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In April, I wrote a column outlining the constitutional violations of mask mandates and asking why the courts have failed to abide by the line of Supreme Court cases protecting the right to bodily integrity. Well, on Friday a Florida appeals court did exactly that, perhaps in more emphatic language than a Kentucky judge last week.

Although Florida has been largely free of state-based COVID restrictions and never had a mask mandate, several counties, such as Alachua, zealously instituted unconstitutional regulations until fairly recently. In a landmark ruling on Friday, Florida’s First District Court of Appeals ruled that a lower court had erred in tossing out the lawsuit against Alachua County’s mask mandate because it should be held as presumptively unconstitutional.

“Based on what the supreme court has told us about the scope of article I, section 23, Green (and anyone else in Alachua County) reasonably could expect autonomy over his body, including his face, which means that he was correct to claim an entitlement to be let alone and free from intrusion by Alachua County’s commission chairman,” Judge Adam Scott Tanenbaum, an appointee of Gov. Ron DeSantis (R), wrote. “The mask mandate, then, implicated the right of privacy. According to Gainesville Woman Care, the mask mandate was presumptively unconstitutional as a result.”

This language is very significant because it’s the first time a judge is using the principle of bodily autonomy to affirm a constitutional right not to have one’s breathing restricted. The lawsuit was originally brought last May by Justin Green, a Gainesville business owner, but he was denied an injunction against the mandate by Eighth Judicial Circuit Judge Donna Keim.

There are several very striking elements about this ruling, which will reverberate throughout the country even as the mask mandates officially expire. Defendants had argued that the mandate is now moot given the orders of the governor requiring all counties to end their mandates. However, the judge noted in a footnote, “Because of the nature of the various emergency orders that we have seen and the county’s continued commitment to public mask wearing, we are not convinced that this is the last that we will see of this issue.”

In other words, you can’t have a gross violation of the most fundamental rights hanging over our heads at any time and somehow suggest that we have no recourse to eliminate it. “We conclude, then, that this case fits within the exception to the mootness doctrine, which is for controversies that are capable of repetition, yet evading review,” presciently observed Judge Tanenbaum.

The judge also recognized that the pretext for these “fiats” and “diktats” is rooted in abuse of emergency powers, which can be repeated at any moment:

It would behoove the trial court also to consider that while article I, section 23 “was not intended to provide an absolute guarantee against all governmental intrusion into the private life of an individual,” Fla. Bd. of Bar Exam’rs re Applicant, 443 So. 2d 71, 74 (Fla. 1983), “even in a pandemic, the Constitution cannot be put away and forgotten.” Roman Catholic Diocese of Brooklyn v. Cuomo, 141 S. Ct. 63, 68 (2020). And there is this warning from William Pitt the Younger, roughly paraphrasing a similar sentiment in John Milton’s Paradise Lost: “Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom.”

Drawing on precedent from the state’s supreme court, the judge ruled that bodily autonomy is a fundamental right. What this means is that the starting point for any mask mandate must begin with the government proving that masks absolutely work and are necessary to achieve a vital state interest. “The supreme court in Gainesville Woman Care told us multiple times what this special approach means for the evidentiary burden at a temporary injunction hearing: A plaintiff does not bear a threshold evidentiary burden to establish that a law intrudes on his privacy right, and have it subjected to strict scrutiny, ‘if it is evident on the face of the law that it implicates this right.'”

Also notable in this opinion is how the judge believes that the harm to plaintiffs is not just the threat of fines or denial of service.

Another consequence was being subjected to whispering informants, impelled by county-designed publicity like the following proposed signage encouraging citizens to inform on their disobedient neighbors.

The judge warned, “The threat of government-sponsored shaming was not an idle one. The chairman who issued the original mask mandate stated publicly that ‘masks are the only outwardly visible signal that you are contributing to the solution.'”

In other words, this line of reasoning will give plaintiffs throughout the country a continued cause of action to fight both the mask mandate and the vaccine mandate. Both of them violate bodily autonomy and use public shaming to coerce people to violate their autonomy. According to this ruling, any edict requiring masking for those not vaccinated would also violate the Constitution.

The next step for those seeking judicial relief would be a victory in federal court. It happens that the only lawsuit against the CDC mask mandate on public transportation, including airplanes, is in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida. Lucas Wall, a plaintiff from D.C., is suingthe TSA, the CDC, and other federal agencies in federal court because he was prevented from traveling without a mask and is now stuck in Florida. The well-written and researched complaint accuses the government of violating fundamental rights, usurping legislative power, and providing no data that any of the policies are effective.

It’s also possible that Gov. Ron DeSantis’ lawsuit (also brought in the Middle District of Florida) against the CDC’s mandates on cruise liners could result in the collapse of the entire federal mandate, including on airplanes. During oral arguments last Thursday, U.S. District Court Judge Steven Merryday observed that the CDC’s own study showed that masks were “barely statistically significant” in stopping the spread of COVID-19. “Where does this mask efficacy theory come from?” Merryday said. “We’ve had masking and social distancing for a long time and we had a pandemic in the middle of it.”

Throughout the hearing, the judge seemed to oppose the entire premise that non-pharmaceutical interventions work against the virus, possibly opening the door for a very broad ruling against mask mandates, a ruling he promised “soon.”

At this pace, perhaps it’s a good thing for some of the mandates to remain in place just long enough to get standing to sue against them. For if we fail to destroy this ill-gotten government power while it’s unpopular, it will surely rear its ugly head next flu season.

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Data clearly show ivermectin can prevent COVID-19 and when used early can keep patients from progressing to the hyper-inflammatory phase of the disease. It can even help critically ill patients recover

Ivermectin has a long history of use as an antiparasitic, but its antiviral properties have been under investigation since 2012

Studies have shown ivermectin inhibits replication of SARS-CoV-2 and seasonal influenza viruses, inhibits inflammation through several pathways, lowers viral load, protects against organ damage, prevents transmission of SARS-CoV-2 when taken before or after exposure, speeds recovery and lowers risk of hospitalization and death in COVID-19 patients

Doctors have been told not to use ivermectin as large controlled trials are still lacking. However, once you can see from clinical evidence that something is working, then conducting controlled trials becomes unethical, as you know you’re condemning the control group to poor outcomes or death. In fact, this is the exact argument vaccine makers now use to justify the elimination of control groups and giving everyone the vaccine

The Frontline COVID-19 Critical Care Alliance recommends widespread use of ivermectin for all stages of COVID-19, including prevention

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Watch the video here.

In the video above, DarkHorse podcast host Bret Weinstein Ph.D., interviews Dr. Pierre Kory about the importance of early treatment of COVID-19 and the shameful censoring of information about ivermectin, which has been shown to be very useful against this infection.

It’s no small irony then that YouTube deleted this interview, which is why I embedded a Bitchute version. How this interview could possibly be labeled as misinformation is a mystery, considering all they do is discuss published research. Not to mention, they’re both credentialed medical science experts.

Kory, a lung and ICU specialist and former professor of medicine at St. Luke’s Aurora Medical Center in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, is the president and chief medical officer¹ of the Frontline COVID-19 Critical Care Alliance (FLCCC). Another founding member of FLCCC is Dr. Paul Marik² who, as noted by Kory, is the most-published intensive care specialist who is still practicing medicine and seeing patients.

Marik, known for having created an effective sepsis treatment protocol, was asked by a group of peers early on in the pandemic to help create a treatment protocol for COVID-19. The resulting collaboration led to the creation of the FLCCC. Each of the five founding members has treated critical illnesses for decades and, as Weinstein says, they are “unimpeachable. You couldn’t ask for better credentials. You couldn’t ask for a better publication record.”

Yet, despite stellar credentials and being on the frontlines treating hundreds of COVID-19 patients, they have been dismissed as “kooks on the fringe, making wild-eyed claims,” Weinstein says. How can that be? Initially, the FLCCC insisted, based on the evidence, that COVID-19 was a corticosteroid-dependent disease and that corticosteroids were a crucial part of effective treatment.

“I was actually invited to give Senate testimony back in May [2020] where I testified that it was critical to use corticosteroids; that lives are being lost [because we weren’t using it],”Kory says.

“As you might know, I got killed for that. We got killed for that. We were totally criticized for not having an evidence-base. [Yet] our reading of the evidence was that you had to use it. So that basically that’s how we came together, and that was the first components of our protocol.”

Ivermectin Suitable for All Treatment Stages

The FLCCC’s COVID-19 protocol was initially dubbed MATH+ (an acronym based on the key components of the treatment), but after several tweaks and updates, the prophylaxis and early outpatient treatment protocol is now known as I-MASK+³ while the hospital treatment has been renamed I-MATH+,⁴ due to the addition of ivermectin.

The two protocols — I-MASK+⁵ and I-MATH+⁶ — are available for download on the FLCCC Alliance website in multiple languages. The clinical and scientific rationale for the I-MATH+ hospital protocol has also been peer-reviewed and was published in the Journal of Intensive Care Medicine⁷in mid-December 2020.

Since those early days, the FLCCC has been vindicated and corticosteroids, as well as blood thinners, are now part of the standard of care for COVID-19 in many places. The same cannot be said for the remainder of the protocols, however, including the use of ivermectin, which continues to be suppressed, despite robust clinical evidence supporting its use in all phases of COVID-19.^8,9As noted by the FLCCC:¹⁰

“The data shows the ability of the drug Ivermectin to prevent COVID-19, to keep those with early symptoms from progressing to the hyper-inflammatory phase of the disease, and even to help critically ill patients recover.

… numerous clinical studies — including peer-reviewed randomized controlled trials — showed large magnitude benefits of Ivermectin in prophylaxis, early treatment and also in late-stage disease. Taken together … dozens of clinical trials that have now emerged from around the world are substantial enough to reliably assess clinical efficacy.”

Kory has testified to the benefits of ivermectin before a number of COVID-19 panels, including the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs in December 2020¹¹ and the National Institutes of Health COVID-19 Treatment Guidelines Panel in January 2021.¹²

A Disease of Phases

As noted by Kory, they rather quickly realized that COVID-19 was a disease with very specific phases, and that successful treatment depended on the phase the patient was currently in. It starts out as a general viral syndrome, much like a cold or flu. Most patients recover without incidence. However, in a subset of patients, things take a turn for the worse after Day 5. Their oxygen level starts dropping and lung inflammation sets in.

“We now know that it’s a cell called a macrophage that gets activated and attacks the lungs,” Kory explains. “So, you have this sort of immune response that is attacking the lungs and the lungs start to fail … So, it’s predominantly a severe lung disease …

We knew relatively early on that by the time they get to the ICU … there’s not a lot of viral replication on going on. In fact, you can’t culture a virus after about Day 7 or 8. So, it’s actually a disease of inflammation, not viral invasion …

So, you didn’t have to go after the virus at that point, you had to actually check the inflammation … What we think triggers [the] inflammation is actually the viral debris. It’s the RNA that triggers this massive response. It’s not the virus. It’s actually the debris of the dead virus that does it.”

Kory notes that after having treated the first handful of patients, he realized that anticoagulants, blood thinners, were needed, as there was abnormal blood clotting going on in all of them. Yet for some reason the medical community was, again, told not to do it because there were no clinical trials supporting the use of anticoagulants for a viral illness.

“It was bizarre,” Kory says. “They were like, you can’t observe, you can’t make clinical reasoning, you can’t deduce, you need a trial before you do [anything] … Everyone talks about evidence-based. I’m like, what about experience-based medicine? I’ve been doing this for 30 years. Why can’t I do what my experience tells me to do? …

You couldn’t actually doctor. I felt like I was being handcuffed. I I’ve never seen that in my life before … I have the sense that doctors have been forcibly demoted from the position of scientific clinician to technician …

I’ve never been asked before to get advice from … desk jockeys. I mean, they’re not on the front lines … I’ve never been asked to do that before. I’ve always been asked to use the best extent of my experience and judgment and insight to best help the patient. That’s the oath I took …

Instead we’re in this situation where if we open our mouth and say the wrong word, suddenly there are warnings appended to what we’ve said. It’s insane. It’s limiting discussion, limiting choices, limiting approaches.”

Overwhelming Evidence for Ivermectin

Kory spends a significant portion of the 2 1/2-hour interview reviewing the evidence for using ivermectin. This drug has a long history of use as an antiparasitic. It’s been credited with virtually eradicating onchocerciasis (river blindness), a condition caused by a parasitic worm. The drug was originally made from a soil organism found in Japan. However, as early as 2012, researchers started looking at ivermectin’s antiviral properties.

In April 2020, an Australian group showed ivermectin eradicated all viruses studied in as little as 48 hours, at least in the petri dish. Due to the state of emergency the world was in, some countries, including Peru, decided to recommend ivermectin to their population. It was well-known that the medication was safe, so the risk of doing so was very low.

As was the trend, Peruvian officials were roundly criticized for using an “unproven” remedy, and shortly thereafter, they removed it from the national guidelines. Some states continued to give it out, however, and according to Kory, each ivermectin campaign resulted in a precipitous decline in cases and deaths.

Marik was the first in the group to really take notice of the remarkable consistency in the studies using ivermectin. Kory dove into the research right behind him, and came to the conclusion that there indeed was something special about this drug. The population-based evidence was also very strong.

With regard to calls for randomized controlled trials, Kory points out that once you can see from clinical evidence that something really is working, then conducting controlled trials becomes more or less unethical, as you know you’re condemning the control group to poor outcomes or death. In fact, this is the exact same argument vaccine makers now use to justify the elimination of control groups by giving everyone the vaccine.

“When I posted our preprint November 13 [2020], I literally thought the pandemic was over,”Kory says. “We showed the basic science level. We showed multiple clinical trials. We showed the epidemiologic effects.

Everything was there to show that this is an intervention on the par of vaccines that could literally extinguish the pandemic, and quickly. I thought at the beginning that it was as simple as putting the evidence out there … and what happened? Crickets! Nothing happened …

I cannot believe that this is occurring. Literally, people are dying because they don’t know about this medicine. Providers are being told not to use the medicine … And I’ve never studied a medicine which has more evidence than this …

You have dozens of randomized controlled trials conducted by interested and committed clinicians from oftentimes low and middle income countries around the world. And there’s no conflicts of interest. None of them is going to make a million dollars by finding out that ivermectin works in COVID. None of them have a conflict of interest.”

For example, studies have shown ivermectin:¹³

Ivermectin Has Been Intentionally Suppressed

As noted by Weinstein, ivermectin appears to be intentionally suppressed. It’s simply not allowed to be a go-to remedy. The obvious question is why? Don’t they want to save lives? Isn’t that why we shut down the world?

“I would have these data arguments,” Kory says. “But it’s not about the data. There’s something else. There’s [something] out there that is just squashing, distorting, suppressing the efficacy of ivermectin, and its egregious.”

Indeed, as noted by Weinstein, it’s not even difficult to prove that ivermectin is being suppressed and censored. Censorship of certain COVID-related information, such as ivermectin, is written into the community guidelines. You’re not allowed to talk about it. If you do, your post will be censored, shadow-banned or taken down. If you persist, your entire account will be taken down.

Mexico’s Experience With Ivermectin

Another population-based experiment that demonstrates ivermectin’s real-world usefulness occurred in Mexico. Kory explains:

“Mexico did something which I think is the model for the world. I think, on a public health level, it’s what every country in the world should adopt, at a minimum. They [had a] clinicians committee.

They actually got expert clinicians [and] they gave them a seat at the table at the public health level. It’s called IMSS, Instituto Mexicano del Seguro Social. That’s the agency which controls a good portion of their healthcare infrastructure, mostly outpatient, I think …

In December, hospitals were filling. It was a crisis almost like in India. They decided to deploy ivermectin using a test and treat strategy. Basically, anyone who appeared at the testing booths, if you tested positive, you were given ivermectin at a reasonably low dose … 12 milligrams … and only two days’ worth. They got four pills [at 3 mg each].

And when they did that, you saw across Mexico this precipitous decline in deaths and hospitalizations. And, if you look a few months later, right now — and this is publicly available data — look at the occupancy of beds in hospitals in Mexico, throughout the entire country, we’re talking about 25% to 30% occupancy.

