddy policy in the region, and the resulting confusion it kicks up, may be the worst of both worlds, setting both countries on a collision course towards regime change.

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Barbara Boland is TAC’s foreign policy and national security reporter. Previously, she worked as an editor for the Washington Examiner and for CNS News. She is the author of Patton Uncovered, a book about General George Patton in World War II, and her work has appeared on Fox News, The Hill,  UK Spectator, and elsewhere. Boland is a graduate from Immaculata University in Pennsylvania.  Follow her on Twitter @BBatDC.

Featured image: Activists gather in front of the Venezuelan embassy in Washington, DC in March, 2019.

Americans awaiting their COVID-19 stimulus and unemployment checks will be thrilled to know their taxes continue to be spent via Netanyahu bombing and murdering Syrians in their homes. Israel remains the US’ most voracious welfare state queen, subsidized at more than four billion USD, annually. Netanyahu’s criminal and cowardly pre-dawn bombings murdered three civilians and injured three others.

The Netanyahu regime’s murderous war crimes against Syrians, today, involved another breach of International Law, Israel’s aggressive and illegal entry into Lebanon’s airspace. In 2014, Obama’s one billion guaranteed loan bribe to Abdullah was grounded in Jordan giving legal access to its airspace to Israel. The Netanyahu regime prefers to flout its chutzpah when murdering Syrians, and the NATO klan running the UN ignore all legitimate complaints from Lebanon.

In al Hujaira, Damascus’s southeastern countryside, one home bombed by the Netanyahu regime forces resulted in the murders of a husband and wife, in addition to injuries of two other adults and one child. This family had been displaced from al Quneitra city, by NATO-backed and armed moderate terrorists.

Another woman was murdered by Israeli bombing, in al Adliya.

Unindicted war criminal Netanyahu air force targeted people’s homes, including ones under construction, identified by the steel rope lay in this photograph.

Given the timing of the war criminal bombings, and Syria’s curfews to prevent the spread of COVID-19, these murder victims were killed in their homes, and likely while sleeping.

Netanyahu regime media have pulled out all the stops in hasbara fake headlines. Beyond Kafka and beyond chutzpah, they continue to ridiculously cite British owned and funded SOHR, fake founded by a thrice convicted on felony charges criminal, who jumped bail more than one decade ago — to avoid his fourth trial, leaving his pals holding the bag — who sought refuge in England, courtesy of the British taxpayers.

More housing under construction, bombed by Netanyahu regime forces.

Syria News reminds our readers that mere hours before Israel criminally bombed Tadmor on 20 April, Madman Netanyahu had barked that COVID-19 would not diminish his war crimes.

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All images in this article are from SANA

Black Alliance for Peace National Organizer Ajamu Baraka discussed the role of U.S. activists in stopping the U.S. war machine during “An Inside View of Resistance to US Imperialism in Venezuela and How to Build International Solidarity,” a webinar co-hosted by the Black Alliance for Peace, Alliance For Global Justice, CODEPINK: Women For Peace, International Action Center, Sanctions Kill and United National Antiwar Coalition.

Featuring speakers from the Venezuelan government, U.S. Peace Council and Popular Resistance.

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Featured image is from Alliance for Global Justice

Giulietto Chiesa died a few hours after concluding the April 25^th International Conference “Let’s Get Rid of War Virus”  on the 75th Anniversary of Italian Liberation and the End of World War II. The streaming conference was organized by the No War No Nato Committee – Giulietto was one of its founders – and GlobalResearch (Canada), the Centre for Research on Globalization directed by Professor Michel Chossudovsky.

Several speakers – from Italy to other European countries, from the United States to Russia, from Canada to Australia – examined the fundamental reasons why war has never ended since 1945: the Second World conflict was followed by the Cold War, then by an uninterrupted series of wars and the return to a situation similar to that of the Cold War, with increased risk of nuclear conflict.

Economists Michel Chossudovsky (Canada), Peter Koenig (Switzerland) and Guido Grossi  explained  how powerful economic and financial forces are exploiting the coronavirus crisis to take over national economies, and what to do to thwart this plan.

David Swanson (director of World Beyond War, USA), economist Tim Anderson (Australia), photojournalist Giorgio Bianchi and historian Franco Cardini talked about past and current wars, functional to the interests of the same powerful forces.

Political-military expert Vladimir Kozin (Russia), essayist Diana Johnstone (USA), Secretary of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament Kate Hudson (UK) examined the mechanisms increasing the chance of a catastrophic nuclear conflict.

John Shipton (Australia), – father of Julian Assange, and Ann Wright (USA) – former US Army colonel, illustrated the dramatic situation of journalist Julian Assange, WikiLeaks founder detained in London at risk of being extradited to the United States where a life or death sentence awaits him.

Giulietto Chiesa’s participation focused on this issue. In summary, these are some passages of what he said:

“Someone wants to destroy Julian Assange: this fact means that we too, all of us will be fooled, obscured, threatened, unable to understand what is going on at home and in the world. This is not our future; it is our present.

In Italy the government is organizing a team of censors officially charged with cleaning up all news differing from the official news. It is State censorship, how else can it be called?

Rai, public Television, is also setting up a task force against “fake news” to erase the traces of their everyday lies, flooding all their television screens.

And then there is even worse, mysterious courts far more powerful than these fake news hunters: they are Google, Facebook, who manipulate news and censure without appeal with their algorithms and secret tricks.

We are already surrounded by new Courts that cancel our rights. Do you remember Article 21 of the Italian Constitution? It says “everyone has the right to freely express its thought.” But 60 million Italians are forced to listen to a single megaphone that screams from all 7 Television channels of the Power. That’s why Julian Assange is a symbol, a flag, an invitation to rescue, to wake up before it’s too late.

It is essential to join all forces we have, which are not so small but have a fundamental flaw: that of being divided, unable to speak with a single voice. We need an instrument to speak to the millions of citizens who want to know.”

This was Giulietto Chiesa’s last appeal. His words were confirmed by the fact that, immediately after the streaming, the on line conference was obscured because “the following content has been identified by the YouTube community as inappropriate or offensive to some audiences.”

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This article appeared on the Italian web newspaper, Il Manifesto.

Manlio Dinucci is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization.

Once again, the good old reliable US major media proved unreliable again — time and again delivering fake news to readers, viewers and listeners.

On April 20, the NYT reported that North Korean leader Kim Jong-un “was receiving treatment after undergoing heart surgery.”

Days later, the Times asked: “Where in Kim-Jong-un? Rumors are swirling about Kim Jong-un’s location and health.”

On Sunday, the Washington Post asked is Kim “dead after heart surgery? Is he lying in a vegetative state in a hospital bed?”

After being out of public view in 2014, there were false rumors of his death or a military coup.

The Wall Street Journal quoted Wilson Center public policy fellow Jean Lee, saying rumors about Kim’s health “could impact his ability to lead the country.”

Market Watch.com reported that Kim was either dead or in a “vegetative state,” citing Hong Kong and Japanese media.

MSNBC’s Katy Tur reported that Kim was “brain dead,” citing unnamed US officials, adding:

“He recently had cardiac surgery and slipped into a coma.”

So-called media analyst Mark Dice claimed the above information is “confirmed.”

The Washington Examiner claimed that Kim is in “grave danger” after surgery, adding:

“A US official with direct knowledge of the matter told CNN” that the US was “monitoring intelligence of” his conditions.

South Korean-based Daily NK cited unnamed sources, claiming that Kim had a “cardiovascular surgical procedure.”

CNN’s chief national security correspondent Jim Sciutto claimed he was “told by a US official with direct knowledge that the US is monitoring intelligence that the North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un is in grave danger following a surgery.”

RT mocked CNN with the following headline:

“No confirmation needed? CNN fans rumors about Kim Jong-un’s alleged health issues, reports he’s in ‘grave danger’ after ‘surgery.’ ”

Screenshot from RT News

Bloomberg News got it wrong with a similar report, claiming Kim was in “critical condition.”

Senator Lindsey Graham was quoted, saying “’I’ll Be Shocked If He’s Not Dead.”

An unnamed Trump regime official said it’s unclear if Kim is alive or dead.

Former CIA deputy division chief for North Korea Bruce Klinger noted numerous earlier “rumors about Kim’s health,” adding:

“(O)ver the years, there have been a number of false health rumors about Kim Jong-Un (and) his father.”

A spokesman for South Korea’s Blue House (its White House equivalent) said the following:

“We have no information to confirm regarding rumors about Chairman Kim Jong Un’s health issue that have been reported by some media outlets. Also, no unusual developments have been detected inside North Korea.”

Britain’s Express said Kim hadn’t been seen in public since April 11, adding:

“Reports suggest his sister, Kim Yo Jon…could be set to take over.”

On Sunday, South Korean President Moon Jae-in’s senior policy adviser Moon Chung-in said Kim was “alive and well,” claims otherwise false.

Western media rumors, speculation, and reports got it all wrong.

On Monday, South Korea’s Yonhap News Agency quoted Pyongyang’s Rodong Sinmun, the DPRK’s main broadsheet, saying Kim thanked builders in the country’s port city of Wonsan, the report saying:

Kim “sent his appreciation to the workers who devoted themselves to building the Wonsan-Kalma tourist zone.”

Satellite imagery reportedly showed his train in the area last week.

Rumors about his death or serious illness circulated when he wasn’t at a birthday ceremony for his late grandfather, Kim Il-sung, North Korea’s founder.

On Monday, RT mocked Western media, headlining: “Not dead anymore?”

“(M)edia (now) downplay death rumors after Seoul adviser sa(id) (Kim) is ‘alive and well.’ ”

Reports of his death, grave danger, vegetative state, being brain dead in a coma were greatly exaggerated.

They were fake news all along, no credible information supporting them.

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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.

Among the “losers of globalization” in the US, in addition to African-Americans and Latinos, indebted university students and white adults over 45 years of age without university studies and with jobs with low added value appear for the first time, after being enrolled in the ranks of the unemployed. , they would have ended up plunged into an explosive circle of depression, alcoholism, drug addiction and suicide after seeing the blackbird of the “American dream” disappear, which would have had as a collateral effect the disaffection of these segments of the white population with respect to the traditional Democratic and Republican establishment.

Thus, according to an NBC survey, 54% of the white population would be “angry with the system,” compared to 43% of Latinos and 33% of African Americans who continue to trust the American dream, which would have led White voters to support politically incorrect positions and refractory to the dictates of Donald Trump’s traditional republican establishment, symbolized by the support of outraged whites over 45 years of age for Trump and of the neo-Nazi and white supremacist parties that continue to control the spheres of power of “deep America”.

Paranoia and hybris syndrome in Donald Trump

The Spanish psychiatrist Enrique González Duro in his book La paranoia (1991 *), affirms that

“the triggers of this disease are very active in individuals who present a pronounced narcissism and who have been exposed to serious frustrations, consequently being endowed with low self-esteem ”.

Donald Trump’s personality would fit fully into the medical description of the disorder known as paranoid psychosis because his thinking is rigid and incorrigible: he does not take into account the opposite reasons, he only collects data or signs that confirm the prejudice to turn him into conviction and even if he is afflicted with such delusional disorder it would be quite functional and does not tend to show strange behavior except as a direct result of the delusional idea (read the construction of the Wall with Mexico).

In the specific case of Trump, we would be facing a typical case of megalomaniac paranoia, delusion of greatness that causes the individual to create himself endowed with extraordinary talent and power because the deities have chosen him for a high mission (restoring the White Power in a society in which demographic evolution will cause the white population to be a minority in the 2,043 scenario).

Trump’s paranoia would have been aggravated by being affected by the so-called “hydris syndrome” cited by the English doctor and politician David Owen in his work “The Hybris Syndrome: Busch, Blair ant the Intoxication of Power”. This term comes from the Greek word “hybris” which means excess and in his work, Owen defines it as “the exaggerated self-confidence of politicians when they reach power brings with it the Subject’s excessive self-confidence, exacerbated pride and rebuff before others, and may lead to abuse of power (autocracy) and the temptation to harm the lives of others. ” Another trait would be histrionics that impels him to “attract public attention and be reckless in his statements without caring about the opinion of others due to his evident lack of morality”, which would be his advice to use disinfectant to cure the coronavirus.

Can COVID-19 end Trump’s dystopia?

The theory of the Black Swan was developed by Nicholas Taleb in his book “The Black Swan (2010) in which he tries to explain” the psychological biases that make people individually and collectively blind to uncertainty and unaware of the massive role of the strange event in the historical issues ”, which would explain Trump’s frivolization of the coronavirus and his delay in adopting surgical measures in the main centers of transmission of the coronavirus in the USA. This would have exacerbated the effects of the pandemic in the United States in the form of a trickle of the dead, the collapse of medical services, the paralysis of productive activity and the recession of the United States economy.

Likewise, the collapse of the oil price would have caused nearly 200 bankruptcy declarations of companies dedicated to shale with an accumulated debt of nearly $ 120 billion that will subsequently affect the income statement of large banks such as JP Morgan, Bank of America, Citigroup and Wells Fargo and that could lead to a new financial crisis in the future. On the other hand, the inaction of the companies would have triggered a stratospheric increase in unemployment (26 million unemployed), which together with the Wall Street stock market crash could dilute the beneficial effects of Donald Trump’s economic policy and cause the disaffection of the population segment of its voters (40% of the electorate) in the next Presidential elections in November.

Thus, the traumatic shock that the coronavirus pandemic will generate in American society and the subsequent recession of its economy will force a profound catharsis and metanoia of society as a whole, which will cause the fundamentals that underpin it to be revised. The metanoia would be to transform the mind to adopt a new way of thinking, with new ideas, new knowledge and an entirely new attitude in the face of the emergence of the new pandemic scenario, which will imply the double connotation of physical movement (retracing the path followed) and psychological ( change of mentality after discarding the old prevailing stereotypes). This will have as beneficial effects the rediscovery of values such as respect for the environment, solidarity and equal rights in a new stage that will lead to the implementation of new renewable energy, basic income, unemployment benefits as well as healthcare Universal Public, a stage that will symbolize the end of the Trump dystopia and the reissue of the Rooseveltian “New Deal”.

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Germán Gorraiz López is an analyst.

In my first week in the House of Representatives in 1976, I cast one of the two votes against legislation appropriating funds for a swine flu vaccination program. A swine flu outbreak was then dominating headlines, so most in DC were frantic to “do something” about the virus.

Unfortunately, the hastily developed and rushed-into-production swine flu vaccine was not only ineffective, it was dangerous. Approximately 50 people who received the vaccine subsequently contracted Guillain-Barré syndrome, a potentially fatal form of paralysis. According to an expert with the Centers for Disease Control, the incidence of Guillain-Barré was four times higher among those who received the swine flu vaccine than in the general population.

That sad history may soon repeat itself. Right now, governments and private industries are working to rapidly develop and deploy a coronavirus vaccine. Microsoft founder Bill Gates, who is a major funder of these efforts, has suggested everyone who receives a vaccine be issued a “digital certificate” proving he has been vaccinated. Dr. Anthony Fauci, whose record of wrong predictions makes him the Bill Kristol of epidemiology, also wants individuals to carry some proof they have been vaccinated.

Another authoritarian proposal floated to deal with coronavirus is to force everyone to download a phone app that will track their movements. This would allow government officials to identify those who may have been near anyone who may have had coronavirus. Such mandatory “contact tracing” is an assault on our privacy and liberty.

Vaccines can improve health. For example, vaccines helped reduce the incidence of diseases like polio. But not all vaccines are safe and effective for all people. Furthermore, certain modern practices, such as giving infants multiple vaccines at one time, may cause health problems. The fact that vaccines may benefit some people, or even most people, does not justify government forcing individuals to be vaccinated. It also does not justify vaccinating children against their parents’ wishes. And it certainly does not justify keeping individuals and families in involuntary quarantine because they do not have “digital certificates” proving they have had their shots.

If government can force individuals to receive medical treatment against their will, then there is no reason why government cannot force individuals to buy medical insurance, prohibit them from owning firearms, dictate their terms of employment, and prevent them from taking arguably harmful actions like smoking marijuana or drinking raw milk. Similarly, if government can override parents’ wishes regarding medical treatment for their children, then there is no reason why government cannot usurp parental authority in other areas, such as education.

Proponents of mandatory vaccines and enhanced surveillance are trying to blackmail the American people by arguing that the lockdown cannot end unless we create a healthcare surveillance state and make vaccination mandatory. The growing number of Americans who are tired of not being able to go to work, school, or church, or even to take their children to a park because of government mandates should reject this “deal.” Instead, they should demand an immediate end to the lockdowns and the restoration of individual responsibility for deciding how best to protect their health.

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Featured image is from Children’s Health Defense

Giulietto Chiesa morreu algumas horas depois de concluir, no 75º Aniversário da Libertação e do fim da Segunda Guerra Mundial, a Conferência Internacional de 25 de Abril, “Libertemo-nos do Vírus da Guerra”. Uma conferência de transmissão ao vivo, organizada pelo Comitato No War No NATO, do qual era um dos fundadores, e pela Global Research (Canadá), o centro de pesquisa sobre a globalização, dirigido pelo Professor Michel Chossudovsky.

Vários oradores – da Itália e de outros países europeus, dos Estados Unidos à Rússia, do Canadá à Austrália – examinaram as razões subentendidas devido às quais a guerra nunca terminou desde 1945: a Segunda Guerra Mundial foi seguida pela Guerra Fria, depois houve uma série ininterrupta de guerras e o regresso a uma situação análoga à da Guerra Fria, que aumenta o risco de um conflito nuclear.

Os economistas, Michel Chossudovsky (Canadá), Peter Koenig (Suíça) e Guido Grossi (Itália), explicaram como é que as forças económicas e financeiras poderosas exploram a crise do coronavírus para dominar as economias nacionais e o que devemos fazer para impedir esse plano.

David Swanson (Director do World Beyond War, USA), o economista Tim Anderson (Australia), o fotojornalista Giorgio Bianchi e o historiador Franco Cardini, falaram sobre as guerras passadas e presentes, ligadas aos interesses dessas mesmas forças poderosas.

O perito em questões politico-militares, Vladimir Kozin (Russia), a ensaísta Diana Johnstone (Usa),  a secretária da Campanha para o Desarmamento Nuclear, Kate Hudson (Reino Unido), analisaram os mecanismos que aumentam a probabilidade de um conflito nuclear catastrófico.

John Shipton (Austrália), pai de Julian Assange e Ann Wright (USA), antiga Coronel do US Army, retrataram a situação dramática de Julian Assange, o jornalista fundador do WikiLeaks, detido em Londres, com o risco de ser extraditado para os Estados Unidos, onde o aguarda a sentença de prisão perpétua ou a pena de morte.

Giulietto Chiesa direccionou a sua intervenção sobre esse tema. Em resumo, estas são algumas passagens:

“O facto de que se queira destruir Julian Assange significa que, também nós, todos nós, seremos amordaçados, obscurecidos, ameaçados, incapazes de compreender o que está a acontecer no nosso país e no mundo. Isto não é o futuro, é o presente. Em Itália, o Governo organiza uma comissão de censuradores encarregados, oficialmente,  de ‘limpar’ todas as notícias que se afastem das notícias oficiais. É a censura do Estado, como é que pode ser chamado de outra maneira? Também a RAI, a televisão pública, institui uma ‘task-force’ contra as “fake news” para apagar o rasto das suas mentiras diárias, que inundam todos os seus écrans de televisão.

E há, ainda pior, os misteriosos tribunais muito mais poderosos do que esses caçadores de ‘fake news’: são o Google e o Facebook, que manipulam as notícias e, com seus algoritmos e truques secretos, censuram sem apelação. Já estamos cercados de novos tribunais, que apagam os nossos direitos.

Recordam-se do artigo 21 da Constituição Italiana?

Está escrito: “Todos têm o direito de manifestar livremente o seu pensamento”.

Mas 60 milhões de italianos são forçados a ouvir um único altifalante, que grita através dos sete canais televisivos do poder.

Por esse motivo é que Julian Assange é um símbolo, uma bandeira, um convite para a reconquista dos direitos civis, políticos e económicos, para nos acordar antes que seja tarde demais.

É indispensável unir as forças que temos, que não são assim tão pequenas, mas têm um defeito crucial: o de estar divididas, incapazes de falar a uma só voz. Precisamos de um instrumento que fale aos milhões de cidadãos que querem saber”.

Estas são as últimas palavras de Giulietto Chiesa. Confirmadas pelo facto de que, imediatamente após a transmissão, o vídeo da Conferência ficou obscurecido, porque “o seu conteúdo foi identificado pela comunidade do YouTube, como sendo inapropriado ou ofensivo para certos tipos de público”.

Manlio Dinucci

Artigo original em italiano :

Giulietto Chiesa in prima linea fino all’ultimo

ilmanifesto.it

US policymakers from both right wings of the one-party state want China’s rise on the world stage as an economic, industrial, and technological power undermined.

A undeclared Cold War between both countries rages. There’s always risk of things turning hot by accident or design when US imperialists choose this option.

Much like US propaganda war and unacceptable policies against Russia, Iran, Venezuela, and other sovereign states free from US control, hostile anti-China venom rages in Washington.

It’s notably at a fever pitch, a tactic by Trump regime hardliners to falsely blame Beijing for DJT’s failed and wrongheaded policies to contain COVID-19 outbreaks.

No credible evidence suggests that the virus was produced in a Chinese biolab.

One or more outbreaks first occurred in Hawaii late last summer, not China. Nothing suggests the virus is bat or other wildlife-related.

Is COVID-19 a US-created bioweapon — unleashed on humanity with diabolical aims in mind?

It wouldn’t be the first time US policymakers used chemical, biological, radiological, and other banned weapons against adversaries and its own people.

It happened time and again throughout US history. Are COVID-19 outbreaks the latest example of US Machiavellian tactics against humanity for greater wealth and power at the expense of public health and welfare?

The fullness of time will tell whether diabolical US objectives are behind what’s going on. If past is prologue, it’s clearly possible.

Blaming others for its high crimes and malfeasance is longstanding US policy.

China is falsely blamed for the Trump regime’s failure to prepare for and properly address COVID-19 outbreaks when occurred — even though the threat of what’s ongoing was known about years ago.

Establishment media operate as mouthpieces for the imperial state, publishing and reporting material hostile to other countries that reads and sounds like intelligence community, state and war department press releases.

The NYT slammed China’s Red Cross this week. Because it receives state funding, the Times accused it of being “an arm of the state” instead of praising its human health mission.

Citing no evidence, the Times claimed “the group’s goal of helping people (is pitted) against the party’s interests in maintaining control over society.”

Far and away, China leads the world in addressing and containing COVID-19 outbreaks — in contrast to Trump regime blunders and indifference to public health and welfare.

The Times falsely accused China of letting “protective gear s(it) in a sprawling warehouse as desperate health workers battled the virus without it.”

China widely distributes personal protective equipment (PPE) internally, along with exporting it to scores of countries worldwide.

Months after US COVID-19 outbreaks occurred, National Nurses United continue to complain about lack of enough PPE — despite the Trump regime’s Department of Health and Human Services having declared virus outbreaks to be a national emergency on January 30.

Through mid-April, over 9,000 US healthcare professionals contracted COVID-19. Lack of enough proper PPE leaves them vulnerable, the Trump regime doing little to help states address an issue that should be prioritized.

The Times is a lying machine. The same goes for other US establishment media.

The neocon/CIA-connected Washington Post falsely blamed China for “spread(ing) the coronavirus by covering up initial reports about it (and) tr(ing) to use the pandemic to advance its authoritarian political model globally at the expense of democracy (sic).”

Separately, WaPo accused China of waging a “disinformation” campaign about the virus through “fake social media accounts (sic).”

On Monday, the Wall Street Journal reported that the Trump regime “is tightening…export-control restrictions to prevent US companies from sending (high-tech) products abroad that could strengthen China’s military.”

The same policy applies to Russia, Venezuela and other invented US adversaries.

China’s Global Times (GT) said the Trump regime “is driving the US to failed state status,” the country already thirdworldized by its hostility to social justice.

Days earlier, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Hua Chunying said through April 20, Beijing “provided the US with over 2.46 billion masks, meaning seven masks for each (person) in the US, plus nearly 5,000 ventilators and many other types of medical equipment.”

Yet PPE and other supplies needed to combat COVID-19 haven’t been sent to states, Dem governors notably complaining about lack of federal help in dealing with a public health emergency.

GT: “China does need to take a lesson from the US and examine why (its ruling authorities) failed to protect (their) people, (let the country fall) into political division (at a critical time, and is) stunned by corruption and unparalleled social divide?”

China won’t play “scapegoat” to US indifference toward its own people, to its botched handling of COVID-19 outbreaks.

An internal GOP document obtained by Politico shows “Republicans have indicated they plan to make China a centerpiece of the 2020 campaign,” according to the broadsheet.

The Trump regime succeeded in alienating countless millions of people worldwide.

A Morning Consult poll conducted from April 24 – 26 showed Trump with a 41% approval rating, 54% disapproving of his performance as president.

Other polls earlier in April showed similar results, Trump’s disapproval exceeding 50% in nearly all conducted, 56% in a Global Strategy Group/GBAO survey.

The latest Gallup poll conducted in mid-April showed Trump’s approval at 43%, disapproval at 54%.

He’s an embarrassment to the office he holds. The option for US voters in November is no better.

Both right wings of the US war party operate the same way at the expense of ordinary people at home and abroad.

Whatever the outcome of dealing with COVID-19, the worst of times likely lies ahead in the US.

Voting achieves nothing, a popular revolution the only solution for possible responsible change.

Power yields nothing without strong resistance, the only sensible option looking ahead.

*

Note to readers: please click the share buttons below. Forward this article to your email lists. Crosspost on your blog site, internet forums. etc.

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.

Giulietto Chiesa è morto poche ore dopo aver concluso, nel 75° Anniversario della Liberazione e della fine della Seconda guerra mondiale, il Convegno internazionale del 25 Aprile «Liberiamoci dal virus della guerra». Un convegno in diretta streaming, organizzato dal Comitato No Guerra No Nato, di cui era uno dei fondatori, e da Global Research (Canada), il Centro di ricerca sulla globalizzazione diretto dal professor Michel Chossudovsky.

Diversi relatori – dall’Italia ad altri paesi europei, dagli Stati uniti alla Russia, dal Canada all’Australia – hanno esaminato le ragioni di fondo per cui dal 1945 ad oggi la guerra non è mai terminata: al Secondo conflitto mondiale ha fatto seguito la Guerra fredda, quindi una serie ininterrotta di guerre e il ritorno a una situazione analoga a quella della Guerra fredda che accresce il rischio di un conflitto nucleare.

Gli economisti Michel Chossudovsky (Canada), Peter Koenig (Svizzera) e Guido Grossi hanno spiegato come potenti forze economiche e finanziarie sfruttano la crisi del coronavirus per impadronirsi delle economie nazionali e cosa dovremmo fare per sventare tale piano.

David Swanson (direttore di World Beyond War, Usa), l’economista Tim Anderson (Australia), il fotogiornalista Giorgio Bianchi e lo storico Franco Cardini hanno parlato delle guerre passate e attuali, funzionali agli interessi delle stesse potenti forze.

L’esperto di questioni politico-militari Vladimir Kozin (Russia), la saggista Diana Johnstone (Usa),  la segretaria della Campagna per il disarmo nucleare Kate Hudson (Regno Unito) hanno esaminato i meccanismi che accrescono la probabilità di un catastrofico conflitto nucleare.

John Shipton (Australia), padre di Julian Assange, e Ann Wright (Usa), già colonnello dello US Army, hanno illustrato la drammatica situazione di Julian Assange, il giornalista fondatore di WikiLeaks detenuto a Londra, col rischio di essere estradato negli Stati Uniti dove lo attende la pena dell’ergastolo o quella di morte.

Su tale tema ha incentrato il suo intervento Giulietto Chiesa. Questi, in sintesi, alcuni brani:

«Il fatto che si voglia distruggere Julian Assange  vuol dire che anche noi, noi tutti, saremo imbavagliati, oscurati, minacciati, impossibilitati a capire cosa succede a casa nostra e nel mondo. Questo non è il futuro, è il presente. In Italia il governo organizza una squadra di censori ufficialmente incaricata di fare pulizia di tutte le notizie che divergono da quelle ufficiali. E’ la censura di stato, come altrimenti si può chiamare? Anche la Rai, la televisione pubblica, istituisce una task force contro le “fake news” per cancellare le tracce delle loro bugie quotidiane che inondano tutti i loro teleschermi.

E poi ci sono, ancor peggio, i tribunali misteriosi di gran lunga più potenti di quanto non siano questi cacciatori di fake news: sono Google, Facebook, che manipolano le notizie e, con i loro algoritmi e i loro trucchi segreti, censurano senza appello. Siamo già circondati da nuovi tribunali che cancellano i nostri diritti.

Vi ricordate l’articolo 21 della Costituzione italiana?

C’è scritto “tutti hanno diritto di manifestare liberamente il proprio pensiero”.

Ma 60 milioni di italiani sono costretti ad ascoltare un solo megafono che urla da tutti i 7 canali televisivi del potere.

Ecco perché Julian Assange è un simbolo, una bandiera, un invito alla riscossa, al risveglio prima che sia troppo tardi.

È indispensabile unire le forze che abbiamo, che non sono tanto piccole ma hanno un difetto fondamentale: quello di essere divise, incapaci di parlare con una voce unica.

Occorre uno strumento che parli ai milioni di cittadini che vogliono sapere».

Queste le ultime parole di Giulietto Chiesa. Confermate dal fatto che, subito dopo lo streaming, il video del Convegno è stato oscurato perché «il suo contenuto è stato identificato dalla Comunità YouTube inappropriato o offensivo per alcuni tipi di pubblico».

Manlio Dinucci

A rabid anti-China propaganda campaign has spread through the media since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic. The hysteria seems to be just as contagious as the virus, as Americans are bombarded with anti-China stories from the pages of The New York Times to segments on Fox News. Both Republicans and Democrats are arguing the other side is not tough enough on China as they gear up for the 2020 election.

Since Donald Trump was elected president, the unfounded claim that Russia meddled in the 2016 election was spread far and wide by intelligence officials and liberal media outlets.

A common tactic used to promote the Russiagate narrative was unnamed officials making statements to the press without providing evidence or any factual basis to their claims. Another common tactic was frequent media appearances by former intelligence officials, like James Clapper and John Brennan, usually making wild accusations about Trump and Russia. These tactics are being repeated to promote an anti-China narrative.

The New York Times ran a story on April 22^nd titled, “Chinese Agents Helped Spread Messages That Sowed Virus Panic in US, Officials Say.” The article says rumors that were spread through text messages and social media posts in mid-March that claimed the Trump administration was going to lock down the entire country to combat coronavirus were boosted by “Chinese operatives.” The authors’ sources are “six American officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to publicly discuss intelligence matters.”

The story is lacking in detail and provides no evidence for the officials’ claims. “The origin of the messages remains murky. American officials declined to reveal details of the intelligence linking Chinese agents to the dissemination of the disinformation, citing the need to protect their sources and methods for monitoring Beijing’s activities,” the story reads. Two of the officials told the Times that “they did not believe Chinese operatives created the lockdown messages, but rather amplified existing ones.”

Sensationalized reporting in the Times would not be complete without mentioning the Russians. “American officials said the operatives had adopted some of the techniques mastered by Russia-backed trolls, such as creating fake social media accounts to push messages to sympathetic Americans, who in turn unwittingly help spread them.”

Ironically, the story recognizes the danger of US officials making selective leaks to the media. “Foreign policy analysts are worried that the Trump administration may politicize intelligence work or make selective leaks to promote an anti-China narrative … American officials in the past have selectively passed intelligence to reporters to shape the domestic political landscape.” The Times uses the run-up to the 2003 invasion of Iraq as an example of the dangers of selective leaks, ignoring the past four years of Russiagate stories that plagued its pages.

On April 17^th, Fox News Host Tucker Carlson had former CIA officer Bryan Dean Wright on his show to deliver some wild accusations about US politicians and the Chinese government. Wright insinuated that some members of Congress might be agents of China’s intelligence service, the Ministry of State Security (MSS). Carlson explained to Wright that the show reached out to Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) and other elected officials to ask if they’ve had contact with any Chinese officials since the coronavirus outbreak began. Carlson said they did not respond and asked Wright, “What do you think we should infer from that?”

Wright responded, “I think that they’re nervous. I think there are a bunch of people who, because they’re either useful idiots or they have some degree of knowledge and relationships behind the scenes with the Chinese government. Some of them in fact could be Chinese agents of the MSS.” Wright’s language comes straight from the Russiagate playbook. Intelligence officials and media pundits often referred to Trump as a “useful idiot” for Moscow, and some even speculated that the president is a “Russian agent.”