There’s nobody in the hospitals in Mexico. They’ve basically decimated COVID in that country by using a test and treat strategy … Those were real public health leaders. They made a risk-benefit decision. They used their clinical judgment and expertise to have the right people at the table.”

As noted by Kory, the IMSS was attacked by the federal health minister, but they fought back, and laid out the evidence supporting their decision. This included studies showing a 50% to 75% reduction in hospitalizations using just that four-pill regimen.

As for the FLCCC, they recommend dosages between 0.2 mg and 0.4 mg per kilogram when taken at first signs of mild symptoms. For mild disease, they recommend continuing the drug for five days. For moderate disease, of if you start taking it late, they recommend continuing until you’re recovered.

The in-hospital protocol involves higher doses. Keep in mind, however, that the FLCCC protocols include several other remedies, not just ivermectin, so be sure to review the latest guidance.^17,18

Some regions in India have also used ivermectin. Kory believes the minister of Goa made some of the boldest moves in the world with regard to ivermectin, recommending all adults over the age of 18 to take ivermectin for five days, as a preventive. Uttar Pradesh also gave it out, while other states, such as Tamil Nadu, outlawed it. Here too, population-based data suggest ivermectin is tightly correlated with a decline in hospitalizations and deaths.

Where You Can Learn More

While ivermectin certainly appears to be a useful strategy, which is why I am covering it, it is not among my primary recommendations. In terms of prevention, I believe your best bet is to optimize your vitamin D level, as your body needs vitamin D for a wide variety of functions, including a healthy immune response.

What’s more, although ivermectin is a relatively safe drug, it can still have side effects. Vitamin D, on the other hand, is something your body absolutely requires for optimal health, which is why I would encourage you to focus on vitamin D first.

As for early treatment, I recommend nebulized hydrogen peroxide treatment,^19,20 which is inexpensive, highly effective and completely harmless when you’re using the low (0.04% to 0.1%) peroxide concentration recommended.

All of that said, ivermectin and several other remedies certainly have a place, and it’s good to know they exist and work well. On the whole, there’s really no reason to remain panicked about COVID-19. If you want to learn more about ivermectin, there are several places where you can do that, including the following:

As noted by Lawrie during her closing address at the 2021 International Ivermectin for COVID Conference:²⁹

“The story of Ivermectin has highlighted that we are at a remarkable juncture in medical history. The tools that we use to heal and our connection with our patients are being systematically undermined by relentless disinformation stemming from corporate greed.

The story of Ivermectin shows that we as a public have misplaced our trust in the authorities and have underestimated the extent to which money and power corrupts.

Had Ivermectin being employed in 2020 when medical colleagues around the world first alerted the authorities to its efficacy, millions of lives could have been saved, and the pandemic with all its associated suffering and loss brought to a rapid and timely end …

With politicians and other nonmedical individuals dictating to us what we are allowed to prescribe to the ill, we as doctors, have been put in a position such that our ability to uphold the Hippocratic oath is under attack.

At this fateful juncture, we must therefore choose, will we continue to be held ransom by corrupt organizations, health authorities, Big Pharma, and billionaire sociopaths, or will we do our moral and professional duty to do no harm and always do the best for those in our care?

The latter includes urgently reaching out to colleagues around the world to discuss which of our tried and tested safe older medicines can be used against COVID.”

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Notes

^1, 2 FLCCC Alliance

^3, 5, 17 FLCCC Alliance I-MASK+ Protocol

^4, 6, 18 FLCCC MATH+ Hospital Protocol

⁷ Journal of Intensive Care Medicine December 15, 2020 DOI: 10.1177/0885066620973585

^8, 11 FLCCC December 8, 2020

⁹ Medpage Today January 6, 2021

¹⁰ Newswise December 8, 2020

^12, 15 FLCCC January 7, 2021 Press Release (PDF)

^13, 25 FLCCC Summary of Clinical Trials Evidence for Ivermectin in COVID-19 (PDF)

¹⁴ European Journal of Medical & Health Sciences 2020; 2(6)

¹⁶ Swiss Policy Research December 31, 2020

¹⁹ Science, Public Health Policy, and the Law July 2020; 2: 4-22 (PDF)

²⁰ A Holistic Approach to Viruses by Dr. Brownstein

²¹ Evidence-Based Medicine Consultancy Ltd.

²² Ivermectin for COVID Conference

²³ Ivermectin for COVID Conference Speakers List

²⁴ Bird-group.org Conference videos

²⁶ Frontiers of Pharmacology 2020 DOI: 10.3389/fphar.2021.643369

²⁷ FLCCC FAQ on Ivermectin

²⁸ c19Ivermectin.com

²⁹ The Desert Review May 6, 2021

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On June 16, 2021, the late rap icon Tupac Shakur would have turned 50 had he survived a still unsolved drive-by shooting in Las Vegas 25 years ago. Few knew that behind his “gangsta rap” façade, Tupac was an activist leader who worked to counter CIA drug trafficking through street gangs.

Tupac did this with his Black Panther-extended family and others. Evidence supports that this and Tupac’s accumulating influence contributed to U.S. intelligence’s murderous targeting of him, his Panther family, and activist-converted gang leaders.

BMW in which Tupac was shot. [Source: hip-hop-music.fandom.com]

Panther Leader Tupac, Belafonte, and Black Panthers Politicize Gangs

By the time Tupac was 18 years old in 1989, the New Afrikan Panthers, a group active in at least eight cities and trying to replicate the Black Panthers, had elected Tupac as their national chairman.

Tupac only left that leadership position in 1990 to eventually produce five full CDs and hundreds of unreleased rap songs before his death in September 1996. He also acted in over six films, befriending his co-stars Janet Jackson, Mickey Rourke, Tim Roth, and Jim Belushi.

[Source: newafrikan77.wordpress.com]

In the early 1990s, former Black Panthers and other activists successfully developed a gang truce between several sections of the Bloods and the Crips, who vowed to fight police racism instead of each other.^[1] Former Panthers and civil rights activists such as singer Harry Belafonte helped the peace truce, and activist conversions spread to Oakland, which worried the intelligence community.^[2]

[Source: youtube.com]

The Bloods and Crips not only encompassed the majority of the estimated 100,000 gang members in Los Angeles. News articles also acknowledged that the two gangs had spread to states across the U.S. ^[3] and were reportedly active in all four branches of the armed services.^[4]

Tupac worked on this movement with his imprisoned radical stepfather Mutulu Shakur and they came up with Tupac’s Thug Life Movement as part of the gang peace truce movement. Mutulu had been a member of the Republic of New Afrika in the 1960s. Mutulu organized the gang peace truce movement in the federal prison system.^[5]

Tupac’s manager and longtime political mentor, Watani Tyehimba, confirmed that Tupac had decided to pretend to be a “gangsta” in order to appeal to gangs and then politicize them,^[6] as part of what he wrote out as a “Code of Thug Life.” This plan also had Tupac hosting gang leaders meeting for truce summits. Tyehimba had been a Revolutionary Action Movement-based Black Panther in Los Angeles and was the co-founding Security Director of the New Afrikan People’s Organization (NAPO).^[7]

As the movement spread nationwide, it further included Latino gangs, while activists such as comedian Dick Gregory, NFL legendary running back Jim Brown, and others also got involved.^[8]

In Los Angeles, gang leader-turned socialist writer “Monster” Kody Scott and Congresswoman Maxine Waters helped the movement. Scott changed his name to Sanyika Shakur in deference to Tupac and Mutulu.^[9]

Gang-Activist Conversions Counter CIA Drug Trafficking, Death Row Link

Whistleblowers such as CIA agent John Stockwell have discussed CIA heroin trafficking during the Vietnam War, while Drug Enforcement Agency Director Robert Bonner detailed CIA cocaine trafficking in the 1980s and early 1990s, as reported by 60 Minutes.^[10] Mutulu Shakur had founded Lincoln Detox in the Bronx in the early 1970s, with Black Panthers and the Young Lords backing him. Lincoln was the first to use acupuncture to counter drug addiction.^[11]

New York City first de-funded Lincoln Detox, reportedly due to its radical political education work. It then used dozens of armed police to shut its doors completely for a time, and its director received death threats, just before his bizarre death.^[12]

In California, the late investigative journalist Gary Webb had researched and written extensively on the CIA’s work with the Nicaraguan Contras supplying cheap cocaine to the Los Angeles-based Freeway Ricky Ross. Ross then trafficked cocaine nationwide.^[13] Webb wrote that Michael “Harry-O” Harris worked as one of Ross’s two key buyers and understudies in trafficking crack cocaine.^[14]

Harris’s attorney, David Kenner, helped Harris start Death Row Records (Tupac’s last record label), while making himself owner of a parallel parent company, Godfather Productions.^[15]

Harris then went to jail for the next 30 years [he was pardoned in 2021 by Donald Trump], and Kenner continued operations. Investigating Los Angeles police detective Russell Poole found much support for the reports that Death Row was trafficking drugs and guns.^[16]

New York saw the conversion of thestate chapter of the Latin Kings into the Almighty Latin King and Queen Nation(ALKQN). In The Almighty Latin King and Queen Nation: Street Politics and the Transformation of a New York City Gang, published by Columbia University Press, it was reported that the 3, 000-strong group stopped drug dealing and started to get involved in activism.^[17] Former Young Lords activist Vicente “Panama” Alba influenced Latin Kings leader,Antonio “King Tone” Fernandez to make this conversion.^[18]

Vicente “Panama” Alba of the Young Lords on our left walking away in 1996. Antonio “King Tone” Fernandez on the far right. [Source: photo courtesy of author John Potash]

Furthermore, former top-level Wall Street insider and U.S. Deputy Housing Commissioner Catherine Austin Fitts explained how cash can increase stock values by twenty times, and this is why banks and other corporations that launder this money support the CIA drug trafficking.^[19] It is also why the Latin Kings’ conversion, alone, cost the CIA traffickers millions of dollars a year and the money launderers billions of dollars a year.

Law Enforcement’s Iron Fist Response

After King Tone converted the Latin Kings into the activist Almighty Latin King and Queen Nation, the NYPD arrested King Tone on many charges, but courts failed to convict him. Prosecutors finally sent King Tone to prison long-term for “conspiracy to sell and distribute heroin” in 1998. Panama Alba and other prominent leaders have said on film they believe it was a frame-up in line with other police machinations against ALKQN.^[20]

It came after the FBI and New York police spent a million dollars on Operation Crown that year. In a single raid during that operation, they used 1,000 federal, state and local police to kick down doors just before dawn but failed to find evidence against King Tone and 91 other ALKQN leaders in what was reportedly the largest raid in New York City since alcohol prohibition.^[21]

The law enforcement branch also responded fiercely in California, from the Los Angeles Police Department starting special gang units to U.S. Attorney General William Barr, saying gangs replaced Communism as the major domestic subversive threat. The FBI deployed a 100-agent unit to investigate the Bloods and the Crips. ^[22]

Police raided activists’ gang-truce meetings, gunmen murdered gang-truce leaders, and the government framed gang-truce leaders. For example, the government quickly freed a gunman accused of murdering gang-truce leader Tony Bogard in 1994.^[23]

Police also arrested gang-truce leader Dewayne Holmes at a gang-unity dance. Trial appearances on his behalf by California Congresswoman Maxine Waters and Governor Jerry Brown could not free him.^[24]

Los Angeles Bloods and Crips agree to a truce in 1993 but gang-truce leaders were afterwards arrested. [Source: finalcall.com]

The Shakur Extended Family’s Leftist Leadership and the Murderous Targeting of Tupac

One-time Harlem Black Panther leader Afeni Shakur named Los Angeles Black Panther leader Geronimo Pratt (later Geronimo Ji Jaga), Tupac’s godfather, and Bronx Black Panther Assata Shakur, Tupac’s godmother. Afeni Shakur lived with Mutulu Shakur, Tupac’s stepfather, who was a member of the Republic of New Afrika. In 1984, Mutulu was arrested on charges of helping break Assata Shakur from jail in the 1970s and “conspiring” to rob a Brinks armored truck in 1981.^[25]

Afeni had worked with Watani Tyehimba on trying to free Geronimo Pratt and Watani introduced Tupac to New Afrikan People’s Organization national chairman Chokwe Lumumba. Tupac made Lumumba his national lawyer.^[26]

The author’s book that exposes the FBIs war on Tupac and other Black leaders. [Courtesy of John Potash]

Evidence supports at least four U.S. Intelligence attempts to murder Tupac before their successful fifth attempt. The FBI’s Counterintelligence Program (Cointelpro) had targeted Tupac’s Black Panther family before it officially ended in 1971.

FBI Cointelpro agent Wes Swearingen said in a memoir that Cointelpro actually continued into the 1990s under different names.^[27]

As a 2017 biopic on Tupac stated, evidence supports a Justice Department admission of more than 4,000 pages in Tupac’s FBI file.^[28]

Regarding Tupac, in 1991, just days after his first MTV video release, Oakland police stopped Tupac for jaywalking, choked him unconscious, and repeatedly banged his head against the curb. Both police actions had previously led to victims’ deaths. In 1992, police also passively watched as strangers punched and then shot at Tupac for no reason in Marin City, California.^[29]

At ten cents per page, the author had to pay over $400 to receive the FBI’s 4,000+ page file on Tupac. [Courtesy of John Potash]

In 1993, witnesses described how two purportedly off-duty police officers ran over to Tupac’s car, smashed his car window and shot at him using a gun stolen from an evidence locker. In 1994, a doctor’s affidavit confirmed how alleged muggers shot Tupac twice in the skull as he lay on the lobby floor of a Times Square recording studio. Tupac miraculously survived, but police refused to review lobby surveillance video of the incident and simply closed the investigation.^[30]

Tupac after being assaulted by police. [Source: 2paclegacy.net]

And finally, by September 1996, Tupac had completed his short three-CD recording contract with Death Row Records. Los Angeles Police Detective Russell Poole reported finding dozens of his fellow police officers at all levels of Death Row Records. In his book LAbyrinth, veteran reporter Randall Sullivan quoted Poole as saying his supervisors told him these Death Row cops could be considered “troubleshooters or covert agents.”^[31] Filmmaker Nick Broomfield said Poole stated that he believed his fellow cops were involved in Tupac’s murder.^[32]

Kevin Hackie, who was one of Tupac’s top bodyguards, said he was on the FBI’s payroll while working for Death Row.^[33] Hackie actually defied the FBI in telling Tupac not to go to Las Vegas the night of his murder. Death Row then fired Hackie, before the FBI then framed and jailed him. Hackie reported to Detective Poole that Santa Monica police had confiscated a gun that they gave to him. The FBI then told him to give that gun to police working for Death Row, and that was the gun that killed Tupac.^[34]

Tupac’s murder temporarily ended the gang truce as Death Row spread the word that the Crips gang killed Tupac, before activists quelled the week-long reignited gang war.^[35]

Continued Attacks and Coverup around the Shakurs?

In one of the few definitive media investigations of Tupac’s murder, A&E’s Who Killed Tupac? documentary series (2017), attorney Benjamin Crump and others provided some answers. For one, they showed the ridiculous weakness of Los Angeles police disinformation agent Greg Kading’s evidence that Sean “P Diddy” Combs paid Crips gang members to kill Tupac. Secondly, they stated that 28 people associated with Tupac and the investigation suffered early deaths since his murder.

One of the first two examples came when Watani Tyehimba’s son, Yakhisizwe Tyehimba, who acted as a Tupac bodyguard, died mysteriously soon after Tupac.^[36]

Then, Tupac’s backup singer, Yafeu “Kadafi” Fula, the son of Bronx Black Panther Sekou Odinga and Panther Yaasmyn Fula, was shot in the head a few months after Tupac was shot.^[37] Fula was the top forthcoming witness to Tupac’s murder but police never detained him for a statement.^[38]

In 2015, Afeni Shakur separated from her husband, and then filed for divorce in 2016. She died suddenly in 2016, at the age of 69, while in the middle of a court battle over Tupac’s $50 million estate. Afeni’s body was bizarrely given to that estranged husband instead of her adult daughter Sekyiwa Shakur.^[39] Authorities also denied Mutulu Shakur parole in 2016, as well as compassionate parole in 2020 when he was diagnosed with cancer. ^[40]

While such attacks continue on Tupac’s Shakur family, his legacy as a rap icon, film star, and particularly his important activism deserves more widespread attention.