Trump’s anti-Russia policies show that he is not working in the White House on behalf of Vladimir Putin. Similarly, anti-China legislation that has recently passed through the House and Senate makes it unlikely any MSS agents are working in the halls of Congress.

The Hong Kong Human Rights and Democracy Act passed unanimously through the Senate last year and had one lone nay vote in the House from Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY). The act, which was signed into law by President Trump, requires the State Department to prepare an annual report on the autonomy of Hong Kong from mainland China. The act also requires the Commerce Department to report on “China’s efforts to use Hong Kong to evade US export controls.” The bill says the president shall present Congress with a list of any individuals that violate human rights in Hong Kong. Any findings that are unsatisfactory to the US could result in sanctions.

The Uyghur Human Rights Policy Act was also passed unanimously through the Senate, and again, Rep. Massie was the only one to vote against the bill in the House. This bill, which has not made it to President Trump’s desk, would require the US to impose sanctions and export restrictions over China’s treatment of Uyghur Muslims in the western autonomous region of Xinjiang.

Rep. Massie, the sole dissenting voice in Congress, did not vote against these bills because of any loyalty to Beijing or Xi Jinping. “When our government meddles in the internal affairs of foreign countries, it invites those governments to meddle in our affairs,” Massie wrote on Twitter, explaining his votes.

The Taiwan Allies International Protection and Enhancement Initiative (TAIPEI) Act, which was signed into law by President Trump in March, passed unanimously through both the House and Senate, with Rep. Massie finally falling in line with his colleague’s anti-China policy. The TAIPEI Act says the US should “help strengthen Taiwan’s diplomatic relationships and partnerships around the world.”

Taiwan remains the most sensitive issue between the US and China, since Beijing considers the island to be a part of China. Although the US does not formally recognize Taiwan as an independent nation, Washington supplies the island with arms and frequently sails warships through the Taiwan strait, drawing the ire of Beijing. No members of Congress speak out against these provocations. Like the accusations about Trump and Russia, the idea that Congress is crawling with agents of Beijing is easily disproven by actual policy.

Tucker Carlson did not challenge any of Wright’s outrageous claims but instead nodded along. Since the start of the outbreak, Carlson’s show has focused on putting all the blame for the coronavirus pandemic on Beijing. Carlson’s recent content reflects the strategy of the White House. The Daily Beast obtained internal White House documents in March that showed the administration was pushing US officials to blame China for a “cover-up” in the early days of the outbreak. The strategy has proven useful as many pro-Trump media outlets put Beijing’s response to the pandemic under a microscope, and largely ignore the US government’s early missteps.

Politico obtained a memo sent by the National Republican Senatorial Committee to GOP campaigns. The memo outlines an anti-China strategy for Republicans running for office in 2020. The document advises candidates to blame the pandemic on China, say Democratic opponents are too soft on China, and advocate for sanctions against Beijing. The memo is full of strong rhetoric like, “China is not an ally, and they’re not just a rival — they are an adversary and the Chinese Communist Party is our enemy.”

The GOP guidelines are similar to the rhetoric coming from China hardlinerslike former White House Chief Strategist Steve Bannon. In March 2019, Bannon and neoconservative Frank Gaffney founded the Committee on Present Danger: China, a think-tank that identifies China as the greatest “existential threat” to the United States. In his almost-daily podcast, Bannon rails against Beijing and pins all the blame for the pandemic on China. “The Chinese Communist Party is at war with their people, they’re at war with the world, and they’re at war with you … You may not have an interest in the Chinese Communist Party but its destroyed your life. OK? Your economic life, your spiritual life, your social life. The destruction is from Beijing,” Bannon said in a recent episode.

Republicans and right-wingers are not the only ones looking to attack China this election season. The Biden campaign released an ad on April 18^th that attacked Trump for his response to the virus. The ad said, “Trump rolled over for the Chinese” and criticized how much the president praised China’s handling of the pandemic early on. “Trump praised the Chinese 15 times in January and February as the coronavirus spread across the world,” the ad said.

The anti-China propaganda seems to be turning public opinion against Beijing. A new poll from the Pew Research Center that surveyed 1,000 adults throughout March found that 66 percent have an unfavorable view of China, an increase of 14 percent since Pew last asked the question in 2018. Nine out of 10 adults surveyed view China as a threat, including 62 percent who see China as a major threat.

China may have made some mistakes in its early response to the virus, but that does not excuse the US government’s lack of preparedness, and treating the pandemic as an attack sets a dangerous precedent for future outbreaks. The strategy could backfire on Washington if any future pandemics originate in the US.

Like Russiagate, the anti-China propaganda will serve as a useful tool for a national security state that is looking to focus more on great power competition. The Pentagon identifies China as its number one priority and is looking to increase its footprint in the Indo-Pacific region. The constant propaganda will make that increased presence more palatable to the American people. But that increased presence will bring more confrontation between the US and China, and bring the region and the world closer to nuclear war.

*

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Dave DeCamp is assistant editor at Antiwar.com and a freelance journalist based in Brooklyn NY, focusing on US foreign policy and wars. He is on Twitter at @decampdave.

What passes for US-style “democracy” would make some despots blush. 

It’s more fanciful than real, an illusion of what doesn’t exist.

The nation was created to be run by its rich, well-born, and able, John Adams explained.

John Jay, the first US Supreme Court chief justice, said owners of the country should run it.

When US elections are held, outcomes are predictable, continuity assured every time,

Names and faces change, results always the same.

Privileged interests are served at the expense of most others under one-party rule with two extremist right wings.

The nation’s bipartisan criminal class runs things for monied interests and themselves alone — at the expense of world peace, equity, social justice, and the rule of law they disdain.

When so-called elections are held, US voters get to choose between GOP and Dem presidential and congressional candidates for key posts who resemble an FBI most wanted list, not legitimate seekers of high office.

The race for the White House gets most attention for obvious reasons.

In November, US voters will choose between mentally unstable, narcissistic, congenital liar, disturbingly unhinged Trump, a person whose brain doesn’t work like normal people.

According to criminal psychology expert Robert Hare, he and hardliners surrounding him like Pompeo currently and Bolton earlier fit the definition of psychopathological derangement.

They exhibit the following disturbing traits: “coldheartedness,” a “callous unconcern for the feelings of others,” a lack of remorse, shame or guilt, irresponsibility, an extremely high threshold for disgust, impulsiveness, emotional shallowness, “pathological lying,” a “grandiose sense of self-worth,” an incapacity for love, a “parasitic lifestyle,” among other “dissocial personality” abnormalities.

They “con others for personal profit…pleasure,” and power over other people they seek to dominate.

They operate like recklessly dangerous sociopaths and psychopaths, blaming others for their own failures and wrongdoing.

They turn truth on its head for self-aggrandizement and malevolent aims, indifferent to the human toll.

Trump’s consistent dissembling suggests an inability to distinguish between facts and fiction.

His misleading, deceptive, and falsified remarks on key issues show profound ignorance and an aversion to truth-telling.

His callous indifference toward public health and welfare is polar opposite what responsible leadership is supposed to be all about.

In September 2017, thousands of mental health professionals said they believe that he “manifests a serious mental illness that renders him psychologically incapable of competently discharging the duties of president of the” US, adding:

“(W)e respectfully request he be removed from office, according to article 4 of the 25th amendment to the Constitution, which states that the president will be replaced if he is ‘unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office.’ ”

As president and commander-in-chief with his finger on the nuclear trigger he’s able to squeeze against one of more nations on the US target for regime change, he represents a clear and present danger to everyone everywhere.

What about Joe Biden, the presumptive Dem presidential nominee? Does he represent a safe alternative to Trump?

He and DJT are two-sides of the same coin, differing only in style and party label.

They’re both unapologetically pro-war, pro-Wall Street, pro-the military/industrial/security/media complex, pro-corporatism over the general welfare, pro-police state control, and anti-what just societies cherish.

Biden is Hillary with a gender difference, assuring continuation of Obama’s disturbing record if elected — notably endless wars against invented enemies, force-fed neoliberal harshness on ordinary Americans, and police state crackdowns on nonbelievers.

Ahead of formally announcing his candidacy for president, he said:

“I’m Joe Biden and I work for you (sic)…Are you with us (sic)?”

Throughout his near half-century political career as US senator, vice president, and presidential aspirant, Biden’s agenda has been all about serving privileged interests exclusively at the expense of public rights, needs and welfare.

He never met a sovereign independent nation he didn’t want forcefully transformed into a US client state by wars or other hostile actions.

His Senate record alone revealed the measure of the man, supporting wars of aggression, police state laws, the racist war on drugs, mass incarceration, and other harmful policies to ordinary people, notably affecting people of color.

He opposes Net Neutrality, the last frontier of free and open expression, a fundamental right too vital to lose.

He and Trump have been accused of sexual misconduct numerous times.

Since the 1970s, many women accused Trump of assaulting them sexually.

As a private citizen, he earlier boasted about groping women. As a presidential candidate, he claimed many “women…got paid a lot of money to make up stories about me,” no evidence presented backing his claim.

One accuser said “(h)e was like an octopus. His hands were everywhere.”

Biden’s accusers are coming forth with lurid tales about him — from inappropriate touching to sexual assaults.

Psychology Today calls sexual assault “any sexual activity that occurs without consent,” adding:

It’s “a pervasive problem. In America, one in three women and one in four men experience sexual violence in their lifetimes, according to the National Institutes of Health.”

“And those numbers are likely an underestimate due to the shame and fear that prevent many survivors from reporting abuse.”

“Sex and violence are closely linked,” notably by “dominant men forcing themselves on women.”

“(S)exual assault is more about power than…sex…motivation stem(ming) from the perpetrator’s need for dominance and control.”

Sex is used by one person to exert power over another. Children and adolescents are affected like adults.

Men most often are perpetrators in male-dominant societies like the US. Trump long ago bragged that he could do what he pleased with women, saying:

“When you’re a star, they let you do it.”

Women in all walks of life tell horror stories of rape, assault, harassment, and abuse by powerful men, including politicians, celebrities, and the clergy.

Based on what’s know about Trump and Biden, neither figure is fit to hold any public office, notably not the highest in the land.

The choice for US voters in November is none at all.

It’s nearly always this way, notably since the neoliberal 90s — especially in Trump v. Hillary and incumbent DJT v. Biden.

Whoever is inaugurated US president in January 2021 will represent continuity like earlier, most likely in harsher form based on what’s ongoing.

It’s the American way. Democracy in the country is pure fantasy, never the real thing, notably not now and what’s coming ahead.

*

Note to readers: please click the share buttons below. Forward this article to your email lists. Crosspost on your blog site, internet forums. etc.

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.

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We are in a world that is globally flabbergasted today.

In other words, stunned, panicked.

Our brains are in a state of excessive, inordinate paranoia.

Our paranoia switches have been activated!

Martha Stout, an American psychologist, describes this in her book, “The Paranoia Switch“, published in 2007.

Our paranoia switch had already been activated on September 11, 2001.

Remember June 18, 2001? What you did, what you ate, the people you met, the TV program?

Not unless you were married that day. And again.

On the other hand, everyone remembers what they were doing on September 11, 2001, and especially what happened that day.

Not because everyone has a great memory or got married that day.

Because their paranoia switch has been turned to maximum.

I’m not going to lecture you on neuroscience or brain anatomy or brain amygdala or limbic system.

Those who want to, listen to the author [1] or read Martha Stout‘s book (photo on the right) [2], edifying, instructive, or this review article translated into French on the website fr.sott.net :

Limbic Warfare and Martha Stout’s “Paranoia Switch”

In summary, the stronger a traumatic event is, especially visual, the more the cerebral amygdala, the centre of fear and aggressiveness, is stimulated and, above all, the less the hippocampus (centre of factual memory) and its relays with the higher centres of the brain (reflection) are operational and intact.

This means ?

After the traumatic event, even years later, any image, sound, word closely or remotely related to this event plunges us back into the same state of fear by activating the amygdala and depressing the hippocampus and our upper brain centres.

Basically, the “panicker”, freed from the control of the “analyst”, takes over the reins of our brain, and that’s not nice, that’s not good.

For example, the sound of a car horn in the street can immediately awaken intense paranoia in a war veteran that is completely disproportionate or even irrelevant, escaping reason.

Martha Stout points out that among all traumatic experiences, the ones that will cause the most astonishment and terror are those intentionally caused by our fellow human beings, such as rape, kidnapping, aggression or a terrorist attack, far ahead of those caused by accidents (explosion, car accident…) or natural disasters (earthquake…).

The important thing to remember is that once stunned in this way, the human brain no longer thinks, or thinks badly [with difficulty]. A bit like a short circuit in an electrical installation.

As a result, despite all its intelligence, its possible knowledge or its reflexes of critical analysis of a situation, the human brain becomes as if frozen.

It is mature, ready to submit.

Primary emotions such as fear, anger and aggression take control.

Such humans become very malleable, very suggestible and feel a strong urge to calm this fear by preferring simplistic speeches, ready-made solutions, even if they are irrational, impossible, illogical, by thinking it over.

But precisely!

Once the paranoia switch is turned on, people’s brains stop thinking.

The citizens are told all the official authorities’ lies that seem to them to be the providential solution, in this climate of extreme fear.

Could the powers that be, well aware of these psychological weaknesses of human beings, use our paranoia switches to keep their power and commit their misdeeds?

Martha Stout, in her excellent book, says:

“Agents of fear maintain their power by exploiting human weaknesses. »

History shows how those in power have always used fear to commit their misdeeds, often using a scapegoat of that fear to exonerate themselves and give the brain a bone to gnaw in the brain amygdala of the deceived populations.

• Hitler used the anarchists, the Jews, the communists, accusing the latter of the burning of the Reichstag [3], to pass his freedom-destroying laws and establish Nazi rule.
• Successive American administrations have always used the fear of the other, from Native Americans to the Russians, and now the Chinese.
• Bush Junior used the fear of terrorists and Muslims by using the Osama Bin Laden lie, then the Fake news of weapons of mass destruction to invade Iraq, a new demonized enemy, used to activate the switch of paranoia of Western civilian populations.
• The New World Order (a transnational entity that now wants to establish a world government), uses a virus, COVID-19, to scare people, to stifle their paranoia switch, and this time, the enemy is represented by anyone who opposes their freedom-destroying laws presented as laws for the common good. Theirs above all!Always the same means for the same goal:

  Create a powerful paranoia switch and use it to dumbfound people’s thinking abilities, demonize opponents of the authorities and make them accept anything, as long as the fear is calmed.

  For September 11, 2001, the image of the collapsing twin towers and the cloud of dust, of people jumping into the void or scurrying like mad rabbits through the soot-blackened streets, served as a hook, a detonator for our cerebral amygdala.

  For the COVID-19 pandemic, all that was needed were these convoys of deaths in Italy, a few news stories about young people who died [6] and these daily macabre counts, these truncated statistics that our media inflict on us every day.

  The WHO of 2009, whose corruption has been officially brought to light [5-6-7], has remained and remains the patented organizer of this organized panic.

  The same gang of criminals has simply done it again, exploiting the psychological weaknesses well known to humanity.

  This time, it was done at a level never seen before, on a world level.

  And for many so-called civilized, “free” countries, it works.

  For me, this is what is most frightening, much more frightening than COVID-19, that all these countries, including mine, Belgium, have submitted so quickly to this evil New World Order.

  Martha Stout’s book not only describes how terror rewires our brains and reshapes our behaviour, it also describes how we can restore our dignity and freedom of thought.

  Dr. Pascal Sacré

  Photo: pixabay.com

  Author’s note : A Healthy Human Society:

•  Would have in all areas of life, first and foremost that of health, boards and committees made up of experts independent of merchants, vendors, industry which is not scientific, which is mercantile especially in a capitalist society.
• Would have “official” media at least neutral, at best critical of the executive power.
• Would have courses in its national education program on the functioning of the human brain and its weaknesses through the limbic system, the cerebral amygdala and the construction of memories, and popularized courses on how psychological trauma affects all these functions.
• Would have in the wake of these explanatory courses, courses of intellectual and emotional self-defense, with courses to be taken from among the many disciplines that have proven their effectiveness in managing stress and its emotional balance (meditation, self-hypnosis in particular).
• Would have control bodies made up of individuals with no ties of any kind to vendors, merchants, the industry mentioned above. Wise men” who proved this by their deeds and not only by their words, such as Professor Henri Joyeux, Professor Philippe Even, Doctor Michel de Lorgeril or the late Sylvie Simon in France.
• Would have in its medical and public health system a lobby that would put as much energy, if not more, into prevention and into the promotion of natural medicines, in particular the promotion of a healthy diet, if not more, than into the promotion of vaccination.
• Would have in its national education programme courses which would value pacifism and all the individuals who embodied it by their actions, rather than this endless series of admiring courses on the greatest mass murderers of History (Napoleon, Alexander the Great, Churchill*, Julius Caesar…).
• Would value bloodthirsty oppression resisters such as Powhatan, Opechancanough, Sir William Wallace and Arnold Winkler, rather than their oppressors.* “Winston Churchill was a patent-pending imperialist, a man who had no intention of ending domination over India, the African colonies and other British possessions.” [8]

Ingrained racism, brutality, warlike exaltation, and Churchill’s responsibility – whether in the military or while in power – for the brutal suppression of numerous revolts (in India, Sudan, South Africa as an army officer, in Ireland, Malaysia, Kenya as Secretary of State or as British Prime Minister), and for the abandonment to death of millions during the Bengal famine of 1943.

See:

Churchill’s Empire. The World That Made Him and The World He Made. Richard Toyle. London. Macmillan, 2010

Churchill’s Secret War. The British Empire and the Ravaging of India During World War II, New York, Madhusree Mukerjee, Basic Books, 2010 (English

The Crime of Bengal.

La Part d’Ombre de Winston Churchill, Paris, Les Nuits Rouges, 2015.

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Notes
1] The Paranoia Switch, YouTube video, interview with the author, in English

2] The book, The Paranoia Switch, by Martha Stout, PhD.

[3] Reichstagsbrandverordnung, Reichstag Fire Decree
http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reichstagsbrandverordnung

4] COVID-19 – The choice of media: fear!

[5] Politics and corruption at WHO

6] Vaccination and the 2009 viral pandemic: do you trust SAGE?

[7] COVID-19 – Check your sources. War against… corruption?

8] Christopher Columbus and other cannibals, Jack D. Forbes, Le Passager Clandestin, 2018, pp 23-24.

It has yet to become clear just how harmful the coronavirus (Covid-19) will prove to be, with case figures and deaths continuing to evolve. As was anticipated, this highly contagious disease is causing havoc once it enters hospitals, nursing homes and other care facilities – where the virus is spreading forth at ease and infecting thousands of vulnerable people.

To make matters worse, in the neoliberal era, hospitals and care centres have been under-funded and stripped of staff due to cuts or privatisation. For elderly people with underlying conditions like cancer or diabetes, the coronavirus has provided a death knell to an already depleted constitution. On these occasions the impression is often given, by mainstream media and politicians, that Covid-19 resulted solely in the patient’s death. It is more likely that, in many cases, the virus was a contributory factor in the loss of life, rather than the single cause.

Yet this virus should certainly not be written off as a mild disease, as analysis later on here may demonstrate. In some instances Covid-19 has been unwisely and recklessly dismissed, downplayed or even blamed on other countries.

Unlike heart disease or cancer, the coronavirus is of course infectious; it can spread quickly, unseen and, crucially, there is no vaccine or immunity to it. Therein lie some of the legitimate core concerns relating to this illness.

Covid-19’s emergence was most likely as a combination of the following factors, bolstered by scientific opinion and research: Industrial meat production which is massively reliant on the administering of antibiotics (1). Dangerous, mutant bacteria resistant to drugs have been developing as a result of overuse of antibiotics fed to livestock. America and China, the world’s strongest economies, are among the largest utilisers of antibiotics in meat processing and agriculture.

Tellingly, antibiotic resistance in domestic animals has almost tripled since the year 2000, as antibiotic usage has exploded this century (2). The abuse of antibiotics, in which both livestock and humans are becoming resistant to treatment, has many worrying repercussions, among them the likely spawning of various illnesses, including viruses. Another major factor in disease development is ongoing human encroachment into the natural world, like rainforests and grasslands. Habitat destruction across the globe has increased greatly over the past 70 years. This has resulted in regular interaction between billions of people, their livestock and wild creatures, all possible carriers of diseases, new or old.

It is irrelevant as to which country Covid-19 sprang forth from, whether it was China or some other state. For political or ideological reasons, a great deal of energy has been wasted in directing fingers of blame towards a particular nation, pertaining to the virus’s emergence. A viral outbreak is a world issue in which global corporate power, greed and the pursuit of profits are largely accountable – not a specific country or race.

About four months after the coronavirus was first reportedly identified, it has at least partly contributed so far to an official death toll of about 200,000 people, with global cases at present approaching three million. (3)

The above figures consist of a very small fraction of 1% of the planet’s human population. However, Covid-19 is in its early stages, and worldwide infections are increasing daily by the tens of thousands through statistics relayed to the public. There could be a considerable rise in cases to come, particularly if there are outbreaks of the virus among broader communities. It continues to spread relentlessly in hospitals, care facilities, etc., contributing to hundreds of deaths each day. In addition, the official coronavirus numbers are only the cases reported. The real Covid-19 figures are quite probably higher, due to inadequate testing and misdiagnoses, problems which have already come to the fore.

Early symptoms in patients with Covid-19 and influenza (flu) can be similar. The resemblance soon ends there. Every year, flu epidemics affect from 5% to 10% of the world’s human populace, up to 780 million people. Out of this, the flu is responsible for killing between 290,000 to 650,000 people globally per annum (4). Therefore the death rate worldwide from the flu each year, though slightly increasing in recent times, amounts to well below 1%.

Regarding Covid-19, official figures currently portray a death rate of around 7%: that is, 200,000 deaths out of 2.9 million cases. These statistics will, as stated, change over time but it indicates that Covid-19 is far more harmful than influenza – and likewise relating to the swine flu pandemic of a decade ago. These observations are supported by medical experts on the ground. Dr. Randell Wexler, a family physician working in various hospitals in the Ohio area, wrote earlier this month that, “What makes Covid-19 so much more dangerous than the flu, is that there’s no vaccine and no natural immunity in the world, meaning everybody is susceptible”. (5)

Indeed, and as of yet there is no evidence that recovered Covid-19 patients will thereafter develop immunity to the virus. They could catch it again and spread the disease about. Official figures from countries with some of the world’s highest coronavirus infection levels – such as Italy, France, Spain, Britain, Belgium, the Netherlands and Sweden – show that in each of these nations the death rate, from those infected with Covid-19, is presently at 10% or over (6). Bearing in mind that these are wealthy countries just mentioned, with more resources at their disposal than the vast majority of nations. The UN Human Development Index (HDI) places the above seven European states listed near the top of the “Very High Human Development” bracket. (7)

To provide one example, Italy, over 25,000 people there have died at least partially due to Covid-19, out of fewer than 200,000 cases recorded at present. This comprises a current death rate of 13.5% in Italy. There are indications that the disease is being contained in the country, mostly due to the necessary clampdown on Italian society announced in early March, it can be noted. The daily Covid-19 figures in Italy are gradually declining, but the Italians are not out of the woods by any means. Further outbreaks or clusters could occur, as in any affected country, and caution will need to be applied in the time ahead.

The coronavirus was first identified on Italian soil during 31 January 2020. In the 12 weeks or so directly prior to this, there were at least three million confirmed flu infections recorded in Italy by medical experts, up to 23 January 2020. Out of these approximately three million flu cases, just 240 people are thought to have died. (8)

Research conducted by scientists at separate universities in Britain, has outlined that those most vulnerable to the coronavirus are not only the elderly, but rivalling them are the obese (9). Medics have been struck by the influx of obese patients admitted to British hospitals with Covid-19. Obesity is a worsening problem in Britain, with almost 30% of the adult population considered obese, and many of them are not elderly. The insidious connection between obesity and Covid-19 has been under-reported by the media, and is presumably little know among the public.

America has easily the world’s highest level of reported coronavirus infections. By now, over 50,000 Americans are said to have succumbed to the virus, out of more than 900,000 official detections and counting. During the winter of 2018-2019, an estimated 35.5 million people contracted the flu in America, with 34,200 people dying, a death rate of a fraction of 1% (10). Studies have shown that obesity is a leading factor in coronavirus hospitalisations in New York City for example, the worst affected area of the US. Just over 40% of the American adult population is obese (11). Another one third of American adults are classed as overweight, below the level of obesity, but we will stick with the latter phenomenon which has more severe health ramifications.

Most of those enduring obesity are again far from advanced in years – 17% of American children are obese. Dr. Nivedita Lakhera, working in an intensive care unit in San Jose, California, noticed the large numbers of young and obese with coronavirus entering O’Connor Hospital, where she is mainly based. Dr. Lakhera revealed last week that, “They are young and coming to ER [Emergency Room] and just dropping dead” (12). Some of the patients who died of Covid-19 had no other known health problems, other than being that of morbidly obese.

America’s national public health institute, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), has listed those afflicted with obesity among the high risk patients (13). This term, obesity, is defined by medical professionals as people who have a Body Mass Index (BMI) of 30 or above. Dr. Jennifer Lighter, an epidemiologist at New York University Langone, noted recently that, “BMI is the achilles’ heel for American patients. In China it was smoking and pollution, and Italy had a larger older population, and many grandparents lived with extended families. Here, it’s BMI that’s the issue”.

Tim Spector, professor of genetic epidemiology at King’s College London, warned last week, “Obesity and poor diet is emerging as one of the biggest risk factors for a severe response to Covid-19 infection that can no longer be ignored”. (14)

The food industry is amassing huge profits in churning out cheap, low quality processed foods that fill supermarket shelves, and which is a cause behind disturbing obesity levels. Furthermore, those who are severely overweight are more likely to have embedded health issues, such as diabetes or cancer. Considering the high rate of obesity in America, it would not at all be accurate to suggest that a minority of the US population are potentially vulnerable, should they contract the virus. On obesity figures alone, more than a third of the American adult population could face health complications should they become infected with Covid-19.

Such a prospect is a low possibility, and it is not to suggest that millions will die due to the virus in America, or badly affected countries elsewhere – but every precaution must be taken to prevent it from spreading at will among the public. A World Health Organisation (WHO) account expounded that 80% of patients “experienced mild illness” when infected with Covid-19, before recovering quickly. The WHO was referring here primarily to cases in China (15). This WHO report was published almost two months ago, when China then had the world’s highest infection numbers. The virus was swiftly contained in China following strict lockdown measures enacted by the authorities.

Not mentioned once in the WHO report in question is the threat of obesity. Only between 5% to 6% of China’s population is obese. In Hubei province, where the city of Wuhan is located, 7.8% of its inhabitants are obese (16). By comparison, more than three times that percentage suffer from obesity in New York state, encompassing New York City. In the UK to date, three-quarters of critically ill coronavirus patients have either been overweight or obese. The official death rate from Covid-19 infections in Britain is 13.5%, with around 20,000 reported to have died, but this does not include those who passed away in care homes. The actual British death toll from the disease is likely to be 40% higher than the figures released by the government, which relate just to hospital deaths.

Elsewhere it may be no coincidence that, in South Korea, with one of the lowest obesity rates worldwide, that nation has experienced a very mild coronavirus death rate. Although there may be other factors involved in South Korea’s low fatality count, the country with the planet’s lowest obesity level, Vietnam, has so far recorded no deaths from Covid-19 – despite the fact that the first virus patient was noted in Vietnam just three days after the first American case.

Recent scientific studies highlight that more than 10% of the global human population is obese, around 800 million people (17). Dr. Samuel Kline, a gastroenterologist at Washington University School of Medicine, said that obesity sufferers “already have lower oxygen levels, they are predisposed to pulmonary dysfunction, and they have decreased chest function because of the weight on their chest. And many have sleep apnea. So they’re at pulmonary risk already”.

As the coronavirus is a respiratory disease that attacks the lungs, obese patients become yet more vulnerable. It could explain Dr. Lakhera’s poignant remarks about how some obese patients in California are “just dropping dead” after contracting Covid-19. In the age of neoliberal globalisation especially, one is well advised to treat government actions with suspicion. Nevertheless regarding the coronavirus epidemic, governments are undoubtedly correct in ordering lockdowns of the public so as to suppress this disease; providing it is done professionally, with proper notice and explanation given to the public, the opposite to which took place in India last month.

It must be stressed that governments have no other alternative but to call for lockdowns of societies for a certain period of time, and to promote social distancing initiatives. To suggest by now that governments should not implement these policies is irresponsible, to put it mildly. Were the public free to pursue their lives as before, this dangerous virus would clearly spread at a much quicker rate. As general populations of all ages are in overall poor physical shape, and with many having underlying illnesses, a lack of restrictions could have serious consequences.

Bucking the trend in Europe, the Swedish government has so far withheld implementing a complete lockdown, and precautions in the country have been light. The authorities may well be advised to alter their policies, as the official Covid-19 death rate in Sweden now stands at around 12%. On per capita terms Sweden, with a modest 10 million population, is among the world’s worst affected nations. Other Scandinavian countries also have much lower Covid-19 figures than Sweden.

It remains to be seen if the planet’s ultra-rich sectors will emerge in an even stronger position, when the virus is finally quelled. The signs may not be encouraging, even for the absolute elite. From late January to late March 2020, the richest 100 billionaires lost over $400 billion of their wealth, a painful dose of medicine by any measure (18). Almost all of the wealthiest people have seen their grotesquely bloated incomes fall appreciably during this period, coinciding with the virus outbreak. US president Donald Trump himself lost a billion dollars over the course of a month.

The reality is that the top 1% around the world, and more specifically the top 0.1%, were managing very nicely prior to the virus spread. Covid-19’s emergence was not desired by much of those in de facto control of the world. Corporations that will benefit are primarily the large pharmaceutical and drug companies, but this is just one segment of the big business sphere. The masses are unsurprisingly bearing the brunt of suffering once more, from highly unequal and impoverished countries like India, to the world’s richest nation, America.

Global spread of coronavirus could in fact have been prevented from the start (19). A growing likelihood of a virus epidemic was well known to scientists and other experts, and also by governments. Nothing was done, however. The crisis was compounded by the perfidy of our political systems. The reaction to Covid-19 was particularly sluggish and shambolic in America and Britain, where the warning signs had previously become so obvious. Thousands have since needlessly died.

While Covid-19 is having disastrous economic and social consequences, two greater challenges loom on the horizon which are scarcely mentioned: rising threat of nuclear war and climate change, both of which are being largely driven by a combination of Trump administration policies and neoliberalism. A major nuclear war or rampant climate change will make Covid-19 seem like child’s play in comparison. Mass media coverage of these bigger threats is either inadequate (climate change) or almost non-existent (nuclear war). Yet the media have directed enormous attention towards the coronavirus.

*

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Shane Quinn obtained an honors journalism degree. He is interested in writing primarily on foreign affairs, having been inspired by authors like Noam Chomsky. He is a frequent contributor to Global Research.

Notes

1 Al Jazeera News, “Noam Chomsky: ‘Coronavirus pandemic could have been prevented’”, Al Jazeera, 3 April 2020

2 ScienceDaily, “Antibiotic resistance in food animals nearly tripled since 2000”, Princeton University, 9 October 2019

3 Max Roser, Hannah Ritchie, Esteban Ortiz-Ospina and Joe Hasell, “Statistics and Research Coronavirus Disease (Covid-19)”, Our World in Data, 26 April 2020

4 World Health Organisation, “Up to 650,000 people die of respiratory diseases linked to seasonal flu each year”, 13 December 2017

5 Randell Wexler, MD, “How Covid-19 is different and worse than the flu”, The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center, 15 April 2020

6 Statista, “Coronavirus (Covid-19) death rates in countries with confirmed deaths and over 1,000 cases as of 26 April 2020, by country”

7 Human Development Reports, “Table 1: Human Development Index andits components”, United Nations Development Programme

8 The Local, “Flu outbreak in Italy peaking as half a million people struck down in a week”, 23 January 2020

9 Oli Smith, “Scientists discover ‘single biggest coronavirus risk factor’ – and 3 out of 5 Brits have it”, Daily Express, 20 April 2020

10 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, “Estimated Influenza Illnesses, Medical Visits, Hospitalisations, and Deaths in the United States – 2018 – 2019 season”

11 Gaby Galvin, “The U.S. obesity rate now tops 40%”, U.S. News, 27 February 2020

12 Dawn Fallik, “Covid-19 is hitting some patients with obesity particularly hard”, ScienceNews, 22 April 2020

13 Hannah Osborne, “Obesity one of the biggest risk factors in Covid-19 hospitalisations, study finds”, 14 April 2020

14 Oliver Morrison, “Coronavirus and obesity: Doctors take aim at food industry over poor diets”, Food Navigator, 22 April 2020

15 World Health Organisation, “Coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19) Situation Report – 41”, 1 March 2020

16 Lina Su, Long Sun, Lingzhong Xu, “Review on the prevalence, risk factors and disease Management of Hypertension among floating population in China during 1990–2016”, SpringerLink, 23 July 2018

17 AFP News Agency, “Obesity ‘epidemic’ affects one in 10 peopleworldwide – study”, TheJournal.ie, 12 June 2017

18 Tanner Brown, “Only 9 of the world’s top 100 billionaires have gotten richer during the coronavirus pandemic”, MarketWatch, 11 April 2020

19 The Real News Network, Marc Steiner, “Noam Chomsky On Covid-19 And His New Book: Internationalism Or Extinction”, 13 April 2020

Featured image is from CODEPink

It is with great sorrow that we learned yesterday, April 26^th, that Giulietto Chiesa has passed away. One of the most remarkable European intellectuals – activists of our times, deeply enshrined in the “Leninist” tradition of action before anything else, even if he would not claim it, Giulietto participated in the Delphi initiative which was born out of the Delphi Conference in 2015. It was from this center of the ancient World that he delivered a passionate warning on the danger of a new world war and an equally passionate appeal to stop both the coming war and NATO.