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John Potash is the author of two books: The FBI War on Tupac Shakur and Black Leaders, and Drugs as Weapons Against Us: The CIA War on Musicians and Activists.  Both books have been made into films. John can be contacted at: [email protected].

Notes

1. Jesse Katz, “Crips and Bloods Factions Prepare Ground for Widespread Gang Truce Cease-fire,” Los Angeles Times, May 19, 1994, p. 1. http://articles.latimes.com/1994-05-19/local/me-59703_1_city-s-black-gangs-crips-and-bloods-factions-widespread-gang-truce 
2. Joe Garofoli, “Singer Belafonte feels the beat of antiwar sentiment/Keynote speaker at Oakland rally hears international criticism,” San Francisco Chronicle, April 5, 2003, p. A15. 
3. Mitchell Landsberg and John Mutchell, “In Gang’s Territory, a Weary Hope,” Los Angeles Times, December 5, 2002, p. A1.
 
4. Reuters, “Gangs Found in Military, Magazine Says,” St. Louis Post-Dispatch, July 17, 1995, p. A4. 
5. Bruck, “The Takedown of Tupac,” The New Yorker, July 7, 1997, p. 53. He reportedly started organizing the truce in the Lompoc federal prison, http://www.hitemup.com/tupac/family.html 
6. Tupac’s national lawyer, Chokwe Lumumba May 6, 2000. See John Potash, Drugs as Weapons Against Us (Walterville, Oregon: Trine Day, 2015), p. 337. Also see John Potash, The FBI War on Tupac Shakur and Black Leaders (Baltimore, MD: Progressive Left Press, 2007). 
7. See “Code of Thug Life” reprinted in Jamal Joseph, Tupac Shakur: Legacy (New York: Atria, 2006), pp. 37-38. See also Bruck, New Yorker,  http://www.hitemup.com/tupac/family.html . [NOTE: Why space below?] 
8. Plain Dealer Staff, “‘Stop the Killing’ Gang Summit: How it began and who was involved (with photo gallery),” The Cleveland Plain Dealer, March 24, 2013. 
9. Mike Davis, “Who Killed LA: Part Two: The Verdict is Given,” New Left Review 198, pp. 34-35; Kody Scott (aka Sanyika Shakur), Monster: The Autobiography of an L.A. Gang Member (New York: Penguin, 1994), pp. vii-viii, 347-49. 
10. Stockwell at 4:00 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pf98TYr0MUc 
11. Mia Donovan, Dope Is Death (2020) https://www.imdb.com/title/tt11828284/ Lee Lew Lee, All Power to the People (1996) https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0210482/ 
12. Dr. Mutulu Shakur, A Life of Struggle, October 16, 1992, Chicago Full Interview; Ellinor R. Mitchell, “The Lincoln Story,” National Acupuncture Detoxification Association. 
13. Gary Webb and Rick Ross, as well as DEA agent whistleblower Michael Levine, on The Montel Williams Show, [NOTE: Is something missing here? If not, change comma to period.} 
14. Gary Webb, Dark Alliance: The CIA, the Contras, and the Crack Cocaine Explosion (New York: Seven Stories Press, 1998). 
15. Ronin Ro, Have Gun Will Travel: The Spectacular Rise and Violent Fall of Death Row Records (New York: Doubleday, 1998), pp. 76-80. 
16. Police Detective Russell Poole said this on film in Nick Broomfield, Biggie and Tupac (2002). Poole names many of the cops working in Death Row throughout this book. Randall Sullivan, LAbyrinth, (New York: Grove/Atlantic, 2018) pp. 40, 124, 166, 169-70, 191. Also, www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/lapd/interviews/poole.html 
17. David Brotherton and Luis Barrios, The Almighty Latin King and Queen Nation: Street Politics and the Transformation of a New York City Gang (New York: Columbia University Press, 2004). On membership, p. 199. Further see video, Black and Gold: The Latin King and Queen Nation, a documentary (Big Noise Films, 1999). 
18. “Seize the Hospital to Serve the People: An Interview with Activist Cleo Silvers, 2009,” www.socialmedicine.org/media/.
 Personal interviews with Vicente “Panama” Alba October 25, 1996 and May 1, 1998; also, personal interview with Antonio “King Tone” Fernandez and Hector Torres, April 25, 1997. [NOTE: Why space below?] 
19. Catherine Austin Fitts, “Narco Dollars for Beginners; How the Money Works in the Illicit Drug Trade; Part II: The Narco Money Map,” Narco News Bulletin, October 31, 2001; also, Michael Smith, “Banks Financing Mexico Drug Gangs Admitted in Wells Fargo Deal,” Bloomberg News, September 29, 2010. http://www.narconews.com/narcodollars2.html
20. Big Noise Tactical Media and PM Press, Black and Gold: The Story of the Almighty Latin King and Queen Nation (2008). 
21. “Operation Crown: The Political Persecution of the Latin Kings,” Revolutionary Worker#959, May 31, 1998. 
22. Mike Davis, “Who Killed LA? A Political Autopsy,” New Left Review 197, 1993, p. 7;
Megan Garvey and Rich Winton, “City Declares War on Gangs,” Los Angeles Times, December 4, 2002. 
23. Jesse Katz, “Man Freed in Death of Gang Leader, Courts: Rodney Compton is to get one year probation in the slaying of Tony Bogard, who helped reach a truce between the Crips and Bloods,” Los Angeles Times, June 1, 1994, p. 3; activist witness broadcast on 99.1, WBAI radio in New York City, April 29, 2001.
 
24. Mike Davis, “Who Killed Los Angeles? Part Two,” New Left Review 198, 1993, p. 35. 
25. Connie Bruck, “The Takedown of Tupac,” The New Yorker, July 7, 1997, p. 47. On Assata Shakur, see editorial, “Thoughts and Notes on Tupac,” The Amsterdam News (New York), December 17, 1994, p. 24. 
26. Personal interview, Watani Tyehimba, May 2, 2000; personal interview with Chokwe Lumumba, May 10, 2000; Michael Eric Dyson, Holler If You Hear Me, p. 84. 
27. M. Wesley Swearingen, FBI Secrets: An Agent’s Exposé (Boston, MA: South End Press, 1994); Jon Roland, FBI Secrets: An Agent’s Expose (a review of the Swearingen book). https://constitution.org/2-Authors/jroland/col/mwswear.htm 
28. This writer filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request in 1999. A Justice Department worker inadvertently admitted over 4,000 pages in Tupac’s FBI file, explaining it’s 10 cents a page so over $400 would be needed. See letter requesting that from this writer. Also, Benny Boom, All Eyez On Me (2017) https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1666185/ 
29. “Claim Against the City of Oakland, California, Claimant: Tupac Shakur” by John Burris, Esq., photocopied for Jacob Hoye and Karolyn Ali, eds., Tupac: Resurrection (New York: Atria Books, 2003), pp. 78-79; Danyel Smith “Introduction,” Vibe editors, Tupac Shakur (New York: Crown Publishing, 1997), p. 17; Robert McFadden, “At Two Rallies, Protesters Accuse Police in Killings,” New York Times, August 3, 2003, p. 32; Barry Paddock, Rocco Parascandola and Corky Siemaszko, “Homicide: Medical Examiner Says NYPD Chokehold Killed Staten Island Dad Eric Garner,” New York Daily News, August 21, 2014; Marku Reynolds, Thug Immortal (Documentary, Xenon Entertainment, 1997) starting at 51:30 minutes; Veronica Chambers, “Ain’t Nothing Changed but the Weather,” Premiere, August 1993. 
30. Personal interviews with Tupac’s Atlanta trial lawyer, Ken Ellis, May 12, 2000; eyewitness Watani Tyehimba, November 5, 2003, and eyewitness Billy Lesane, April 10, 1999; and Tupac’s national lawyer, Chokwe Lumumba May 6, 2000. Personal interview with Tupac’s Atlanta trial lawyer, Ken Ellis, May 12, 2000. Also see Danzy Senna, “Violence is Golden,” Spin Magazine, April 1994, pp. 43-47, and, Scruggs and Marshall, “Witness says off-duty cops fired first shot,” Atlanta Journal Constitution, p. D12, November 3, 1993. On bullets through head while on ground, see Deposition of Barbara Justice, MD, New York v. Tupac Shakur, December 21, 1994. 
31. Police Detective Russell Poole in Broomfield, Biggie and Tupac, and in Sullivan, LAbyrinth, pp. 40, 124, 166, 169-70, 191. Also, www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/lapd/interviews/poole.html 
32. Originally in Nick Broomfied, Biggie and Tupac (2002), excerpted for John Potash, Drugs as Weapons Against Us: The CIA War on Musicians and Activists (2019) trailer (long form). 
33. Billboard staff, “FBI Informant Testifies in B.I.G. Case,” Billboard, June 23, 2005. 
34. Former Detective Russell Poole and Michael Douglas Carlin, “The Facts Behind the Murder of Tupac Shakur,” Century City News, March 12, 2019. 
35. Nick Broomfield quoting police officer and FBI informant Kevin Hackie in documentary, Biggie and Tupac, starting at 1:08:44. Sullivan, LAbyrinth, pp. 141-43, 145 
36. Tupac’s national lawyer, Chokwe Lumumba May 6, 2000. Printed in John Potash, Drugs as Weapons Against Us (Walterville, Oregon: Trine Day, 2015), p. 337. Also printed in John Potash, The FBI War on Tupac Shakur and Black Leaders (Baltimore, MD: Progressive Left Press, 2007). 
37. Cathy Scott, “Shakur Shooting Witness Found Dead in New Jersey,” The Las Vegas Sun, November 13, 1996. 
38. On Las Vegas police ignoring Fula, see Cathy Scott, The Killing of Tupac Shakur (Las Vegas, Nevada, Huntington Press, 2^nd ed. 2002), pp. 111-12. 
39. Nancy Dillon, et al, “Gust Davis, estranged husband of Tupac Shakur’s mother, claims her body to be cremated,” New York Daily News, May 9, 2016. 

40. My Religion Is Rap Admin, “Tupac’s Stepfather Mutulu Shakur Denied Early Release from Federal Prison Even Though He’s Dying From Cancer,” My Religion Is Rap, November 6, 2020. 

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The situation in Nagorno-Karabakh is nearing another round of escalation with regular reports about new casualties in border regions. Some believe that the resumption of military hostilities could become a chance for Baku to take control of more territories in Nagorno-Karabakh but it would also be a possibility for external forces to strengthen their influence in the region through various public and clandestine measures.

In particular, the recent war in Nagorno-Karabakh unveiled a large involvement of Syrian mercenaries in military activities. Dozens of them were killed while fighting along the Azerbaijani forces in the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh, while thousands of militants were deployed there.

Turkey was the main partner of Baku during the last war, having sent its military equipment, military, as well as Syrian proxies.

The al-Qaeda-affiliated al-Nusra Front (now known as Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham) is among the main Turkish suppliers of cannon fodder ready to take part in military conflicts all over the world in return for money, supplies and support.

However, Turkey is not the only supporter of the Syrian terrorist group. In the course of the conflict in Syria, the al-Nusra Front has established fruitful contacts with various actors, mostly NATO member states and Gulf monarchies, that funded and supported it to achieve own goals in the region. Diplomats and media outlets of these states tried to brand the terrorist organization as a “moderate opposition”. Furthermore, a new round of attempts to whitewash the al-Qaeda-linked terrorists has been picking up momentum in the West.

On May 31, Russian TASS news agency reported that the British MI6 intelligence agency’s representative met with the leader of the al-Qaeda-affiliated al-Nusra Front. According to the reports, the meeting took place near the Bab al-Hawa Border crossing on the Syrian-Turkish border.

A day later, former HTS commander Saleh al-Hamwi, commonly known as “As al-Seera fi al-Sham,” confirmed that the group leader Abu Mohamad al-Julani met with Jonathan Powell. He stressed out that the meeting was held four years ago, but this event still provides a useful insight at the core of relations between the al-Nusra Front and its Western partners.

The meeting established a close contact with international terrorist groups active in Syria. An agreement was reportedly reached on maintaining a permanent communication with international terrorists designated as such by the United Nations Security Council. The UK’s allies, primarily the US, were supposed to take part in rebranding of the al-Nusra group.

It is easy to notice that the media and diplomatic campaign to whitewash  HTS, al-Qaeda’s main branch in Syria, is still going in full force.

On April 2, the American Public Broadcasting Service published a part of an interview with the terrorist group’s leader Abu Mohamad al-Julani. The leader was interviewed by PBS journalist Martin Smith on February 1 and 14. The rare interview will be part of an upcoming FRONTLINE documentary examining al-Julani’s emergence.

The al-Nusra whitewashing serves the greater purpose of more freely funding of its activities aimed at combating government forces in Syria together with their Russian allies, as well as facilitating the deployment of Syrian mercenaries in other regions of the world, such as Nagorno-Karabakh.

Meanwhile, ties between London and Ankara have gained a new momentum amid tensions between Turkey and the United States. Thus, the UK finally gained the role of a good partner in crime for Erdogan.

A new escalation in Nagorno-Karabakh would serve interests of the whole ‘alliance’ of Azerbaijan, Turkey and Britain.

A crushing advance of Azerbaijan and its allies on Armenian forces in Karabakh would allow to destabilize once again the situation near the southern borders of Russia, which is London’s main interest. This will also trigger important military and diplomatic developments in the region.

Thanks to efforts of the anti-Armenian Pashinyan clique in Yerevan the Armenians already lost large territories and undermined relations with the only real ally of Armenia – Russia. Attempts of Pashinyan and his masters to hide the reality behind the defeat of the Armenians in Karabakh also had a negative impact on Moscow’s reputation in Armenia as their propaganda tried to paint Russia as the side responsible for the negative outcome of the recent Karabakh war for Armenia. Meantime, chances that Russia will intervene militarily in the escalation on the territory of the contested region in case of the resumption of large-scale clashes between Azerbaijani and Armenian forces still remain low. The potential Russian participation in the conflict will become possible only in case of a direct intervention of Azerbaijan into the internationally recognized territory of Armenia.

Thus, a further escalation of the military conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan could be expected in the coming weeks. The UK-Turkish-Azerbaijani coalition will not waste time as long as the Western puppet Pashinyan still keeps in hands his crumbling power.

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It’s amazing how often Sweden still crops up in conversations. It didn’t impose tough lockdown, kept primary schools and core economic activities functioning, issued clear guidelines and relied on voluntary social distancing and personal hygiene practices to manage the crisis. For harsh lockdowns to be justified elsewhere, Sweden had to be discredited. Hence the harsh criticisms of Sweden’s approach last year by the New York Times, Newsweek, USA Today, CBS News and others.

But with Sweden’s demonstrable success, goalposts have shifted. Every time it’s mentioned as a counter to Europe’s high Covid-toll lockdown countries, the response now is: ‘But their Nordic neighbours did much better. Look at Denmark’. Let’s ‘interrogate’ this argument.

First off, the situation in any other country is irrelevant to assessing the utility of modelled projections on which the lockdowns were based. The 16 March 2020 Neil Ferguson model from Imperial College London (ICL), by now deservedly infamous, precipitated lockdowns with grim predictions of 510,00 British and 1.2 million American dead in an unmitigated spread of the virus.

The second sentence of the summary boasted its epidemiological modelling ‘has informed policymaking in the UK and other countries’. In an article in Nature last June, the team claimed lockdowns had ‘averted 3.1 million deaths’ in eleven European countries as of 4 May 2020.

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Today, June 15, 2021, Israeli Jewish supremacists are marching in East Jerusalem as Palestinians call for a ‘Day of Rage’ in response.

“We call on all free people everywhere to stand in solidarity with the Palestinian people and its just cause and end the Israeli aggression on our people and holy places,” The Committee of Islamic and National Groups stated. “Let the world know that the continuous Israeli violations in Jerusalem will remain to be the trigger, which sparks the fight.”

Palestinians see the Israeli annual raid of the Old City (including the Haram al-Sharif complex, where al-Aqsa mosque is housed) in celebration of the occupation, annexation and Judaization of Jerusalem under the flag of the Zionist Jewish state as an abomination.

In previous years, Palestinian Jerusalemites mostly cowered and shuttered their businesses and homes in the face of the rampage and hate-filled slogans of the Israeli Jewish marchers. They too took to describing the event as instigated by “far-right and anti-Palestinian activists,” rather than by the very apartheid and systemic structure of the Jewish supremacist state itself.

But this time, as Ahmed Abu Artema wrote in The Electronic Intifada on 14 May 2021, this time, it’s different:

The current escalation is distinguished by the fact that the Palestinian people demanded a response to the practices of the Israeli occupation. Hamas, in responding, is being considered heroic.

There is no public judgment or denunciation of Hamas’ decision to act, even when citizens are paying the harshest price of Israeli aggression, losing their loved ones and their homes.

It is clear in Gaza that Palestinians remain firm in their belief in resistance as the pathway to liberation from occupation.

This round of fighting is also significant because it came as a response to continuous violations in Jerusalem.

All previous rounds of Hamas escalation have been provoked by Israeli aggression on the Gaza Strip. Thus, when Jerusalem called for Gaza’s aid, and Gaza rose to defend Jerusalem, this amplified the burgeoning sense of Palestinian national unity and liberated the Palestinian resistance from its isolation in Gaza.

In effect, this time, Hamas is saying to Israeli Jews in occupied Jerusalem: If you want to worship in the Old City, leave your occupation flags at home and leave al-Aqsa alone.

Wikipedia informs us about Jerusalem Day in the following harmless Israeli PR narrative as: “an Israeli national holiday commemorating the reunification of Jerusalem and the establishment of Israeli control over the Old City in the aftermath of the June 1967 Six-Day War.” All kosher and above board.

That PR is in keeping with today’s rhetoric by Internal Security Minister Omer Bar-Lev, who issued a statement justifying the provocation of the Flag Day March through Jerusalem as, of all things, a democratic act!

“In a democracy it is allowed and important to demonstrate for all types of causes as long as it is within the confines of the law. We will hold a police assessment about the events and we will operate according to the recommendations of the police.”

For Palestinians, the rampaging herds of Jewish youth annually coursing through their streets shouting “Death to Arabs” are a far cry from what Bar-Lev is suggesting — that they represent a far-right racist group, like the KKK in the US, who have the right to freedom of speech in a democracy. What he is obscuring is the fact that Israel, as a state from top to bottom, is a Jewish supremacist colonial-settler state whose reason and strategy for existing is exactly that of these rampaging hoards.

To Palestinians, this march through Jerusalem means that “opportunities” continue to open up in Israel for “a lasting and radical solution of the most vexing problem of the Jewish state” — the Palestinian population.

Consider this:

On this day in 1948, future Israeli Prime Minister Sharett exulted to World Zionist Organization head Goldman on Israel’s successful ethnic cleansing: “the most spectacular event in the contemporary history of Palestine…is the wholesale evacuation of its Arab population…The opportunities opened up by the present reality for a lasting and radical solution of the most vexing problem of the Jewish state, are so far-reaching, as to take one’s breath away. The reversion to the status quo ante is unthinkable”, i.e. the refugees would not be allowed to return.

What we’re seeing here is the rise of a nakedly genocidal regime in Israel, one that is identical and faithful to its fundamental Zionist roots. And as a friend commented on Facebook: “This is going to go from horrible to a level of atrocious we can’t imagine. And thus makes stepping up the resistance even more imperative.”

Palestinian rage is righteous. It ought to be clear to the world now what and who “the obstacle to peace” is and has always been. This remarkable Palestinian uprising may have been sparked by the Sheikh Jarrah expulsions, but it has radiated across all of Palestine and beyond.

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Rima Najjar is a Palestinian whose father’s side of the family comes from the forcibly depopulated village of Lifta on the western outskirts of Jerusalem and whose mother’s side of the family is from Ijzim, south of Haifa. She is an activist, researcher and retired professor of English literature, Al-Quds University, occupied West Bank. 

She is a frequent contributor to Global Research.

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Since the Sandinistas won the 2006 election their anti-poverty policies have had enormous success.

The country is 90% self-sufficient in food. 99% of the population have electricity in their homes that is now generated with 70+% green energy; International financial Institutions including the World Bank, the International Development Bank and The Central American Bank for Economic Integration praise Nicaragua for its excellent, efficient project execution. it has one of the best health systems in Latin America praised by the International Monetary Fund, with 20 new state of the art hospitals since 2007 achieving one of the lowest Covid mortality rates in the world. Poverty, extreme poverty, maternal, child and infant mortality have all been cut at least in half. Nicaragua is number one in the world in both women in politics and women in ministerial positions and it is fifth in gender equity behind the Nordic nations.

Many more advances for the majority of the population in education, housing and infrastructure have resulted in huge wins for the FSLN in the last two elections (2011 and 2016) and polls indicate that in the Nov. 7 presidential elections they will garner at least 60% of the vote with at least 70% voter turn-out. Some 95% of the adult population have identity cards needed for voting. If the US public knew what this nation, impoverished by nearly 200 years of US war and aggression, has been able to achieve in fourteen years it would surely encourage them to demand better education, infrastructure and universal health care in the United States.

To prevent similar acts of sovereignty by small nations still considered colonies by the United States, the CIA prepared the way for the 2018 coup attempt and has never stopped trying to overthrow the Sandinista government since. The CIA uses US agents, many who pass themselves off as journalists or activists, as well as those eternally stationed at the US embassy; it has provided millions of dollars to hundreds of Nicaraguans acting as foreign agents as well as their nonprofit organizations that conspire against the Sandinista government like those recently arrested for money laundering, fraud and requesting foreign intervention.

The US helped grow the pro-US anti-Sandinista media in Nicaragua

Much of the US-directed propaganda apparatus was designed and funded by the US after the FSLN won the 2006 elections ending 17 years of three US-directed governments. A subversive front of newspapers, magazines, television stations, radio stations, websites, news agencies, and social media pages was formed. Journalists and media outlets were paid by the US (millions through the USAID, NED, IRI and US foundations) and much of it was administered by the Chamorro family media cartel, specializing in fake media campaigns to try to promote anti-Sandinista hatred and mistrust of the government.

Part of this has been known for some time. For example, in May, 2018 during the coup, Tom Ricker of the Quixote Institute described 55 NED grants awarded between 2014 and 2017 for US$4.2 million “as part of a U.S. government-funded campaign to provide a coordinated strategy and media voice for opposition groups in Nicaragua. NED grants fund media (radio, social media and other web-based news outlets) and opposition research. In addition, strategies targeting youth get substantial funding, along with programs seeking to mobilize women’s and indigenous organizations. Though the language is of support for “civil society” and “pro-democracy” groups, the focus on funding is specifically to build coordinated opposition to the government.”

US propaganda funds for 2018 coup channeled through Chamorro family media dynasty

On June 2, Journalist William Grigsby on his news analysis program, Sin Fronteras, revealed (see below) US documents which show that the CIA openly channeled US$16.7 million for the coup attempt, between February 2017 and July 2018, through the Violeta Barrios de Chamorro Foundation whose director Cristiana Chamorro is part of a famous family of oligarchs that count eight members as previous presidents; she is also the daughter of former president Violeta Barrios de Chamorro. She and her uncle are owners of the only daily, La Prensa, funded by the US for pro-Contra lies since the 1980s. Her brother Carlos Fernando has his own media dynasty. US funds to the VBCHF support these family businesses. Her now-deceased husband, Antonio Lacayo is widely considered to have exercised great power during her mother’s presidency from 1990 to 1997 overseeing some 7 billion dollars in privatization of state property, as well as privatization of education and health care. During the early 90s you couldn’t get so much as an aspirin at a government hospital without paying for it.

Chamorro Family, 1990s, Cristiana is second from the right, Antonio Lacayo on far right, laprensa.com.ni

The US$16.7 million was given by US agencies and foundations specifically to finance media terrorism [lies, fake news and distortion to foment assassinations and hate, destabilize and create chaos] to incite and maintain the coup attempt. The Chamorro Foundation also received €679,530 from European government-financed organizations during this period. The attempted coup left more than 200 families in mourning, thousands of people traumatized as well as much destruction and severe damage to the economy resulting in the loss of at least 130,000 jobs.

The Foundation’s Director, Cristiana Chamorro, was accused by the Public Prosecutor’s Office of money laundering, and given house arrest on June 2, 2021. She closed the Foundation in February of this year saying she didn’t want to comply with the “Foreign Agents” law passed in October 2020, similar to but not as strict as the 1938 US Foreign Agents Act. Under the Nicaraguan law, organizations receiving foreign funding must report that funding and how it is used – thousands of nonprofits are doing this with no problem.

According to Grigsby and Liberal Party news analyst, Enrique Quiñones, there was still at least US$7 million in the Foundation account when she closed it and this money appeared soon afterward in three of her personal banks accounts.

The US$16.7 million given by the CIA during that short time-span was just the money given for fake news – to fund every kind of news media, programs, social media and to directly fund individuals. Many millions more were provided to other nonprofits and “Human Rights” organizations. It is telling that in a country of 6.3 million people there are four human rights organizations – all funded by the US government and one was even founded by the US government in the 80s to cover up for the Contra.

Within that US$16.7 million, US$9,409,853 was provided by USAID for individuals, projects and media. The National Endowment for Democracy gave the Foundation US$564,134 for a project “promoting independent journalism and freedom of expression” in November 2017.

US Financing of Propaganda for Coup Attempt

The Soros Foundations – owned by New York-based tycoon George Soros – also financed fake news in Nicaragua through several of his organizations that are known to fund destabilization efforts around the world: US$6,722,325 was given by two of the Soros Foundations: US$6,148,325 by the Soros Foundation for the project, “independent and transparent journalism” given in March 2018 a month before the coup began, and $574,000 in July 2018, the month the coup was defeated, by the Open Society Foundation for the “independent journalism and citizenship” project.

The 2017-2018 funding of opposition media and journalists through the Chamorro Foundation by USAID, NED and Soros Foundations – US$16,696,312 million provided just before and during the attempted coup is a small part of funding provided by agencies like USAID, NED, IRI, Freedom House and foundations, like those of Soros with close ties to the Council on Foreign Relations.

USAID spent US$160 million on agents and agent organizations to try to topple the Sandinistas

The US began major destabilization attempts after the Sandinistas won the 2006 elections.

The bigger picture on USAID financing for destabilization in recent years is that it gave US$160 million to opposition organizations and individuals between 2015 and early 2021, information still available by year on the internet; however much information about recipient organizations has been removed. Most information about NED money and the recipients has also been removed.

Official US documents presented by Grigsby in July 2020 provide more detailed evidence of which nonprofits and individuals benefitted from US$30 million right before the 2018 coup.

Breaking the Yankee Propaganda Apparatus

The USAID says this about their role in Nicaragua, “USAID/OTI partnered with independent media to operate and produce more targeted digital content during the political crisis. The program enabled independent media to preserve and promote democratic discourse, absent further economic destabilization or dramatic state intervention.”

In a recent article Rita Jill Clark-Gollub writes:

“Anyone who has been watching Nicaragua knows that these supposedly “independent” media inNicaragua have been the main source of Nicaragua news reported here in the United States. In otherwords, in my country most people get information about Nicaragua from the CIA!”

New laws passed in 2020 (a Foreign Agents Law and a law against terrorism, coups and inciting foreign intervention, which the US is screaming about even though they are less punitive than those of the US and Europe), and the recent arrests of US Foreign Agents are actions to try to limit US intervention and prevent coup attempts. The US will still get money to their agents, but it won’t be nearly as easy as before and this will limit their ability to carry out the kind of terrorist actions they did in 2018.

William Grigsby on June 2 described what is happening right now in Nicaragua: “[We are] breaking the heart of the Yankee propaganda apparatus in Nicaragua, which was their main way of intervening, now, for the elections – influencing public opinion with lies, instilling fear, instilling hatred in order to try to defeat the Sandinistas. This whole operation that is being carried out from the prosecutor’s office as a spearhead is just that, to destroy the propaganda apparatus of US imperialism.” He asked what all the journalist agents in Nicaragua will do without the salaries they were getting. “Are they committed enough to actually do independent journalist?”

RAIN: the CIA destabilization plan in progress now

Nevertheless, Uncle Sam will still continue efforts to destabilize the country. US ambassador Sullivan is constantly seen meeting with the agents, even denounced by President Daniel Ortega:

“This goes for the Yankee ambassador (U.S.) and other ambassadors; they like to meddle everywhere and want to make decisions for us; the Yankee ambassador (Sullivan) parades his candidates, promoting them as if he were Nicaraguan.”

In August 2020 William Grigsby received a USAID document leaked from the embassy. It details in couched terms US destabilization plans for “transition” in Nicaragua and even the contracting of a US company to head it all up. They call it RAIN – Responsive Action in Nicaragua. The document has since been deleted, but not before it was archived. RAIN is a blatant plan for destabilization and overthrow of the democratically elected government of Nicaragua. It is likely that much of what the US has financed in the last year is part of the RAIN plan.

The USAID document establishes three scenarios that they call “democratic transition in Nicaragua:”

“RAIN will pursue these activities against a variety of scenarios generally falling under three categories: 1. Free, fair and transparent elections lead to an orderly transition [the US candidate wins] 2. A sudden political transition occurs following a crisis [a coup leads to a US backed government] 3. Transition does not happen in an orderly and timely manner. The regime remains resilient in the face of domestic and international pressure. It is also possible that the regime may remain in power following electoral reforms and a fair election, but without changes to the rule of law or democratic governance [i.e. without changes that benefit US corporations].”

It is clear from the RAIN document that the U.S. government realizes that the Sandinistas will win the 2021 election by a large margin: that is another reason they have provided millions to agents, organizations and fake news media, hoping that they can put a dent in the 60% Sandinista win predicted in the polls, or to dis or undermine the elections altogether.

The long-time US agents under investigation for very serious crimes are not leaders: there has not been even one small protest since the arrests began June 2 because those arrested have no “pueblo.” People know that the US funded the very violent coup attempt through them – and hold them accountable. The foreign media tout them as presidential candidates, which they are not. When some of them saw that they might be arrested they ran to try to inscribe with the CXL (Citizens for Freedom) party as pre-candidates thinking this might protect them from detention. They all had the opportunity to form new political parties, but they didn’t even try because they don’t have enough members to fulfill minimal requirements. And more importantly, 19 legitimate parties are participating in the November 7 elections that don’t receive foreign funding.

And while the United States wastes millions of tax-payer dollars destabilizing the country, Nicaragua effectively and efficiently makes social and economic advances lauded by international organizations and banks, like universal health care, education, affordable housing, social infrastructure, gender equity, conversion to green energy, natural disaster and climate change mitigation, free recreation, and job creation with the creative and popular economy. The majority of the safest population in Central America with the lowest Covid mortality rate, who are healthier, better educated and housed, with electricity and potable water, whose food is locally grown and available at a decent price, with parks, fairs, pools and sports stadiums to enjoy their free time, are unlikely to let Uncle Sam influence their vote in November.

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Nan McCurdy is a United Methodist missionary with the General Board of Global Ministries. She and her missionary husband, Miguel Mairena, begin service with Give Ye Them to Eat in Puebla, Mexico.

Nan served the people of Nicaragua from 1985 to 2014. She and Miguel worked for 20 years with women and youth through the Women and Community Association in San Francisco Libre.