South Yemen’s Southern Transitional Council declared self-rule over the vast regions of the country that they claim as their own in response to the Saudi-backed Hadi government’s repeated violations of last year’s Riyadh Agreement that was aimed at de-escalating tensions between the nominally allied sides, thus representing the next step towards independence and one which couldn’t have been made at a more strategically opportune moment.

The 25th of April is an important date in Italy’s history. It commemorates the 75th anniversary of  Liberation, which is also the Anniversary of the Resistance.

On April 25, 2020, Commemorating the Liberation of Italy. We express our solidarity with the people of Italy. At the same time we express our concern regarding the US military bases established in Italy immediately established after World WarII.  

Italy like many other countries is currently experiencing the COVID-19 crisis. This year on the 25th of April which commemorates Italy’s Liberation, we were  not able to meet in Firenze to debate and discuss the “coronavirus crisis” which is affecting millions of people Worldwide.

Below is the transcript of the interview with Peter Koenig

***

Question: After the Corona virus lockdown that stopped the economy in a large part of the world, what do you think will happen with the economically weaker countries and how can they be defended?

Peter Koenig: First, I must tell you, it is virtually impossible to predict what might happen and in what time. We are quite possibly experiencing a huge paradigm shift. That means that nothing will – or almost nothing – will remain the way it was before.  This is a well-concocted plan -emanating from the infamous 2010 Rockefeller Report. We are right now living the beginning of the first phase, called the “Lock Step” scenario.

What we can see already after barely 3 months of this “pandemic” lockdown – there is massive unemployment. In the US already more than 23 million people are claiming for unemployment benefits. That does not take into account, all those that have given up….

FED and GS (Goldman Sachs) predict unemployment to reach between 32% and 40% in the next quarter.

And there will be massive bankruptcies- over the next few months, spinning out of control- triggering more unemployment. Hardest hit are the small and medium size enterprises

The situation in Europe will be similar- if not worse.

So far, we have barely seen the tiny tip of the iceberg.

The countries most affected will be the debt dependant – i.e. highly indebted countries. And I’m talking about enslaving foreign debt.

This evil plan COVID-19 /2010 Rockefeller Report – contains many very people-unfriendly elements. It would be too long, to explain them here. But let’s list the most important ones – and how they may impact us and the economy:

• A massive vaccination program
• population reduction through vaccination – and other means, like induced famine, man-induced climate change, GMOs, 5G (strong electromagnetic fields – EMF) – and so on….
• digitized ID
• digitized money – no more cash
• rolling out 5G – to control all and every move we take – plus our digitized bank accounts – what is commonly called and misleadingly called “the internet of things”
• 5G is a weapon when used at its full strength – which is not yet the case. 5G is weaponized and can kill.

The Plan foresees massive repression through – what has already been called before the end of the last Century – the NEW WORLD ORDER, often also referred to as the ONE WORLD ORDER. A small elite of super powerful and super rich people would control us all.

The principal of the “Lock Step” arrangement. All we have left is marching in Lock Step to the orders from above.

But we do not have to allow this to happen. If we are aware of the Plan, we can take control – I suggest that you all read the 2010 Rockefeller Report – it’s probably still to be found on Internet. So, you realize that I’m not talking “conspiracy theory” – but that this Conspiracy is REAL.

For example, tell your governments with urgency to Stop Rolling Out 5G -the health impact has not been studied, except for individual scientist- 180 of whom have written to the EU Commission in Brussels, asking for a moratorium and independent study.

WHO has suspiciously remained silent about 5G.

Mr. Putin, for example, so far has refrained from rolling out 5G in Russia.

This may not answer the original question. But it is important to know the Plan to find the answers on how to save our local – not globalized – economies:

So – Deglobalize –

• Do not belong to a monetary or a political union that has no common constitution, no common interests, and no common goals- and especially no solidarity.
• Italy knows best about abject lack of solidarity within the EU – recent events with COVID-19 are a living testimony to the sham of the European Union.
• Greece also knows what it means to be in a union without solidarity
• So – get out of the EU and the Euro-prison. Yes, a Euro-prison, because the Euro, the way it has been injected into Europe, does not allow your countries economic and monetary sovereignty.
• What happened for example to Greece could never have happened if Greece would have had her economic and monetary sovereignty -i.e. her own currency
• Countries do need to regain their economic and monetary sovereignty – and
• be able to restart their local economy for local consumption with local money, with local public banks and with a publicly-owned central bank, that works for the local economy.

At the beginning, until a country achieves a high degree of auto-sufficiency, international trade is of lesser importance.

Then – trade with friendly nations, with countries and people that share the same or similar values. Make your own trading agreements – you do not need WTO.

And once you take back your country’s economic and monetary autonomy, you do not need international loans – from – I call them indebting organizations, like the World Bank and the IMF and regional development banks.

You can create your own internal debt and resolve that internal debt according to your own economic pace and strength. No need to pay a foreign institution interest for a foreign currency.

As to a recovery, poorer – or less industrialized – countries may be better suited to recover quickly, because they have a much bigger informal sector. Informality is creative and can adapt and adjust usually much faster than strictly and often rigidly structured economies.

A Prominent example is China – China grew out of the ashes in 1948 – internally independent, no foreign debt to speak of, with the principal goal of becoming auto-sufficient in food, education and health. When these goals were nearly reached, China started opening up for international trade and relations – in the 1980s.

Granted, China is not Italy – China is a huge country with 1.4 billion people. But the principal applies to every nation that wants to become her sovereign self again.

Question: After this long Covid-19 economic stagnation, can Europe recover? and by what means?

PK: Yes, Europe can recover. It depends how.

Remember, there is going to be a great paradigm shift in socioeconomic terms, as I mentioned before – of values, of customs, of our behaviour vis-à-vis each other – and likely in relations between countries. It is difficult – or rather impossible to predict – which way the wheels will be turning.

But what we can say now, is that our world will not be the same again – at least for a long-long time.

What happened during this almost total lock-down – not only of people, but of the world economy, lives have been destroyed, not by COVID-19, but by the shrieking unprepared halt of the economy around the world, and the multiple consequences that nobody with a sane mind could have foreseen.

People who have caused that were and are of an insane mind. It looks like a wanton destruction of the world’s assets, savings, incomes – the entire societal livelihood has been annihilated. At will. None of this would have been necessary to come to grips with the COVID-19 pandemic.

But that is another subject.

What to do now?

This is the moment for US, the people to take over and create a new economic system, one of peace, equality and solidarity.

What first must go – in order to foster peace and to use available resources for the benefit of the people – we Europeans have to get out of NATO.

Imagine the trillions of dollars or Euros saved by abandoning this war-mongering apparatus that has only hostile and negative effectives on our closest neighbour, Russia – and a bit farther away – China?

These are our normal partners, they have been for centuries, if not millennia before the onset of the Anglo-American Empire – as they are on the same huge landmass, called EURASIA – no need to look and listen and being sanctioned left and right by the Masters across the Atlantic. No need at all. Europe and her Eastern Partners don’t need NATO.

There is no aggression whatso ever coming from either Russia or China. These people are friendly and want to enter into social and economic relationships.

None of these countries have a history of invading and interfering in other countries, not like the west – with at the forefront the US of A.

We are being indoctrinated on a daily basis that these are our enemies. That is a huge LIE. – A lie, the west, or the United States needs to maintain its power base, its military industrial complex that produces about half of the US GDP.

So, the silver lining of this crisis is that it gives us the opportunities to rethink Europe’s priorities, who are our true alliances – peaceful alliances. – And we do not need NATO.

Again – imagine what we, Europe, could be doing with the trillions saved from not belonging to the most destructive war-machine of this planet.

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This was livestreamed by BYOBLU and Pandora TV.

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 Global Research; ICH; RT; Sputnik; PressTV; The 21st Century; Greanville Post; Defend Democracy Press, TeleSUR; The Saker Blog, the New Eastern Outlook (NEO); and other internet sites. 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.

Global CO₂ rise and warming rates have reached a large factor to an order of magnitude higher than those of the past geological and mass extinction events, with major implications for the shift in climate zones and the nature and speed of current extreme weather events. Given the abrupt change in state of the atmosphere-ocean-cryosphere-land system, accelerating since the mid-20ᵗʰ century, the terms climate change and global warming no longer reflect the nature of the climate extremes consequent on this shift. Further to NASA’s reported mean land-ocean temperature rise to +1.18°C for March 2020, relative to the 1951-1980 baseline, large parts of the continents, including Siberia, central Asia, Canada, parts of west Africa, eastern South America and Australia are warming toward mean temperatures of +2°C and higher.

The rate exceeds that of the Last Glacial Termination (LGT) (21–8 kyr), the Paleocene-Eocene hyperthermal event (PETM) (55.9 Ma) and the Cretaceous-Tertiary boundary (K-T) (64.98 Ma) impact event. A principal question arises regarding the relationships between the warming rate and the nature and progression of the current migration climate zones toward the poles, including changes in the atmosphere and ocean current systems. Significant transient cooling pauses, or stadials, are projected as a consequence of the flow of cold ice melt water from Greenland and Antarctica into the oceans.

Figure 1. Global temperature distribution in March 2020, relative to a 1951-1980 baseline. NASA GISS.

The K-T impact and subsequent warming

According to Beerling et al. (2002) the CO₂ change triggered by the K-T impact event 65 Ma years ago involved a rise from about 400-500 ppm to 2300 ppm over 10.000 years from the impact (Fig. 2) at a rate of 0.18 ppm/year. This is less than the mean Anthropocene CO₂ rise rate of 0.415 ppm/year and an order of magnitude less than the 2 to 3 ppm/year rise rate in the 21ˢᵗ century. Likewise the Anthropocene temperature rise rate of ~ 0.0074°C/year is high by an order of magnitude as compared to the K-T impact event rate of~ 0.00075°C/year (Table 1) reported by Beerling et al. (2002).

Beerling et al.’s (2002) estimate, based on fossil fern proxies, implies an initial injection of at least 6,400 GtCO₂  and possibly as high as 13,000 GtCO₂ into the atmosphere, significantly higher than values derived by Pope et al. (1997). This would increase climate forcing by +12 Wm⁻² and mean warming of ~7.5°C, which would have strongly stressed ecosystems already affected by cold temperatures and the blockage of sunlight during the impact winter and associated mass extinction at the KT boundary (O’Keefe et al. 1989).

Figure 2. Reconstructed atmospheric CO₂ variations during the Late Cretaceous–Early Tertiary derived from the SI (Stomata index) of fossil leaf cuticles calibrated by using inverse regression and stomatal ratios. Beerling et al. (2002).

The PETM hyperthermal event

The Palaeocene–Eocene Thermal Maximum, about 55.9 Ma, triggered the release of a large mass of light ¹³C-depleted carbon suggestive of an organic source, likely methane, has led to a global surface temperature rise of 5 – 9°C within a few thousand years (Table 1; Fig. 3). Deep-sea carbonate dissolution indices and stable carbon isotope composition were used to estimate the initial carbon pulse to a magnitude of 3,000 PgC or less. As a result, atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations increased during the main event by up to 70% compared with pre-event levels, leading to a global surface temperatures rose by 5–9°C within a few thousand years.

Figure 3. Simulated atmospheric CO2 at and after the Palaeocene-Eocene boundary (after Zeebe et al. (2009).

The last glacial termination

Paleoclimate indices based on ice cores and isotopic evidence suggest temperature rise generally correlates with CO₂ during the Last Glacial Termination between 17.5 kyr to 10 kyr. Whereas the rise rates of CO₂ and temperature are broadly parallel the temperature somewhat lags behind CO₂ (Figure 2), including changes of CO₂ (186 – 265 ppm) and of temperature (T°C -3.3°C – +0.2°C) (Fig. 4). A rise rate of ~0.010 ppm CO₂/year and of temperature ~0.00046°C/year are indicated (Table 1) (Shakun et al., 2012). Differences between temperature changes of the Northern Hemisphere and Southern Hemisphere correspond to variations in the strength of the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation.

Figure 4. Global CO₂ and temperature during the last glacial termination (After Shakun et al. 2012).(LGM – Last Glacial Maximum; OD – Older Dryas; B-A – Bølling–Allerød; YD Younger Dryas).

Trajectories and rates of global CO₂ rise and warming

The rates at which atmospheric composition and climate changes occur constitute major control over the survival versus extinction of species. Based on paleo-proxy estimates of greenhouse gas levels and of mean temperatures, using oxygen and carbon isotopes, fossil plants, fossil organic matter, trace elements, the rate of CO₂ rise since ~1750 (Anthropocene) (CO₂ ᴀɴᴛʜ) exceeds that of the last glacial termination (CO₂ ʟɢᴛ) by an order of magnitude (CO₂ ᴀɴᴛʜ/CO₂ ʟɢᴛ = 41) and that of the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum (CO₂ ᴘᴇᴛᴍ) by a high factor (CO₂ ᴀɴᴛʜ/CO₂ ᴘᴇᴛᴍ ~ 3.8–6.9)(Table 1). The rise rate of mean global temperature exceeds that of the LGT and the PETM by a large factor to an order of magnitude (Table 1; Figs 5 and 6). It can be expected that such extreme rates of change will be manifest in real time by observed shifts in state of global and regional climates and the intensity and frequency of extreme weather events, including the following observations:

• A shift in climate zones (Fig. 7) including expansion of the tropics and migration of moderate Mediterranean-type climate zones toward the poles, estimated at a rate of 56-111 km per decade (Thurton 2017), signifying a fundamental shift in state of the Earth’s climate regime.
• A high rate of ice melt and development of cool ocean pools south of Greenland and around Antarctica (Fig. 8a) developing into cool ocean regions and stadial climate conditions (Fig. 8b).
• Reduced temperature differences between the polar zones and mid-latitudes and thereby weakening of the polar boundaries and the polar jet stream boundary.
• Weakening of the North Atlantic Thermal Circulation.
• Changes in the southern ocean Antarctic oscillation and the Antarctic vortex.
• The rapid increase in extreme weather events, including droughts, heat waves, fires, cyclones and storms.

Figure 5. Cenozoic and Anthropocene CO₂ and temperature rise rates.

Figure 6. A comparison between rates of mean global temperature rise during:

(1) the last Glacial Termination (after Shakun et al. 2012);

(2) the PETM (Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum, after Kump 2011);

(3) the late Anthropocene (1750–2019), and

(4) an asteroid impact. In the latter instance, temperature associated with CO₂ rise would lag by some weeks or months behind aerosol-induced cooling.

Figure 7. Migration of the subtropical Sahara climate zone (red spots) northward into the Mediterranean climate zone leads to warming, drying and fires over extensive parts of Spain, Portugal, southern France, Italy, Greece and Turkey, and to melting of glaciers in the Alps. Migration, Environment and Climate Change, International Organization for Migration, Geneva, Switzerland. With permission of the IOM UN Migration. The regional impacts of climate change map extracted from The Atlas of Environmental Migration (Ionesco D., Mokhnacheva D. and Gemenne F., Routledge, Abingdon, 2017), p. 63 © IOM (Mokhnacheva, Ionesco), Gemenne, Zoï Environment Network, 2015. Sources: IPCC (2013, 2014)

By contrast to linear IPCC climate projections for 2100-2300, climate modelling for the 21st century by Hansen et al. 2016 suggests major effects of ice melt water flow into the oceans from the ice sheets, leading to stadial cooling of parts of the oceans, changing the global temperature pattern from that of the early 21ˢᵗ century (Figs 8, 9a) to the late 21ˢᵗ century (Fig. 9b).

Figure 8. Global temperature patterns during El Nino and La Nina events. NASA GISS

Figure 9. (a) An A1B model of surface-air temperature change for 2055-2060 relative to 1880-1920 (+1 meters sea level rise) for modified forcing (Hansen et al. 2016);
(b) A1B model surface-air temperatures in 2096 relative to 1880-1920 (+5 meters sea level rise) for 10 years ice melt doubling time in the southern hemisphere and partial global cooling of -0.33°C (Hansen et al. 2016).

Summary and conclusions

1. Late 20th century to early 21asrt century global greenhouse gas levels and regional warming rates have reached a high factor to an order of magnitude faster than those of past geological and mass extinction events, with major implications for the nature and speed of extreme weather events.
2. The Anthropocene CO₂ rise and warming rates exceed that of the Last Glacial Termination (LGT) (21–8kyr), the Paleocene-Eocene hyperthermal event (PETM) (55.9 Ma) and the post-impact Cretaceous-Tertiary boundary (K-T) (64.98 Ma).
3. Further to NASA’s reported mean land-ocean temperature rise of +1.18°C in March 2020, relative to the 1951-1980 baseline, large parts of the continents, including central Asia, west Africa eastern South America and Australia are warming toward mean temperatures of +2°C and higher.
4. Major consequences of the current shift in state of the climate system pertain to the weakening of the polar boundaries and the migration of climate zones toward the poles. Transient cooling pauses are projected as a result of the flow of cold ice melt water from Greenland and Antarctica into the oceans, leading to stadial cooling intervals.
5. Given the abrupt shift in state of the atmosphere-ocean-cryosphere-land system, the current trend signifies an abrupt shift in state of the atmosphere, accelerating since the mid-20th century. Terms such as climate change and global warming no longer reflect the extreme nature of the climate events consequent on this shift, amounting to a climate catastrophe on a geological scale.

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Dr Andrew Glikson, Earth and climate scientist, ANU Planetary Science Institute, ANU Climate Change Institute. He is a frequent contributor to Global Research.

For many years, we in the alternative media have been warning that when a new crises emerges, a future of social engineering and control would bring us closer to George Orwell’s predictions right to our doorstep.  Since the start of the Corona Virus Pandemic (Covid-19) the destruction of the world’s economy with the US in an already fragile state of affairs taking the biggest hit with its lock downs and an estimated 26 million people so far who are now unemployed.  It has crippled the social fabric of society, basically forever and as a result, more invasive technologies are being introduced to the world now more than ever before. Recently, the US mainstream media has been reporting on the new technologies that can be implemented by governments to track the potential carriers of Covid-19 from drones that will be able to check your temperature and determine that you may or may not carry the virus to a program that can track individuals Smart phones through a mapping tool which was created by an Israeli company looking to have a footprint in the US market.

When it comes to the surveillance of the public’s health from the sky, drone manufacturer Draganfly comes to mind as it made recent headlines with claims that their drone technology can monitor the public’s health in real time which brings us to the town of Westport, Connecticut. The Westport local police department had originally agreed to monitor and track its citizens for fevers or coughs but had decided to reverse its course and not to roll out the drone program due to its citizens privacy concerns according to NBC news:

A Connecticut police force is grounding its plans to test a “pandemic drone” that would detect a person with a fever or cough, after privacy concerns were raised. The town of Westport has chosen to opt out of the ‘“Flatten the Curve Pilot Program” from drone manufacturer Draganfly, according to NBC Connecticut. Westport Police Chief Foti Koskinas said Thursday that while he was thankful for the opportunity to participate, he also wanted to be responsive to citizens’ concerns.

“We thank Draganfly for offering the pilot program to Westport and sincerely hope to be included in future innovations once we are convinced the program is appropriate for Westport,” Koskinas said, according to NBC Connecticut

Why Westport residents were concerned with Draganfly’s drone capabilities? Watch their introductory video:

This is just one of the technologies that happens to be floating around, giving those in power new ideas that can be used in any future outbreak or any other crisis. What if there is another outbreak in the late fall or winter season? . 

Another not so great idea that is not drone related is currently being used around the world is a program called Fleming created by an Israeli technology firm called the NSO Group based in Herzliva, Israel, a firm that was founded by Omri Lavie and Shalev Hulio who happens to employ former IDF soldiers.  An article from Australia’s online news site www.news.com.au from 2016 ‘Everything we know about NSO Group: The cyberarms dealer responsible for the iPhone hack’ describes who the founders are linked to which should not be a surprise to anyone at this point:

According the LinkedIn pages of Mr Lavie and Mr Hulio, both men are self-proclaimed serial entrepreneurs, with a string of Israeli start-ups attributed on their profiles.  Despite the plethora of tech companies the pair has founded, both men also have ties to the Israeli government. 

Mr Lavia’s profile shows he was an “employee” of the Israeli Government from July 2005-October 2007, while Mr Hulio’s claims he was a Company Commander (Search and Rescue) for the Israeli Defence Force from August 1999-November 2004.  The company also boasts to have employees from Unit 8200 — the signal intelligence and code deciphering arm of the Israel Defence Force

The NSO group is known worldwide for a highly-controversial spyware program called Pegasus which enabled remote surveillance of individuals smartphones. The NSO Group’s history has been controversial since its introduction of the Pegasus program to the world, for example, in a 2019 article from fastcompany.com, ‘Israeli cyberattack firm woos investors amid a human rights firestorm’ explains one particular controversy that targeted numerous activists and journalists worldwide:

NSO makes Pegasus, a sophisticated tool that can hack into smartphones and is intended, the company says, to help governments stop criminals and terrorists.  But Pegasus has also been implicated in attacks on members of civil society. Targets of the software have included at least two dozen activists, journalists, and lawyers in the Middle East, Mexico, Asia, and Europe, according to extensive analysis by Citizen Lab, a digital watchdog at the University of Toronto

NSO Group has many other scandals, one of them is with Saudi dissident, Omar Abdelaziz who filed a lawsuit claiming that his conversations with Jamal Khashoogi, the Washington Post journalist from Saudi Arabia who was murdered in the Saudi embassy in Istanbul, Turkey in 2018 were intercepted by Pegasus. Now, the NSO Group is rolling out a new program called Fleming. According to the NSO group,

“Fleming features an advanced mapping tool that identifies the spread of coronavirus in real-time, empowering health and other government officials to make informed decisions, backed by data, to quickly mitigate the pandemic.”

They say that they will empower healthcare workers and “other government officials” which is pretty vague. “By utilizing this technology, decision makers can more effectively deploy resources, including critical supplies and medical personnel, and implement public health protocols that help contain the spread”, resources can be taken out of proportion because the government will decide what “resources” they will use. What if they decided to use a drone strike as a resource?

In an opinion piece published by Ynetnews of Israel ‘ The truth about digital tracking to fight coronavirus’ by Shalev Hulio, the CEO of the NSO Group who of course takes a defensive approach for his firm’s new program “It is important to appreciate that the historical information for each mobile subscription is already and routinely available to the cellular companies” so, since it is already in use, Hulio is suggesting that we can go a little further.

“This information only includes cellular locations for that subscription and does not require any collection of information from the device itself”

which is something they cannot guarantee. He continues

“In other words, with the exception of retrieving the historical location of the device, there is no listening in on calls and no data, personal information or messages that exist on the device can be gathered.”

This is the same tech firm that has been implicated in violating the privacy concerns of journalists, activists and lawyers around the world. Hulio says that “through mapping the path of the patient, we can see the people around them and they can be directly alerted” and then he asks the question, “So how does all this not violate privacy?”

He claims that the data is analyzed with no verifiable information that can identify you, “In fact, not even a phone number is collected: The analysis is based on the SIM card number that exists on the device.” Then once all the information is collected then they can send a message to the person infected and request they go into self-isolation “This will allow the authorities to build a “tree of infection.”

These are just two of many Orwellian ideas being floated around as potential tools to monitor and control the corona virus outbreak. If we allow these technologies to be implemented into our daily lives, whatever remaining freedoms you may still have, will slowly be taken away.

It does not have to be this way, we can resist this type of invasive technology as the people of Westport, Connecticut proved. They had privacy concerns and voiced their concerns to the local authorities about using ‘Draganfly’s drones that would have initiated the ‘Flatten the Curve Pilot Program’ which is a victory in itself, but this fight has only begun, and will continue well into the future as George Orwell’s warning becomes a reality day by day as the lock downs continue.

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Timothy Alexander Guzman writes on his blog, Silent Crow News, where this article was originally published. He is a frequent contributor to Global Research.

Featured image is from the author

Beijing is not back to normal but there is an air of normality. The Beijing Subway has 23 lines but only one runs on a north-south axis. This is Line 5, the busiest. In February and March its carriages were almost empty. Now it is running at about 75 per cent of its pre-outbreak capacity.

The capital’s parks are filling up again as families take advantage of the warmer weather. The May day holiday is approaching and picnic spaces are being prepared.   Restaurants are opening tentatively with social distancing enforced for diners. Primary schools are also reopening but most secondary schools and universities remain closed until September. The capital was never under lockdown but all residents must have a pass to enter their compound. If you lose it, a new one must be issued before admittance is granted.

And everyone, without exception, is wearing face masks. You cannot use public transport, go into a shop or go to work without one. Temperature checks are ubiquitous. They are carried out swiftly at the entrances to subways, work places, shops or any public gathering.  The masks serve another purpose. This is the time of year when millions of catkins take to the air, and pedestrians have to protect their eyes, noses and throats from them. There are pockets of Beijing where COVID-19 has appeared but generally the capital seems to be controlling the outbreak.

Anyone re-entering the city limits must undergo a 14-day quarantine. If this is permitted to be carried out at home, a sticker is put on the apartment door asking neighbors to inform the authorities if quarantine has been broken.

Supermarkets in the capital have remained well-stocked. More than 300,000 tons of pork from the strategic pork reserves were released for the capital’s residents and trucks have been requisitioned to deliver vegetables. As the capital, food shortages for its residents were unthinkable.

The blame game? From China’s point of view, the narrative is clear cut. It made catastrophic mistakes initially. It was slow to recognize the danger posed by COVID-19. It hassled and arrested doctors for warning about it in early January. That same month it allowed a massive Lunar new year’s public banquet for 40,000 families to take place. And as it became clear that an epidemic was raging, politics took precedence as the local party congresses in Wuhan and in Hubei province were being held in January prior to the (postponed) national congress in March.

Even when it announced the Wuhan lockdown, it did not implement it until five hours later allowing people, many presumably infected, to leave the city. But then it acted with resolve. Locking down Wuhan, a city of 11 million people, telling most of the country’s workers to stay at home, shutting schools and universities, cutting air links, introducing national temperature checks, and home passes. These and other measures allowed it to find a route to recovery and gave the rest of the world a precious window of opportunity. This, again, in China’s view, was squandered. Despite the evidence from China, the rest of the world seemed reluctant to face reality.  Italy, Span and Germany seemed to understand the peril but Japan, Britain and the United States adopted an almost laissez-faire mentality. And US President Donald Trump’s remark that COVID-19 could be treated by people injecting disinfectant seemed to confirm China’s worst fears: The lessons it painfully learned were being willfully ignored.

Even if a vaccine is developed relative quickly, say by September, COVID-19 will change the world.

There will be political consequences. Mutual mistrust between China and the West is the new norm. And in China, the unwritten law that has shaped that country’s and the world’s fortune over the last 30 years seems to have been broken. That law states that China will deliver its citizens economic growth at the cost of political rights. Before COVID-19 the Chinese economy, according to Beijing, was growing at about 6 per cent per annum. This year it is estimated to grow at about 2.5 per cent. Pre-COVID, any growth less that 5 percent was considered a recipe for massive social upheaval. The consequences of this outbreak will be felt long after the face masks in Beijing are discarded and the temperature checks stopped.

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Reporting from Beijing Tom Clifford is a frequent contributor to Global Research.

Featured image is from Wikimedia Commons

April 24, 2020, marks the 105^th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide, which was the first genocide of the 20^th century.  The starting date is held to be April 24, 1915, in a premeditated and systematic campaign to exterminate the Armenian people in the Ottoman Empire, which resulted in at least 1.5 million deaths by 1923.  The Ottoman Empire is the direct predecessor of modern Turkey. 

The Armenians were the first nation in the world to make Christianity their official state religion. The Turks were Muslims, and this holds today. Not only Armenians were targeted for extermination, as the Assyrian and Greek Christian communities were among those massacred.

Armenian Genocide facts

While the world was focused on their collective suffering in World War 1, the Turks were carrying out the genocide in two phases.  The second phase involved the deportation of women, children, the elderly, and the sick on death marches leading to the Syrian Desert city of Deir Ez Zor, then also under Ottoman Empire occupation. Those marching across the vast desert were deprived of food and water and subjected to periodic robbery, rape, and massacre.

The Turks viewed Armenians as “heathens”, and deserved to be treated differently than the Muslims.

Turkish denial of history

Turkey denies the Armenian Genocide ever happened, despite the documented history.  Turkey and Turkish leaders have vociferously refused to acknowledge the Armenian Genocide, and have attacked, punished, and harassed all Turkish citizens who do publicly acknowledge the crime against humanity.

The brutal Turkish dictator, Sultan Abdul Hamid II, was infuriated by the Armenian campaign to win their basic civil rights, and he declared that he would crush them.  “I will soon settle those Armenians,” he told a reporter in 1890. The first Armenian massacre occurred between 1894 and 1896 and was the precursor to the later genocide.

The Turks not only succeeded in exterminating 1.5 million Christians, but they changed the entire culture, as they tried to re-write history.  The results were over 450 monasteries, 1,900 schools and 2,400 churches were seized and turned into Muslim places of worship, or state use.  Many of the Museums in Turkey today were once a busy and thriving church.  Libraries, artwork, and Christian antiquities were destroyed or removed to obscurity.

The names of over 3,600 towns and villages that had once been Armenian communities were morphed into new Turkish names, to erase the Armenian, and Christian history of modern Turkey once called Anatolia.

The Turks ancestors were a Central Asian race, who were warriors on horse-back, and converted to Islam.  Othman conquered Constantinople, which was a Christian center. He established the Ottoman Empire on the doors of Europe, but his culture and mentality were Eastern.  Germany has repeatedly refused to accept Turkey into the European Union, and much of that refusal is rooted in the culture of the Turks.

Turkey attacked an Armenian village in Syria in 2014

History repeats itself, and the world allows it because Turkey is unrepentant, and acts with impunity. Turkey is a member of NATO and a close US ally.  President Obama’s war on Syria for ‘regime change’ included Turkey as the transit hub for the terrorists following Radical Islam, which is a political ideology followed by Turkey and most of the Arab Gulf monarchies.

The attack on Kessab, Syria began on March 21, 2014. Resident Samuel Poladian told Dr. Declan Hayes of Ireland he heard Turkish military helicopters overhead on the morning of the invasion.  Kessab is a small Armenian village on the border with Turkey, just north of Latakia. Turkey orchestrated the invasion which sent 2,000 residents fleeing for their lives, as 20,000 foreign terrorists poured over the border from Turkey.

Hovian Khatcherian had been sheltering in Kessab, having been forced to flee Reqaa, and then Aleppo.  For the third time, she was running for her life from terrorists who were supported by the US-EU-NATO project for a new Syria.

The terrorists systematically desecrated all three of Kessab’s churches, and they looted the village’s graves seemingly looking for gold. They stripped every house of anything of value, and their Turkmen partners ferried off household goods to be sold in the markets of Antakya and Iskenderun.

Kessab’s very elderly residents were kidnapped and taken to Turkey where they languished for months of captivity. The US Ambassador to Turkey visited them on “April Fools Day”, but when he left without releasing them, it was no joke.

Pepken Djourian and his wife watched in horror as the US-backed terrorists executed their only son Kevork in front of them and they refused to allow them to bury him. The parents were also among the kidnapped victims enduring captivity in Turkey.

The Kessab attack, destruction, and occupation were directed solely against Armenian Christians. It was Turkey’s brutal way of showing the Armenians and the Syrian Arab Army which protect them that, just as in 1915, they can occupy Kessab and slaughter its inhabitants at any time.