During the war in Nicaragua in the 1980s, Nan and her late husband, Philip Mitchell, worked in a pastoral ministry of accompaniment with people in the war zone. After the war, she assisted in the creation of the Foundation for Nicaraguan War Victims. 

Nan holds degrees in biology, ecology, and pharmacy, and has done extensive non-degree studies in gender in the fields of development and community development. Nan and Miguel are members of the Baltimore-Washington Annual Conference. 

Contact Information: email: [email protected]

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The United States and its NATO allies bid a symbolic farewell to Afghanistan and the war that’s still going on there.

On June 14^th, at the NATO summit, a goodbye was said to the efforts in Afghanistan.

The 18-year effort cost the United States alone $2.26 trillion, and the price in lives includes 2,442 American troops and 1,144 personnel among U.S. allies.

Afghan losses were a bit more substantial, including more than 47,000 civilians, up to 69,000 members of the national armed forces and police, and over 51,000 Taliban killed.

NATO itself doesn’t release information about how many troops it had lost.

The military effort followed the 2001 arrival of a U.S.-led coalition that ousted the Taliban for harboring al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.

NATO plans to leave civilian advisers to help build up government institutions. The 30-nation alliance is also weighing whether to train Afghan special forces outside the country.

These advisors will not receive any protection, as well as those who fought alongside the NATO forces from the Afghan side, in case if the Taliban targets them.

This withdrawal gave the Taliban an impetus, and several districts have been captured between June 12^th and 14^th.

On June 12, Taliban fighters imposed control over two districts located in the central and northern regions of Afghanistan. The group announced its fighters had captured the district of Zare in the northern province of Balkh.

Later on the same day, the group imposed control over the district of Tolak in the central province of Ghor following a heated battle with government forces.

On June 14^th, things ramped up as Taliban captured four new districts in four separate provinces.

The Taliban stepped up its operations against government forces across Afghanistan following the US announcement of a plan to pull all troops from the country by September 11. In the last two months, the group’s fighters took over the centers of at least 17 districts.

The situation is such that even before the withdrawal is complete, the Taliban may capture the majority of the country’s provinces and their districts.

Seeing this reality develop, and looking to further increase its influence, Turkey is attempting to make moves.

On June 13^th, a day before he could meet US President Joe Biden, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has said Turkey will be the ‘only reliable’ country left to stabilize Afghanistan.

As relations between the US and Turkey have been tense in recent years, Erdogan said he wanted to turn a new page with the Biden administration.

Seeing as to what a stabilization force Ankara has been in northern Syria, Iraq, Libya and even Nagorno-Karabakh, there is ample room for skepticism.

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Travellers entering UK are being forced to quarantine at Heathrow Airport.

They are being treated like prisoners with only a couple of exercise breaks a day, 24hr security guards to ensure they do not leave and at a personal cost to themselves of £1,750!

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Today’s Alternative Visions radio show analyzes the just released Consumer Price Index inflation for May and reports on the latest developments in the ‘Infrastructure Follies’ phony negotiations going on in Congress and the Biden administration. How ‘smoke & mirror’ offers and counter-offers are steadily reducing the level of infrastructure spending and, in turn, how Biden is cutting out his tax hike proposals in turn (and what tax items are likely next).

At the conclusion of the show Dr. Rasmus begins a series of shows on what did 3 noted economists (Keynes, Marx and Adam Smith) actually say—not what the media, critics, and mainstream economists claim they’ve said. What is science and what is ideology in economics, in other words.

Continuing next week, Dr. Rasmus explains how Keynes’ economics is quite different from what is called ‘Keynesian Economics’. Why has much of what Keynes actually said been purged from economics, academic and public, and replaced with what he himself, Keynes, critiqued back in the 1930s? (Subsequent weeks and shows will do the same analysis and commentary on Marx’s economics and Smith’s. Be surprised as to what they all actually said.)

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On 28 July 2021, Peru, with her 33 million inhabitants, celebrates 200 years of Independence. The People of Peru may have chosen this Bicentennial celebration, to bring about a drastic change to their foreign and national oligarchy-run country. In a neck-on-neck national election run-off on 6 June 2021, the socialist Pedro Castillo, a humble primary school professor from rural Cajamarca, a Northern Peruvian Province, rich in mining resources, but also in agricultural land, seems to be winning by a razor thin margin of less than 100,000 votes against the oligarch-supported Keiko Fujimori, daughter of former President Alberto Fujimori, currently in prison – or rather house arrest for “ill-health” – for corruption and crimes against humanity during his presidency 1990-2000.

Election results have been considered as fair by the pro-US, pro-capitalist Organization of American States (OAS). The same organization that supported the post-election US-instigated coup against Evo Morales in November 2019. Either they have learned a lesson of ethics, or there were too many international observers watching over OAS’s election observations. Or, as a third option, Washington may have yet a different agenda for this part of their “backyard”.

Keiko Fujimori, before becoming a Presidential candidate she was in prison under preventive arrest, while under investigation into corruption and human rights abuse. She is currently collecting millions from her ruling-class elite supporters and spending her own ill-begotten money to turn the election result around. Ten days after the elections, there has no definite result been published yet. For Keiko becoming President is not only a question of power, it is also a question of freedom under government immunity, or back to prison, at least until the investigation into her alleged crimes is completed.

All is possible in a country where money buys everything, and may convert clearly and visibly intended cast votes either as invalid or as a vote for the opponent. This is Peru, but to be sure, election fraud happens even in the most sophisticated countries, including in Peru’s North American neighbor, who pretends to run the world.

However, should this turn-around happen, Keiko Fujimori and her capitalist supporters are working so hard to achieve, the country risks a civil war. Because this is the moment for the vast majority of Peruvians that they have been waiting for; those Peruvians that have always been considered as “non-people” by the oligarchy. They should now finally get their justice, get their piece of the very rich pie that is Peru. After two hundred years of an oligarchy-ruled nation, this mostly silent majority truly deserves a break. They were good enough to work, to rake in the millions from low paid, health-risky mining jobs, from low-paid agriculture work, from living lives at the margin by discrimination from their white capitalist rulers. No more. “Pedro Castillo is one of us.”

Looking back in history just blending in a few landmark moments. The 1989 Washington Consensus that not only “coincidentally” preceded the collapse of the Soviet Union, but more importantly perhaps for the Global South, it meant the rolling out in “warp speed” of neoliberal politics and economics, the enslavement of the Global South into poverty – many of them into extreme poverty. There was no escaping. The IMF, World Bank FED and all related so-called regional development banks played along.

Why is it that Peru is so different in how they treat their natives, the so-called indigenous people, the original landowners of their country, if you will, so different from, for example, neighboring Bolivia, Ecuador and even Colombia? And why do these discriminated “lesser” people react so different in Peru than they do in neighboring countries?

It is my guess that it has a lot to do with the Kingdom of Spain officially creating on 18 August 1521 (500 years ago – by coincidence?) the Kingdom of “New Spain” in what today is Peru. It later became the first one of four Viceroyalties Spain created in the Americas. Ever since Peru became the first Spanish Viceroyalty, the white descendants of Spain, later extended to the immigrants from the “Old Continent”, had the audacity to oppress and discriminate the natives.

Vote strength results of the second round of the 2021 Peruvian presidential election. (CC BY-SA 4.0)

As of this day, this is the impression I get as a foreigner having been partially working and living in Peru for almost the last four decades. Especially the Lima elite they treat the indigenous as lesser people, even though they invaded their territory, but they feel and many of them still pretend being descendants of the Royal Court of Spain. That gives them a superiority which is hard to ignore. It is also reflected in the still largely centralized education system, where Lima decides what the pluri- and multi-ethnicities cultural nation of Peru should be taught in uniformity.

Aside from the different ethnicities, Peru is divided economically and culturally into three distinct geographic areas: The Coastal Region, mostly desertic, but very fertile when irrigated, where 70% of Peru’s agricultural produce is grown; the Highlands of the Andes, also called the Sierra, where people survive on patch-work agriculture on small pieces of land; and then there is the Amazon area that covers about 70% of Peru’s landmass, with only about 5% of the country’s population. They are the most independent people, with a culture close to Mother Earth. Their lives are still largely tied to traditional shamanism, starkly different from western values.

Education, basic infrastructure but foremost exploitation of Peru’s enormously rich natural resources is all decided by Lima, by the oligarchs, the self-styled descendant of the Spanish Royals – not in spoken words, of course, but in deeds and behavior. Lima has a population of 11 million, i.e., a third of the country’s populations, of which about two thirds live at the edge of poverty or below. This situation may have become worse during covid-times. The lack of proper and appropriately decentralized education, has left the original owners of Peru, the indigenous people, including a high proportion of ethnic mixtures, at a stark and decisive disadvantage.

This is the ethnic composition of Peru: Amerindians (or purely indigenous people) account for 45 % of the population; 37 % is mestizo (mixed Amerindian and white), 15 percent is white, and 3 percent is black, Japanese, Chinese and other. See this.

In other words, 85% of the population is ruled by a white immigrant minority. It is high time that Peru gets an indigenous president who pays attention to the real needs and interests of the majority of the Peruvian population. This time, it seems, after more than 500 hundred years of a lopsided rule, the 85% of the population will demand a government of more equilibrium. Pedro Castillo may be their man.

Here some history to connect the dots up to June 2021and to help understand what is happening now in Peru. Extreme social injustice and differences between the majority peasant society and a small ruling elite, brought about the revolutionary ”Shining Path” in 1980, led by Abimael Guzmán, or by his “nom de guerre”, Chairman Gonzalo. He was a professor of philosophy strongly influenced by the teachings of Marxism and Maoism. He developed an armed struggle, what became to be known as the “Shining Path” – Spanish, “Sendero Luminoso” – for the empowerment of the neglected and disadvantaged indigenous people. Acts of terrorism abounded throughout the 1980’s, also and largely to the detriment to the peasant population.

The Shining Path emerged as the country had just held its first free elections after a 12-year military dictatorship, first by Juan Francisco Velasco Alvarado (1968 – 1975), pursuing what the Peruvians called a Maoist socialism. Velasco organized a disastrous totally unprepared land reform, and nationalized most foreign investments, creating massive unemployment and perpetuating poverty. Towards the mid-1970s, Velasco was very sick with cancer and appointed on 29 August 1975 his Prime Minister, Francisco Morales Bermúdez, as his successor. Bermúdez began the second phase of the Peruvian armed Revolution, promising a transit to a civilian government.

However, Bermudez soon became an extreme right-wing military dictator, pursuing a policy of leftist cleansing. He kept his promise, though, and led Peru to democratic elections in 1980, when Fernando Belaúnde Terry was elected, the very Belaúnde, who was deposed as president in the 1968 Velasco military coup.

There was no doubt, that a clear pattern of US-influenced brutal right-wing military dictatorships became omnipresent throughout Latin America, with General Jorge Rafael Videla in Argentina (1976-1981); General Augusto Pinochet in Chile (1973 to 1981); Alfredo Stroessner of Paraguay (1954 – 1989); General Juan María Bordaberry of Uruguay (1973 – 1985); the Brazilian military dictatorship of various successive military leaders (1964 – 1985). The Bolivian history of successive military dictatorships (1964 – 1982), also fit the pattern of the epoch.

The South American US-supported military dictatorships, prompted the creation of the Shining Path in Peru, loosely following the objectives of the Uruguayan Tupamaro guerilla organization, named for Túpac Amaru II, the leader of an 18^th-century revolt against Spanish rule in Peru.

The Shining Path was open and transparent about its willingness to inflict death and the most extreme forms of cruelty as tools to achieve its goal, the total annihilation of existing political structures.

“We ae a rising torrent at which they will launch fire, stones and mud; but our power is great. We turn everything into our fire, the black fire will become red, and red is the light.” Abimael Guzmán

Guzman was caught in 1992 and convicted to life imprisonment.

In 1990, Alberto Fujimori, a little-known Rector of and professor at the Agrarian State University of Lima, with the support of Washington, became President, defeating Nobel Prize-winner adversary Mario Vargas Llosa, in a landslide victory of 62.4% against 37.6%. Fujimori imposed neoliberalism in Peru from the get-go of his presidency in 1990. He followed closely the mandates of the IMF and the World Bank. His other main objective was to finish with the Shining Path.

Other than stopping terrorism for humanitarian reasons, there were a myriad of commercial and economic interests at stake. For example, the entire mining industry was largely in control of foreign corporations. As soon as elected, Fujimori was “given” a top CIA „advisor“, Vladimiro Lenin Ilich Montesinos. The CIA agent soon called the shots for all affairs of international importance. There was little left for Fujimori to decide, let alone for the Peruvian Parliament.

In 1992 Fujimori instigated an auto-coup, with Washington’s tacit consent, dissolving Parliament and becoming the sole ruler, who also changed the Constitution allowing him to be “reelected” for another 5 years, until 2000, when he fled the country returning to his “native” Japan. Many analysts say he was actually born in Japan and was lying having been born in Peru, so he could ascend to the presidency. Just for the record, his registered birthday 28 July – Peru’s Independent Day – is kind of suspicious. Fujimori was accused of corruption, abuse of power and human rights violations.

During a visit to Chile in 2005, Fujimori was arrested and eventually extradited to Peru where he was convicted in 2009 to 25 years in prison for corruption, human right abuses and for his role in killings and kidnappings by the Grupo Colian Death Squad during his government’s battle against the Senderos Lumiosos in the 1990s.

During the two decades of Shining Path, some 69,000 people, mostly Peruvian peasants died or disappeared. According to the Peruvian Truth and Reconciliation Commission (PTRC), at last as many people died at the hands of the Fujimory military commandos, as were killed by the Shining Path. The PTRC is also called Hatun Willakuy, a Quechuan expression meaning the great story, signifying the enormity of the events recounted. Before the commission, Peru had never conducted such a comprehensive examination of violence, abuse of power, or injustice. See this.

To this day father Fujimori is in prison – or under house arrest for his alleged ill-health – while his daughter Keiko Fujimori was largely running Congress with a majority of her Party “Popular Force” – Fuerza Popular. It is not exaggerated to claim that during the past three decades Fujimorismo and the APRA (American Popular Revolutionary Alliance – a left-turned-right party) largely ran the country with crime and corruption, selling off the country’s riches to international corporatism, mainly in the US – and for the benefit of Peruvian oligarchs, but leaving the large majority of Peruvians behind.

Peru has a wealth of mineral resources. Copper, iron, lead, zinc, bismuth, phosphates, and manganese exist in great quantities of high-yield ores. Gold and silver are found extensively, as are other rare metals, and petroleum fields are located along the far north coast and the northeastern part of Amazonia.

Peru’s GDP of US$ 270 billion (World Bank – 2019) is misleading, as a great proportion is generated by mostly foreign majority holding extractive industries, manufacturing and ever-increasingly also agriculture, leaving little in the country which is why the poverty level has hardly changed over the last 30 years. While in the first decade of 2000 Peru had a phenomenal GDP growth, between 5% and 7% annually – about two thirds went to 20% of the population and the rest was trickling down to the other 80%, with the bottom 10% to 20% getting next to nothing.

The poverty rate after covid encompasses at least two thirds of the Peruvian population, with up to 50% under extreme poverty. Exact figures are not available. Those listed by the World Bank indicating a 27% poverty rate are simply fake. In addition, the informal sector in Peru amounts to at least 70%. While it is informality that keeps Peru somewhat going, it is also the informal sector that has plunged masses of people into poverty.

Candidate Pedro Castillo, if finally declared the winner, has a challenging job ahead. He is aligned with a seasoned and well-experienced and nationally respected politician, socialist Veronica Mendoza from Cusco. She also identified the current economic advisor for Mr. Castillo, Pedro Francke, who has a center-left reputation.

Mr. Francke served as director of the Cooperation Fund for Social Development (FONCODES), a Peruvian government -controlled social services and small investments institution, promoting small and medium size enterprises and creating jobs. He also had several roles at the Peruvian Central Bank and worked as an economist at the World Bank.