Kessab’s nightmare has not ended. Few of the residents have returned to their homes, and most homes, shops, and farms have not been repaired. Most residents can’t afford repairs, and those who can are reluctant to invest in repairs which can be wiped out again by Turkey, and its terrorist allies. Al Qaeda is in control of Idlib, which is close to Kessab. The terrorists have continued to periodically strike Kessab with missiles fired from Idlib. The terrorists are supported by President Erdogan and President Trump has repeatedly demanded that Idlib and its terrorist leaders be protected against attack by the Syrian Arab Army. Until Idlib is free of terrorists, Kessab cannot be safe.

Israel refuses to recognize the Armenian Genocide

‘Israel’ insists that six million Jews were barbarically and cruelly murdered in the Holocaust at the hands of the Nazis.  The Jews were the victims of the second genocide. Jews and Armenians have shared common experiences; however, ‘Israel’ has refused to ever recognize the Armenian genocide. Raphael Lemkin in 1943 was the first to coin the word genocide as he was reflecting on the Armenians.  Adolf Hitler is reported to have said in 1939: “Who, after all, speaks today of the annihilation of the Armenians?” Turkey was never punished for the Armenian genocide, which gave Hitler the confidence for his plan to exterminate the Jews.

‘Israel’ has refused to recognize the Armenian genocide out of fear of Turkey’s reaction, a nation which is a close ally with ‘Israel’ and has established a thriving oil business, trafficking stolen oil from the east of Syria through Turkey, and then shipped to ‘Israel’. The schools in ‘Israel’ refuse to teach the Armenian genocide as part of history, even though it has a connection to their own Holocaust. The Armenian Quarter in Jerusalem is just a place on a map for ‘Israeli’ students.

Armenian Genocide Recognized Internationally

32 countries currently recognize the Armenian Genocide, including the US, Russia, Syria, and Germany. In 2015, the martyrs of the genocide were canonized by the Armenian Apostolic Orthodox Church, and special icons were placed in Armenian churches around the world.

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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: Armenian Americans march in Los Angeles on April 24 during an annual commemoration of the deaths of 1.5 million Armenians under the Ottoman Empire. (Source: AP)

The statistics surrounding the Covid-19 crisis have always been unreliable, yet msm and other sources use these numbers without qualifications. To qualify the numbers would be to dismantle the Lie. The Lie must be maintained because it is fundamental to hidden agendas which include economic warfare, and a vast transfer of wealth upwards,(1) war propaganda against China (2), the anti-democratic ushering in of police-state surveillance mechanisms, and the imposition of what some refer to as a Fourth Industrial Revolution.(3)

In the following video, Senator Jensen dismantles the statistical corruption. He explains that administrators pressure Doctors to use the Covid-19 descriptor. Why? Hospitals in his area receive $5,000.00 for a pneumonia diagnosis, $13,000.00 for a Covid-19 diagnosis, and $39,000.00 if the patient receives treatment with a ventilator.

Since the distinction between dying FROM Covid and WITH Covid-19 is not being made, most Mainstream Media and government statistics are not valid. They are being used to satisfy other agendas.

Accurate statistics, largely suppressed, do exist, and they involve results from antibody tests.

These numbers are not inflated, and they reveal Covid-19 infection fatality rates as being in line with flu mortality rates. (4)

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Mark Taliano is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG) and the author of Voices from Syria, Global Research Publishers, 2017. Visit the author’s website at https://www.marktaliano.net where this article was originally published.

Notes

(1)
The Last American Vagabond, “Your Government Is Using Coronavirus To Create The Largest Transfer Of Wealth In American History” (video) 5 April, 2020.
(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5_hwCEXZphQ&feature=share&fbclid=IwAR0ARHj6HbP6KsEJpiJUcz-uMkFEwxTZySX_NpQsslJpnDUkeHXb5iov2Hk)

(2) Mark Taliano, “Coronavirus False Flag.” Global Research, 22 April, 2020.
(https://www.globalresearch.ca/coronavirus-false-flag/5710403) Accessed 26 April, 2020.

(3) The Jimmy Dore Show, “Security State Using Coronavirus To Implement Orwellian Nightmare.”. 23 April, 2020.
(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bGMkSNj_-7Q&feature=youtu.be&fbclid=IwAR2fUd81wk1aCLw3C0Sw6Hynd9f7qp8GQhOrusfivlcQ_9ZxY-F3-yS1mM4) Accessed 26 April, 2020.

(4) “THIS IS HUGE: Stanford’s Antibodies Study Wraps Up, Shows Covid-19 Is 50x More Prevalent and 50x Less Deadly Than Believed/ Will this be the stake through Covid Rouge’s dark, rotten heart? It should be /By Dr. John Ioannidis/ANTI-EMPIRE”
(https://www.marktaliano.net/this-is-huge-stanfords-antibodies-study-wraps-up-shows-covid-19-is-50x-more-prevalent-and-50x-less-deadly-than-believed-will-this-be-the-stake-through-covid-rouges-dark-rotten-heart-it/) Accessed 26 April, 2020.

Order Mark Taliano’s Book “Voices from Syria” directly from Global Research.

Mark Taliano combines years of research with on-the-ground observations to present an informed and well-documented analysis that refutes  the mainstream media narratives on Syria. 

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Author: Mark Taliano

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Last year we met in Florence on the 7th of April, coinciding with the 70th anniversary of the founding of NATO. The theme of our conference last year was NATO EXIT.  

On April 25, 2020, Commemorating the Liberation of Italy. We express our solidarity with the people of Italy.

Italy like many other countries is currently experiencing a major crisis. This year on the 25th of April which commemorates Italy’s Liberation, we are not able to meet in Firenze to debate and discuss the “coronavirus crisis” which is affecting millions of people Worldwide.

VIDEO: Presentation of Colonel Ann Wright

On Friday, May 1, an ongoing General Strike campaign begins. This campaign could become the most powerful movement in the United States and reset the national agenda. It comes when the failures of the US political system have been magnified by the COVID-19 pandemic, which triggered an economic collapse in a presidential election year.  The General Strike campaign will be ongoing with actions on the first of every month. Strategic strikes of workers, students, consumers, prisoners, and renters will also continue.

This new era of mass strikes builds on successful strikes by teachers, healthcare workers, hotel workers, and others.  According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, in the last two years, there has been the largest number of major work stoppages in 35 years with more than 400,000 workers involved in strikes in both 2018 and 2019. This continues in 2020 with a wave of wildcat strikes.

People must commit to an ongoing campaign of strikes starting now and continuing after the election. FDR faced more than 1.4 million people striking after he was elected, which forced him to put the New Deal and workers’ rights legislation in place. The next president should be subjected to continuous strikes with specific demands. Striking is the most powerful tool of the people. We need to learn to use it effectively.

United action magnifies popular power and shows those in power that they cannot ignore us any longer. You can participate by sharing this article with other people and urging them to participate. Follow and share the hashtags #CoronaStrike, #GeneralStrike, #MayDay2020,#GeneralStrike2020, and #PeoplesStrike.

Participate in Popular Resistance’s Zoom call on April 29, 2020, at 7:00 pm Eastern/4:00 pm Pacific to learn about what will be happening on May Day and how you can be part of it. Register at bit.ly/MayDayMeeting.

General Strike

COVID-19 exposes the fact that essential workers who provide food, healthcare, and deliveries to our homes are mistreated and underappreciated. Workers are underpaid and are not being provided with protective equipment or allowed sick leave. The COVID-19 rescue laws have given trillions in funding to investors and big businesses while leaving people and small businesses with crumbs. Twenty-six million people have filed for unemployment but states are not processing claims quickly and the COVID-19 rescue only provided an inadequate one-time $1,200 payment. Millions of the newly unemployed are losing their health insurance.

The #GeneralStrike has five demands:

(1) Protection from Covid-19

(2) Safe Housing.

(3) Living Wages.

(4) Medicare for All.

(5) Equal Education.

We would add a sixth urgent demand – saving the postal service.

The tactics of the General Strike will vary over time. During this initial phase of the COVID-19 virus, there will be car caravans, sickouts, and signs on windows supporting the strikes. People will use social media to show support for the demands. On May 1 and beyond there will be webinars on the strike and the issues raised by it.

With a campaign of strategic and general strikes very likely going on until 2022, people can take control of the country and put the necessities of the people at the top of the agenda. Jane McAlevey points to three areas where workers have decisive power. These include logistics, healthcare, and education.

• Logistics includes providing food, delivery, transit, and other services that keep the economy functioning. Workers disrupting these areas makes the country ungovernable by creating economic dysfunction. 
• Despite being essential, healthcare workers lack protective equipment and basics such as tests. Healthcare workers have stood against the dangerous so-called “Liberate” protests Donald Trump is encouraging to prematurely re-open the economy. Nurses have protested the lack of protective equipment and been fired for doing so. These acts of defiance must be supported as we also demand national improved Medicare for All so everyone has access to high-quality healthcare. We must build our public health system so never again will the country be unprepared for a pandemic.
• Teacher’s unions have developed the model for all unions to follow, strikes for the common good. Teacher strikes have been successful because they have represented theinterests of students and the communities where they live. Poverty, inadequate housing, brutal policing, and ICE raids undermine the ability of teachers to do their jobs. Making demands for the common good unites us to work for what we need.

Recently, there have been wildcat strikes. These can include a variety of work stoppages, e.g. people taking sick days, work slowdowns, work disruptions due to flat tires on delivery trucks, and other ways that prevent work from being accomplished. To follow strike actions, visit On The Picket Line or check out this interactive map of strike actions, or the “Dual Power” map by Black Socialists in America. Get in the loop and get connected at General Strike 2020.

Rent Strike

As unemployment reaches Depression-era levels, with one in six US workers being unemployed, and the government is unable to process unemployment benefits and is refusing to provide a basic income, people are unable to pay their rents. According to data from the Rentec Direct property management software platform, “The rent received by property managers in the U.S. by April 8 was 17% less than it was through the first eight days of March. Other data point to a similar trend. For example, data from the National Multifamily Housing Council found that 69 percent of renters paid their rent between April 1 and April 5, down from 82% in the same period in April 2019.” According to the New York Times, 40 percent of New York City tenants may have skipped their April payments.

In January before the pandemic, a Harvard University report found that nearly half of US renters are “cost-burdened,” meaning they spend more than 30 percent of their income on housing, a quarter of renters—eleven million people—are “severely cost-burdened,” spending more than half of their income to make rent. There was already a housing crisis in the US, the economic collapse has magnified it

This economic reality is turning into an organized and growing rent strike against corporate landlords. Calls for an expanded rent strike on May 1 are growing. In Kansas City, Missouri, tenant advocates tweeted: “Highway takeover in an hour. We will have tenants spanning the state, every five miles, from Kansas City to St. Louis.” Tenant groups from South Carolina to Los Angelescalled for a rent strike in May as have groups in Chicago, Milwaukee, Philadelphia, Denver, Bloomington, St. Louis, and New York. Yesterday, Cancel the Rent car caravans were held in many cities. Rent strikes are building into a nationwide revolt with calls for rent strikes going viral in unlikely places like Georgia. How this will evolve? If tenants are made homeless, people will take over buildings to be housed, assets of landlords could be nationalized, and social housing could escalate.

Rent strike organizers say, “We are banding together: folks who cannot pay and those who will join them in solidarity. We refuse to pay for the right to live. Many will have to choose between rent and food, and many won’t have enough for either. We will not sacrifice our lives to keep the market afloat, or to fill the pockets of real estate lenders and landlords…Together, we can transform this moment of isolation into a moment of shared strength, support and compassion.” Rent strikes are demanding:

• Forgive unpaid rents and waive mortgage interest and defer mortgage payments for the months of April, May, and June;
• Cease evictions of any renters and foreclosures on any homeowners during the full duration of the crisis — for at least six months;
• Use their political power to call on public officials to support housing relief for the tens of millions of American workers who have lost their jobs.

The COVID crisis has magnified a reality in US housing — housing has been turned in a profit engine for the super-rich. Rentals have been corporatized and controlled by some of the wealthiest individuals in the world. The Action Network reports: “Companies like Greystar, Equity Residential, and Lincoln Property Company control the rents for apartments in every state in the United States, while billionaires like Sam Zell founder and chairman of Equity Residential and Barry Sternlicht of Starwood Capital effectively serve as landlords for millions of us. These enormous companies dictate the rent and home prices in communities across the country. “

As a result, polling shows that a majority of people across the political spectrum support canceling rent payments and suspending home mortgage payments during the coronavirus pandemic. By a margin of 22 percent, voters strongly favor suspending or forgiving rents, for those under 45 years of age, the margin is 50 percent.

Building Power For An Effective General Strike

We do not yet have the organization to conduct a massive General Strike and only a few unions are aggressive enough to conduct strategic work stoppages. We must use the General Strike campaign to build our power and learn how to strike.

The foundation of all movements is education. We must constantly work to educate people about what is going on around them. This means overcoming the corporate media, which reports from the perspective of major corporate interests and the two Wall Street-funded parties. Independent media and social media are areas of activism that must always be a priority.

Subscribe to our daily digest for ongoing movement news and choose articles to promote in your social media networks. Each of us should act with the intention to build our social media networks so we become an effective media outlet. If the tens of thousands of people who receive this newsletter behave as media outlets, we will change the national dialogue.

We must organize to bring people into the movement. Mass movements win, fringe movements fail. How do you organize?  Organizing is as simple as talking to people who are not yet part of the movement, listening to their concerns, and showing them how joining together we can solve problems. This requires the patient and steady systematic building of relationships in the community. Talk to your neighbors, participate in apolitical neighborhood email groups, and speak with those who deliver to your home.

In the workplace, talk to co-workers, form clandestine strike committees, and speak and listen to each other. Work stoppages can vary in form. Workers can use the tactic of “Work to Rule,” following often ignored workplace safety and other rules, resulting in a slowdown. The bosses will fight back, so this will not be easy. Workers need to build community support so bosses are isolated and the conflict is broadened.

There are also tactics for at-home workers where sickouts and slowdowns are easy to adapt. Workers can call in sick during the first week in May. Even mild symptoms can result in a day or two off work. With the stress of COVID-19 and the economic collapse, a ‘mental health day’ is needed for many.

Then, we must mobilize people. When people are in the movement, a union, or an organization, they are ready to be mobilized in mass action. This requires showing this is a strategic campaign, not one protest, but a series of escalating events that build and are focused on achieving change. We discuss how you can create a strategic campaign in the free Popular Resistance School, How Social Transformation Occurs, eight web-based classes and readings we urge you to use.

If you are not part of a union or organization, become an active supporter of their actions. Show up, join them, call the media, religious leaders or neighbors, and urge them to show up.  If you see a picket line, join the workers or bring food and beverages. See yourself as the media and report on strikes, share their stories, and use your social media networks. If a union organizer is fired, come to the aid of that person including highlighting the injustice, insisting the person gets their job back, and raising funds to support them. We can support local strikers through “GoFundMe” pages or join a local Mutual Aid team.

In the coming era of strikes, we must remember that an injury to one is an injury to all. Show solidarity with the general strike. Wear red on Friday. Display a strike poster in your window. Wear a red or black or lavender bandana. Change your Facebook cover image.

As the era of strikes builds and people develop the skills, confidence, and courage to exercise their rights, the potential for transformational change will grow in ways that we cannot yet foresee.

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Kevin Zeese and Margaret Flowers co-direct Popular Resistance where this article was originally published. 

All images in this article are from PR

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The Unbearable Lightness of China

By Pepe Escobar, April 27, 2020

As Mahbubani carefully explains, “while Chinese leaders want to rejuvenate Chinese civilization, they have no missionary impulse to take over the world and make everyone Chinese.” And still, “America convinced itself that China has become an existential threat.”

The best and the brightest across Asia, Mahbubani included, never cease to be amazed at the American system’s total inability to “make strategic adjustments to this new phase in history.” Mahbubani dedicates a whole chapter – “Can America make U-turns?” – to the quandary.

The Dengvaxia Disaster Was Twenty Years in the Making—What Will Happen with a Rushed COVID-19 Vaccine?

By Children’s Health Defense, April 27, 2020

For several weeks, Dr. Anthony Fauci and Bill Gates have been beating the drum about a COVID-19 vaccine, seeking to keep the world’s coronavirus optics focused on a medical intervention that Gates acknowledges to be risky enough to require indemnification against lawsuits. The two are casting a COVID-19 vaccine—which they speculate could be ready in as little as 18 months—as the passport for a return to “normalcy.” The two opinion leaders’ gambit seems to be backfiring among people savvy enough to understand that Fauci’s and Gates’ organizations, pocketbooks and agendas are driving the rush for an indemnified vaccine. Other Americans may be too distracted by the historically unprecedented lockdown, however, to think through the safety issues raised by a potential COVID-19 vaccine.

Saudi Arabia: What Happens When the Oil Stops

By David Hearst, April 27, 2020

Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) can no longer plead youth or inexperience. That time has passed. What you see is what you get. The misrule, blunders and war associated with him as crown prince will only continue with him as king. The full repertoire of the crown prince’s statecraft was on display in a stormy telephone call he made to Russian President Vladimir Putin on the eve of an Opec meeting last month which ended in a calamitous price war between Saudi Arabia and Russia.

As Food Banks Struggle to Cope with Demand, Desperate Farmers Dump Unsellable Produce

By Alan MacLeod, April 27, 2020

In San Antonio, over 10,000 people lined up overnight in their vehicles in the hope of receiving a box of basic foods. “Needs have skyrocketed not just here but around the country,” one Washington, D.C. organizer told MintPress last week. Meanwhile, a veteran Louisiana food bank employee said the current situation is graver than it was after Hurricane Katrina. Food banks are going millions of dollars over budget trying to keep up with surging demand; one estimate suggests that one in three people seeking groceries at pantries last month had never done so before. Those who manage the facilities are worried that they will soon be completely drained of food.

The Digital Revolution: Unlimited Ability to Spy and Control Populations. The Creation of a Police State Dystopia

By Dr. Paul Craig Roberts, April 26, 2020

The digital revolution provides government and corporations with unlimited and unaccountable ability to spy and control populations.  Every word, deed, and movement of people can be tracked and a “social credit” dossier built for them.  China already has such a control system in place.  Those whose profiles are outside acceptable parameters are unable to function in normal society, being blocked from passports, driving licenses, employment, and activities reserved to those with acceptable social credit scores.

The Gates Foundation and the “War on Cash”: ‘Financial Inclusion’ in an Age of Neoliberalism

By Colin Todhunter, April 26, 2020

When we look beyond the mainstream narrative to gain an understanding of the current crisis, it doesn’t take long before the name of Bill Gates and his foundation appears. And this is no coincidence seeing that he has placed himself firmly in the limelight on prime time TV shows offering his opinion on COVID-19 and what he thinks should be done. He has mentioned the need for maintaining some form of lockdown until a vaccine is discovered.

Predictions: What Will Happen Next in the Corona Crisis?

By James Corbett, April 26, 2020

There is a second wave of Covid-19 coming in the next few months. We don’t have to speculate about this. Not only have we heard this from all manner of politicians and health “authorities” over the past few months, but it was an integral part of MIT Technology Review’s now-infamous “We’re not going back to normal” article, which revealed how the waves of lockdown and release were going to restructure our lives and condition us into the Corona World Order. And, lest there be any doubt that this is an important part of the plandemic narrative, Bill Gates just reaffirmed it in his latest “GatesNotes” on “The first modern pandemic.”

As a living embodiment of how East and West shall meet, Mahbubani is immeasurably more capable to talk about Chinese-linked intricacies than shallow, self-described Western “experts” on Asia and China.

Especially now when demonization-heavy hybrid war 2.0 against China is practiced by most factions of the US government, the Deep State and the East Coast establishment.

Distinguished fellow at the National University of Singapore’s Asia Research Institute, former president of the UN Security Council (from 2001 to 2002) and the founding dean of the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy (2004-2017), Mahbubani is the quintessential Asian diplomat.

Ruffling feathers is not his business. On the contrary, he always deploys infinite patience – and insider knowledge – when trying to explain especially to Americans what makes the Chinese civilization-state tick.

All through a book elegantly argued and crammed with persuasive facts, it feels like Mahbubani is applying the Tao. Be like water. Let it flow. He floats like a butterfly reaching beyond his own “paradoxical conclusion”: “A major geopolitical contest between America and China is both inevitable and avoidable.” He centers on the paths towards the “avoidable.”

The contrast with the confrontational, stale and irrelevant Thucydides Trap mindset prevalent in the US could not be starker. It’s quite enlightening to observe the contrast between Mahbubani and Harvard University’s Graham Allison – who seem to admire each other – at a China Institute debate.

An important clue to his approach is when Mahbubani tells us how his Hindu mother used to take him to Hindu and Buddhist temples in Singapore – even as in the island-state most Buddhist monks were actually Chinese. Here we find encapsulated the key cultural/philosophical India-China crossover that defines “deep” East Asia, linking Confucianism, Buddhism and the Tao.

All about the US dollar 

For Asia hands, and for those, as in my case, who have actually lived in Singapore, it’s always fascinating to see how Mahbubani is the quintessential Lee Kuan Yew disciple, though without the haughtiness. As much as his effort to understand China from the inside, across the spectrum, for decades, is more than visible, he’s far from being a disciple of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).

And he stresses the point in myriad ways, showing how, in the party slogan, “Chinese” is way more important than “Communist”: “Unlike the Soviet Communist Party, [the CCP] is not riding on an ideological wave; it is riding the wave of a resurgent civilization … the strongest and most resilient civilization in history.”

Inescapably, Mahbubani outlines both Chinese and American geopolitical and geoeconomic challenges and shortcomings. And that leads us to arguably the key argument in the book: how he explains to Americans the recent erosion of global trust in the former “indispensable nation,” and how the US dollar is its Achilles’ heel.

So once again we have to wallow in the interminable mire of reserve currency status; its “exorbitant privilege,” the recent all-out weaponization of the US dollar and – inevitably – the counterpunch: those “influential voices” now working to stop using the US dollar as reserve currency.

Enter blockchain technology and the Chinese drive to set up an alternative currency based on blockchain. Mahbubani takes us to a China Finance 40 Forum in August last year, when the deputy director of the People’s Bank of China, Mu Changchun, said the PBOC was “close” to issuing its own cryptocurrency.

Two months later, President Xi announced that blockchain would become a “high priority” and a matter of long-term national strategy.  It’s happening now. The digital yuan – as in a “sovereign blockchain” – is imminent.

And that leads us to the role of the US dollar in financing global trade. Mahbubani correctly analyzes that once this is over, “the complex international system based on the US dollar could come tumbling down, rapidly or slowly.” China’s master plan is to accelerate the process by connecting its digital platforms – Alipay, WeChat Pay – into one global system.

Asian Century 

As Mahbubani carefully explains, “while Chinese leaders want to rejuvenate Chinese civilization, they have no missionary impulse to take over the world and make everyone Chinese.” And still, “America convinced itself that China has become an existential threat.”

The best and the brightest across Asia, Mahbubani included, never cease to be amazed at the American system’s total inability to “make strategic adjustments to this new phase in history.” Mahbubani dedicates a whole chapter – “Can America make U-turns?” – to the quandary.

In the appendix he even adds a text by Stephen Walt debunking “the myth of American exceptionalism.” There’s no evidence the Exceptionalistan ethos is being seriously contested.

A recent McKinsey report  analyzes whether the “next normal” will emerge from Asia, and some of its conclusions are inevitable: “The future global story starts in Asia.” It goes way beyond prosaic numbers stating that in 20 years, by 2040, “Asia is expected to represent 40% of global consumption and 52% of GDP.”

The report argues that, “we may look back on this pandemic as the tipping point when the Asian Century truly began.”

In 1997, during the same week when I was covering the Hong Kong handover, I published a book in Brazil whose translated title was 21^st: The Asian Century (excerpts from a few chapters may be found  here). By that time I had already lived in Asia for three years, and learned quite a few important lessons from Mahbubani’s Singapore.

China then was still a distant player on the new horizon. Now it’s a completely different ball game. The Asian Century – actually Eurasian Century – is already on, as Eurasia integration develops driven by hard-working acronyms (BRI, AIIB, SCO, EAEU) and the Russia-China strategic partnership.

Mahbubani’s book, capturing the elusive, unbearable lightness of China, is the latest illustration of this inexorable flow of history.

Has China Won? The Chinese Challenge to American Primacy (Kishore Mahbubani), published by Public Affairs (US$19.89).

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This article was originally published on Asia Times.

Pepe Escobar is a frequent contributor to Global Research.

Featured image is from Wikimedia Commons

In pursuit of its imperial aims, the US needs enemies. None exist so they’re invented.

Iran is US public enemy No. 1 in the Middle East, China considered Washington’s leading adversary globally — despite no threat posed by either country.

Demeaning China is all about its growing economic, industrial, and technological development, its political influence, and military strength able to defend against US aggression if occurs.

The world’s leading state sponsor of terrorism USA consistently blames other nations for its own high crimes.

Operating as press agents for wealth and power, establishment media repeat false accusations against targeted nations with disturbing regularity.

For weeks after COVID-19 outbreaks emerged, Trump falsely claimed they’d “disappear” on their own.

As they increased to the present day, he, hardliners surrounding him, and Congress have been indifferent toward the health, rights and welfare of ordinary Americans.

They failed to provide states with personal protective equipment, funding to combat outbreaks, or treatment for infected individuals.

Despite advance warning of what could happen, they let a public health crisis fester, focusing almost entirely on handing favored business interests trillions of dollars of free money.

They delayed in authorizing nationwide testing that remains woefully inadequate.

All along, Trump praised his response that remains dismal for ordinary Americans he’s indifferent toward.

Instead of correcting flawed policies, he blames China for his failures, a nation on top of the problem swiftly, able to bring it under control in about two months while the US continues to struggle.

China’s official People’s Daily broadsheet responded to unacceptable Trump regime accusations.

It slammed Pompeo, calling him one of China’s “most radical critics,” ignoring the country’s achievements while “the coronavirus ravages the country he serves,” adding:

“A leaked Republican strategy memo tells the GOP to ‘attack China’ over coronavirus.”

“(A) top Republican strategist advis(ed) party candidates to address the coronavirus crisis by aggressively attacking China.”

Beijing stressed that the GOP strategy is doomed to fail, including claims that China caused COVID-19 and its spread to other nations.

China’s Global Times (GT) slammed the US notion that Beijing is responsible for spreading COVID-19 outbreaks.

At a time when world community cooperative relations are needed to address and contain a common problem, US hardliners focus on shifting blame for its failures onto others, notably China.

On Sunday, a GT editorial slammed the Trump regime for unacceptably “scapegoating China” to distract attention from its own failures in dealing with coronavirus outbreaks.

Its epicenter is in the US, not China or other countries. While outbreaks are largely contained in China, they remain a major problem in the US and West.

As for Pompeo, GT called him “sinister…a political hooligan, (an) an enemy (of) world peace…playing with fire…steering the US State Department into becoming the” CIA, operating as an anti-diplomat, not the other way around.

He’s not alone. The Trump regime and Congress are infested with like-minded extremists.

Trump and others like him are unfit for any public office, Biden no better.

US-led Western-style predatory capitalism “can’t be repaired, economist Richard D. Wolff stressed, calling how it operates structurally flawed, asking:

“Are we experiencing capitalism’s historic decline?”

“For the 21st century, the most popular slogan on socialists’ banners will likely be “Democratize the Enterprise.”

US economic collapse at a time of an inadequately addressed public health crisis brought to light the inequities of how the US-led West operates — serving privileged interests exclusively at the expense peace, equity, the rule of law and justice.

Ordinary Americans are protesting against failed public policies at the federal and state levels, including against unacceptable conditions for workers on the job.

Hundreds of Amazon workers staged sick-outs for lack of personal protective equipment (PPE) and overall unsafe working conditions.

Whole Foods workers walked off the job over similar complaints, the company owned by Amazon.

Instacart workers called for strike action for lack of PPE and hazard pay. So did Detroit and Birmingham Alabama bus drivers, Pittsburgh sanitation workers, Kroger warehouse employees, and others in the US for similar reasons.

Growing numbers are not showing up for work, calling in sick, and staging wildcat strikes.

On May 1, a first of the month US general strike action is set to begin, involving workers, students, and other segments of society.

Achieving vitally needed social justice that eroded to a shadow of its New Deal/Great Society status depends on how widespread and sustained actions become.

Current US conditions reflect a failed system. Resistance against inequity and injustice is the only chance for responsible change.

With growing mass unemployment and indifference toward public health and welfare by US ruling authorities, now is the time for large-scale public actions for restoration and enhancement of vital social programs.

Ordinary people have power when mobilized to use it. Positive change requires sustained struggle.

Former Supreme Court Justice William Douglas said “(p)ower concedes nothing without a demand.”

Social movements can be pivotal forces. Disruptive activism works when ordinary people challenge what’s unacceptable.

Electoral politics doesn’t work. Changing names and faces assures continuity.

America’s political system reflects how power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

Scattered reforms are woefully inadequate and won’t work, major change needed.

The late Doug Dowd called the US “a sick and dangerous nation run by a handful of the politically powerful” — serving the country’s privileged class by exploiting most others at home and abroad.

Equitable transformational change is the only acceptable option.

At a time of overwhelming public duress, the moment is now to challenge authority for responsible change — collective defiance and disruption the way to go.

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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.

Since Iranians ended a generation of CIA-installed fascist dictatorship in 1979, the US has been at war on the Islamic Republic by other means.

The Trump regime escalated it way beyond where its predecessors went, risking confrontation by accident or design.

While US war on Iran is unlikely because of the IRGC’s military capabilities that could hit back hard against regional Pentagon bases and Israel if attacked, what’s unthinkable is possible because of US rage to transform all sovereign independent nations into vassal states it controls.

Cracks in Trump regime sanctions on Iran exist because Russia, China, and other countries maintain friendly diplomatic relations.

They show up in Iranian exports. Last week, Press TV reported that Tehran exported “around $60 billion (worth) of products, services, and energy since the” Trump regime began stiffening illegal sanctions in spring 2018.

According to Iran’s trade ministry,  Iran shipped 135 million metric tons of non-crude goods to other countries since Trump abandoned the JCPOA.

Year-over-year to today, Iranian sponge iron exports increased by 86%.

Shifting from heavy dependence on petroleum exports at a time of Trump regime sanctions, and now rock-bottom oil prices, enabled Tehran to develop export markets for other goods, including petrochemicals, metals, raw materials, food and other products.

In January, Iran estimated its year-over-year steel exports through March would be around 10 million tons, yielding up to $5 billion in revenue.

On Sunday, data from Iran showed steel exports increased by over 25% in the past year through March 19.

Through late March 2020, Iran exported about $32 billion worth of non-oil goods.

Tehran’s deputy industry minister Hossein Modares Khiabani called its achievement “a miracle in the current economic situation of the country.”

In early April, head of the Iran/Iraq Joint Chamber of Commerce Yahya Al Eshaq said the Islamic Republic aims to export a record $20 billion of goods to neighboring Iraq in a few years, its second largest foreign market after China.

Iraq relies on Iran for food,

natural gas, electricity and construction materials. China is the largest importer of Iranian oil.

Iran’s ability to persevere in the face of Trump regime “maximum pressure” is  a tribute to its ingenuity, peace agenda, and cooperative relations with other countries.

For over 40 years, its ruling authorities withstood efforts by the US to return the country to subservient client state status — including everything thrown at it by the Trump regime.

Over the weekend, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani vowed that the Islamic Republic will “never” initiate conflict against another nation.

It’ll retaliate strongly against an aggressor if attacked, its legal right under international law.

The US remains its main threat, followed by Israel.

According to a Sunday Tribune News Service report, the Pentagon is boosting the presence of its AC-130 gunships and Apache attack helicopters in the Persian Gulf — a provocative action, along with the perpetual presence of US warships in Persian Gulf waters.

Days earlier, Trump belligerently “instructed the (US) navy to shoot down and destroy any and all Iranian gunboats if they harass our ships at sea.”

Iranian vessels harass no one. They patrol offshore waters, defending the nation’s territory from possible hostile actions from an aggressor like the US and Israel.

Trump’s war secretary Esper threatened Iran, saying “they need to be well-warned” — a hostile remark against the region’s leading proponent of peace and stability.

Moscow expressed concern about hostile US anti-Iran threats,  Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov saying the following:

“This is one of the methods that create uncertainty in the international community.”

“This is a deliberate desire to sow discord among members of the international community, given that different countries interpret the relevant provisions of international law differently.”

“This is one of the elements of US policy that is aimed at continuing to play on the nerves.”

Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zaif slammed the hostile presence of US forces “7,000 miles away from home” where they don’t belong, an unacceptable provocation.

Reportedly, Pompeo is set to defy reality by claiming the Trump regime never abandoned the JCPOA.

Maintaining the fiction that it remains a “participant state” aims to use the status it does not have to try maintaining a UN arms embargo on Iran via a Security Council resolution or threats of sanctions on nations selling conventional arms to the Islamic Republic.

The UN arms embargo expires in October. The Trump regime wants it remaining in place, Pompeo saying:

“We cannot allow the Islamic Republic of Iran to purchase conventional weapons in six months.”

“We are prepared to exercise all of our diplomatic options to ensure the arms embargo stays in place at the UN Security Council.”

The Trump regime drafted a Security Council resolution on this issue, Russia and China able to veto what they consider unacceptable.

By falsely claiming the US remains a JCPOA signatory, the Trump regime aims to enforce continuation of the anti-Iran arms embargo even if its Security Council resolution isn’t adopted.

Over the weekend, Pompeo falsely claimed “Iran’s space program is neither peaceful nor entirely civilian (sic),” adding:

Its “satellite launch vehicle and others launched before it incorporate technologies identical to, and interchangeable with, ICBM ballistic missiles.”

“No country has ever pursued an ICBM capability except for the purpose of delivering nuclear weapons (sic).”

Pompeo failed to explain that repeated IAEA inspections showed and continue to show that Iran’s legitimate nuclear program has no military component.

According to the Arms Control Association, ICBMs are weapons able to travel over 5,500 km.

Iran has none in its arsenal, its longest-range BM-25/Musudan  ballistic missile able to travel a distance of about 2,500 km.

All Iranian missiles are designed to carry conventional warheads alone.

They’re for defense, not offense. Iran is at peace with its neighbors, polar opposite how the US, NATO and Israel operate.

Time and again, the world’s leading state sponsor of terrorism USA accuses other nations for its high crimes against them, notably Iran.

Its ruling authorities are committed to regional peace and stability in contrast to US war on humanity worldwide.

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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.

For several weeks, Dr. Anthony Fauci and Bill Gates have been beating the drum about a COVID-19 vaccine, seeking to keep the world’s coronavirus optics focused on a medical intervention that Gates acknowledges to be risky enough to require indemnification against lawsuits. The two are casting a COVID-19 vaccine—which they speculate could be ready in as little as 18 months—as the passport for a return to “normalcy.” The two opinion leaders’ gambit seems to be backfiring among people savvy enough to understand that Fauci’s and Gates’ organizations, pocketbooks and agendas are driving the rush for an indemnified vaccine. Other Americans may be too distracted by the historically unprecedented lockdown, however, to think through the safety issues raised by a potential COVID-19 vaccine.

Americans would be well advised to revisit a virus-and-vaccine cautionary tale that briefly captured front-page attention a year ago. In April 2019, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved Sanofi Pasteur’s Dengvaxia vaccine, joining 19 other countries in granting regulatory approval to the world’s first dengue vaccine. The FDA gave its green light not long after the Philippines—the first country to roll out the vaccine widely—witnessed hundreds of distressing hospitalizations and deaths in 9-16 year-olds, representing a clear safety signal.

Dengvaxia’s fallout was so dramatic that it even overrode the U.S. media’s customary whiteout of vaccine safety problems. As summarized by National Public Radio (NPR), the Philippines’ mass dengue vaccination program—implemented with “undue haste”—not only killed children but provoked protests, criminal investigations, indictments, revocation of the vaccine’s license in that country and a plummeting of parental confidence in vaccine safety from 82% to 21%.

Viral vaccines and “disease enhancement”

Given that an estimated 40% of the world’s population is at risk of mosquito-borne dengue infection, it is not surprising that the vaccine industry has had a dengue vaccine on its list for decades. There are four types of dengue virus that can trigger infection, albeit with a highly variable trajectory that  ranges from asymptomatic infection or “mild and non-specific febrile illness” (together representing about 75% of cases) to “classic dengue fever” and, in an “occasional” subset, more severe outcomes such as plasma leakage, bleeding, shock or death. In children, experts believe the majority of dengue infections are subclinical. Researchers note that environmental and host immune factors play a significant role in shaping both susceptibility and outcomes.

Natural infection with one type of dengue virus provides long-lasting protection against the same type but only short-term protection against the other three varieties. The vexing result is that, in some individuals, subsequent infection with a different dengue virus can increase the risk of severe outcomes—a phenomenon known as “disease enhancement.” In a 2018 review, researchers listed reports of “enhanced illness” resulting from influenza, respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), Zika, West Nile virus, dengue and coronavirus—and emphasized that either infection or vaccination could produce this response.

In 2018, the WHO’s Global Advisory Committee on Vaccine Safety reviewed some of the deaths associated with Dengvaxia but stated that it could not determine whether the vaccine was causally related to the “vaccine-related immune enhancement.” This disingenuous conclusion flies in the face of decades of evidence showing some viral vaccines to be capable of “subverting” the immune system and provoking “exacerbated illness.” It is doubtful that WHO or Sanofi are unaware of this phenomenon, which numerous publications acknowledge as a “major obstacle” for the development of safe dengue and other viral vaccines. After the problems in the Philippines, however, Sanofi’s global medical director asserted that “In hindsight . . . Sanofi wouldn’t do anything differently.”

A dengue expert who develops vaccines for the U.S. military issued warnings about Dengvaxia’s risks ahead of time—vainly cautioning that vaccinating 9-16 year-olds who were “seronegative” or “dengue-naive” at baseline (that is, had never before been exposed to dengue) was likely to significantly augment their lifetime risk of severe disease when later exposed to dengue. (About 21% of vaccinees were seronegative.) Why did this industry insider—who has been a paid dengue vaccine consultant to Takeda, Merck, Sanofi Pasteur and SmithKlineBeecham—voice these concerns and condemn international health institutions for unethical, unscientific and “contorted explanations” that “fail[ed] to identify breakthrough dengue disease in vaccinated subjects as serious adverse events”? As he pointed out in numerous letters and articles, the potential for vaccine-enhanced dengue disease was readily apparent in Dengvaxia’s clinical trials, but both Sanofi and WHO chose to ignore the evidence.

Belatedly—a year and a half after the launch of the Philippines’ disastrous vaccination campaign—Sanofi announced that “new information” was prompting the company to declare that “vaccination should not be recommended” for seronegative individuals of any age. Repackaging Dengvaxia as a vaccine solely for individuals who have had at least one laboratory-confirmed bout of dengue is easier said than done, however, because many mild dengue infections go undiagnosed and undocumented.

The dengue vaccine pipeline

Sanofi reluctantly revised its recommendation to provide Dengvaxia only to individuals with evidence of past infection, which “leaves a substantial unmet need” that other dengue vaccine developers appear only too eager to exploit. Although Sanofi’s formulation—which took two decades and two billion dollars to develop—is the first dengue vaccine ever to make it out of the pipeline and into the marketplace, two other vaccines (TAK-003 and Butantan-DV) are currently undergoing late-stage clinical trials in Asia/Latin America and Brazil, respectively.

Dengue vaccine development has been marked by strong for-profit industry involvement. In addition, there has been “wide participation and co-ownership” by U.S. government institutions in dengue vaccine research and development, even though dengue disease poses little threat on the U.S. mainland. With dengue-endemic areas limited to Puerto Rico and a few offshore territories and protectorates, HHS—the umbrella agency for the National Institutes of Health (NIH), Fauci’s National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), the CDC and the FDA—owns 65 dengue-vaccine-related patents, dwarfing the 19 owned by Sanofi and the 12 and 4 owned by GlaxoSmithKline and Merck, respectively. All of the private companies involved in dengue vaccine development share patents with U.S. government agencies; meanwhile, very few patent applications have been filed in developing countries.

CDC scientists designed and constructed the TAK-003 vaccine and then licensed it to Japan’s Takeda Pharmaceutical Company, Asia’s largest pharmaceutical conglomerate. However, preliminary analyses of the clinical trial results suggest that TAK-003 may suffer from similar problems as Dengvaxia, providing “unbalanced protection among the four types of dengue” that could “increase the risk of severe disease after exposure to a second type of the virus.” Takeda plans to apply for approval in dengue-endemic countries anyway.

Some experts are placing their bets on the third finalist, Butantan-DV, developed by none other than NIAID. NIAID has sponsored Butantan-DV clinical trials in Brazil since 2013, licensing its vaccine technology to Brazil’s Butantan Institute and launching the most recent trials in 2016. Not content to lurk in the background, NIH and NIAID have taken pains to call attention to their role in the vaccine’s development; publications presenting clinical trial results have titles referring to the “National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases tetravalent dengue vaccine” and the “National Institutes of Health dengue vaccine.” In studies published to date, investigators only monitored adverse reactions for 21 days.

Mosquito versus needle

The Dengvaxia experience—involving a skewed immune response and enhanced risks—raises questions “applicable to all dengue vaccine candidates” and a number of other viral vaccines. One not-often-discussed consideration pertains to the “considerable differences between a wild-type [dengue virus] delivered by a mosquito versus needle administration of a vaccine,” which have the potential to elicit different immune responses. Instead of acknowledging these vaccines’ potentially unconquerable risks, why not focus on training health care workers in the provision of the supportive care known to be “very effective when delivered by experienced practitioners”? Even in severe cases of dengue characterized by vascular permeability and fluid loss, practitioners who “accurately and rapidly” replace fluids can stabilize patients’ condition—“and rather quickly”—with the result that “the vascular permeability phenomenon abruptly disappears.” In addition, fruitful avenues of research could include studying the environmental and immune system factors associated with the minority of cases that involve more severe dengue outcomes.

With vaccine damage occurring in association with many different vaccines, it is unclear why so many individuals and organizations jumped on the anti-Dengvaxia bandwagon last year, but—with a rushed COVID-19 vaccine in the works—their words of warning are worth heeding. As NPR noted, “the debacle in the Philippines offers a key lesson for governments and manufacturers when it comes to approving and selling new vaccines: Slow down.” The dengue expert who presciently warned about Dengvaxia’s dangers put it this way:

Dengvaxia-enhanced disease has created a major ethical dilemma for the vaccine community, an enduring public health management crisis, and legal nightmare. Vaccines should not harm recipients, directly or indirectly. WHO and the manufacturer owe the customer a safe product.

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Featured image is from the author

The World Health Organization (WHO) will receive a $30 million grant from the government of China to use these resources for the containment of COVID-19.

The announcement of the donation was made Thursday by the Chinese Foreign Ministry’s spokesperson Hua Chunying.

On her Twitter account, Hua Chunying recalled that the government donated $20 million in cash to the WHO on 11 March.

China’s donation comes one week after President Donald Trump’s administration announced the end of funding to the WHO.

China has decided to donate additional $30 million in cash to WHO to support its global fight against #COVID19, in particular strengthening developing countries' health systems. China already donated $20 million in cash to WHO on March 11.

— Hua Chunying 华春莹 (@SpokespersonCHN) April 23, 2020

Washington argued its decision by accusing the World Organization of trying to protect China at the beginning of the COVID-19 outbreak and of not giving true information.

For Trump, the WHO mishandled the pandemic, even though at the time of the outbreak in late 2019, a team of U.S. scientists was working at the organization’s headquarters.

These scientists kept Donald Trump’s administration informed of the progress of the new coronavirus in China, step by step.

Today, China seeks “to support the WHO’s fight against Covid-19. We support multilateralism and global solidarity,” Hua Chunying said.

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Featured image: Healthcare workers were registered Wednesday when they performed rapid coronavirus tests on citizens in their cars, enabled by the government of Brasilia, Brazil. April 22, 2020. | Photo: EFE

Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) can no longer plead youth or inexperience.

That time has passed.

What you see is what you get. The misrule, blunders and war associated with him as crown prince will only continue with him as king.

The full repertoire of the crown prince’s statecraft was on display in a stormy telephone call he made to Russian President Vladimir Putin on the eve of an Opec meeting last month which ended in a calamitous price war between Saudi Arabia and Russia.

A big mistake

Mohammed bin Salman can see for himself just how big a mistake that call was. The price of oil has collapsed, storage will rapidly run out, and oil companies face the real prospect of having to cap wells. The oil and gas sector accounts for up to 50 percent of the kingdom’s gross domestic product and 70 percent of its export earnings. This has just disappeared.

As anyone who has met Putin will tell you, you can bargain as hard as you like with the Russian president. You can even be on opposing sides of two regional wars, in Syria and Libya, and still maintain a working relationship, as the Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan continues to do.

But what you must not do is back Putin into a corner. This is what the Saudi crown prince did by giving Putin ultimatums and shouting at him. Putin just shouts back, knowing that the Russian balance of payments is in better shape to play that game of poker than the Saudi one is.

MBS is finding out now how weak his cards are. To be fair, before he made that call, he took advice from someone as arrogant and unthinking as he is. US President Donald Trump’s son-in-law and Middle East advisor Jared Kushner listened to what the Saudi crown prince was about to do and did not object.

This explains why Trump’s first reaction was to welcome the oil crash. Trump thought for every cent cut from the price of oil, a billion dollars of consumer spending power would be released at home. That was until his attention turned to what the oil price collapse was doing to his own oil industry.

Saudi Arabia without oil 

With the price of Brent Crude less than $20, Mohammed bin Salman is about to find out what happens when the world does not need his oil. In the past, the standard response to that hypothesis was condescending looks. Not any more. The prospect of Saudi becoming a debtor nation is real.

Saudi Arabia’s financial decline has been in the works for some time. When his father Salman took over as king on 23 January 2015, foreign reserves totalled $732bn. In December last year they had depleted to $499bn, a loss of $233bn in four years, according to the Saudi Arabian Monetary Authority (SAMA).

The kingdom’s GDP per capita has also declined, from $25,243 in 2012 to $23,338 in 2018, according to the World Bank. The nest egg has been diminished with speed. The IMF has calculated that net debt will hit 19 percent of GDP this year, 27 percent next year, while coronavirus and the oil crisis could push borrowing to 50 percent by 2022.

The war in Yemen, a coup in Egypt and interventions across the Arab world, outsized arms purchases from America, vanity projects like the building of a futuristic city Neom, not to mention his own three yachts, paintings and palaces, each play a part in draining Saudi coffers.

Saudi’s economy was already struggling before coronavirus took hold with a growth rate of just 0.3 percent and a drop of 25 percent in construction since 2017. Add to that the lockdown imposed by coronavirus and the cancellation of the Umrah and Hajj, which attract up to 10 million pilgrims a year, and a further $8bn is wiped off the balance sheet.

But it isn’t just what the Saudi crown prince spent his money on that caused the problem. It was also what he put his money in that went bad.

Bad investments

One indication of bad investments is the decline in the relative value of sovereign wealth funds. Big brother Saudi Arabia now finds itself dwarfed by its much smaller Gulf neighbours on that score.

The chief sovereign wealth fund, Public Investment Fund (PIF), ranks at 11th in the world, behind Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, Kuwait Investment Authority and Qatar Investment Authority. When sovereign funds are pooled by nation, UAE comes first with funds worth $1.213 trillion then Kuwait with $522bn, Qatar with the $328bn and Saudi with $320bn.

Even before the coronavirus pandemic took hold, the IMF thought that plans to increase PIF to a trillion dollars would not be enough to generate the income needed if Saudi diversified from oil. If “Saudi Arabia were to grow its PIF from its current $300bn to this scale, financial returns alone would not constitute adequate income replacement in a post-oil world. Oil production of 10 million barrels per day, valued at $65 per barrel, translates to annual oil revenues of about $11,000 per Saudi at present,” the IMF wrote.

Another measure of decline is what has happened to the investments themselves. Masayoshi Son, the CEO of Japan’s Softbank, recalled how he got $45bn after spending just 45 minutes with MBS for his $100bn Vision Fund. “One billion dollars per minute,” Son said. Softbank announced last week it expects its Vision Fund to book a loss of $16.5bn.

PIF paid almost $49 a share for a stake in Uber Technologies Inc. in 2017. Uber shares have dived since. It sold almost of all its $2bn stake in Tesla toward the end of 2019, just before Tesla stock went through the roof, with an 80 percent rally this year. At this rate the PIF stake in Newcastle United is looking like a solid bet in comparison.

The oil crash comes less than two weeks after PIF splashed another $1bn on stakes in four European oil companies and the Carnival cruise liner – all of which casts in doubt the strategy of PIF diversifying away from oil. “I don’t understand why the PIF is doing what they are doing now when their country is going to need every penny,” one Middle Eastern banker told the Financial Times.

“It very much reminds me of the QIA [Qatar Investment Authority] in its early years. There’s a strategy, but they are not adhering to a strategy. They want high visibility but they also want to make money. They want to diversify the economy, but want to be opportunistic.”

No financial stimulus

Saudi Arabia today can not afford the financial stimulus to cushion the impact of the pandemic that its Gulf neighbours are making. The kingom is spending one percent of GDP on supporting its economy during the lockdown, while Qatar is spending 5.5 percent, Bahrain 3.9, UAE 1.8.

There are many examples  of money running out. The king decreed that the state would pay 60 percent of salaries during the coronavirus shutdown.

But employees of the Saudi’s biggest telecoms company STC are only getting 10 percent of their salaries, I am told, because the government is not paying STC the money for the furloughed staff.

The Saudi Ministry of Health has been requisitioning hotels to run as hospitals. Instead of compensating hotel owners for the temporary loss of their property or paying them a cost price, they are forcing them to pay the running costs in addition to the costs of disinfecting the rooms.

Or take the paycut Egyptian doctors working in the Saudi private health sector are being forced to take. Those who are on annual leave, are not being paid. Those who are instructed to work from home  on shifts by their hospitals to lessen the risk of infection, either have to take that time from their annual leave or work for free.

So, as Bloomberg reported, the prospect of Saudi becoming a net debtor nation is real. The question is how soon that happens.

The IMF calculated that with oil prices of $50 to $55 a barrel, Saudi Arabia’s international reserves would fall to about five months import coverage in 2024. With oil at zero, a once unthinkable balance of payments crisis and abandonment of the dollar peg is now all too likely.

Regional effect

Both pillars of Mohammed bin Salman’s plan to modernise and reform his country are crumbling. His plan to generate foreign investment by selling off five percent of Aramco on foreign stock exchanges has gone and now PIF, the main vehicle for diversifying his economy away from oil, is in chaos too.

Many in the region would cheer MBS’s demise. He has simply done so much harm to so many people, particularly in Egypt. In a post-oil era, MBS would lose his power of patronage, the power of an oligarch who can spend a billion pounds a minute and not blink.

But the collapse of Saudi Arabia’s economy, which for decades has been the engine room of the economy of the whole region, would quickly be felt in Egypt, Sudan, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, Tunisia – all of which send millions of their workers and professionals to the kingdom and whose economies have grown to depend on their remittances.

This is not a prospect anyone should welcome.

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David Hearst is the editor in chief of Middle East Eye. He left The Guardian as its chief foreign leader writer. In a career spanning 29 years, he covered the Brighton bomb, the miner’s strike, the loyalist backlash in the wake of the Anglo-Irish Agreement in Northern Ireland, the first conflicts in the breakup of the former Yugoslavia in Slovenia and Croatia, the end of the Soviet Union, Chechnya, and the bushfire wars that accompanied it. He charted Boris Yeltsin’s moral and physical decline and the conditions which created the rise of Putin. After Ireland, he was appointed Europe correspondent for Guardian Europe, then joined the Moscow bureau in 1992, before becoming bureau chief in 1994. He left Russia in 1997 to join the foreign desk, became European editor and then associate foreign editor. He joined The Guardian from The Scotsman, where he worked as education correspondent.

It’s April 2020, and since March, the UK has swiftly commissioned and built vast, temporary, intensive care hospitals, in readiness for a predicted epidemic number of severe COVID-19 cases.

They are called NHS Nightingale Hospitals, and to date there are seven of them, either open or planned. The first one was announced on 24 March by the Health Secretary, Matt Hancock, and was opened almost immediately on 3 April at the London Excel Centre. It has a capacity of some 4,000 beds. The other temporary field hospital sites are in Manchester, Birmingham, Glasgow, Bristol, Exeter, Harrogate, and Washington.

Additionally, over the last month, some 8,000 beds in private hospitals have been re-assigned for Covid-19 use, along with other NHS beds in hospitals all over the UK. By the beginning of April, one third of all non-ICU NHS beds had been converted into potential ICU beds for possible Covid-19 patients. Yet, by 12 April, the London Nightingale had treated just 19 patients, and to date, only 41 patients have been treated.

This sudden blitz is both unusual and unprecedented. We regularly have seasonal infectious illnesses spread throughout the population; in fact in recent years, some of these epidemic diseases were also predicted well in advance. Yet no new mega-hospitals, temporary or otherwise, were ever built to cope with them, nor were they seen to be needed. Why now?

According to the King’s Fund, over the last thirty years, the number of ICU beds has declined, at a time when the population has risen. Over that period, around 34% of general and critical care beds in England have been lost.

Peter Donaghy, an independent data analyst, reports that the UK now comes near the bottom of the world league in the number of hospital beds per head of population: in 2019, and across the four UK nations, he found that there are about 5.7 ICU beds per 100,000 of the population [interpolation of his figures mine]. Cyprus has double that number, Germany has 29, the USA 34, and even Kazakhstan and Mongolia do better than the UK.

Bed shortages are not news, however. In 2008, it was revealed that 32,000 beds of all types had been cut in the decade since 1997, when, ironically, the Blair government came into power on a ticket of increasing the number of hospital beds.

Between 2010 and 2017 there were 70,000 fewer intensive care beds in the UK:

In 2016, the Royal College of Surgeons had complained of chronic bed shortages, so much so that the occupancy rates had gone beyond 89%, when 85% is considered the maximum safe level. This complaint was made just before the British Medical Association chimed in, reporting on the shortage of beds being more severe than in other Western countries, and that such overcrowding can lead to the spread of infections.

And in 2018, the Faculty of Intensive Care Medicine (FICM) astonishingly reported that across the UK, 80% of intensive care units were sending patients to other hospitals, either because of a lack of beds or a shortage of staff, particularly nurses.

To cap things off, by 2019, it was being reported by the British Medical Association that ICU beds had begun to be used for patients recovering from routine operations, and that when more emergency beds were needed, a policy of “escalation beds” came into force. The BMA drily reported that there was “little sign of this practice ending”.

When one thinks of the NHS, intensive care is at the heart of most people’s perceptions of it. Yet the decline in the number of ICU beds over the last 30 years is so counterintuitive that it’s as if some monster deus ex machina has intervened and decided not only that the general numbers of hospital beds are of little import, but that intensive care beds are even more expendable. But whatever the case, in the event of a mass epidemic, the consequences of ICU bed shortages were indeed grim prior to 2020.

What official policies have the post-Blair governments been maintaining throughout this decline in the number of ICU beds?

To get a general feel, looking back to 2011, the government published the UK Influenza Pandemic Preparedness Strategy Paper, outlining what the official response to a hypothetical pandemic should be.

This paper appears to have been written largely in response to the 2009 H1N1 influenza outbreak. Its precautionary approach stresses that actions following the emergence of a pandemic, which could occur suddenly at any time:

• must be evidence based
• be proportional to the level of threat
• be flexible
• be based on ethical principles.
• emergency powers must last no longer than 30 days

Significantly, it states that during any pandemic, it should be “business as usual” and notes that its recommendations are in line with an earlier, 2007, National Framework paper’s “defence in depth” approach to a pandemic.

The Pandemic Preparedness Strategy Paper also makes clear that military personnel are not to be redeployed during a pandemic, but must remain on their normal defence duties. So of course, this means that they were not to be used to help build vast temporary hospitals, transport patients, or manage the public.

Military convoy off the coast at Devonport on the morning of 23 March, the day Boris Johnson announced the lockdown

In fact, the paper is silent on any hospital bed policies; it takes it as read that there would be enough UK ICU beds for the treatment of pandemic disease patients – for in 2009’s H1N1 swine flu outbreak, generally, hospitals may have just coped with finding enough beds for acute H1N1 patients. There were 540,000 cases of swine flu in England, and 138 fatalities at the time, or 0.026% of those infected.

Exercise Cygnus

Following the publication of the 2011 preparedness paper, however, the number of ICU beds continued to fall. Then, five years later, government held an unusual and secretive event called Exercise Cygnus.

It involved all government departments, all local authorities, and the NHS, right across the UK. Its report has not been published for “national security reasons” and so as not to “frighten the public”. However, according to those with first-hand knowledge of the operation, Cygnus’ script contained a scenario of a patent lack of capacity in ICU beds and personal protective equipment.

Based on its given hypotheses, it predicted that thousands more critical care beds would be required, large parts of the NHS would need to be switched off to redeploy staff, frail patients would be denied care, and mortuaries would be overwhelmed.

Was this just an experiment to see how the public sector actors involved would react to each other, like some kind of Grand Guignol? Did the exercise take its inspiration from the memorably twisted 2012 London Olympics ceremony, in which rows of thousands of NHS patients in hospital beds, in a dark auditorium looking like a Nightingale Hospital, were danced around by strange beasts and actors wearing scrubs?

The modelling of Cygnus was done by Imperial College, London, under the aegis of Neil Ferguson, who is also now doing the modelling of Covid-19.

Tellingly, it is said that last month’s Coronavirus Act, the emergency legislation which underpins the lockdown, is based on his modelling in Exercise Cygnus. Ferguson’s involvement in the Coronavirus crisis does raise other questions – for further coverage see Vanessa Beeley’s article: Who controls the British Government response to Covid–19?

Outside of the strange artificial world of Exercise Cygnus, the British Medical Association and the Royal College of Surgeons continued to complain about bed shortages. So why was there no turnaround policy introduced at least by 2016 after these professional outcries?

The Health Secretary at the time was Jeremy Hunt. Simon Stevens was Chief of NHS England. Both had been involved in cutting bed numbers. Yet, since 2016, and prior to the COVID-19 outbreak, with Sir Simon Stevens still at the helm, there appears to have been no general improvement in ICU bed capacity.

Following Exercise Cygnus, in 2017, the NHS Board published a short internal paper called Emergency Preparedness, Resilience and Response (EPRR). Its approach is centred on three Acts of Parliament: the Civil Contingencies Act (2004), the NHS Act (2006), and the Health and Social Care Act (2012).

Drawn up by Director of Operations and Information for the NHS Board, Matthew Swindells (sic), it asks the Board to agree that progress had been made in EPRR over the last year, and that the NHS was in a state of pandemic readiness. EPRR was rubber stamped, but as we have seen above, the somewhat rosy, self-congratulatory picture that was approved by the NHS Board was shown to be completely incorrect by Statista in 2017, and later, by the Faculty of Intensive Care in 2018, the BMA in 2019, and Peter Donaghy in 2020.

Back to Exercise Cygnus. This was supposed to be merely a computer simulation. So why would it be an issue of “national security”? Why would it “frighten the public”? Perhaps because it was intended to change the real world into its simulated image?

It’s an uncanny coincidence that, after the Coronavirus pandemic was declared, it was announced that there were not enough ICU beds or personal protective equipment, that NHS staff have been redeployed to other areas, that hospitalised elderly patients have been denied care through the use of “Do Not Resuscitate” orders, and large, temporary, mortuaries have also been built up and down the country, just as in the simulation.

Temporary mortuary set up in Ernesettle Fort, Plymouth

Since the first reported UK Covid-19 case, there has been non-stop media coverage propagandising the numbers of cases and deaths, and its threat. All the while, there have been regular reports that many ICU beds are empty, that beds of other sorts are empty, and that although accident and emergency visits are down, people with serious conditions telephoning the NHS advice and triage number, are being told to “Stay at home – Save the NHS – Save Lives”. Many of these callers have then died for lack of care.

It has also emerged that standards in death registration have been lowered by the government, and that there has been encouragement to register anyone who dies, of any underlying condition, as a Covid-19 death. There need be no objective verification of the existence of Covid-19 to register a death as being caused by it.

Despite these efforts to inflate the death rate, actual mortality rates since the beginning of this crisis do not show that we are in the middle of a pandemic, and actual critical case numbers are not overwhelming the NHS’s depleted intensive care units. In that regard, Covid-19 is not mirroring Exercise Cygnus’ computer-generated scenario.

The government response, however, seems to match it exactly.

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All images in this article are from UK Column unless otherwise stated

Even as food banks nationwide are inundated with hungry Americans, many of the country’s farmers are dumping or destroying their harvests. Amidst a pandemic that has seen tens of millions of workers laid off, the nation’s food banks have struggled to cope with the surge in demand for their vital services.

In San Antonio, over 10,000 people lined up overnight in their vehicles in the hope of receiving a box of basic foods. “Needs have skyrocketed not just here but around the country,” one Washington, D.C. organizer told MintPress last week. Meanwhile, a veteran Louisiana food bank employee said the current situation is graver than it was after Hurricane Katrina. Food banks are going millions of dollars over budget trying to keep up with surging demand; one estimate suggests that one in three people seeking groceries at pantries last month had never done so before. Those who manage the facilities are worried that they will soon be completely drained of food.

Yet even as hunger rises, economics dictates that farmers across the country are dumping, discarding, or failing to harvest vital foods. Dairy farmers are pouring rivers of fresh milk down the drain every day. Pig farmers are slaughtering piglets en masse. Meanwhile, ripening fruits and vegetables are being left to wither and die on the vine or in the ground. The reason? “Demand” is falling greatly.

Of course, during a pandemic, the caloric needs of America are basically the same as before: we have all got to eat. The problem is that so much of the produce was predestined to be bought by businesses that have now closed due to the lockdown. Restaurants, universities, hotels, stadiums and many more popular eating locations are now shuttered, leading to a collapse in orders for many farmers. At the same time, there is an increased demand for supermarkets and food banks, leading to a situation where farms are full, but store shelves and bellies are increasingly empty. Re-routing interrupted supply chains is not easy, and many farms have not found new buyers willing to collect, transport and distribute their food.

A perfect encapsulation of this is an Idaho woman who went to her local farm yesterday and saw mountains of discarded potatoes, given away free to anyone who passed. Yet three days earlier she noted that her local food bank had fed more people in the last four weeks than it did in the whole of last year. Unfortunately, the current system is currently unable to make those ends meet.

Farmers in Idaho are dumping their potatoes. 😢 I went to Picabo today to see the discarded pile (and pick up a bagful). Commercial demand has fallen, and there is no market for the extra potatoes. 🥔 pic.twitter.com/7MLLeIigmC

— Molly Page (@idahomolly) April 23, 2020

Marion Nestle, Paulette Goddard Professor, of Nutrition, Food Studies, and Public Health, Emerita, at New York University and author of the influential book Food Politics: How the Food Industry Influences Nutrition and Health, explained the situation to MintPress News:

Of all of the contradictions and deep flaws in our food system, none is a more poignant example of its lack of resiliency than food dumping in the face of long lines of cars waiting hours for food handouts. The last time we saw this was in the Great Depression of the 1930s. Then, the government stepped in with assistance programs for farmers and hungry people — that’s how the Food Stamp program (now SNAP) got started. But today’s government has done all it can to weaken SNAP and bailout funds largely go to Big Agriculture, not small farmers. The only hope is that public pressure will force the government to step in and intervene in some positive way. I see signs of useful actions — increased SNAP benefits, for example — but will they last? One can only hope.”

Some of the hotspots of the COVID-19 outbreak are also in areas of most pressing food insecurity. This is rarely a coincidence. The South Bronx, for example, is the most food insecure community of the United States: some 37 percent of residents regularly going hungry. Bronx residents are over twice as likely to contract coronavirus as their much wealthier Manhattan neighbors. Those who live in poverty often have neither the accommodation nor the economic means to shelter in place like others can. Furthermore, 32 percent of the Bronx works in education, healthcare or social assistance, meaning their jobs cannot be done from home.

The coronavirus pandemic is currently shaking America’s food supply and production system. And after only a few weeks, it appears much of it is failing the stress test.

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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: Discarded potatoes lay near an Idaho roadside, dumped by a farmer unable to sell them amid the coronavirus lockdown. Photo | Molly Page @idahomolly

It’s been over 25 years since that glorious warm, blue sky summer day at Belmont Park Racetrack. I not only remember it so well, but I can almost inhale that special racetrack smell, the combination of disinfectant merged with horse manure. The moment you walked into the place, open air as it was , you might have been on some livestock farm for that matter. But this was Elmont, Long Island, and this writer lived within one mile of the track. I had just finished up my sales rep phone calls by noon, and my wife allowed me to do what I always did on beautiful race days like this one: Go to the track. Well, not so fast. First I drove to Guido’s deli nearby our place and got my usual Salami and American cheese hero. At the track, wearing my usual racetrack wardrobe of baggy shorts, loose cotton shirt with giant pocket to hold my two Pilot pens and Te Amo cigars, I ventured up to the 3rd floor grandstand. This was my spot right on the finish line. The sandwich was devoured along with a cold draft beer (couldn’t beat the racetrack beer) and  I puffed on my cigar as I attacked the Daily Racing Form.

By a quarter to one I was joined by my two compatriots, jock’s room masseur Stevie Lee and loveable retiree Ira from Great Neck. We were all doping out the first race when greatness was being born right before our eyes. “You see that number 3 horse, Great All Over?” Stevie volunteered to us. “Well, I worked on him about an hour ago at the barn.” Ira and I both were startled to learn that our buddy did more than just massage humans.