In a political statement, Francke separated a potential Castillo presidency from what he called Chavez socialism of currency control, nationalizations and price controls. In fact, this is an easy and purely partisan statement, because the two economies are so fundamentally different that there is simply no comparison. But the intent is to tranquilize a worried and right-wing media indoctrinated populace. The right-wing, mostly El Comercio and affiliated media dominated news outlets, control about 90% of Peruvian media.

Mr. Francke told Reuters, “Our idea is not to have massive interventionism in the economy”, indicating that Castillo would respect market economy. Francke also said that a Castillo Government would not proceed with nationalization and expropriation at all. They may, however, renegotiate some of the corporate profit-sharing. Having experienced the Velasco Government in the 1970s, this is one of the major worries of more senior Peruvians, who lived through the Velasco years.

Pedro Francke also repeated what Castillo said in his campaign speeches, that he would encourage local over foreign investments, a valid assertion, because at present the Peruvian economy is to about 70% dollarized, meaning that local banks finance themselves largely by Wall Street, while locally earned money is invested abroad rather than at home. Hopefully Castillo will be able to muster the necessary trust to bring about local investments with local money. If so, this would be among the healthiest economic moves for Peru – moves towards fiscal autonomy and monetary sovereignty.

At the time of this writing, 10 days after the ballot, the vote recounts and quarrels over voter fraud is growing, creating a chaotic ambiance, one that becomes increasingly volatile. We can just hope that the Peruvian Election Commission applies fair rules and is able to avoid civil unrest.

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Peter Koenig is a geopolitical analyst and a former Senior Economist at the World Bank and the World Health Organization (WHO), where he has worked for over 30 years on water and environment around the world. He lectures at universities in the US, Europe and South America. He writes regularly for online journals and is the author of Implosion – An Economic Thriller about War, Environmental Destruction and Corporate Greed; and  co-author of Cynthia McKinney’s book “When China Sneezes: From the Coronavirus Lockdown to the Global Politico-Economic Crisis” (Clarity Press – November 1, 2020).

He is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization.

Featured image is from Wikimedia Commons

The Covid Outbreak: “Biggest Health Scam of the 21st Century.” Report by 1500 Health Professionals

By United Health Professionals, June 15, 2021

We say: STOP to all crazy and disproportionate measures that have been taken since the beginning to fight SARS-CoV-2 (lockdown, blocking the economy and education, social distancing, wearing of masks for all, etc.) because they are totally unjustified, are not based on any scientific evidence and violate the basic principles of evidence-based medicine.

Murder by Decree: The Crime of Genocide in Canada. “The Indian Residential Schools”

By The International Tribunal for the Disappeared of Canada, June 15, 2021

This report was prompted by the enormous miscarriage of justice engineered by the government and churches of Canada known as the “Truth and Reconciliation Commission” (TRC). It is written as a corrective response to that Commission’s unlawful and deceptive efforts to conceal the extent and nature of deliberate Genocide in Canada by church and state over nearly two centuries.

Another Toxic COVID Vaccine Coming

By Stephen Lendman, June 15, 2021

There’s nothing remotely safe and effective about four entries into the covid mass-jabbing sweepstakes. When taken as directed, they risk irreversible harm, shortened lifespans, and death near-or-longer-term. They increase the likelihood of contracting the viral illness they’re supposed to protect against, but don’t — because they’re not designed for this purpose, just the opposite.

Being Blacklisted by the USA: The Western Balkan’s Trap

By Biljana Vankovska, June 15, 2021

Joe Biden’s Executive Order Blocking Property and Suspending Entry Into the United States of Certain Persons Contributing to the Destabilizing Situation in the Western Balkans accompanied by Notice on the Continuation of the National Emergency with Respect to the Western Balkans was issued on 8 June 2021.

NATO Summit: The American Empire Deploys Troops for Battle

By Manlio Dinucci, June 15, 2021

The NATO Summit took place yesterday at the headquarters in Brussels: the North Atlantic Council at the highest level of State and Government Leaders. It was formally chaired by Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg, de facto by the President of the United States Joseph Biden, who came to Europe to call to arms his Allies in the global conflict against Russia and China.

The Same Shady People Own Big Pharma and the Media

By Dr. Joseph Mercola, June 15, 2021

What does The New York Times and a majority of other legacy media have in common with Big Pharma? Answer: They’re largely owned by BlackRock and the Vanguard Group, the two largest asset management firms in the world. Moreover, it turns out these two companies form a secret monopoly that own just about everything else you can think of too.

#ArrestBillGates: Here’s Why Indians Are Enraged at the Gates Foundation

By Free Press, June 15, 2021

On Sunday, widespread criticism of Microsoft founder Bill Gates began on Twitter in India with the #ArrestBillGates. Gates is being accused of funding a programme in 2009 of testing and sterilizing indigenous vaccines on tribal children via his NGO Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF).

Video: Ankara Prepares to Plunge Syria’s North into Pandemonium

By South Front, June 15, 2021

Turkey has not said its last in northern Syria, as the situation appears to be escalating. On June 12th, at least 22 people, mostly civilians, were killed in heavy shelling in the Turkish-occupied city of Afrin. At least 35 were injured in the attack. The bombing of the city of Afrin also caused huge material damage to civilian property, including homes, cars and shops.

The Manipulated Human Being Is Capable of Anything, Except Saying NO.

By Dr. Rudolf Hänsel, June 15, 2021

Say NO to the machinations of the new dictators and their accomplices. These have already begun to “thin out” humanity with their Corona emergency measures and killer vaccines and plunge it into economic and social chaos. Educate yourself in the alternative media so that you know about the gigantic deception of humanity regarding the Covid-19 virus.

8 Fully Vaccinated Die of COVID in Maine, as States Continue to Report ‘Breakthrough’ Cases

By Megan Redshaw, June 15, 2021

Eight people in Maine have died with COVID after being fully vaccinated, according to the latest numbers from Maine’s Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), which confirmed a total of 457 breakthrough cases in the state. Initial data suggest breakthrough cases in Maine are more common in older individuals and people with underlying health conditions — the same populations that, among the unvaccinated, are most at risk of hospitalization or death from the virus.

Meet Me in Geneva. Biden’s Russophobia Means the Summit Will Fail.

By Philip Giraldi, June 15, 2021

With the exception of his perseverance in a long overdue withdrawal from Afghanistan, President Joe Biden has been assiduously pursuing policies that make the world a more dangerous place for Americans, up to and including opening up the country’s southern border to waves of illegal immigration.

Another “Western Betrayal”? Biden-Putin and the Polish Question

By Konrad Rękas, June 15, 2021

Have Polish politicians come from imposing on the World a vision of Poland as a relentless victim of “Russian aggression” – into a phase of despair and desperation? This is how Polish statements on eastern matters are starting to look like, in particular as far are the issue of Nord Stream 2 and the Joe Biden-Vladimir Putin summit concerned.

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Dr. Robert Malone (father of mRNA vaccines) and Steve Kirsch, wunderkind inventor, all of whom have dived very deeply into the weeds. 

All extremely bright.  The debate and discussion should be compelling for anyone who listens.

.

Dr. Meryll Lynch, June 15, 2021

***

Dr. Robert Malone is the inventor of mRNA Vaccine technology.

Mr. Steve Kirsch is a serial entrepreneur who has been researching adverse reactions to COVID vaccines.

Dr. Bret Weinstein is an evolutionary biologist.

Bret talks to Robert and Steve about the pandemic, treatment and the COVID vaccines.

*

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Si è svolto il 14 giugno, al quartier generale di Bruxelles, il Summit Nato: il Consiglio Nord Atlantico al massimo livello dei capi di stato e di governo. Esso è stato presieduto formalmente dal segretario generale Jens Stoltenberg, di fatto dal presidente degli Stati uniti Joseph Biden, venuto in Europa per chiamare alle armi gli Alleati nel conflitto globale contro Russia e Cina.

Il Summit Nato è stato preceduto e preparato da due iniziative politiche che hanno visto Biden protagonista – la firma della Nuova Carta Atlantica e il G7 – e sarà seguito dal vertice del presidente Biden col presidente della Federazione Russa Vladimir Putin, il 16 a Ginevra, il cui esito è preannunciato dal rifiuto di Biden di tenere, come di prassi, una conferenza stampa finale con Putin.

La Nuova Carta Atlantica, firmata il 10 giugno a Londra dal Presidente degli Stati uniti e dal Primo ministro britannico Boris Johnson, è un significativo documento politico al quale i media nostrani hanno dato scarso rilievo.

Biden e il segretario generale della Nato Jens Stoltenberg al vertice del 2021 © Stephanie Lecocq, Pool via AP – LaPresse

La Carta Atlantica storica – firmata dal presidente Usa Roosevelt e dal primo ministro britannico Churchill nell’agosto 1941, due mesi dopo che la Germania nazista aveva invaso l’Unione Sovietica –enunciava i valori su cui si sarebbe basato il futuro ordine mondiale, garantito dalle «grandi democrazie», anzitutto la rinuncia all’uso della forza, l’autodeterminazione dei popoli e i loro uguali diritti nell’accesso alle risorse.

Dopo che la Storia ha dimostrato come siano stati applicati tali valori, ora la Carta Atlantica «rivitalizzata» ribadisce l’impegno a «difendere i nostri valori democratici contro coloro che cercano di minarli». A tal fine Usa e Gran Bretagna assicurano gli Alleati che potranno sempre contare sui «nostri deterrenti nucleari» e che «la Nato resterà una alleanza nucleare».

Il Summit G7, svoltosi in Cornovaglia l’11-13 giugno, intima alla Russia di «porre fine al suo comportamento destabilizzante e alle sue attività maligne, compresa la sua interferenza nei sistemi democratici di altri paesi», e accusa la Cina di «pratiche non di mercato che minano il funzionamento equo e trasparente dell’economia globale».

Con queste e altre accuse (formulate con le stesse parole di Washington), le potenze europee del G7 – Gran Bretagna, Germania, Francia e Italia, che sono allo stesso tempo le maggiori potenze europee della Nato – si sono allineate con gli Stati uniti prima dello stesso Summit Nato.

Esso si è aperto con la dichiarazione che «la nostra relazione con la Russia è al punto più basso dalla fine della guerra fredda: ciò è dovuto alle azioni aggressive della Russia» e che «il rafforzamento militare della Cina, la sua crescente influenza e il suo comportamento coercitivo pongono sfide alla nostra sicurezza». Una vera e propria dichiarazione di guerra che, capovolgendo la realtà, non lascia spazio a trattative che allentino la tensione. Il Summit ha dichiarato aperto un «nuovo capitolo» nella storia della Alleanza, basato sull’agenda «Nato 2030».

Viene rafforzato il «legame transatlantico» tra Stati uniti ed Europa su tutti i piani – politico, militare, economico, tecnologico, spaziale ed altri – con una strategia che spazia su scala globale, dal Nord America all’Europa, dall’Asia all’Africa In tale quadro gli Usa schiereranno tra non molto in Europa contro la Russia e in Asia contro la Cina nuove bombe nucleari e nuovi missili nucleari a medio raggio.

Da qui la decisione del Summit di accrescere ulteriormente la spesa militare: gli Stati uniti, la cui spesa ammonta a quasi il 70% di quella complessiva dei 30 paesi della Nato, spingono gli Alleati europei ad accrescerla.

L’Italia, dal 2015, ha aumentato la sua spesa annua di 10 miliardi, portandola nel 2021 (secondo i dati Nato) a circa 30 miliardi di dollari, la quinta in ordine di grandezza fra i 30 paesi Nato, ma il livello che deve raggiungere supera i 40 miliardi di dollari annui.

Viene allo stesso tempo rafforzato il ruolo del Consiglio Nord Atlantico, l’organo politico dell’Alleanza che, secondo le norme Nato, decide non a maggioranza ma sempre «all’unanimità e di comune accordo», ossia d’accordo con quanto deciso a Washington.

Ciò comporta un ulteriore indebolimento dei parlamenti europei, in particolare di quello italiano, già oggi privati di reali poteri decisionali su politica estera e militare dato che 21 dei 27 paesi della Ue appartengono alla Nato.

Non tutti i paesi europei sono però sullo stesso piano: Gran Bretagna, Francia e Germania trattano con gli Stati uniti in base ai propri interessi, mentre l’Italia si accoda alle decisioni di Washington contro i suoi stessi interessi.

I contrasti economici (ad esempio quello tra Germania e Usa sul North Stream) passano però in secondo piano di fronte al superiore comune interesse: far sì che l’Occidente mantenga il suo predominio in un mondo in cui emergono, o riemergono, nuovi soggetti statuali e sociali.

Manlio Dinucci

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***

The world has been treated to successive spectacles of national leaders gathering at a G7 Summit in Cornwall and a NATO Summit in Brussels.

The U.S. corporate media have portrayed these summits as chances for President Biden to rally the leaders of the world’s democratic nations in a coordinated response to the most serious problems facing the world, from the COVID pandemic, climate change and global inequality to ill-defined “threats to democracy” from Russia and China.

But there’s something seriously wrong with this picture. Democracy means “rule by the people.” While that can take different forms in different countries and cultures, there is a growing consensus in the United States that the exceptional power of wealthy Americans and corporations to influence election results and government policies has led to a de facto system of government that fails to reflect the will of the American people on many critical issues.

So when President Biden meets with the leaders of democratic countries, he represents a country that is, in many ways, an undemocratic outlier rather than a leader among democratic nations. This is evident in:

• the “legalized bribery” of 2020’s $14.4 billion federal election, compared with recent elections in Canada and the U.K. that cost less than 1% of that, under strict rules that ensure more democratic results;
• a defeated President proclaiming baseless accusations of fraud and inciting a mob to invade the U.S. Congress on January 6 2021;
• news media that have been commercialized, consolidated, gutted and dumbed down by their corporate owners, making Americans easy prey for misinformation by unscrupulous interest groups, and leaving the U.S. in 44th place on Reporters Without Borders’ Press Freedom Index;
• the highest incarceration rate of any country in the world, with over two million people behind bars, and systemic police violence on a scale never seen in other wealthy nations;
• the injustice of extreme inequality, poverty and cradle-to-grave debt for millions in an otherwise wealthy nation;
• an exceptional lack of economic and social mobility compared to other wealthy countries that is the antithesis of the mythical “American Dream”;
• privatized, undemocratic and failing education and healthcare systems;
• a recent history of illegal invasions, massacres of civilians, torture, drone assassinations, extraordinary renditions and indefinite detention at Guantanamo—with no accountability;
• and, last but not least, a gargantuan war machine capable of destroying the world, in the hands of this dysfunctional political system.

Fortunately though, Americans are not the only ones asking what is wrong with American democracy. The Alliance of Democracies Foundation (ADF), founded by former Danish Prime Minister and NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen, conducted a poll of 50,000 people in 53 countries between February and April 2021, and found that people around the world share our concerns about America’s dystopian political system and imperial outrages.

Probably the most startling result of the poll to Americans would be its finding that more people around the world (44%) see the United States as a threat to democracy in their countries than China (38%) or Russia (28%), which makes nonsense of U.S. efforts to justify its revived Cold War on Russia and China in the name of democracy.

In a larger poll of 124,000 people that ADF conducted in 2020, countries where large majorities saw the United States as a danger to democracy included China, but also Germany, Austria, Denmark, Ireland, France, Greece, Belgium, Sweden and Canada.

After tea with the Queen at Windsor Castle, Biden swooped into Brussels on Air Force One for a NATO summit to advance its new “Strategic Concept,” which is nothing more than a war plan for World War III against both Russia and China.

But we take solace from evidence that the people of Europe, whom the NATO war plan counts on as front-line troops and mass casualty victims, are not ready to follow President Biden to war. A January 2021 survey by the European Council on Foreign Affairs found that large majorities of Europeans want to remain neutral in any U.S. war on Russia or China. Only 22% would want their country to take the U.S. side in a war on China, and 23% in a war on Russia.