Still, looking over the horse’s past performances I cracked “Yeah, I think God would have to work on this horse to  move him up!” Stevie countered “I know, I’m just saying that the trainer had me work on the horse for about 45 minutes before he brought him over. The horse was tight too.” I again looked at the horse’s past form and he wasn’t just bad… he was terrible! This was a cheap maiden claiming race, the bottom of the barrel in NY, and this horse sure was consistent: he finished up the track from gate to finish in every start.” This horse doesn’t need a massage… it needs a miracle!” Ira laughed, but very subtlety so as not to insult Stevie. “I like the number 4 horse, the second choice in the betting. I cannot see myself putting even a dime on that 3 horse. Sorry Stevie.” We all laughed. As the horses were approaching the gate, we all scurried up to get our bets in. I went with the 11 horse and threw out the favorite, who looked so good on paper that he was a candidate for a stiff job. Ira bet his 4 horse and Stevie passed on the race. Great All Over now had odds of 60-1 and rising.” Should be 160-1″ , Ira offered. “The horse has absolutely no form.”

The next two minutes proved fateful for me, and for Stevie Lee, massage therapist extraordinaire. No, Great All Over did not win the race at 75-1… that’s the stuff of a Walter Matthau film. I’ll tell you what he did do, however. He ran the race of his life! After being trapped on the rail in this 13 horse field, he weaved through horses down the stretch and lost the whole race by no more than a head! He finished third, beating 10 horses  and causing gasps from track announcer Tom Durkin. Stevie just sat there, perhaps even a bit shocked at what his work must have accomplished. Ira and I looked at each other, shaking our heads. “What did you actually do to that horse Stevie?” Ira asked. “Could you do the same thing for me… my wife would be grateful?”

Stevie was never asked back to massage Great All Over again. Why. “You see”, Stevie explained, “If the owner finds out that I improved his horse that much by massage, then it takes away from the trainer, and trainers usually have big egos in this business.”

A few months later, when a writer for a popular magazine found out about Stevie’s prowess, he arranged to do a story on massaging horses. Stevie asked a trainer friend of his if he had a horse Stevie could work on. Sure, said the trainer, come to my barn with the writer and work on my colt; The horse is scheduled to race in a few days and could use some loosening up. Stevie set it up and did his thing… not once but actually on two early AM occasions. The horse ran a few days later and won at 40-1 odds. The trainer never invited him back again. Such is the reason why Damon Runyon loved the racetrack experience. You never know what to expect!

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Philip A Farruggio is a contributing editor for The Greanville Post. He is also frequently posted on Global Research, Nation of Change, Cross Currents and Off Guardian sites. He is the son and grandson of Brooklyn NYC longshoremen and a graduate of Brooklyn College, class of 1974. Since the 2000 election debacle Philip has written over 400 columns on the Military Industrial Empire and other facets of life in an upside down America. He is also host of the ‘It’s the Empire… Stupid‘ radio show, co produced by Chuck Gregory. Philip can be reached at [email protected].

What do we want to call the geopolitical operation of the “global elite” with its real “depopulation agenda” currently taking place before our very eyes?

The consequences of this gigantic, frightening swindle are being experienced by everyone personally at the moment.

Both the young and the old are deprived of their freedom and driven into despair, hopelessness and ultimately death. Is this geopolitical operation a “crime against humanity” as outlined under Nuremberg (1945/46 Trials) (1)

I hereby publicly denounce the “main actors” and institutions who know what they are doing (“J’accuse…!”)

It is also allowed to speak on behalf of all those who either do not have a public voice or who do not dare or are not (any longer) able to speak: For example, the countless old and elderly people who are cared for in their families or who are waiting to die as residents of old people’s homes; the inmates of prisons or psychiatric institutions who are not allowed to speak at all; the infants and students who are no longer allowed to move freely, who are sometimes deprived of their educational opportunities and are not yet able to articulate themselves; the many day laborers, workers and parents who do not know how life should go on and who do not even take the right to freedom of expression for granted.

The restrictions imposed by the governments on the officially guaranteed civil liberties in connection with the so-called  “Corona crisis” must be lifted in their entirety, because in the opinion of countless independent scientists who do not bow down to criminal policies, there are no convincing arguments for the current arbitrary restrictions!

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Dr. Rudolf Hänsel is a certified psychologist and educationalist.

Note

(1) Arendt. H. (2013, 8th edition) Eichmann in Jerusalem. A Report on the Banality of Evil. Munich, p. 399

Many have expressed concerns that coronavirus will be used, as 9/11 and the hoax “war on terror” were, to further expand the American police state dystopia.  But we were doomed by the digital revolution to a controlled existence regardless of 9/11 and Covid-19.  

The digital revolution provides government and corporations with unlimited and unaccountable ability to spy and control populations.  Every word, deed, and movement of people can be tracked and a “social credit” dossier built for them.  China already has such a control system in place.  Those whose profiles are outside acceptable parameters are unable to function in normal society, being blocked from passports, driving licenses, employment, and activities reserved to those with acceptable social credit scores.

Technology is now available that permits videos to be created of people speaking words that they never spoke.  These can be used to ruin people on social media and to convict them falsely in trials.  Privacy no longer exists despite endless “privacy notices,” and people have no control over their persona. 

Even a person’s unspoken thoughts are under assault by mind-reading technologies. Once money has been reduced to digital money, a person’s access to his funds can be cut off at any time.  Financial independence ceases to exist for those who don’t comply. 

The outcome of the digital revolution is completely different from the naive belief that the Internet opened up communicative freedom that would ensure liberty.  What a joke this belief turned out to be.  The tech and social media firms themselves engage in censorship of explanations, called “conspiracy theories,” that differ from official or permissible explanations or use words found “offensive” by privileged groups.  Truth itself has become a “conspiracy theory.” Factual history is unacceptable to Identity Politics and is being replaced by fake history, such as the New York Times’ 1619 Project.

It is certainly true that indoctrination is part of enculturation, and every age has had to struggle for truth.  There have always been interests whose agendas are served by falsehood.  But for those determined, it was possible to challenge and to expose the falsehoods.  That possibility is what is extirpated by the digital revolution. 

The technology is already in advance of that portrayed in George Orwell’s dystopia, 1984. We await the coalescing of elite interests in a leadership agenda. All the tools Big Brother needs await his arrival.

The young born into the digital revoluton know no different. They are so taken with their electronic gadgets and indispensable apps and so content in their self-isolation in virtual reality that liberty means the ability to push buttons to call up images and entertainment. Liberty will not have to be taken from them.  It has already left them.  Indeed, they never knew it or its requirements.

The well-rewarded techies who created the instruments of oppression are proud of their contribution to the creation of a police state dystopia. These preening fools are the handmaidens of the police state. 

Years ago I read a science fiction short story about a father and mother who were concerned about their son as the age of testing approached.  They were members of a people that had somehow recovered from an enslaving technology. To prevent a reoccurence, testing of the young was instituted to weed out for extermination those whose intelligence and aptitude could bring back technological tyranny.  In their society, not all forms of human creativity were permissible.  A society so full of hubris that it played God was unacceptable.

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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 blogtrepreneur/Flickr

While the world is pre-occupied with coronavirus and its impact on lives and the international economy, one must not forget that suffering due to oppression knows no season and has no vaccine, but is not without a cure. Sadly, for years, and especially since August, the world has watched India increasingly pressure and repress the Kashmiri people, as India now embarks on a colonizing project on the model of Israel’s brutal oppression of the Palestinian people.

Let’s review the situation.

On August 5, 2019, the government of India revoked Article 370 of the Constitution, thus nullifying whatever autonomy Kashmir, long considered ‘disputed’ had. This was accompanied by a complete lockdown of Kashmir, in which no one, included journalists and diplomats, was allowed to enter or leave. Social media was also shut down, depriving the people of Kashmir from any contact with family and friends outside of the country. Additionally, the presence of Indian troops, already there in large numbers, was increased, with the ratio now of at least one security officer (police, member of the military) for every 30 residents, including men, women and children. This constitutes an extremely repressive police state.

One month after the revoking of Article 370, India’s consul-general to New York made the following comment: “I believe the security situation will improve, it will allow the refugees to go back, and in your lifetime, you will be able to go back … and you will be able to find security, because we already have a model in the world. I don’t know why we don’t follow it. It has happened in the Middle East. If the Israeli people can do it, we can also do it.”

This has already begun, with the beginning of the construction of ‘outposts’ in Kashmir, which, like in Palestine, will soon become full-blown settlements.

Why is the world simply sitting back and allowing this to happen? There are several reasons:

• The United Nations, in 1948, passed a resolution to resolve the India-Pakistan dispute over Kashmir. The resolution did not bind those nations to any legal action, but implied that it bound them ‘morally’.Activist Assata Shakur, formerly of the United States but a long-time resident of Cuba, once stated the following: ​ “Nobody in the world, nobody in history, has ever gotten their freedom by appealing to the moral sense of the people who were oppressing them.” Expecting India and Pakistan to be ‘morally’ bound to do the ‘right thing’ is the ultimate pipe dream, perhaps only matched by anyone’s expectation for Israel to feel a moral obligation to do what is right. The United Nations is also responsible for the 70+ year atrocity known as the Israeli occupation of Palestine. But such wording gives the international community, hardly led by people of strong moral values, the ability to say there is nothing they can do.
• A second, and perhaps even more significant reason for the world to ignore Kashmir, as it ignores Palestine, is because Kashmir, like Palestine, is a mostly Muslim nation. Throughout the west, Muslims have been vilified. In the United States, it is cliché to say that any crime committed by a white man indicates that he has emotional problems and needs assistance to be re-integrated into society; a crime by a Black man indicates that he is a criminal and should be shot on sight and, if not, should be incarcerated for life. And a crime committed by a Muslim is always an act of terrorism, deserving of the most stringent penalties, and requiring all Muslims everywhere to disavow the act, pledge their allegiance to the United States above anything else, and from then on keep out of sight as much as possible.

Over the course of nearly seventy-three years, Palestinians have watched the size of their nation shrink, due first to United Nations decree, and then to Israeli terrorism. The Kashmiri people, for basically the same length of time, have suffered cruel repression, and now Indian Prime Minister Modi has decided to emulate Israeli brutality against the Kashmiris.

What can the international community do for either Kashmir or Palestine? This is not a puzzling question, but one with obvious answers.

1. Condemn in the strongest terms the repression of Kashmir by India, and Palestine by Israel. Do this constantly.
2. Sanction India and Israel. The BDS (Boycott, Divest and Sanction) movement has cost Israel dearly in terms of economic consequences, due to people around the world who will not buy its products, and reputationally, as academics and people from the entertainment world refuse to appear there. It is time for nations around the world to take their cue from their citizens, and cease all trade with India and Israel.
3. Support the International Criminal Court first in its determination that it does, indeed, have jurisdiction over Palestine, and then on insisting that investigators be allowed into Gaza to perform their duties.
4. Demand an end to the occupation of both nations, and of the blockade of the Gaza Strip.

The similarities of the repression of Kashmir and Palestine are striking. And now, with the coronavirus on everyone’s mind, that repression is being even further ignored.

Governments have demonstrated that they will do nothing to further the human-rights of struggles of the Kashmiri and Palestinian people. Therefore, it is up to the people around the world to demand action. The barbaric cruelty of the Indian and Israeli governments cannot be allowed to continue. Today is it Palestine and Kashmir; tomorrow, it could be any country that a more powerful one decides it wants to colonize, and precedent for doing so is being established.

International crimes must be identified, prosecuted and punished as are individual crimes. And crimes against humanity, as perpetrated by India and Israel, should both shock and motivate the world. We who recognize these crimes must do all that is in our power to make our governments react appropriately.

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Featured image: A sign stating ‘Danger, demolition. Entry is prohibited’ was placed by Israeli authorities on top of the rubble of the Khalialehs’ houses (MEE\Sondus Ewies)

Neocon hardliner Haley is a “hawk” on the far-right fringe of US politics. She’s militantly hostile toward sovereign states on the US target list for regime change.

As former Trump regime UN envoy, she was an embarrassment to the position she held, using her platform to “tak(e) names” and urge retaliation against nations unwilling to sacrifice their sovereign rights to US interests.

Straightaway after assuming her post in 2017, she said “(y)ou’re going to see a change in the way we do business.”

Along with other hardliners in Washington from both right wings of the one-party state, her goal was and remains achieving US dominance over planet earth, its resources and populations — endless wars and other hostile actions their favored strategies.

Haley is back with a website called “Stop Communist China.” She’s part of a US hard right-wing cabal that’s aiming to “prevent China’s growing influence.”

Big Lies and deception about Beijing’s successful model and its ruling authorities are her featured tactics with remarks like the following:

“China’s Communist government needs to be held accountable for their role in lying about the coronavirus pandemic (sic), and the US Congress needs to respond – now.”

“Join us in our fight to stop China from gaining influence in America and around the world.”

Last July, capitalist to the bone Forbes magazine praised China’s development since the 1970s, saying the following:

“…China is the world’s leading export nation, ahead of the” US.

Its economic achievements are remarkable by any standard.

“(N)ever before in history have so many people escaped poverty in such a short time as in the past decades in China.”

“According to official World Bank figures, the percentage of extremely poor people in China in 1981 stood at 88.3%.”

“By 2015 only 0.7% of the Chinese population was living in extreme poverty.”

“In this period, the number of (extremely) poor people in China fell from 878 million to less than ten million.”

Whether these numbers are  accurate or not takes nothing away from China’s rapid rise on the world stage as a dominant economic power in a remarkably short period of time.

Forbes claims China’s success “provides clear evidence of the power of capitalism.”

China’s development is attributed to developing a successful economic model that’s different from and free from US control, not victimized by its exploitive practices.

Last August, Ellen Brown explained that US/Western-style neoliberalism “met its match in China.”

Over 80% of its banks are state owned and controlled, loans made to public and private businesses on favorable terms to stimulate longterm growth.

Brown:

If “businesses cannot repay the loans, neither the banks nor the businesses are put into bankruptcy, since that would mean losing jobs and factories.”

“(N)on-performing loans are just carried on the books or written off. No private creditors are hurt, since the creditor is the government…”

China considers its system superior to the West that’s focused on short-term profits by private enterprises.

China’s successful model is superior to the West’s “unfair trade practices.”

US policymakers want China’s system replicating America’s. They want control over the country as a US vassal state.

Michael Hudson said the Trump regime “wants the Chinese to be as threatened and insecure as American workers.”

“They should get rid of their public transportation. They should get rid of their subsidies.”

“They should let a lot of their companies go bankrupt so that Americans can buy them” on the cheap.

“They should have the same kind of free market that has wrecked the US economy.”

Brown noted China’s impressive “long-term growth and development,” its success revealing superiority over the flawed US model.

Instead of pushing China to operate like America, its policymakers should adopt Beijing’s model.

Its success reflects the superiority of its system, not “the power of capitalism,” as Forbes claimed.

The magazine that calls itself a “capitalist tool” praised China’s impressive development that far exceeds anything in the West.

“Hundreds of millions of people in China are far better off today,” Forbes stressed.

The nation is an economic success story unmatched in the West, China heading one day for becoming the world’s leading economy.

It’s why US policymakers want its economic, industrial, and technological development undermined.

In cahoots with other US dark forces, that’s what Haley’s “Stop Communist China” campaign is all about — an agenda doomed to fail.

China and other nations are rising, the US and West declining.

Already thirdworldized for its ordinary people, the disparity between the rich and most others is widening, things heading toward getting worse, not better — notably in the US.

Poverty, unemployment, underemployment, human deprivation, and police state control are growth industries in the world’s richest country.

Its fantasy democracy provides cover for steadily eroding human and civil rights, notably under current conditions.

COVID-19 and economic duress provide a pretext for convincing people to sacrifice personal freedoms for greater security, not realizing that both are being lost.

Endless wars on invented enemies and police state control in the US followed 9/11.

What’s ongoing now has the earmarks of 9/11 2.0 in new form.

What Pompeo called a “live exercise” in March (state-sponsored, not natural?) may make the US more unequal, unsafe and unfit to live in than before what’s happening emerged.

What most Americans haven’t grasped is what should concern them most — not coronavirus outbreaks that will pass.

A Final Comment

Haley has high-level political ambitions. She may seek the 2024 GOP presidential nomination.

Last year she was a Boeing board member, earning substantial six-figure compensation, perhaps more given her political connections.

In March, she resigned her board position, citing disagreement with bailing out the company.

Her memoir titled “With All Due Respect” was published to pursue her political ambitions, along with cashing in on her public persona.

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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.

State Health officials have acknowledged a bending of the “Covid Curve” seeing smaller spikes in positive cases, or rather, not as exponential of a jump as recorded weeks ago when virus testing capability was much lower.

Additionally, despite the additional virus-related deaths being reported everyday, Illinois Department of Public Health reports those numbers are decreasing too.

Still, the department’s Director, Dr. Ngozi Ezike used part of her time during Sunday’s health briefing to explain how the department determines if a death is related to Coronavirus.

Click here to watch the video.

Essentially, Dr. Ezike explained that anyone who passes away after testing positive for the virus is included in that category.

“If you were in hospice and had already been given a few weeks to live, and then you also were found to have COVID [“presumed” or “confirmed” with or without lab confirmation], that would be counted as a COVID death. It means technically even if you died of a clear alternate cause, but you had COVID at the same time, it’s still listed as a COVID death. So, everyone who’s listed as a COVID death doesn’t mean that that was the cause of the death, but they had COVID at the time of the death.” Dr. Ezike outlined.

She reiterated Illinois health officials will continue to work vigorously to protect the state’s most vulnerable populations.

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Featured image is from 25 News – Week

In a televised CBS interview with Anthony Mason on April 2^nd, Bill Gates issued a few key words that have since become iconic in the world of mainstream media.  As has been the general trend whenever the famed co-founder of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation declares something that appears to implicate the personal lives of every other person on the planet, these words effectively set the tone for what would become an oft-repeated stanza across the globe. 

Essentially, Gates advised that life is not expected to get back to “normal” until a thorough, international vaccination infrastructure has been implemented.  On Fox News Sunday April 5^th, Bill Gates specifically told host Chris Wallace that life “won’t get back to normal” until a vaccine is delivered to the “entire world.”

Within days of these rather bold prescriptions from the Microsoft founder, news headlines around the world were lit ablaze with the parroted advisory that life, as we know it, is “not expected to return to normal until a vaccine is available.”

Quoting directly from Canadian Prime Minister Trudeau during his nationwide address on April 8^th,

“normality as it was before will not come back full-on until we get a vaccine for this…”

Similarly, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen warned the public that life cannot be expected to resume any sense of former stability until a vaccine becomes widely available.  While she was initially setting an optimistic (if you can call it that) timeline of the Fall of 2020, her predictions were cooled by the European Medicines Agency which suggested a more conservative arena of 12 to 18 months.

In the meantime, news media everywhere are essentially saying the same thing; life as we know it is not expected to return to normal until a vaccine program is in some kind of deliverable form for the entire world.  Gates himself offered 18 months as a reasonable time frame and, in the interim, his recommendations are fairly transparent.  As he explicitly stated during his CBS interview,

“the country’s leaders need to be clear: shutdown anywhere means shutdown everywhere.”

While these words were specifically addressed to the US, it is no mystery that the intentional audience here is humanity in general.

At any rate, the narrative has been set.  As news headlines everywhere have told us, things are expected to be upside down until we are vaccinated on a nearly worldwide scale.

In the meantime, society en masse has now been successfully programmed to quietly sit still and wait out the ensuing lockdowns so that, eventually, our collective discomfort from a bleeding economy and progressive intimacy-starvation leads us to such a state of prolonged desperation where we’re more than happy to bare our arms (and our children’s arms) to the awaiting syringe.

By that time, we will have also been more than sufficiently indoctrinated in the so-called dangers of COVID-19 where we will be ready and ripened for the ‘solution’ to everything that has fragmented our societies since “Wuhan” first became a household name.

In a sobering article recently published in MIT Technology Review, Gideon Lichfield discusses his views of why social life, on a global scale, may never return to us in quite the same way at all.  He warns that “as long as someone in the world has the virus, breakouts can and will keep recurring without stringent controls to contain them.”

Lichfield then proceeds to outline some rather cold possibilities of what typical life may come to look like in the future, including cell-phone location data for tracking unwitting risk offenders.  He reports that this would not be for tracking merely the infected themselves, but ultimately for “people who’ve been in touch with known carriers of the virus”.  In other words, we’re talking government policies of keeping tabs on pretty much everybody through constant smart phone monitoring.

He also asserts that

“we’ll restore the ability to socialize safely by developing more sophisticated ways to identify who is a disease risk and who isn’t, and discriminating – legally – against those who are.”

He suggests that possible methods may include universal screening of body temperature fluctuations, specific family size, and even annual income. While noting the very likely risk of creating even more social inequities, Lichfield’s concluding comments are simply that the onus will be on government officials to reflect on the propensity for increased social dysfunction and to work hard to guard against the exacerbation of it.

In the meantime, however, Lichfield makes a repeated point that the public, in response, will somehow learn to adapt to these changes and essentially move forward with whatever form life happens to take in the aftermath of these things. He writes that

“we’ll adapt to such measures, much as we’ve adapted to increasingly stringent airport security screenings in the wake of terrorist attacks.”

Furthermore,

“the intrusive surveillance will be considered a small price to pay for the basic freedom to be with other people.”

With these considerations in mind, he correctly points out that

“the true cost will be borne by the poorest and weakest” (MIT Technology Review, March 17/20).

Predictions such as these, in my mind, do not border in any way in the realm of science fiction.  In my opinion, Lichfield’s views appear to have a rather passive flair, particularly when it comes to the issue of widespread public acceptance of such Orwellian approaches to social management.  His repetition of terms like “acceptance,” and “adaptation” in the context of public response lend to an overall theme of involuntary submission; the picture of a society that essentially has no choice in the governance of their affairs and even their very personal lives.

But I suspect that content such as that covered in MIT Technology Review, while accurate on many counts, is nevertheless in the business of building one very specific thing: consumer adaptation to ideals and standards established by high-level and corporate interests.

Let us be clear.  The majority of information that has been given to the international public has been fed and filtered through a severely one-sided source.  It is also no secret that the vast majority of our mainstream media is owned by a literal handful of agencies who have much to gain by steering public perception.  This oligopoly, if you will, consists primarily of AT&T, Comcast, the Walt Disney Company, Viacom CBC, and the Fox Corporation.  Together, these and their subsidiary agencies are indeed very wise in their aims to cash in on the official story of the coronavirus pandemic, primarily since stories of fear tend to sell products of distraction.

While this article is not the place to examine the depth of research and analysis which rightfully questions the nature of our current pandemic, let me simply point out the fact that any self-respecting global citizen owes it themselves to look beyond the confines of the evening news (as well as seeing beyond the unquestioning mass obedience that has taken over our cities) and spend some time to at least review the rest of the information that experts, scientists and independent news producers are trying to share (that is, as long as the self-righteous techno oligarchs haven’t removed them from their hosting platforms yet).

The point is that our history has patiently demonstrated to us, time and time again, that society has often hindered itself by blindly adhering to the official narrative that some persons in power have fed to the overall population.  As Marshall McLuhan put it so succinctly, “all media exist to invest our lives with artificial perceptions and arbitrary values.”

More appropriately, then, the issue of collective values is where I want to dedicate the rest of my thoughts here.  Because, as we have experienced up until this point, it seems to me that we have allowed our shared values to become largely shaped by something most of us don’t even really understand properly.

All of a sudden it seems, we have found ourselves abiding by a set of social norms which, despite how bizarre they must appear to an outside observer, are nevertheless the root of much shaming and mutual policing – principally because there have been enough corporately-paid talking heads and ill-informed leaders who are telling us that social distancing is the “responsible” and “safe” thing to do.

Ridiculous public behavior aside, my graver concern lies in the fact that our worldwide public culture now appears to have been sufficiently neutered and primed for the next stage of this whole illegitimate process.  Specifically speaking, how many of us are actually going to resist the call to be vaccinated once it becomes publically available? Will the social pressure have evolved to such an established norm where resistance will result in serious ostracizing and rejection from our familiar locales and community hubs?  Will we be deemed “unsafe” and “irresponsible” for simply trying to preserve our personal morals of health and safety, in addition to those of our children?  Because let’s face it.  If we’re already heckling people for stepping within our six feet of personal space, then how will we treat those who are deemed guilty for questioning and resisting the very antidote to the thing that is widely-regarded as the very source of our problems to begin with?

My urge is that we remind ourselves of the fact that a collective human response to any manufactured phenomenon begins with the single individual.  I dare say we will not find opportunity to resist vaccination (or any other illegitimately-imposed custom) if we are silently waiting for others among us to step out of line first.  The fact is that our societies have, to a large extent, already been lined up outside the pharmacy.  Global leadership and popular media have made sure of that.  That pharmacy is soon to be opened up and the longer we wait in line then the harder it will be to actually step out of it.

Granted, I don’t know exactly how the rollout of such a vaccine in this instance will look like.  I don’t think many of us do, really.  In all reality, it may look simply like a mandatory thing for people working in certain sectors and with specific populations.  Alternatively, it will be widely promoted as the only reasonable thing to do and most will simply go along with it since too many people (at least up until now) have not bothered to ask the bigger questions about it.

With that in mind, I advise that we openly question the narrative that “life as we know it will not return to normal until we’re all vaccinated.”  After all, we’re the ones buying into that idea and our complicit acceptance of it is what necessarily gives it force.  We breathe life into this type of propaganda purely through our obedience to it and by failing to question the impulses and agendas that have gone into its design.

Let me take a final moment to clarify that I’m not proposing that what we previously enjoyed as our baseline “normal” is really the ideal either.  Far from it.  Pre-COVID ‘normal’ is not the gold standard in my opinion, nor do I imagine that it’s everybody else’s.  It was simply all we knew as a society.

In fact, one thing that our universal lockdown has served, in a positive sense, is to hopefully stimulate us on a deep, personal level to the point of re-evaluating the things in life that matter most.  Granted, some of us have resorted to binging on streaming media and mainstream news gospel (as Viacom would no doubt have intended in the first place).  So rather than launching our vision purely from a place of nostalgia for a perceived era of comfort and familiarity, my intention here is simply to underscore our critical importance as the ultimate deciders of our public fate.  It really comes down to what we are willing to go along with and, as far as I’m concerned, apathy is the most dangerous thing facing our future.

At the risk of sounding like an alarmist, the choices we make in the dawn of a questionable vaccine will go a long way in determining our continued evolution as a society.  And while I am not here to criticize one’s personal choice for vaccination, I am nevertheless insisting that one have the right to that very prized principle itself – choice that is in fact personal.  Particularly, by blindly adhering to the official prescription for mass conduct in the meantime, we are letting powerful agencies know precisely which buttons need to be pushed in order to get our species moving and behaving in the most ‘desirable’ way.

So yes, we do have some say in all of this.

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Brett Jordan, BSW, MSW, RSW, is a Registered Social Worker who works in a hospital ER in Metro Vancouver.  He writes predominantly on issues of spiritual, emotional and social phenomena. 

US hostility toward Iran is all about its sovereign independence — free from US control.

It’s also because of its large hydrocarbon resources the US seeks control over, along with wanting Israel’s main rival neutralized.

Hostile US policy toward Iran reached a unprecedented level under Trump and hardliners surrounding him.

His regime is waging all-out war by other means on the Islamic Republic, a failed policy for over 40 years, yet continues without letup.

In January, Trump’s Treasury Department blocked the .com domain of Iran’s Fars News.

Fars News.ir in English is still available. The website’s valuable truth-telling information warrants following, why the Trump regime wants it silenced.

It targeted the Islamic Republic News Agency (IRNA) the same way, blocking its website by seizing its domain. It’s still available in English at en.irna.ir.

It’s also available at irannewspaper.ir, legal action being taken by the news service to reverse the Trump regime’s illegal action.

On Sunday, IRNA said the hostile action occurred days earlier, adding:

“The name OFAC Holding has been registered in the owner section of the domain of the ‘Iran’ Newspaper website.”

OFAC operates extrajudicially against nations US ruling authorities want transformed into vassal states.

It’s a “financial intelligence and enforcement agency of the US Treasury Department. It administers and enforces economic and trade sanctions in support of US” imperial interests, IRNA explained.

OFAC is one of numerous US tools used to wage political, economic, financial, and medical terrorism on targeted nations.

Iran’s Foreign Ministry denounced the latest Trump regime hostile act, saying the following:

“The Islamic Republic of Iran strongly condemns the decision by the US Treasury Department to block the domain of the Iranian media, which is contrary to the universal declaration of human rights and freedom of expression,” adding:

“The (Trump) regime’s new measure in silencing the media has (further) degraded the US into the main violator of the international legal order.”

Earlier the Obama regime falsely claimed that the US can “seize any .com, .net and .org domain name because the companies that have the contracts to administer them are based on United States soil.”

Cyberspace is the last frontier of press freedom. Without it, the Internet would be like cable TV, controlled by corporate giants.

Truth-telling would be marginalized and silenced, speech and press freedoms consigned to the dustbin of history — where things are heading without redoubtable resistance.

Republicans and Dems are hostile to free and open expression.

They consider truth-telling on vital issues indecent, obscene, hateful, terrorist-related, and harmful to the imperial state.

If speech, press, and academic freedoms are lost, elimination of other fundamental rights will likely follow.

In Texas v. Johnson, a landmark 1989 flag-burning case, Supreme Court Justice William Brennan  wrote the majority opinion, saying:

“(I)f there is a bedrock principle underlying the First Amendment, it is that government may not prohibit the expression of an idea simply because society finds the idea offensive or disagreeable.”

Thurgood Marshall added:

“Above all else, the First Amendment means that government has no power to restrict expression (regardless of its) ideas…subject matter (or) content.”

“Our people are guaranteed the right to express any thought, free from government censorship.”

The same right applies to what’s published in cyberspace, a digital platform for free and open expression by everyone everywhere — not to be censored or otherwise suppressed by any government.

It’s standard practice by US ruling regimes, wanting the message controlled, conflicting views eliminated.

In response to the Trump regime’s action against IRNA, Iran’s Press TV reported that “Google, YouTube, Facebook, Instagram and Twitter (earlier) targeted Iranian accounts, including those belonging to broadcasters,” including English-language Press TV.

It’s hit or miss trying to access it online, at times accessible, at other times blocked by the US to silence its truth-telling information — part of the Trump regime’s “maximum pressure” campaign.

Other Iranian media have been targeted to silence them.

Along with US wars of aggression, state terrorism, and other hostile actions, controlling the message is what the scourge of imperialism abroad and totalitarian rule at home are all about.

The only solution is popular revolution. Without it, remaining fundamental rights are at risk of being lost, full-blown tyranny replacing them.

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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.

Back in November 2016, the Indian government decided to remove all 500- and 1000-rupee notes from circulation overnight without prior notice. This effectively removed 86% of cash in a country that was almost 90% cash reliant.  

The notes became worthless and people were asked to hand them in to banks. They would only receive what they had deposited in dribs and drabs over time in the form of new notes. The official reason for this was that the action would curtail the shadow economy and reduce the use of illicit and counterfeit cash to fund illegal activity and terrorism.  

Some who questioned the official narrative regarded this ‘demonetisation’ policy as a ploy to take money from the public and use it to inject much needed liquidity into the banking system that had been bled dry by the outflow of cheap money (and loan waivers) to large corporations which had been milking the well dry. 

The purpose of this article is not to explore the merits or otherwise of this claim or the official government narrative. The point here is to highlight how the policy (also) formed part of an ongoing global ‘war on cash’. In the discussion that follows, it will be shown that Bill Gates is a major player in trying to get the world to go digital and ditch cash, especially relevant given his role in the COVID-19 issue.

When we look beyond the mainstream narrative to gain an understanding of the current crisis, it doesn’t take long before the name of Bill Gates and his foundation appears. And this is no coincidence seeing that he has placed himself firmly in the limelight on prime time TV shows offering his opinion on COVID-19 and what he thinks should be done. He has mentioned the need for maintaining some form of lockdown until a vaccine is discovered.

Much has been written on the Gates Foundation’s close associations with the big vaccine manufacturers and its questionable practices and record in rolling out vaccines in places like Africa and India. US attorney Robert F Kennedy Jr says that top Trump advisor Anthony Fauci has made the reckless choice to fast track vaccines, partially funded by Gates, without critical animal studies. Gates is so worried about the danger of adverse events that he says vaccines shouldn’t be distributed until governments agree to indemnity against lawsuits.

But this should come as little surprise. The Gates Foundation and its global vaccine agenda already has much to answer for. Instead of prioritising projects that are proven to curb infectious diseases and improve health – clean water, hygiene, nutrition and economic development – Kennedy notes that the Gates Foundation spends only about $650 million of its $5 billion budget on these areas.

It is fair to say that the Gates Foundation has an agenda: it believes that many of its aims can be delivered via the barrel of a syringe. It has been well documented in recent weeks about how the Gates Foundation has spread its tentacles into every facet of global health policy. For instance, it is a major funder of the World Health Organization and donates to other pivotal players in the COVID-19 saga, not least Imperial College London whose Neil Ferguson produced hugely flawed data upon which the UK government implemented a lockdown, which entailed sanctioning draconian state powers and stripping of people’s basic rights via the Coronavirus Emergency Act. 

Although often alluded to, Gates’s push for cashless societies is given less attention in the current climate but is just as important. It is not only the major pharmaceutical corporations which the Gates Foundation is firmly in bed with (along with the big agri-food players), it is also embedded with Wall Street financial interests.

The global shift from cash towards digital transactions is being spearheaded by Bill Gates and US financial corporations who will profit from digital payments. At the same time, by controlling digital payments (and removing cash), you can control and monitor everything a country and its citizens do and pay for.

War on cash in India

In India, the informal workforce has been measured at around 85%. By 2014, fewer than 35% of Indians above the age of 15 had used a bank account and under 10% had ever used any kind of non-cash payment instrument.  

Although some voices welcomed the 2016 demonetisation policy, as they believed it would push many Indians off cash and towards ‘financial inclusion’, it was, according to economist Norbert Haring, concocted in Washington, not for the benefit of Indians but in the interests of Western financial institutions who are pushing for a cashless world. For a lower income country such as India, which runs on cash, the outcomes were catastrophic for hundreds of millions of people, especially those who did not have a bank account (almost half the population) or did not have easy access to a bank.

According to Haring, the global ‘war on cash’ has the backing of some heavy hitters: the major US banks and likes of PayPal, Visa and the Gates Foundation. Writing in 2017, he argued that the cooperation of the Gates Foundation and the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has been a very tight one. For example, Nachiket Mor, a banker, is director of the Gates Foundation India. He is also a board member of the RBI with responsibility for financial supervision.

Haring indicates that the demonetization policy was carried out on behalf of USAID, MasterCard, Visa and the people behind eBay and Citi, among others, with support from the Gates Foundation and the Ford Foundation. He adds that the start of direct cooperation of the Gates Foundation with the RBI on digital payments coincided with the work of the foundation in the President’s Global Development Council, which was to promote cooperation with foreign governments and the private sector with a view to securing US defence and commercial interests.

Bill Gates, Haring notes, gave an example of the link between worldwide digitalisation of payments (via the large US payment companies) and US security interests in a speech in 2015.

Gates said:

“If financial flows go into a digital system that the US is not connected to, it becomes much harder to find those transactions that you want to be aware of or you want to block.”

Demonetisation used the Indian population as a collective guinea pig to see how far the geostrategic interests of the US and those of Wall Street could be secured in a country of 1.3 billion people. The effects of people’s lives did not matter as long as the policy was pushed forward.

And this was carried out with reference to the usual corporate jargon of ‘financial inclusion’. Cash already provides financial inclusion. What does not lead to financial inclusion or any time of inclusion is a neoliberal system that imposes gross inequalities, austerity, joblessness, neocolonialism and the destruction of indigenous practices and cultures under the guise of ‘development’, the deliberate impoverishment of farmers in India, the twisting and writing of national and international laws, the destruction of rural communities or an unjust global food regime.

It is clear that ‘financial inclusion’ really means eliminating the main competitor of digital payments and finance sector profits – cash. In capitalism, every aspect of human life is to be commodified in the quest for fresh markets and profit – in this case, securing payments from payments.  

Norbert Haring quotes Dan Schulmann, CEO of PayPal, who has stated:

“The major competitor we have is cash. Right now, 85 percent of the world’s transactions are done in cash. That is really what we are trying to attack right now.”

He also quotes Strive Masiyiwa, chairman and founder of Econet, a large African mobile phone company with a payment platform:

“Our major competitor is cash. Cash is what we seek to eliminate.”

It seems ‘financial inclusion’ really means denying sections of society their preferred method of payment – cash – to benefit the bottom line of these corporations.

Did Gates and his associates succeed in pushing Indians off cash? By April 2018, the volume of digital payments had doubled. At the same time, however, at the end of May 2019, currency notes in circulation had increased by more than 22% over the pre-demonetisation level. The use of cash was expected to reach $2.45 trillion by 2021, up from $1.5 trillion in 2016, although demonetisation helped digital payments advance by three to four years.  

The 2016 policy adopted a callous and ill-thought-out blanket approach. And it was not as though Indians were clamouring for digital – it was imposed on them.

Under cover of COVID-19 lockdowns, can we expect to see cash being pushed right to the margins when countries emerge from the current crisis (for instance, in an ongoing pandemic culture of fear and paranoia, it would be easy to convince people that notes and coins are potential transmitters of disease, or with mass unemployment we may have universal basic income schemes linked to digital payment systems)? It can already be seen with large stores asking customers to pay by card whenever possible.

Many commentators have discussed how the current crisis has been used to remove basic rights and how vaccines and surveillance will be intensified. What could follow may also see our purchases and behaviour being monitored even further via digital payments. For instance, Haring notes that in Kenya Gates saw little wrong in compelling mobile phone providers to give the authorities the opportunity to monitor all phone calls and mobile payments by telling phone companies to let contracted (private) companies hook up to all routers. The plan was to monitor transactions and use the data to target people with advertising to make even more transactions, thereby driving consumption.

It doesn’t take a great leap of faith to appreciate how in a fully digital system, ‘financial flows’ could be blocked, as Gates implied back in 2015. This already happens in the dollar-centred monetary system. But when there is no cash to fall back on and every single transaction in a society is computerised and can be monitored by the state and private corporations, will the term ‘financial inclusion’ then sound so benign?

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Colin Todhunter is a frequent contributor to Global Research and Asia-Pacific Research.

In each era, it is possible to detect a central factor in the struggle for power between nations, which, when achieved, will enable the nation that conquered it to be at an advantageous stage in relation to all the others that have not yet obtained it. The Argentine scholar Marcelo Gullo called this factor a “threshold of power”. The first threshold would have been the National State, the second was the industrialization, the third was the acquisition of territories during the neocolonial period, the fourth was the atomic bomb and the fifth is not yet perfectly determined, but it is linked to the new technologies of the post-atomic age. In a world increasingly devastated by the effects of a global pandemic, where all countries invest everything they have in researching medicines and vaccines against the new coronavirus, we can reflect more deeply on what the new and current “threshold of power” would be.

In England, scientists started on April 23 the first clinical trials in humans of a new experimental vaccine. The information was confirmed by UK Health Secretary Matt Hancock on Wednesday. According to the secretary, the project is receiving state funding of £20 million. These are his words: “We will support them to the end and give them the resources they need to improve their chances of success”. According to infectologist Andrew Pollard, who leads the research project, the Oxford vaccine center will produce one million doses of the vaccine by September, even though it is in the period of clinical trials, which in itself already reveals how much the project is a bet by the United Kingdom. The English objective is to produce a vaccine before the deadline of one year as stipulated by the World Health Organization, which, undoubtedly, would put the British in an advantage over almost all nations.

Germany also hopes to take advantage on this race. The German government authorized the first clinical trials of a vaccine against the new coronavirus. Two hundred healthy people will participate in the first phase of the tests. Scientists are trying to verify the development of immunity and want to include more people in the tests in a second step of the experiments. But the president of the Vaccination Institute warned that the process will take months before any vaccine is approved and become available to the population at health centers in the country. Leading research to develop the vaccine in Germany are the pharmaceutical corporation Pfizer and the biotechnology company BioNTech SE. Both companies are also awaiting authorization to start clinical trials in the United States.

China, the first country to control the infection, has a position of relative advantage over the other countries, which were later affected. Beijing began clinical trials of an experimental vaccine in March, with doses administered to more than 100 volunteers between 18 and 60 years old in the city of Wuhan. For six months, the volunteers will be followed up, which is why there are no results yet identified regarding the vaccine’s effectiveness. Also in March, the United States began testing an experimental vaccine where the biotechnology company Moderna Therapeutics is conducting the research. Vaccinated volunteers will also be accompanied for the next months.

Russia has announced that it will be ready to start testing its experimental vaccines on humans from June. Rinat Maksiutov, who runs the Vektor state center, said that he plans to carry out the first phase of testing three vaccines on 180 volunteers from 29 June. “Volunteer groups have already been created. We received more than 300 applications”, explained Maksiutov. According to the director, scientists at his laboratory, located in the Siberian city of Novosibirsk, developed the vaccine prototypes based on six different technological platforms. Currently, tests continue to be performed on animals. The most promising prototypes will be announced until April 30, when they will be sent for human testing.

There are still other different vaccine projects underway. As we can see, some of the most powerful nations of the world are in a notorious race to develop their own vaccine, which would represent for the respective State a true pharmaceutical autonomy and an extreme advantage in the era of epidemics. In fact, the new coronavirus has brought us a very significant change in the world order, even though we are still far from knowing its greatest effects: we are already in an age of epidemics and pandemics, and the nation that currently obtains pharmaceutical sovereignty will have reached the newest “threshold of power”.

During the Cold War, the atomic bomb represented the limit of national sovereignty. The Soviet Union and the USA competed with each other in a major arms race, in which the nations sought to gain an advantage through war superiority. Currently, in the context of hybrid war and possibly biological weapons, the most powerful nations cannot be content with nuclear power, but must be concerned with investing in biological and pharmaceutical research for defense purposes. Vaccine has become synonymous with power. What we are seeing now is a new arms race, where weapons are the instruments to combat deadly plagues, which will become more and more frequent in a context of globalization and massive circulation of people. We have entered the age of pandemics and the race for vaccines.

Still, the worst case scenario would be one in which private corporations control these vaccines, as this would put companies at an advantage over nation states. Interestingly, we are looking at this situation in most of the West.

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This article was originally published on InfoBrics.

Lucas Leiroz is a research fellow in international law at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro.

“We’re all going to die!” This feeble appeal came in a Facebook phone call with B. Thapa from deep within Nepal’s eastern hills.

Our conversation was in early March when news headlines from Italy and the U.S. began to alarm Nepalis. With no information about the spread of the disease in his country, this schoolteacher presumed a bleak scenario. “If advanced European societies are swamped with this disease, unable to control it, what can we expect?”

Indeed. The country has a porous 1,000 mile border with India; it has no national health system and its Maoist/Communist-led government has promoted private clinics and hospitals over public healthcare; the prime minister, KP Sharma Oli, had a second kidney transplant without naming any surrogate leader to handle the crisis; there’s almost no medical equipment of the kind needed to test and treat Covid-19; hundreds of thousands of more than five million migrant workers abroad whose remittances keep Nepal economically afloat are now jobless and heading home, and Kathmandu’s swollen population, concerned about congestion in the city, is fleeing to their villages across the land, possibly carrying the virus with them.

Thapa’s fear is repeated by others I speak to. I know about his nation’s truly weak medical system; I agree that the administration is incompetent and deeply corrupt. Yet, I argue, “Nepal’s medics will ensure no one hides the facts. You have an aggressive free press now; it will expose details of any epidemic and force government action.”

Nepali Police Enforcing Quarantine

A month ago, Nepal had yet to report a single Covid-19 death, and only three infected individuals—all traced to Nepalis who’d arrived from abroad. No one believed those figures; the public’s experience on a host of past issues and endemic corruption results in widespread cynicism; the government cannot handle this crisis, they say.

Most Nepalis, like millions of people across the globe, depend on remittances from overseas workers, and food imports (since the outflow of labor leaves fields uncultivated). What options do Nepalis have to handle a looming epidemic?

Without warning, on March 24^th the government imposed a countrywide lockdown. Everyone was to remain inside. Schools and businesses were ordered closed. The quarantine is as severe as anywhere in the world, perhaps with the exception of China. Only policemen are seen in the lanes and roads. A colleague in Lahan village in Janakpur near India exclaims that traveling by motorbike and cycle-rickshaws is prohibited. Shopping for food is restricted; inter-city buses are halted; remittance agencies and banks are closed. Police and special security forces are deployed to Nepal’s border with India to prevent migrant laborers from returning home, creating Nepali refugee camps inside India.

There was one announcement of medical supplies arriving by air from China (ordered by the U.N. Population Fund and various embassies). Otherwise thirty million Nepalis seem to be on their own.

Six weeks into the pandemic, one has to scroll far down the coronavirus world register (ranked by number of infections) –past New Zealand with 17 deaths, Japan (348), Singapore (12), Cuba (49), Ghana (10), Lebanon (22), etc. to find Nepal–with zero deaths and just 48 infections reported (as of April 25, 2020).

Many citizens simply don’t believe the government figures, arguing that it’s incapable of even registering cases. Some Nepali news outlets call out the administration’s incompetence. On the other hand, some citizens suggest that that low rate is indeed a result of their strict adherence to the lockdown and the police’s zero tolerance of noncompliance with the quarantine. Privately, people adopt simple home remedies and advice gleaned from the internet. Families remain especially attentive to the abundant deities they live with and worship. And traditional places of refuge—temples and ashrams whose custodians offer hospitality at any time—are expanding their capacity to feed the needy.

Today, criticism of Nepal’s passive administration is surprisingly tepid. For weeks, returning overseas migrant laborers languished at the border camps. Many jobless men were forced to walk 10-14 days from job-sites in distant parts of Nepal to reach their home village. The government seemed insensitive. (Finally, on April 17, Nepal’s Supreme Court ruled that the government must provide transport to those walking from Kathmandu and other cities to their home destination.)

“We watch what’s happening overseas. Without the service infrastructure of other countries, we must adopt this strict regime,” another colleague insists. “We have no equipment, no medical facilities, no capable governmental services, and no real leadership.”

Nepal is not a country known for self-sufficiency and civic responsibility. Pampered for decades by an excess of foreign aid and favorable press, its people have customarily looked to outsiders for guidance and cash. This epidemic obliges them to find their own solution.

Another month will reveal a clearer picture of Nepal’s state of health. If they somehow escape a battering by this plague, Nepalis’ strict adherence to the simple formula of distancing and quarantine should bolster national confidence. It could lead to a needed move toward self-reliance.

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B. Nimri Aziz is an anthropologist and journalist who’s worked in Nepal since 1970, and published widely on peoples of the Himalayas. A new book on Nepali rebel women is forthcoming.

Featured image: Nepal Kathmandu Feeding Center; all images in this article are from Nepali press sources (provided by the author)

Sometimes it isn’t all that hard to predict the future. All you have to do is listen to what the social engineers are telling you they’re going to do.

For example, when the neocons tell you that we need a “new Pearl Harbor” to justify a transformation of America’s military, you can bet a new Pearl Harbor is going to arrive as soon as they get into office.

And now, after years of Bill Gates warning us that a pandemic was going to strike and utterly transform the world as we know it. He even went so far as to “simulate” the exact scenario we’re living through just before we started living through it.

So, you see my point. Sometimes seeing what’s coming next is just a question of listening to what the planners are telling us. Keeping that in mind, let’s look at four predictions for how the coronavirus crisis is likely to proceed from here.

1. The “Second Wave” Will Be Blamed on the Protesters

There is a second wave of Covid-19 coming in the next few months. We don’t have to speculate about this. Not only have we heard this from all manner of politicians and health “authorities” over the past few months, but it was an integral part of MIT Technology Review’s now-infamous “We’re not going back to normal” article, which revealed how the waves of lockdown and release were going to restructure our lives and condition us into the Corona World Order. And, lest there be any doubt that this is an important part of the plandemic narrative, Bill Gates just reaffirmed it in his latest “GatesNotes” on “The first modern pandemic.”

In fact, the pandemic planners have warned the public of a second (and third and fourth and fifth . . .) wave of this crisis so many times now that we can virtually guarantee that such a “second wave” will occur. Now, such a second wave of sickness could actually occur, if only because—as Dr. Dan Erickson notes in his recent Covid-19 briefing—people emerging from their lockdown isolation will have lowered immune systems and thus be more susceptible to pathogens of all kinds. But this dreaded “second wave” doesn’t even have to take place in reality; the statistical chicanery of the fraudsters can always be relied on to conjure up the impression of a fresh round of infections in the minds of the public. Heck, if the Japanese government can magically conjure a “surge” of SARS-CoV-2 infections into existence the very same day they announced the postponement of the 2020 Olympics (precisely as I predicted), you better believe governments around the world can deliver on the “second wave” narrative regardless of how many people may or may not be ill.

Here’s the rub: Whatever happens, the plandemic agenda-pushers are going to blame this second wave on those evil, dastardly protesters who complained about being put under house arrest. You know, those horrible, heartless grandma-killers who dared to oppose the orders to shutter the business they’ve spent their entire lifetime building up and those detestable, disgusting disease-spreaders who refused to meekly accept their sudden enforced unemployment.

You can see the outlines of this narrative already being planted in the type of coverage surrounding the growing lockdown protest movement. It’s those stupid, ignorant yokels who are out there protesting to “open Fuddruckers” who are putting the lives of those valiant medical heroes on the line by daring to exercise their right to peacefully assemble and demand a redress of their grievances!

So when things are opened up eventually (even just a little bit), you better believe that “second wave” is going to hit full force . . . at least in the media. And every single death in the daily death tally is going to be blamed on people who complained about their house imprisonment and forced unemployment.

2. The Alt Media Are Being Given the Rope to Hang Themselves

This next prediction is based on some observations:

1. About a year ago, YouTube instituted a new system for displaying subscriber counts that corresponded with a flatlining in new subscribers for many alt media channels (including mine).
2. Around the same time, they began implementing changes to the recommendation algorithm ensuring that “harmful content” (read: alt media) would not be recommended to viewers nearly as often.
3. Around the time that the corona crisis really began to kick off six weeks ago, these restrictions seem to have been lifted, with my own channel’s subscriber count surging and my work being routinely recommended by the YouTube algorithm.

Now, I have no insider information about any of these changes here. I can only work with the observations that I (and some of the other alt media figures I’ve talked to) can confirm from my own experience. But there is no doubt in my mind that some of the filters that were artificially suppressing my channel and alt media content in general have been removed.

Yay! Score one for alt media truth, hey?

If only. No, I believe that what we are seeing is actually a push by YouTube and other tech companies to ensure widespread promotion of certain views questioning the official Covid-19 narrative precisely so that they will have the excuse to move ahead with the online purge, probably during that second (or third or fourth or fifth . . .) wave of the crisis. My theory is that we are being set up for a “deadly second wave” not only in the “viral pandemic” narrative, but also in the “deadly infodemic” narrative, and this sudden “flowering” of online conspiracy theorizing is going to be used as an excuse for purging any and all information that does not comport with the official government narrative of the pandemic.

Think of it as an information warfare false flag: push all sorts of “conspiracy” content—from the well-grounded to the utterly outrageous—so that it is a very visible presence in people’s online experience of this crisis. Then, as the pain deepens and things go south, the conspiracy theorists can be blamed (much like the lockdown protesters) for having muddied the waters with “misinformation.”

We’re already seeing the beginning of this narrative playing out. The social media giants have already committed to “combating fraud and misinformation” regarding Covid-19, and YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki has just outlined exactly what they mean by “fraud and misinformation,” namely, anything that challenges the pronouncements of the World Health Organization.

Personally, I’m going to take advantage of this brief window of opportunity to reach as many new people as I possibly can, but I’m under no delusion that the promotion of truth-related information on the controlled Big Tech social media platforms will continue for very long. As I predicted back in New World Next Year 2020, this is likely to be the year that the internet as we’ve known it ends for good.

3. China Will Be Blamed

Isn’t it funny how just a few weeks ago it was a verboten thoughtcrime to suggest that this novel coronavirus could have anything whatsoever to do with the biosafety level 4 laboratory in Wuhan, and now such theories are mainstream headline fodder? Why do you think that is?

I’ll tell you why: It’s because this is World War III.

If that assertion sounds familiar, that’s because it’s exactly what I wrote in these pages last month. I know you’ve heard me say it before, but it bears repeating: Historians of a future age may just mark the great “coronavirus crisis” of 2020 as the first salvo in the Third World War.

As I’ve also said before, those historians would be wrong. At least, assuming they are writing about the surface-level 2D-chess version of “WWIII,” the one involving “China” vs the “US.” As I laid out here last month, the real World War III is already underway and it’s a war on free humanity by the oligarchs who seek to rule over us. But one can rest assured that if and when those oligarchs decide to truly plunge the world into chaos and let slip the dogs of war, the mis-leaders will use a “coronavirus-was-made-in-a-lab” narrative to justify that war.

The war of words is already underway. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian has already raised the possibility that the US Army brought the virus to Wuhan during last October’s Military World Games. In return, Senator Tom Cotton is suggesting that the virus is a leaked Chinese bioweapon, a claim that is now being doggedly pursued in certain parts of the American mockingbird media.

Now, a number of lawsuits are proceeding on the theory that this is a Chinese biological weapon and that the Chinese government should be held liable for all damages caused by Covid-19 and the ensuing shutdown of the global economy (a cool $20 trillion in one suit’s estimation). Naturally, no one is expecting that Beijing would (or would be able to) fork over $20 trillion on a US judge’s order, but if such a ruling were ever made, one can bet that it would add significantly to the case of the China hawks dwelling in Trump’s swamp.

For the millionth time, let me hasten to add that any such China-US war that develops will be a contrived and manipulated conflict, much like the contrived and manipulated Soviet-US conflict of the 20th century. But the lives lost in such a squabble would be all too real.

Make no mistake, you have not heard the last of the squabble between Beijing and Washington over who is to blame for this mess.

5. The Real Bioweapons Are Waiting in the Wings

Speaking of bioweapons, let us not rule out the possibility that we aredealing with a bioweapon of some sort. In fact, there are compelling reasons to believe that, and the knee-jerk dismissal of the idea from the usual crowd is easily debunkable as unscientific claptrap.

Yet another interesting clue along that particular cookie-crumb trail is emerging in the work of Li Lanjuan at Zhejiang University, who is now reporting the discovery of 30 separate strains of the SARS-CoV-2 virus. Some of these strains, including the one prevalent in parts of Europe and in New York City, are capable of producing 270 times the viral load of the weaker strains. The research also uncovered an unusual development in one of the patients studied:

The researchers also found three consecutive changes—known as tri-nucleotide mutations—in a 60-year-old patient, which was a rare event. Usually the genes mutated at one site at a time. This patient spent more than 50 days in hospital, much longer than other Covid-19 patients, and even his faeces were infectious with living viral strains.

Take this research—along with everything else we’re hearing about this virus—with a hefty grain of salt. But, if true, it certainly could add more weight to the theory that we are not dealing with a naturally occurring virus.

Whatever the case, we know that every major military power has spent vast amounts of money developing biological weapons of various sorts. Officially, these biological weapons programs are always done under the pretense that they are for “defensive” purposes. After all, if we don’t develop these weapons then how will we ever be able to defend ourselves against them . . . you know, if the enemy also develops them? (Don’t think about it too hard.)

Of course, Corbett Report listeners know better. The truth is that biological warfare programs are pursued for offensive purposes, too. The fact that the anthrax that terrorized America in the fall of 2001 came from Fort Detrick is just one indication that these programs exist. Heck, the Project For A New American Century even put race-specific bioweapons” on their wishlist in the “Rebuilding America’s Defenses document (see page 60).

The sad truth is that the possibility of a bioweapon being released—and, inevitably, used in a bioterror false flag event to blame on an enemy—has always been there. But now that we are transitioning from the “age of terror” into the “age of bioterror,” that possibility has become orders of magnitude more likely.

So, on that note, I leave you with this bone-chilling observation: Remember that latest “GatesNotes” that I mentioned way back up in Prediction #1? You know, “The first modern pandemic“? Well, here’s how Bill  Gates talks about this current crisis in his conclusion:

Melinda and I grew up learning that World War II was the defining moment of our parents’ generation. In a similar way, the COVID-19 pandemic—the first modern pandemic—will define this era. No one who lives through Pandemic I will ever forget it. And it is impossible to overstate the pain that people are feeling now and will continue to feel for years to come.

Yes, not only does he liken this “fight” against the “invisible enemy” to World War II—as every politician and pundit seems to be doing these days—but he even goes so far as to call this Pandemic I. Yes, “Pandemic I.” As in part one. The obvious implication here is that, just like World War I was followed by World War II, so, too, will Pandemic I be followed by Pandemic II.

Kind of makes you wonder what else he has up his sleeve, doesn’t it?

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Featured image is from the author

‘Take an injection of a strong disinfectant like Dettol or Listerine and call me in the morning.”

President Donald Trump has clearly gone off the rails with his crazy suggestion that the public might try injecting potent disinfectants to combat COVID-19. He sounds increasingly like the late Rev. Jim Jones of toxic Kool-Aid fame and former TV evangelist Jim Baker who is now hawking his own miracle cure for COVID-19.

The difference is that Jim Baker’s nostrum is not lethal while Rev. Trump’s certainly is.

Where did the world’s most powerful elected official – who now threatens war against Iran and Venezuela – get this loopy notion? Likely via Fox News and from some of his circle of louche business cronies.

These cronies were also the likely source of Trump’s infatuation with the potent anti-malarial drugs chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine to fight COVID-19. He has been urging Americans to take this drug despite evidence that it does not work against the disease and may cause serious damage.

Senior French doctors have been warning of chloroquine’s dangers for the past month. They say it can provoke dangerous heart arrhythmias. It’s not even that effective against malaria.

Furthermore, this drug can induce seizures and psychotic episodes. I took chloroquine while in the bush country in southern Africa covering fighting between the South African military (SADF) and African National Congress fighters. After a few days I started to hallucinate and go paranoid. I avoided it thereafter.

Chloroquine was developed by German chemists as a direct descendant of quinine, which is derived from the bark of the Amazonian cinchona tree. Spanish conquistadors learned from native people to use cinchona bark to combat malaria. Mixed with gin, favored by the British, it became a West Indian afternoon staple – gin and tonic.

During World War II, American soldiers and marines were fed another cinchona offspring, atabrine, which made them sick from liver damage and turned some GI’S blue.

Vanity Fair magazine claims in its current issue that some of Trump’s business cronies had a plan to flood the greater New York City area with the two chloroquines after the president promoted its anti-COVID properties. This would not be surprising, given Trump’s use of his hotel and golf clubs for ‘official’ business.

On a curious sidebar, Trump’s biggest fan, Brazil’s loopy new right-wing president, Jair Bolsonaro, is in hot water at home for dismissing COVID-19 as a ‘cold’, promoting quack remedies and opposing social distancing. His most respected minister was just fired for contradicting Bolsonaro’s health schemes. The same thing just happened in Washington, where the senior administration official in charge of vaccines, Dr. Rick Bright, was just fired for opposing Trump’s quack cures.

The only thing of possible merit being said by Trump is his claim that strong light may help fight COVID-19. In South Africa, Boer farmers told me they would get local farm workers who fell ill to go lie in the sun for hours to cure their ailments. It worked surprisingly well – or the workers were feigning illness. But injecting light into the body, as Trump suggested, is fantasy.

Trump’s wacky health panaceas won’t fool most educated Americans, but they are a danger to his many credulous supporters who see Queens New York property developer Trump as some sort of Christian holy prophet and follow his medical quackery.

Trump is a gifted politician and entertainer but he’s no saintly Albert Schweitzer. Alarmingly, this man’s finger is on the nuclear button. Now that’s a real worry.

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Featured image is from The Unz Review

First published April 10.

Minnesota State Senator Scott Jensen appeared on a local news show to report that doctors were receiving instructions from the Minnesota Department of Health to report Covid19 as a cause of death, even if the patient was never tested.

Senator Jensen, who is also a practising physician, said he had never before in his thirty-five-year career received specific instructions on how to fill out a death certificate.

The apparent policy of Minnesota – to report any and all pneumonia or “flu-like illness” decedents as Covid19 cases, with or without a test – ties in with the US policy as described by the CDC’s official memos.

This is not new information, we covered the guidelines from the CDC, here.

In fact the governments of Italy, Germany, the UK and Austria all doing the same thing.

So, while Dr Jensen’s revelation isn’t as shocking as it would have been just 10 days ago, it does at least demonstrate that, within the medical world, these guidelines are not normal. In a separate interview with Lauran Ingraham, Jensen described the guidelines as “ridiculous”.

According to Jensen, citing a colleague, it is not usual practice to ever put “presumptions or probabilities” on a death certificate, but rather to “stick to the facts”.

The question still hangs in the air: Why do national and regional governments appear to be going out of their way to inflate the Covid19 death statistics?

Dr Jensen has his own idea:

Well, fear is a great way to control people, and I worry about that. I worry that sometimes we’re just so interested in jazzing up the fear factor, that…you know, sometimes people’s ability to think for themselves is paralyzed if they’re frightened enough.

Thoughts to consider.

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With billions across the world under lockdown amid the coronavirus pandemic, one country stands almost alone. In Sweden, daily life has been continuing largely as normal as authorities have taken a radically different approach to tackling the virus.

Though gatherings of more than 50 were banned on Sunday, down from 500 previously, restaurants, bars and shops are still serving customers.

And while high schools and universities have closed their doors, the country is one of the few places in western Europe where primary schools remain open.

Sweden has recorded more than 4,400 coronavirus cases and 180 deaths. But the government has asked only those who are sick or in at-risk groups to stay home

France 24

To Read Complete Commentary by France 24, Click Here

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The United States has launched a propaganda campaign by accusing Damascus of its inability to effectively combat the spread of COVID-19 in Syria, the Russian and Syrian coordination centres said in a joint statement.

According to the statement, the United States has influenced the development of a UN plan for sending a humanitarian medical mission to the camp.

“We believe that the document proposed by the UN was developed under the influence of the United States that had launched a propaganda campaign to accuse Damascus of its inability to effectively counter the spread of coronavirus in the [Syrian Arab] Republic. Obviously, the delivery of humanitarian aid to the [Rukban] camp is necessary for the US solely to achieve its goals..” the statement said.

According to the statement, the reception centre for people in the Al-Waha region is equipped with everything necessary to organise quarantine for Rukban residents before they are transported to temporary accommodation centres in the province of Homs.

Moreover, given the critical humanitarian situation in the Rukban refugee camp, and in order to study the real situation with the spread of COVID-19 there, the Syrian Foreign Ministry sent an official request to the UN to conduct an evaluation of medical mission in the camp.

Russia Blames OPCW for Sacrificing Reputation for West’s Ambition in Syria

The Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) has sacrificed its reputation to serve the West’s geopolitical ambition in Syria, the Russian Foreign Ministry said on Wednesday.

“The OPCW reputation as an authoritative expert body in the field of chemical disarmament has actually been sacrificed to the Middle East geopolitical ambitions of a small group of countries”, the Russian ministry said in a statement.

It argued that the investigative body had been set up in violation of the Chemical Weapons Convention. Only the UN Security Council has the right to apportion blame for chemical attacks.

“[The] activity of this quasi-prosecutor structure, which is dominated by representatives of Western countries, encroaches on the exclusive powers of the UN Security Council and is aimed at the solution of odious political tasks to discredit legally elected authorities of Syria”, it said.

Russia sees the decisions to create the investigative team and fund it with money from the OPCW’s regular budget as illegitimate, the ministry said. It refuses to cooperate with the investigators or finance their activities.

The OPCW published the first report of its newly created investigation and identification team two weeks ago, blaming the 2017 chemical attacks in the Syrian town of Al Lataminah on the country’s government, which denied ever using chemical weapons.

Syrian Ceasefire Guarantors to Hold Ministerial Meeting Via Video Conference on Wednesday

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov will discuss the latest developments in Syria in an online meeting with his Turkish and Iranian counterparts, Mevlut Cavusoglu and Mohammad Javad Zarif on Wednesday.

On Monday, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova confirmed that the sides would hold the meeting in the Astana format.

The previous summit in this format was held in December when the three Syrian ceasefire guarantors reaffirmed the importance of preserving the country’s sovereignty and the implementation of the 1998 Adana agreement between Turkey and Syria, which allows Turkish troops to temporarily enter Syria as far as 5 kilometres (3 miles) to fight the Kurdistan Workers’ Party.

Another meeting in the Astana format was scheduled to be held in Iran in March, but it was cancelled due to the coronavirus outbreak.

Zarif met with Syrian President Bashar Assad in Damascus on Monday and informed him that the trilateral talks would focus on Syria’s Constitutional Committee and the situation in the northwestern province of Idlib.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Monday said that tensions in Idlib were again on the rise, accusing the Syrian government of being behind it and warning of a potential military response to the developments.