Few Americans realize that Biden already came close to war with Russia in March and April, when the United States and NATO supported a new Ukrainian offensive in its civil war against Russian-allied separatists in Donetsk and Luhansk provinces. Russia moved tens of thousands of heavily-armed troops to its borders with Ukraine, to make it clear that it was ready to defend its Ukrainian allies and was quite capable of doing so. On April 13th, Biden blinked, turned round two U.S. destroyers that were steaming into the Black Sea and called Putin to request the summit that is now taking place.

The antipathy of ordinary people everywhere toward the U.S. determination to provoke military confrontation with Russia and China begs serious questions about the complicity of their leaders in these incredibly dangerous, possibly suicidal, U.S. policies. When ordinary people all over the world can see the dangers and pitfalls of following the United States as a model and a leader, why do their neoliberal leaders keep showing up to lend credibility to the posturing of U.S. leaders at summits like the G7 and NATO?

Maybe it is precisely because the United States has succeeded in what the corporate ruling classes of other nations also aspire to, namely greater concentrations of wealth and power and less public interference in their “freedom” to accumulate and control them.

Maybe the leaders of other wealthy countries and military powers are genuinely awed by the dystopian American Dream as the example par excellence of how to sell inequality, injustice and war to the public in the name of freedom and democracy.

In that case, the fact that people in other wealthy countries are not so easily led to war or lured into political passivity and impotence would only increase the awe of their leaders for their American counterparts, who literally laugh all the way to the bank as they pay lip service to the sanctity of the American Dream and the American People.

Ordinary people in other countries are right to be wary of the Pied Piper of American “leadership,” but their rulers should be too. The fracturing and disintegration of American society should stand as a warning to neoliberal governments and ruling classes everywhere to be more careful what they wish for.

Instead of a world in which other countries emulate or fall victim to America’s failed experiment in extreme neoliberalism, the key to a peaceful, sustainable and prosperous future for all the world’s people, including Americans, lies in working together, learning from each other and adopting policies that serve the public good and improve the lives of all, especially those most in need. There’s a name for that. It’s called democracy.

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Medea Benjamin is cofounder of CODEPINK for Peace, and author of several books, including Inside Iran: The Real History and Politics of the Islamic Republic of Iran. 

Nicolas J. S. Davies is an independent journalist, a researcher with CODEPINK and the author of Blood On Our Hands: the American Invasion and Destruction of Iraq.

Featured image is from the authors

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***

There’s nothing remotely safe and effective about four entries into the covid mass-jabbing sweepstakes.

When taken as directed, they risk irreversible harm, shortened lifespans, and death near-or-longer-term.

They increase the likelihood of contracting the viral illness they’re supposed to protect against, but don’t — because they’re not designed for this purpose, just the opposite.

They also greatly increase the risk of contracting any or a combination of other serious diseases — another one of its diabolical aims.

All covid vaccines are designed to harm health, not protect and preserve it.

We’ve been lied to and mass deceived by US/Western dark forces, their public health handmaidens — like charlatan Fauci — Pharma profiteers, and their press agent media.

Novavax is the latest toxic covid vaccine that’s heading for availability ahead, a company press release on Monday, saying the following:

Its “recombinant nanoparticle protein-based (covid) vaccine…is one step closer to” becoming available in the West and elsewhere, adding:

“The company intends to file for regulatory authorizations in the third quarter.”

US emergency use authorization — when no emergency exists — may not be sought until September.

According to its CEO Stanley Erck, the company may seek authorization in Britain, the EU, India and South Korea before the US.

The company’s press release said nothing about the vaccine’s hazardous recombinant nanoparticle protein-based delivery system.

A previous article cited Professor of Viral Immunology Byram Bridle.

He explained that the spike protein in covid jabs spreads throughout the body.

It harms the spleen, liver, bone marrow, adrenal glands, ovaries and other organs.

It adversely affects the platelets, risking blood clots, brain bleeding, heart and neurological problems.

According to Bridle, covid jabs are bioweaponized delivery systems.

“We have known for a long time that the spike protein is a pathogenic protein,” he said, adding: 

“It is a toxin (that can) cause damage in our body if it gets into circulation.”

On Monday, Joseph Mercola discussed major problems Bridle learned about hazardous covid jabs, saying:

Spike proteins in Pfizer/Modern jabs “cause cardiovascular and neurological damage…also reproductive toxicity (by) bind(ing) to platelet receptors and the cells that line your blood vessels.” 

“When that happens, it can cause platelets to clump together, resulting in blood clots, and/or cause abnormal bleeding.”

Novavx is a two-dose jab that contains a proprietary Matrix-M adjuvant, according to the company.

Pharmaceutical-Technology.com explained that Novavax’s entry into the covid-jabbing sweepstakes “is a subunit (covid) vaccine.” 

Like others in use, it’s just as toxic and deadly.

Like Pfizer, Moderna, J & J, and AstraZeneca entries, it was rushed to market in months — failing to follow vaccine development protocol.

Requiring about 6 -12 years of testing, only around 2% of vaccines are approved for human use.

Mercola explained that Bridle received a “$230,000 government grant for research on (covid) vaccine development,” adding: 

“As part of that research, he and a team of international scientists requested a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) access to Pfizer’s biodistribution study from the Japanese regulatory agency.”

“(P)reviously unseen, (it) demonstrates a huge problem with all” drugs for covid jabbing, Bridle stressing:

“We made a big mistake.”

“We thought the spike protein was a great target antigen…”

“(W)e never knew the spike protein itself was a toxin and was a pathogenic protein.” 

“So, by (jabbing) people, we are inadvertently inoculating them with a toxin.”

Other noted medical and scientific experts agree.

One point of disagreement with Bridle.

Covid jabs were designed to harm, not protect, as part of a US/Western depopulation scheme to mass-infect maximum numbers of people worldwide.

Its aim is wanting potentially billions of unwitting people eliminated.

That’s what seasonal flu-renamed covid mass-jabbing is all about.

As long as the mother of all diabolical scams continues unchecked, the human toll will be catastrophic.

If unjabbed, don’t sign your premature death warrant by self-inflicting harm.

If already jabbed, take no more when so-called booster jabs begin to be heavily promoted — likely during the upcoming 2021-22 flu season.

Mass casualties already occurred in the West and elsewhere.

The worst lies ahead as long as mass-jabbing with deadly toxins continues.

*

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Stephen Lendman is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG).

VISIT MY WEBSITE: stephenlendman.org (Home – Stephen Lendman). Contact at [email protected].

My two Wall Street books are timely reading:

“How Wall Street Fleeces America: Privatized Banking, Government Collusion, and Class War”

https://www.claritypress.com/product/how-wall-street-fleeces-america/

“Banker Occupation: Waging Financial War on Humanity”

https://www.claritypress.com/product/banker-occupation-waging-financial-war-on-humanity/

Featured image is from Natural News

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***

The Macedonian public (or I should say, a vast majority of it) is troubled and upset by the news from the White House.

Joe Biden’s Executive Order Blocking Property and Suspending Entry Into the United States of Certain Persons Contributing to the Destabilizing Situation in the Western Balkans accompanied by Notice on the Continuation of the National Emergency with Respect to the Western Balkans was issued on 8 June 2021.

At this moment I am not aware of the reactions in the other Western Balkan countries, but the bottom line is that this is much ado about nothing (new)!

The key point is that the pawn states get occasionally surprised by something that is far from being unimportant but has been present all along; actually, occasionally they awake from the delusion of national independence and popular sovereignty.

For a short while – and then get back to sleepwalking.

The bare fact is that the executive order has been updated in the last 20 years. There is nothing novel, except that the new agreements, the brainchildren of the US corridors of powers, get listed along with the Dayton Agreement, the Kumanovo Agreement, and the Ohrid Framework Agreement. These are the agreements mediated by Washington D.C. with more or less assistance by Brussels, which allegedly ‘resolved’ the bloody conflicts on the territory of former Yugoslavia and ‘stabilized the region’, which is of national interest and even important for the national security of the USA.

The Macedonian public (still traumatized by the forceful name change of 2018/2019 due to the agreement concluded between Skopje and Athens) reacts to the implicit threat that any dissent against the Prespa Agreement (as well as the 2001 Ohrid Framework agreement) would be seen as a hostile act against the US and would be treated accordingly.

The Executive Order states that inter alia it targets

“actors engaged in a violation of, or an act that has obstructed or threatened the implementation of, any regional security, peace, cooperation, or mutual recognition agreement or framework or accountability mechanism related to the Western Balkans beyond previous E.O.s, to include the Prespa Agreement…”

In short, the USA is ‘concerned’ about the possible destabilization of the region.

In one of my recent scholarly articles, I explained the geopolitics of the Prespa Agreement (PA), and why it destabilizes the country and the region rather than promotes peaceful coexistence and cooperation.

The PA served the US (and NATO) interests in the context of the multipolar micro-system in the Balkan region but has severely harmed the national (and even vital) interests of the small Macedonian state. Who cares about the academic views, after all? However, many of my colleagues and friends got concerned that from now on they will not be allowed to criticize the PA and the Ohrid Framework Agreement (that introduced a power-sharing system between the ethnic Macedonians and ethnic Albanians and thus turned the country into a consociational political arrangement that is as ineffective and corrupted as the Dayton Bosnia still is). It struck me at a moment that this interpretation of an old and revamp Executive order may serve as an excuse for further self-censorship and silence in academia. My response to them is the following:

Not that those in the fortress Kale (i.e. the US Embassy in Skopje) and their servants have not taken notice of my public dissent since long ago and are aware of exactly who I am and what (I) cannot do – but still, there is an urge to tell them publicly that I do not care about the executive orders of their president (I don’t give a damn) but I do care about their deeds.

My very existence, my voice, the constant use of the words Macedonia&Macedonians (never Northern) is (for now) my only way of resisting against the neo-colonial master.

By the way, this text was originally written in Macedonian and is going to be published as my regular newspaper column (as long as there is no censorship or pressure on the editor) but I thought it was not enough. So here it is in English too, to make myself even clearer to the thought police. My criticism is also neither a new one nor concerns only the US policy towards my country. I have been outspoken against Pax Americana both at home and abroad for years, but since 2018 I am especially proud of myself whenever I manage to publish or speak about Macedonia, stubbornly repeating the (old) constitutional name to the awe of the Greek and Western public.

All the fuss over Biden’s supposedly ‘new order’, which would punish anyone who directly or indirectly opposed the Ohrid and Prespa Accords, is not only exaggerated but it benefits the establishment and its media and civilian satellites, who get the wind at their backs boasting that Washington stands by them and that they are on the right side of history. Prime Minister Zaev even put it explicitly:

“The US – the most perfect democracy in the world sent a most serious message to all defectors and faultfinders.”

It’s indeed hard to understand the short memory syndrome even with smart people: this executive order is 20 years old! It’s only being renewed (updated) along with the new American successes that need to be protected. It’s both deplorable and ridiculous to consider the Dayton, Kumanovo, Ohrid, and now Prespa agreements as issues of US national security – but it’s nothing new. I would not be surprised if the next executive order include the so-called Bulgarian agreement that is currently re-negotiated between Skopje and Sofia in a way to completely de-Macedonianize anything that has been missed in the other two agreements. (It would not be a surprise if the annex is renamed into Dojran Agreement, thus all natural lakes’ names will be well-used for labeling the international arrangements of the Macedonian protectorate.

The Executive Order’s references to anti-corruption is a circus is to die of laughter: one would think they got really concerned at the White House for crime and corruption in the region (since, there is no political and other corruption in the US House of Cards at all, trust me). Without the so-called ‘Balkan methods’ (as the then EU Enlargement Commissioner Hahn called them in October 2018) there would not have been a constitutional change in Macedonia at all! The entire endeavor of crisis management, state building and ‘therapeutic governance’ introduced by Washington (with the help of Brussels) is based exactly on selection and bringing on power suitable ‘Balkan princes’ (who have no clue who was Machiavelli). All they need is to be cooperative and obedient to Western interests. In their free time, they can run various dirty businesses, marijuana and hard drugs, sell out all natural resources, make deals with the urban mafia, etc. – as long as they guarantee stabilitocracy in the state and the region, i.e. in the Western sphere of interest.

Stabilitocracy is just a new academic expression of an old phenomenon – of vassalage for the sake of the status quo that is in favor of the colonial master. Apart from the political establishment composed of mainly injudicious and greedy characters, the operation has already yielded results where mind, reason, academic freedom and/or intellectual dissent are expected. A brilliant columnist (Igor Radev) described extremely well the phenomenon of our ‘brown sahibs’, and their mission to establish and cultivate Western cultural hegemony, which is more powerful than overt physical/military occupation. This is a direct attack on the collective mind of a nation and on individuals: the ultimate result is the ‘captive mind’, usually linked known to the communist dictatorships. To be a ‘dangerous element’ or a black sheep on a blacklist of dictatorships, Eastern or Western, is an honor for anyone who sticks to himself/herself  and his/her integrity, whom power neither can blind nor corrupt.

Some of us have been talking for a long time about the neocolonial vise we are stuck in, which we are often not even aware of because it is vailed in a package of wishful thinking of progress, Western values, integration etc. Here one will hardly find at least ten prominent people who will dare say they are against Macedonia’s membership in NATO and the EU. Even if among them there is someone who is against the military alliance (for various reasons), the criticism against the corporate and imperial EU will stand in his/her throat.

Until we admit that we are slaves, we will not even know how to start fighting for freedom – or what to do with it! Biden’s order (previously enacted and changed by each of his predecessors) is merely the example of the ‘cowboy way’ of dealing with potential adversaries. Of course, we who only write and speak are insignificant and unimportant for the power corners: they know that our influence is still limited or timid. If by any chance our voice is heard wider or articulated politically, other disciplinary measures will follow, for which not issuing a US visa will be a joke. We are dealing here with a ruthless Lord of the Rings: Assange, Manning and Snowden are the best illustrations of what is happening to those who speak the truth to power.

What should we learn from such a powerful and continuous insistence on the implementation of the Ohrid and Prespa Agreements, raised to the level of the Holy Scriptures, by the White House? First of all, it means that there is nothing left of our national sovereignty!

We are an empty shell, nominally a state, and de facto a protectorate. The key of the ‘eternal clause’ for non-change of the Constitution (i.e. the basic social contract) is in their hands and a single letter cannot be altered without their blessing.

The experience teaches us that they give amen only when it is in their own interest, even if it assumes paying dearly with further de-Macedonianization. Let me remind that the Ohrid Agreement was originally drafted in English by American experts, it was never ratified by the parliament or supported on a referendum. It was cast into constitutional amendments in November 2001 under duress from within and from abroad. It can hardly be named a constitution – it’s a manifest of a continuous capitulation and self-denial).

The inclusion of the Ohrid Agreement into the preamble in 2019 was just a ‘cherry on the top of the American pie.’ The annual reports or executive orders that come from the West are meant to guarantee the existence of the deeply divided binational state – as long as it suits the colonial master. Actually, the previous US Ambassador had already prepared the ground for an alleged dialogue over the possible federalization of the country, which is a step short of its final separation along ethnic lines. All proposals for a new Constituent Assembly that would draft a normal, civic constitutional text, are just cries of some courageous people who have probably decided that traveling to the West is not a priority in their lives.

The Prespa Agreement is a bit of a tragicomic story bearing in mind its content. It seems as if the US national interest was to resolve the dispute over who Alexander the Great belonged to and who are ‘real’ Macedonians.

The deal was allegedly concluded between representatives of two sovereign states in a form of a bilateral treaty in which the United States allegedly had no influence (I discussed the matter with my Greek colleague Alexis Heraclides, who recently published a book on the Macedonian issue, but he remained convinced there was no American interference or arm-twisting). The executive orders speak differently.

Furthermore, neither the document was written by the representatives of the Macedonian and Greek sides, nor was it agreed through direct negotiations as the official narrative goes. It was an enforced document, the brainchild of the Western corridors of power, and this is still is a project that must not fail. We still remember how the agreement was introduced in the Constitution: against the will of the people expressed on the 2018 referendum, against the constitutional procedure, by bribing and intimidating MPs, etc.