The Syrian Constitutional Committee is a product of long-standing efforts by international mediators to reconcile the Syrian government and opposition. The 150-member body with equal representation of the government, opposition, and civil society was launched on 30 October to work toward drafting a new constitution.

The committee failed to reach a mutually beneficial solution to the Syrian crisis during the two sessions convened so far due to disagreements between various factions. A third round of talks is currently being planned.

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Featured image is from The Nation

A Canadian political analyst praised Iran’s improved military situation after the IRGC successfully launched the country’s first military satellite into the orbit, and said US will suffer heavy casualties in case of any war in the Persian Gulf.

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“US Navy Commanders are probably aware that if there is war in the Persian Gulf, it will be bloody and they will suffer heavy casualties, so saner heads might prevail. Let’s hope so,” Mark Taliano told Tasnim.

Taliano is an author and independent investigative reporter who recently returned from a trip to Syria with the Third International Tour of Peace to Syria. In his new book titled “Voices from Syria”, he combines years of research with on-the-ground observations to present an informed and well-documented analysis that refutes mainstream media narratives about the dirty war on Syria.

Following is the full text of the interview.

Tasnim: US President Donald Trump said Wednesday that he’s instructed the US Navy to “shoot down and destroy” any Iranian gunboats “harassing” American ships, in the wake of a tense encounter in the Persian Gulf. “I have instructed the United States Navy to shoot down and destroy any and all Iranian gunboats if they harass our ships at sea,” Trump tweeted. What is your take on this?

Taliano: Empire is crashing and desperate. It seeks to continue its policy of permanent warfare. But it is overextended. Its terrorist proxies in Syria and beyond are losing and will continue to lose. US Navy Commanders are probably aware that if there is war in the Persian Gulf, it will be bloody and they may suffer heavy casualties, so saner heads might prevail. Let’s hope so.

Tasnim: The threat came after Iran’s Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) on Wednesday successfully launched and placed the country’s first military satellite into the orbit. Do you think Trump wants to undermine this? What are your thoughts on the launch?

Taliano: I applaud Iran’s improved defense situation. Strength against oppressors, particularly Empire, is the only road to peace and successful diplomacy

Tasnim: It seems he is trying to divert attention from his poor handling of the COVID-19 crisis. What do you think?

Taliano: The COVID-19 crisis is a manufactured crisis. The US economy is crashing and police state measures are ramping up. Poverty in the US is climbing exponentially. Trump appears to be trying to put people back to work, to lift the lockdown, but other forces are at play which are prolonging the crisis. Will he seek diversions?  Yes.  Will he blame other countries for the crisis?  Yes.

Tasnim: There are reports and concerns that China could win over the post-coronavirus world and leave the US behind. How this could happen?

Taliano: The COVID-19 crisis is undermining global economies, including China’s powerful economy. This is likely one of the goals behind the manufactured crisis. China does not have military bases all over the world, and it does not seek world domination, unlike Washington. So, I do not think that China seeks to “win over” the post-coronavirus world.  China is a trading nation and will continue to expand trade to benefit global economies. That being said, China will resist US military hegemony if necessary, and it is equipped to do so.

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This interview was originally published on Tasnim News Agency.

Mark Taliano is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG) and the author of Voices from Syria, Global Research Publishers, 2017. Visit the author’s website at https://www.marktaliano.net where this article was originally published.

Order Mark Taliano’s Book “Voices from Syria” directly from Global Research.

Mark Taliano combines years of research with on-the-ground observations to present an informed and well-documented analysis that refutes  the mainstream media narratives on Syria. 

Voices from Syria 

ISBN: 978-0-9879389-1-6

Author: Mark Taliano

Year: 2017

Pages: 128 (Expanded edition: 1 new chapter)

List Price: $17.95

Special Price: $9.95 

Click to order

If several weeks of state-imposed house arrest and unemployment have maxed out your stress level, wait until you hear what the experts have in mind to “mitigate” a bad seasonal influenza. 

Here is Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel, brother of Rahm, the former mayor of Chicago and a Clintonite: 

Realistically, COVID-19 will be here for the next 18 months or more. We will not be able to return to normalcy until we find a vaccine or effective medications,” he said. “I know that’s dreadful news to hear. How are people supposed to find work if this goes on in some form for a year and a half? Is all that economic pain worth trying to stop COVID-19? The truth is we have no choice.

You may remember Mr. Emanuel. He’s a “bioethicist” in favor of so-called death panels. He advocated denying medical assistance to old folks who are not “participating citizens,” that is to say sickly retired elders no longer working and paying mandatory financial tribute to the state and its corporate owners.

It probably shouldn’t be surprising a guy who believes dementia and elderly cancer patients must be left to die advocates a year and a half of a freeze-frame economy that will ultimately kill thousands, far more than a seasonal coronavirus. 

Meanwhile, New York governor Andrew Cuomo believes those demonstrating in opposition to mandated confinement and enforced unemployment and eventual impoverishment and homelessness are crybabies. 

A reporter asked Gov. Cuomo what he’d say to New Yorkers who want to go back to work because they’re running out of money, to which he replied, “economic hardship doesn’t equal death”

“You want to go to work? Go take a job as an essential worker” he added https://t.co/BgwoOZsQRy pic.twitter.com/WxGQxtg49p

— CBS News (@CBSNews) April 22, 2020

This sort of contempt for the folks who pay Cuomo’s handsome salary is a common trait shared by psychopathic control freaks. It’s fair to say the gov doesn’t really care about New Yorkers who will end up destitute. He is solely focused on what appears to be a nasty influenza and an endless iron-fisted lockdown, never mind the death toll from a nearly moribund economy will far outpace anything produced by COVID-19 (or any other virus).

The political class and technocrats like Ezekiel Emanuel still have time to build fortresses between themselves and an outraged and violent hoi polloi. Maybe that’s why the National Guard and Army have been mobilized. In six months, will every American know who Gen. Terrence J. O’Shaughnessy is?

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Kurt Nimmo writes on his blog, Another Day in the Empire, where this article was originally published. He is a frequent contributor to Global Research.

Featured image is from Wikimedia Commons

Live music is illegal.

Anyone who has been self-employed understands how difficult it is to make a living do so, let alone as a musician. Lives of many musicians are being destroyed as a result of being banned from working and thus without income. 

One would hope that the music community would harbor a few free thinkers who might say, “Enough! Freedom is essential to the human spirit.” 

As I scour the internet for any sort of dissent coming from musicians regarding the government’s heavy authoritarian response to coronavirus, I am saddened and deeply disappointed. Most everyone is content to push for a government solution to a government-caused problem. I perked up momentarily when I saw an article about Christian McBride’s recent Civil Rights Suite, which pays homage to Rosa Parks, Malcolm X, Muhammed Ali, and Martin Luther King, Jr. – brave people who risked and gave their lives for freedom! Alas, the interview was published in JazzTimes on March 16, just as “flattening the curve” was reaching fever pitch and local governments began shutting down businesses across the country. There was no mention of an impending nationwide loss of civil liberties – a poignant moment for jazz’s modern irrelevance. 

Instead of providing much-needed commentary or going on strike to protest ridiculous authoritarian measures imposed without discussion or evidence, musicians race to the bottom by streaming music out of their living rooms, obediently following “mass-telecommuting” orders from their governors and purchasing expensive new microphones and audio interfaces. Many consider themselves lucky that Facebook, YouTube, and Zoom are here to enable them to “connect” with fans in “this new reality”. Even the musicians who are “speaking out” about their plight and recognizing that streaming performances are not sustainable ultimately agree with the statists that the economy needed to be shut down. 

Everyone did such a good job towing the liberal line on Facebook all this time; now is not the time to speak out and ruin what fledgling career you might have left after coronavirus is over (as if it ever will be). Hopefully your live-streamed living room concert doesn’t contain anything that calls into question the state of emergency or the government’s response, since the same internet and media behemoths who trained society to replace open civilized debate with internet likes and comments are now happily charged with censorship. 

The media-hyped narrative surrounding coronavirus has intentionally induced mass hysteria instead of logical discourse and action. Since the controlled media dominates the narrative of holy essential workers fighting the invisible enemy while the rest of us howl in support, would-be dissenters feel pressured to stay silent. Artists are being punished in the same way as other “nonessential” workers, but are also expected to champion the lockdowns in order to stay in line with their “liberal” friends and fans, in direct conflict with their self-interest. 

Government and media are waging psychological and economical warfare against the public. Where are the minority and civil rights advocates who were once outspoken about the police state? Where are the choirs of virtue-signalers and women’s marchers that were “absolutely terrified” of a Trump presidency? Is anyone calling out or resisting the media’s psychological terror program? Now that all of our constitutional rights have been suspended and a lying authoritarian is in charge, the response from the creative left, other than digging their own grave, is crickets. 

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Ann has made a living as a pianist and music teacher for almost 15 years. She is passionate about collaborative live music, freedom, and peace.

TRASMESSO DA BYOBLU e PANDORATV

Sabato 25 Aprile 2020 DALLA ORE 15

In Diretta Streaming, 25 Aprile 2020

Click to VIEW at 15pm (Italia, CET), 9am (EST, USA, Canada)

April 25, 2020

https://www.byoblu.com

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Il 25 aprile è una data importante nella storia dell’Italia. Commemora il 75 ° anniversario di Liberazione, che è anche l’anniversario della resistenza.

L’anno scorso ci siamo incontrati a Firenze il 7 aprile, in coincidenza con il 70 ° anniversario della fondazione della NATO.

Il tema della nostra conferenza dell’anno scorso era USCITA NATO. NATO EXIT

L’evento è stato organizzato dal Comitato italiano No Guerra, No NATO, in collaborazione con il Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG).

La Dichiarazione di Firenze è stata redatta dal Comitato italiano e dal CRG.

Il 25 aprile 2020, commemorando la liberazione dell’Italia. Esprimiamo la nostra solidarietà al popolo italiano. Allo stesso tempo, esprimiamo la nostra preoccupazione per le basi militari statunitensi stabilite in Italia, immediatamente istituite dopo la seconda guerra mondiale.

Dobbiamo riflettere sulla nostra storia. Era una liberazione o un’occupazione?

L’Unione europea è militarizzata. Il Pentagono è attivamente coinvolto sotto bandiera della NATO in Europa occidentale e orientale.

L’Italia come molti altri paesi sta attualmente attraversando una grave crisi. Quest’anno, il 25 aprile, che commemora la liberazione dell’Italia, non siamo in grado di incontrarci a Firenze per discutere e discutere della “crisi del coronavirus” che sta colpendo milioni di persone in tutto il mondo.

Michel Chossudovsky, Global Research, 25 aprile 2020

Andremo in onda online, accogliendo numerosi oratori.

Il tema della nostra conferenza online:

Liberiamoci del Virus della Guerra

L’anno scorso ci siamo incontrati a Firenze. Quest’anno a partire dalle 15:00 CET, 9:00 (EST).

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The 25th of April is an important date in Italy’s history. It commemorates the 75th anniversary of  Liberation, which is also the Anniversary of the Resistance.

Last year we met in Florence on the 7th of April, coinciding with the 70th anniversary of the founding of NATO.

The theme of our conference last year was NATO EXIT.  

The event was organized by Italy’s Comitato No Guerra, No NATO, in collaboration with the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG). The Florence Declaration was drafted by Italy’s Comitato and the CRG.

On April 25, 2020, Commemorating the Liberation of Italy. We express our solidarity with the people of Italy. At the same time we express our concern regarding the US military bases established in Italy immediately established after World WarII.  

We must reflect on our history. Was it a Liberation or an Occupation?  

The European Union is militarized. The Pentagon is actively involved under banner of NATO in both Western and Eastern Europe. 

Italy like many other countries is currently experiencing a major crisis. This year on the 25th of April which commemorates Italy’s Liberation, we are not able to meet in Firenze to debate and discuss the “coronavirus crisis” which is affecting millions of people Worldwide.

Michel Chossudovsky, Global Research, 25 April 2020

We will be airing online, welcoming numerous speakers.

The Theme of our online conference:

Lets Get Rid of the War Virus. Liberiamoci del Virus della Guerra

Last year we met in Florence. This year starting at 3pm CET, 9am (EST) 

TRASMESSO DA BYOBLU e PANDORATV

Sabato 25 Aprile 2020 DALLA ORE 15 In Diretta Streaming, 25 Aprile 2020

Click to VIEW on 15pm (Italia, CET), 9am (EST, USA, Canada)

https://www.byoblu.com

Questa crisi è un atto di guerra economica

C’è una grave crisi sanitaria che deve essere debitamente risolta. E questa è una priorità numero uno.

Ma c’è un’altra dimensione importante che deve essere affrontata.

Milioni di persone hanno perso il lavoro e i risparmi. Nei paesi in via di sviluppo prevalgono la povertà e la disperazione.

Mentre il blocco viene presentato all’opinione pubblica come unico mezzo per risolvere una crisi globale di salute pubblica, i suoi devastanti impatti economici e sociali vengono casualmente ignorati.

La verità non detta è che il romanzo coronavirus fornisce un pretesto a potenti interessi finanziari e politici corrotti per far precipitare il mondo intero in una spirale di disoccupazione di massa, bancarotta e povertà estrema.

L’anno scorso ci siamo incontrati a Firenze. Quest’anno a partire dalle 15:00 CET, 9:00 (EST), trasmetteremo online in diverse lingue.

***

This crisis is an act of economic warfare

There is a serious health crisis which must be duly resolved. And this is a number one priority.

But there is another important dimension which has to be addressed.

Millions of people have lost their jobs, and their savings. In developing countries, poverty and despair prevail.

While the lockdown is presented to public opinion as the sole means to resolving a global public health crisis, its devastating economic and social impacts are casually ignored.

The unspoken truth is that the novel coronavirus provides a pretext to powerful financial interests and corrupt politicians to precipitate the entire World into a spiral of mass unemployment, bankruptcy and extreme poverty.

Last year we met in Florence. This year starting at 3pm CET, 9am (EST) we will be broadcasting online in several languages.

Below is the text of Florence Declaration

Text of The Florence Declaration

Adopted by more than 600 participants to the Florence No War No NATO Conference, April 7, 2019.

Original in Italian. Translations into English, French, Russian, Spanish. The debates and discussions were chaired by renowned author and geographer Manlio Dinucci.

The event was organized by Italy’s Comitato No Guerra, No NATO, in collaboration with the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG). The Florence Declaration was drafted by Italy’s Comitato and the CRG.

The risk of a vast war which, with the use of nuclear weapons, could mean the end of Humanity, is real and growing, even though it is not noticed by the general public, which is maintained in the ignorance of this imminent danger.

A strong engagement to find a way out of the war system is of vital importance. This raises the question of the affiliation of Italy and other European countries with NATO.

NATO is not an Alliance. It is an organisation under the command of the Pentagon, and its objective is the military control of Western and Eastern Europe.

US bases in the member countries of NATO serve to occupy these countries, by maintaining a permanent military presence which enables Washington to influence and control their policies and prevent genuine democratic choices.

NATO is a war machine which works for the interests of the United States, with the complicity of the major European power groups, staining itself with crimes against humanity.

The war of aggression waged by NATO in 1999 against Yugoslavia paved the way for the globalization of military interventions, with wars against Afghanistan, Libya, Syria and other countries, in complete violation of international law.

These wars are financed by the member countries, whose military budgets are increasing continually to the detriment of social expenditure, in order to support colossal military programmes like that of the US nuclear programme which costs 1,200 billion dollars.

In violation of the Non-Proliferation Treaty, the USA is deploying nuclear weapons in five non-nuclear NATO States, under the false pretext of the ”Russian menace”. By doing so, they are risking the security of Europe.

To exit the war system which is causing more and more damage and exposing us to increasing dangers, we must leave NATO, affirming our rights as sovereign and neutral States.

In this way, it becomes possible to contribute to the dismantling of NATO and all other military alliances, to the reconfiguration of the structures of the whole European region, to the formation of a multipolar world where the aspirations of the People for liberty and social justice may be realised.

We propose the creation of a NATO EXIT International Front in all NATO member countries , by building an organisational network at a basic level strong enough to support the very difficult struggle we must face in order to attain this objective, which is vital for our future.

Video: 70 Years of NATO. The Florence Declaration Calls for NATO-Exit

Video:  70 Years of NATO; The Historical Significance. (Florence, April 7, 2019)

NATO: THE NEED TO EXIT “THE WAR SYSTEM”

At President Trump’s April 18 press briefing on the Covid-19 Pandemic, Dr. Deborah Birx, coordinator of the US response to the outbreak, criticized China’s reports on the Covid-19 data.  

She did so by showing a chart with data from the following countries.  (I have updated the chart with data[1] from the New York Times of April 19, but the two data sets differ by only a small and negligible amount.)

.

Mortality, Deaths per 100,000 population

• Belgium: 49.8
• Spain: 43.8
• Italy: 39.2
• France: 29.4
• UK: 24.2
• Netherlands: 21.4
• USA: 10.9
• Iran: 6.3
• Germany: 5.2
• China: 0.3

Dr. Birx called China’s low number “unrealistic,” saying, “I put China on there so you could see how basically unrealistic this could be.”  That was after President Trump pointed at China’s number and interrupted Birx to ask rhetorically, “Excuse me. Does anybody really believe this number? Does anybody really believe this number?”  (Transcript here; see minute 37:08 and following.)

The argument that Blix and Trump were making was clear.  China’s number was way out of line with the others, lower by more than a factor of 10.  Therefore, China’s report was a lie.

But in her chart Dr. Birx omitted data coming from countries of East Asia and nearby which have been praised by the US media for their performance and whose data are unquestioned in the West.  Here are some relevant omitted data, taken again from the New York Times of April 19, with China included again for comparison

Deaths per 100,000 population

• South Korea: 0.5
• Japan: 0.5
• Australia: 0.3
• China: 0.3
• Singapore: 0.2
• Taiwan: <0.1
• Hong Kong: <0.1

China’s number falls right into line with that of neighboring countries!  Birx’s exercise in fact is a classic example of lying by omission, a half truth being a full lie.

Either Dr. Birx was aware of this data and dishonestly withheld it, or she was not aware of it and she is incompetent.  Neither conclusion is very comforting.  Trump is to be criticized both for his jumping in to bash China and for tolerating someone like Birx with the direction of the government’s response to the pandemic.

These data make it quite clear that countries of East Asia and Australia have performed better than the US and Europe.  Why is this?  Two categories of explanation suggest themselves.  First different strains of the virus may differ in lethality. There is no proof for this, but there is some suggestion of it in laboratory tests.

A second reason for the better performance of East Asian countries and Australia is that they paid attention to what China was doing, perhaps because they are neighbors and better informed of what was going on in China.  Much news about China is simply not reported by the mainstream media in the US and among US “allies.”  In this case, however, concern about a developing pandemic right next door may have lofted news from China over information blockade.  These countries may have seen that China had accumulated considerable experience with the virus and at great cost in life and suffering was having success in stopping its spread.  As a result, they followed what China did in many respects.

But no matter the reason, China’s data fall right in line with many of its neighbors. That is the main point. The bottom line is that these data provide us with no reason to doubt China’s reporting. And the correspondence between the data China released and other regional data is consistent with the fact that China reported Covid-19 deaths accurately.

Since so much attention is devoted to fact checking Trump’s press conferences, I thought surely the press would have picked up on this obvious manipulation of data.  I checked on the fact check of the press conference by CNN, no friend of the Trump administration, and there was no mention of this lie by omission.  Next, I checked PBS, a pillar of probity and respectability and also no friend of Trump.  PBS does a brief online look at each press conference with anchor Hari Sreenivasan and Zachary Green.  They showed Birx’s chart and noted Trump’s comments but made no criticism of the omitted data.  A check of the NYT, another arch-foe of Trump, on the following day disclosed no mention of the Birx-Trump deceit.

How can this be explained?  One cannot help but feel that the idea of Chinese malfeasance in all things has become so deeply embedded in the body politic that to challenge charges made against China is now beyond the pale.  No charge, no matter how unfounded or contrary to actual fact, is too brazen to report without a moment’s consideration.  In fact, to tell the truth in such a situation may damage the career of a rising journalistic “star.”

Why are we to be concerned about this matter? Because China’s experience has had much to teach us.  And since China is now emerging from the recession caused by the pandemic, it may have more to teach us as we move to economic recovery.  For example, to get back to normalcy, China has now rolled out large scale testing on a territory roughly the size of the US.  How is that working and how might it be improved?  To ignore China’s experience without careful evaluation at a time like this could well end up as a self-destructive act.

But there is an even bigger danger here.  There has been a growing antagonism between China and the US since Obama’s ill-advised “Pivot” against China followed by Trump’s equally ill-advised trade war.  Now we find Trump and Biden competing to be the number one China basher.  The press conference of April 18 falls into this pattern, allowing Trump to parade as tough on China and escape from a thrashing by a China-hostile media for his earlier praise of Xi and China for their response to Covid-19. To take the route of hostility to China can lead to a clash between two economic giants and nuclear powers, which could lead to a disaster for all humanity.  As Henry Kissinger reminded us some time back, armed conflict between the two giants could bring the same level of devastation to all the world that WWI brought to Europe.  And that is likely to be an underestimate. Let us step back from this path before it is too late.

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John V. Walsh can be reached at [email protected]  He has written about issues of war, peace and empire, and about health care, for Antiwar.com, Consortium News, DissidentVoice, CounterPunch, The East Bay Times, The Mercury News and others. Now living in the East Bay, he was until recently Professor of Physiology and Cellular Neuroscience at a Massachusetts Medical School.

Note

[1] Data is taken from this site: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/world/coronavirus-maps.html  Data is refreshed several times daily so the latest data will be posted there.

Hold mouse arrow over the country and the deaths per 100,000 will appear.  Data is refreshed several times daily.

Singer/Songwriter Neil Young wrote the song ‘Four Dead in Ohio’ for Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young:

Four Dead In Ohio Lyrics

Tin soldiers and Nixon’s comin’.
We’re finally on our own.
This summer I hear the drummin’.
Four dead in Ohio.

Gotta get down to it.
Soldiers are gunning us down.
Should have been done long ago.
What if you knew her and
Found her dead on the ground?
How can you run when you know?

Gotta get down to it.
Soldiers are cutting us down.
Should have been done long ago.
What if you knew her and
Found her dead on the ground?
How can you run when you know?

Tin soldiers and Nixon’s comin’.
We’re finally on our own.
This summer I hear the drummin’.
Four dead in Ohio.
Four dead in Ohio.
Four dead in Ohio.
Four dead in Ohio.

It was a beautiful Spring day in May of 1970 when four Kent State University students, protesting the illegal bombing of Cambodia and the entire Vietnam (so called) War, were gunned down by Ohio National Guard troops, many the same age as them. The event made national headlines and ignited a mass of students from literally hundreds of universities to go on strike. This writer was in my third or fourth year at Brooklyn College, who remembers, and I finally became outraged. Up until then, at my own admission, I only cared about playing on our soon to be first year football team, and of course, chasing women. Oh yeah, and enjoying the pot that my friends and I smoked each  and every Friday and Saturday night. I was just 20 years of age and really ‘feeling my oats’. Yet, when the news made the daily headlines about those four kids, well, just like ME, I swayed over to the campus looking for action. A large group of us literally chased the military recruiters from our campus. No violence. Those guys probably knew deep down that the shit was gonna eventually hit the fan over this ongoing Amerikan tragedy.

The social shock from the dual killings of Martin Luther King Jr. and Bobby Kennedy still filled many of our young minds two years after the fact… Or should I say facts? Two well respected leaders gunned down and by now, 1970, the conspiracy theories were holding lots of water.

I had already known about The Beast, ever since, believe it or not, I read the 1967 Playboy magazine interview with New Orleans district attorney Jim Garrison about the JFK assassination. It opened my eyes to what probably happened, as compared to what my government was telling us. The more I read of that fateful day in November of ’63 the more I knew, intuitively, that The Beast was real. So, we closed down the campus, took over the school  president’s office, and waited for the cops to come. That event never occurred (to my satisfaction) and we ended the strike after a few days. There were some concessions made, nothing of major importance, but enough to make us say that ‘We Won!’. Those four kids at Kent State didn’t bask in our glory, did they? They say, from historians looking back , that President Nixon was affected enough to start realizing that he had to get out of this mess called Vietnam. Of course, when it comes to The Beast and how it operates, it only reacts when it already has the table turned. So, Nixon waited it out until he won re-election 30 months later to then slowly use the ‘Get out of jail free’ card beginning the process… of course his impeachment/resignation left it to another. Point is, the Kent State killings, coupled with the illegal bombing of another sovereign nation, slowly woke up our Moms and Dads to the truth of it all: This (so called) war was not worth it! I can recall, at an Easter dinner a few weeks earlier, with all my aunts and uncles present, the famous words of my father, who voted for Nixon in 1960, Goldwater in ’64 and Nixon again in ’68: “Let me make this clear. Before I see either of my two sons being sent to Vietnam, I’m gonna personally drive them to Canada!! And that’s that!”

Perhaps it was when a guy a few blocks away from me, Tommy L., joined the Marines and came home in a box. I didn’t know him well at all, but I knew his mom. She was our crossing guard on Ocean Ave, which was right by our church, St. Edmunds. Each Sunday after Mass we would see Mrs. L. as we crossed Ocean Ave. She always had this beautiful smile and greeted everyone with it. After her son died in the Nam, you could see how she now had what I always called ‘The Mona Lisa smile’ from that famous DaVinci portrait. It had that look, to me, of someone who was saying ‘If you only know what I am going through’. Then, a year later, another guy from our neighborhood, a Polish born son of my friend’s building superintendent, Vito P., was killed on some famous (for whom?) hill in Vietnam. The last time I saw Vito was, coincidentally, at Mass in St. Edmunds. He was home on leave from the Army, standing there in his Ranger uniform, replete with beret tucked onto his shoulder. Months later we got the word. I used to see his kid brother, who I knew adored Vito, at the school yard where we played softball. He would be hanging out with characters that I would always warn him against. He ignored me, and got into glue sniffing, Quaaludes and finally horse (heroin). Sometime later, maybe a few years after Vito’s death, his brother OD’d and died. What is it they say ‘When the war comes home’? Well in May of 1970 it had… and transformed me into the activist anti empire and anti war writer and street corner protestor  I have been since then.

And what about ‘Feeding the beast’? Well:

1933 Germany: Reichstag fire and Enabling Laws to snuff out political parties and dissent

1964 Amerika: Gulf of Tonkin resolution based upon imaginary attack by North Vietnam on our ship

1991: Saddam Hussein encouraged by US non commitment to Kuwait to invade Kuwait over oil drilling dispute. War on Iraq followed

2001, September 11th- Twin Towers and Pentagon attacked in highly suspicious manner, leading to the Patriot Act, increased military spending and 2nd war on Iraq to follow

March 19th , 2003 – Illegal and immoral war on Iraq over WMDs to this day never found. More increases in military spending along with occupations of Iraq & Afghanistan. Hundreds of thousands of innocent civilians and NATO servicemen dead or damaged for life.

2008-09 – Subprime scam costs taxpayers trillions of dollars to bail out failed Wall Street companies.

Meanwhile, health care system is still a joke as is the needs of infrastructure throughout Amerika.

2011 Libya- USA led NATO carpet bombing of Libya, causing death , destruction and refugee crisis that has still caused havoc throughout the region and Europe.

2020 Pandemic- Trump crew ignored the crisis for almost 2 months, even denying it as a HOAX. Our economy is teetering on default as the super rich get most of the bailout. Oh, but the increased military spending survives, eating up around HALF of our federal tax revenues.

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Philip A Farruggio is a contributing editor for The Greanville Post. He is also frequently posted on Global Research, Nation of Change, Cross Currents and Off Guardian sites. He is the son and grandson of Brooklyn NYC longshoremen and a graduate of Brooklyn College, class of 1974. Since the 2000 election debacle Philip has written over 400 columns on the Military Industrial Empire and other facets of life in an upside down America. He is also host of the ‘It’s the Empire… Stupid‘ radio show, co produced by Chuck Gregory. Philip can be reached at [email protected].

After weeks of dismissing it as a liberal “hoax” designed to unseat the president, brushing the virus off as no big deal and under control, the Trump administration is clearly floundering in its response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Despite weeks of warning where it could have taken precautionary steps, the United States currently has four times the confirmed cases and twice the deaths of any other country. At the same time, the countries it is currently placing under economic siege, totaling around a quarter of the world’s population, are faring far better and leading the global fight against the coronavirus.

China, for instance, the first epicenter of the outbreak, has managed to slow its new COVID-19 cases to a trickle, reopening for business after losing 4,632 people – a number that, in the context of a stark April reality, appears impressively low. Although much of the discourse in the West condemns the Chinese government’s supposedly incompetent or slow response to COVID-19, the reality is that Beijing alerted the World Health Organization on December 31, when just 27 cases (and no deaths) had been identified, with authorities not yet even aware that the condition was a coronavirus.

The country is at the forefront of the production and distribution of protective and medical equipment throughout the world and, along with Russia (another sanctioned state) is one of the few nations to fly medical personnel around the world to help other countries. Russia even sent a planeload of cargo to the United States, despite the American sanctions hurting its economy. While their actions have been presented in corporate media as cynically trying to “curry favor” abroad, the aid has been much appreciated in countries suffering under the pandemic. In contrast, the U.S. has led the world in stealing or requisitioning supplies destined for other nations.

Another sanctioned state exporting doctors across the world during the pandemic is Cuba, the island nation is sending medical staff to neighbors like Haiti, Venezuela, Suriname and Jamaica and also further afield to Italy. “This is a global battle and we have to fight it together,” said nurse Carlos Armando Garcia Hernandez, capturing the medical internationalist spirit of Cuban medicine pioneered by Che Guevara, who quipped that, “The life of a single human being is worth a million times more than all the property of the richest man on earth.” A Cuban antiviral drug, Interferon Alpha 2b, has also proved successful in boosting patients’ immune systems, helping them fight off the coronavirus, and is now being used worldwide.

Venezuela, meanwhile, struggling under crippling U.S. sanctions that have claimed the lives of at least 100,000 people according to an American UN Special Rapporteur, has mobilized to fight the virus head on. The country has conducted twice as many tests as any other South American nation, but only 288 COVID-19 cases have been found, leading to only 10 deaths. Even before any cases were confirmed, President Maduro declared a health emergency, quickly closing public buildings like theaters and restaurants. His administration rapidly organized a huge online database where citizens could inform authorities of their symptoms. Medical professionals visited tens of thousands of people in their own homes, distributing test kits and advice. Maduro decreed the suspension of all rent and utility bills during the crisis, also banning the firing of workers.

A testament to the country’s efforts is that thousands of Venezuelan expats in the U.S., at least 92 percent of whom voted against Maduro in the 2013 elections, came back to the country during the pandemic, suggesting they are far more confident in Venezuela’s handling of the crisis.

Meanwhile, Vietnam, a country not currently sanctioned but having faced Washington’s wrath for decades, surely earns the top prize in handling the virus. Despite recording its first positive case just two days after the first American one, authorities have managed to limit the outbreak to just 268 cases and zero deaths. This is not because they are not testing, far from it. In fact, the country has designed, developed and mass produced multiple test kits all costing less than $20 each and giving dependable results in less than 90 minutes.

Those arriving from abroad are quarantined for two weeks while anyone coming to a major city or building has their temperature checked. Whole villages and towns have been fenced off due to one positive test. There is certainly an authoritarian element to their response; those lying about their past whereabouts or found to be spreading false information about the pandemic can face charges. However, the response has hinged upon the strong collective solidarity of the Vietnamese people, many of whom have likened the present events to the Tet Offensive, where millions united in secret to drive the American invaders back in a surprise attack.

In Iran, one of the first global hotspots and a country that planners in the U.S. were gleefully predicting would fall in on itself under the strain, has managed to get to grips with the pandemic. The number of new daily cases of COVID-19 has been falling day-on-day since March 30.

Ironically, Mohammad Morandi, a professor at the University of Tehran, claims the crippling sanctions that blocked Iranian oil exports have inadvertently better prepared them to deal with the total collapse in global oil prices than U.S. allies like Saudi Arabia, the UAE or Qatar.

Trump blocked Iranian oil exports & inadvertently prepared Iran for the collapse of the oil market.

Are others prepared? Will the Saudi regime survive? UAE? Kuwait? Qatar? US shale? What will happen to the US banking sector & oil industry?

The balance of power is shifting.

— Seyed Mohammad Marandi (@s_m_marandi) April 20, 2020

While the sanctioned countries vary greatly in their level of human development and the democratic credentials of their governments, they all share one thing in common: they have refused to buy into a U.S.-led neoliberal economic order that appears totally unprepared and unable to come to terms with a globalized pandemic. Countries that have been the most enthusiastic adopters of neoliberalism have, not coincidentally, found their individualistic ideology that promotes greed and discourages collective solutions sorely lacking in tackling a public health crisis that threatens the entire world.

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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.