Any intellectual flashes that come from some of our most brilliant people who have preserved the power to imagine a better Macedonia, and to suggest visions and strategies, and even call us that it is time to wake up – are encouraging individual acts. In an atmosphere where Biden’s ‘order’ is the wind at the back to the duplicitous and inept government, the loyal civil sector, and even the academic credentials that come from my colleagues, any such public appearance is and will be tantamount to personal heroism. But the question is, can we change something collectively, together? This is a rhetorical question, of course.

Even these we are symbolically rebelling against will not mind if we stand for democratic processes, human rights, non-discrimination, international integration, the fight against corruption (which must not take its toll when it comes to ruling elites and the pandemic of inequality) – as long as our plans are not too radical (i.e. do not get to the root of things). The root of the problem is not only in our incompetence but also in the fact that we are an occupied territory with a people that are not yet ready for self-sacrifice, powerless and stripped out of its identity, humiliated and frightened.

Fear, conformism and opportunism are dangerous matters – a cancerous wound for every libertarian mind. I see it in my immediate environment when in a closed meeting among a dozen colleagues, the head of the department persistently talks about North Macedonia (I do not know if she is afraid of being betrayed by someone that she is politically incorrect or because she benefits from cooperation). It is reminiscent of scenes familiar with Stalinism, Orwell’s 1984, the 1948 Informbureau aftermath – afraid of each other, people chose self-censorship. Nothing new, right? The only novelty is that this pressure now comes from the West.

How to move on from here? Only by keeping the embers smoldering and not letting them completely extinguish. By adding fuel, protecting them from strong winds, and nurturing a rebellious spirit, even in small circles. Things need to be seen in a perspective, not from today to tomorrow. I may not experience change, but I believe it’s inevitable.

One of my most brilliant and bravest friends, Jan Oberg recently told me:

“Whatever we do, Biljana, we are wasting time trying to save the US/NATO/EU (from themselves) and our role in it. TFF and I are independent to do what is exciting, gives hope and where mutual listening and learning is possible. It is no longer within the West. Therefore, there is also no alternative future for the West but decline and then fall. Tragic!! A slow suicide – where co-existence, win-win with China and everybody else would be perfectly possible.”

I agree with him – Macedonia is just one pawn on the table of ‘saving the West’.

The West has lost its way the moment it trampled on the postulates of the Enlightenment and everything in which it allegedly represents.

Is there anything progressive and benevolent in a power that amputates parts of a small nation and does not allow it to cry?

This treatment is not exclusive for Macedonia, of course. If the West does not bomb you, then it silences you and scares/cancels you with executive orders.

In the meantime, the world still has four sides and is rapidly changing. We in the Balkans remain blind staring at the setting sun while the East rises, in every way – from cultural to political and economic.

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***

The NATO Summit took place yesterday at the headquarters in Brussels: the North Atlantic Council at the highest level of State and Government Leaders. It was formally chaired by Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg, de facto by the President of the United States Joseph Biden, who came to Europe to call to arms his Allies in the global conflict against Russia and China. The NATO Summit was preceded and prepared by two political initiatives that saw Biden as the protagonist – the signing of the New Atlantic Charter, and the G7 – and they will be followed by President Biden’s meeting with the President of the Russian Federation Vladimir Putin on June 16 in Geneva. The meeting outcome  is heralded by Biden’s refusal to hold the usual final press conference with Putin.

The New Atlantic Charter was signed on June 10 in London by the President of the United States and the British Prime Minister Boris Johnson. It is a significant political document to which our media have given little importance. The historic Atlantic Charter – signed by the US President Roosevelt and British Prime Minister Churchill in August 1941, two months after Nazi Germany had invaded the Soviet Union – enunciated the values on which the future world order would be based with “Great democracies” warranty: above all the renunciation of the use of force, the self-determination of peoples, and their equal rights in access to resources. Later history has shown how these values have been applied. Now the “revitalized” Atlantic Charter reaffirms its commitment to “defend our democratic values against those who try to undermine them“. To this end, the US and Great Britain assure their Allies that they will always be able to count on “our nuclear deterrents” and that “NATO will remain a nuclear alliance”.

The G7 Summit, held in Cornwall from June 11 to June 13, ordered Russia to “stop its destabilising behaviour and malign activities, including its interference in other countries’ democratic systems“, and it accused China of “non-market policies and practices which undermine the fair and transparent operation of the global economy“. With these and other accusations (formulated in Washington’s own words), the European powers of the G7 – Great Britain, Germany, France and Italy, which are at the same time the major European NATO powers – aligned with the United States before the NATO Summit.

 The NATO Summit opened with the statement that “our relationship with Russia is at its lowest point since the end of the Cold War. This is due to Russia’s aggressive actions” and that “China’s military build-up, growing influence and coercive behaviour also poses some challenges to our security”. A veritable declaration of war that, by turning reality upside down, leaves no room for negotiations to ease the tension. 

The Summit opened a “new chapter” in the history of the Alliance, based on the “NATO 2030” Agenda. The “Transatlantic link” between the United States and Europe is strengthened on all levels – political, military, economic, technological, space, and others – with a strategy that spans on a global scale from North and South America to Europe, from Asia to Africa. In this context, the US will soon deploy new nuclear bombs and new medium-range nuclear missiles in Europe against Russia and in Asia against China. Hence the decision of the Summit to further increase military spending: the United States, whose expenditure amounts to almost 70% of the 30 NATO countries’ total, is pushing the European Allies to increase it. Since 2015, Italy has increased its annual spending by 10 billion, bringing it to about 30 billion dollars in 2021 (according to NATO data), the fifth nation in order of magnitude among the 30 NATO countries, but the level to reach is more than 40 billion dollars annually.

At the same time, the role of the North Atlantic Council is strengthened. It is the political body of the Alliance, which  decides not by the majority but always “unanimously and by mutual agreement” according to NATO rules, that is, in agreement with what is decided in Washington. The strengthened role of the North Atlantic Council entails a further weakening of the European Parliaments, in particular the Italian Parliament that is already deprived of real decision-making powers on foreign and military policy,  given that 21 out of the 27 EU Countries belong to NATO. 

However, not all European countries are on the same level: Great Britain, France and Germany negotiate with the United States on the basis of their own interests, while Italy agrees to Washington’s decisions against its own interests. The economic contrasts (for example the contrast on the North Stream pipeline between Germany and the USA) take a back seat to the superior common interest: to ensure that the West maintains its dominance in a world where new State and social subjects emerge or re-emerge.

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This article was originally published in Italian on Il Manifesto.

Manlio Dinucci, award winning author, geopolitical analyst and geographer, Pisa, Italy. He is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization.

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***

Have Polish politicians come from imposing on the World a vision of Poland as a relentless victim of “Russian aggression” – into a phase of despair and desperation? This is how Polish statements on eastern matters are starting to look like, in particular as far are the issue of Nord Stream 2 and the Joe Biden-Vladimir Putin summit concerned.

Shere Khan abandoned Tabaqui?

By linking all their geopolitical hopes only with Donald Trump’s victory – even the leaders of Polish ruling party, the Law and Justice (PiS) are probably already aware that they have put Poland in a situation with no way out. Our state is not only waging an incessant propaganda war against Russia, not only has it been involved in a pitifully unsuccessful coup attempt in Belarus – but has also been in conflicts with practically all neighbours, even those described as “strategic allies”. So, the last chance for political Warsaw was the American Democratic War Hawks, usually no less anti-Russian than the Republican right. And again, however, the disastrous Polish understanding of American politics made itself felt. Poland played blindly to continue or even tighten sanctions on Nord Stream2, to increase NATO’s presence in Ukraine, and to complete the coup in Belarus. Meanwhile, none of these scenarios is currently being implemented, and Poland, with its anti-Russian campaign, has been left alone, like a… still inciting jackal, surprised by the escape of its tiger boss.

Forgotten word normalization

Of course, any independent state, even the worst governed – would have understood long ago that such a policy leads nowhere, only increasing the costs and losses on the Polish side. We are not even talking about any great geopolitical change, there is no statesman of the appropriate format for such a manoeuvre among the Polish political elite. Self-imposing, however, would be at least to calm down the atmosphere, mute the anti-Belarusian campaign and withdraw from the most absurd anti-Russian declarations and actions. Even if the Polish Government did it insincerely and against itself – it could at least be a signal that at least some of the reasons for Poland’s disastrous international position were understood. And although Minsk and Moscow have no reasons for treating such a hypothetical change other than with distrust, it would be a first, completely basic step to normalization.

And if no one in Warsaw can think in such strategic terms, they could at least understand the tactical idea: the shadow of suggesting to Western capitals that Poles can also figure out something and are not prisoners of their own phobias and imposed propaganda. Sure – in the West hardly anyone would believe that Poles are smart enough to do it, but again, a seed of doubt could grow over time. And it would be all the easier to do, and also to sell it to the Polish public, as our compatriots, if they remembered anything more or less correctly from recent history – this is the slogan of “the West Betrayal”.

This concept has a long tradition in Polish consciousness. That is how was called the indifference of Western capitals to the partitions of Poland in the 18th century and the 123-year occupation of our country by Germany, Russia and Austria. For Poles classical example of the West Betrayal was especially the Phoney War in 1939, when for several weeks we stood alone against Hitler. And finally, leaving post-war Poland in the Soviet bloc is considered an allied betrayal as well. That is why Poland loves the West with a hopeless love, but at the same time full of regret and distrust. We are a nation of mental children and ruling women, who take offense when someone chooses their own interests instead of giving Poland gifts.

And this motive should be played now, explaining the change of accents. The more so as Law and Justice does everything it does, also in international politics – only in terms of being attractive in the eyes of its own electorate. And the Polish Government is pretty sure that cannot change anything in Polish diplomacy, because voters will never buy it. But Polish leader Jarosław Kaczyński can be absolutely wrong with that if only he plays smart with the complexes and resentments still alive among Poles. Instead of hating Russia, he should recall Poland’s distrust of the West, all unfulfilled Polish hopes and dreams related to the desire for Western acceptance of Poland and turning it all into a noticeable improvement in the international situation of Poland, now strongly resents the West again. Unfortunately, nor Jarosław Kaczynski, neither any other Polish mainstream politician is independently thinking and acting enough to do this.

Resistant to the hate campaign?

And we should be sorry of that, because maybe Polish nation ready for such a change. After all, according to the March WCIOM poll, the majority of surveyed Poles and Russians believe that both countries should treat each other as an ally (42 percent of Poles, 40 percent of Russians) or even a friend (22 and 28 percent respectively). Moreover, the results of similar surveys have remained at this surprisingly high level for years – despite the invariably (for a decade) intensity of the aggressive Russophobic campaign in Poland. Meanwhile, a large part of Polish society, even repeating the same political or historical clichés, reluctant to Russia, sees no reasons why relations with the contemporary Russian state should not be simply NORMAL.

Of course, every statistic Pole is bombarded every day with hundreds of news about further examples of “Russian aggression”, about the “terrible possessiveness of the Kremlin”, about dozens of Moscow spies on every corner etc. But it can also be assumed that there is an effect of tiredness, and also negative verification of this propaganda. The anti-Russian campaign in Poland was intensified together with the coup in Ukraine in 2014 with the goal to increase Polish support for the Westernization processes in Kiev. That was the moment when the hunt for the Russian spies began, with intention to silent all circles supporting simply normal Polish-Russian relations, as well as those demanding a more decisive attitude towards the revival of banderites Nazism in Ukraine. But even blind people can see now that seven years have passed, and this terrible Putin still has not attacked us!

Sure, Poles are told that it is thanks to our great governments and even better alliances that terrify the Moscow satrap so terribly. But even dumbfounded a typical Pole he has his own Slavic cleverness, saying him:  Well, if the Russians are not THAT scary after all – why not make a deal with them on our own, discretionally? And if they really are SO terrible – it is an even better argument for agreement!

However, we should not fall into false optimism – these positive instincts of Poles have no relations to any election decisions so far. Poles generally have a problem with articulating and expressing their political or even socio-economic expectations with the help of ballot papers. On the contrary, they expect ready-made recipes served by the chosen ones, and then take them as they are, without paying attention to details. And foreign policy, despite its fundamental economic implications, remains a detail for the majority of Polish voters, not to mention an even more negative attitude to international affairs on the part of the non-voting majority. It does not differ from the typical attitude also in other media-democratic countries.

The principle of Polish geopolitics

Therefore, Polish leaders do not have to worry about the opinions of voters, focusing on carrying out previously received, even no longer valid orders. So, when we hear and read the official expectations of the government or the so-called opposition in Poland about the Geneva meeting of World leaders will not be met if Joe Biden does not at least shoot, beat, or severely insult and spit on Vladimir Putin, taking away Crimea, Belarus and whatever else he would dream about. The level of media-propaganda aberration in Poland is so high that everything below will be considered capitulation and another Western betrayal. And in parallel – of course, self-control mechanisms will work. Whatever happens, whatever the leaders decide – it will be presented in the Polish media as a Russian defeat, proof of Russia’s weakness and of course Putin’s collapse. It simply cannot be otherwise.

The Poles will not find out what the two presidents really agreed or what the consequences for Poland will be. Only after some time, when the subordinate colonies will receive clear guidelines from the relevant embassies – some changes of accents will be expected, maybe attacking some other enemies as well, maybe some new argues with the neighbours, just to distract Polish attention.

And yet it is also a fundamental principle of Polish geopolitics that as for centuries our relations with all other countries and nations could only be a function of our relations with Russia and Germany and their references to other areas of the world – this is by analogy how Poland’s situation between America and Russia looks today. And even known German economic domination over Poland does not change it, as it is being carried out (still) thanks to the American mandate and acceptance. Therefore, Poland cannot have a foreign policy other than policy towards the USA and policy towards the Russian Federation. And other external (?) economic policy, except the policy towards Germany. Everything else is secondary. And Poland does not have any of these three.

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Featured image: Russian President Vladimir Putin (ID1974/Shutterstock) and President Joe Biden (Stratos Brilakis/shutterstock)

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***

Liebe Mitbürgerinnen und Mitbürger, marschieren Sie nicht wieder mit, wie die Bürger in Deutschland in den 1930er- und 1940er Jahren mit Hitler mitmarschierten. Sagen Sie NEIN zu den Machenschaften der neuen Diktatoren und ihren Helfershelfern. Diese haben bereits begonnen, die Menschheit mit ihren Corona-Notfall-Maßnahmen und Killer-Impfstoffen „auszudünnen“ und ins wirtschaftliche und soziale Chaos zu stürzen. Informieren Sie sich in den alternativen Medien, damit Sie über den gigantischen Betrug an der Menschheit bezüglich des Covid-19-Virus Bescheid wissen. Obwohl immer mehr davon ans Licht der Öffentlichkeit dringt, werden diese Psychopathen nicht lockerlassen und versuchen, Ihre Pläne weiter durchzusetzen. Die gegenwärtige psychologische Kriegsführung ist nur das Vorspiel für den nächsten teuflischen Schachzug, die „alternativlose“ Dezimierung und absolute Kontrolle der Menschheit aufgrund einer herbeigeredeten Klimakrise. Lesen Sie hierzu die fundierten Artikel der Experten-Kollegen.

Der manipulierte Mensch marschiert mit den Diktatoren mit 

Die Menschheit hat lange Zeit im Glauben gelebt, was der Pfarrer und die Kirche gesagt haben. Neue Gedanken waren nicht erlaubt, sie sind geahndet worden. Seit einigen Jahrhunderten haben wir die Zeit der Vernunft. Doch wie schaut diese Zeit der Vernunft aus? Nach wie vor gibt es Mord, Gewalt, Totschlag und Diktaturen. Und wie haben die Menschen reagiert auf diese Diktaturen? Waren in Hitler-Deutschland – ebenso wie in anderen Diktaturen – nicht alle mit dabei: die Arbeiter, die Angestellten, die Roten, die Schwarzen, die Psychologen, die Philosophen, die Kirchenmänner? Alle sind mit Hitler mitmarschiert – bis auf einige Persönlichkeiten, die nicht mitmachen wollten. In der Gesellschaft lebte die Gewalt – und sie lebt auch heute noch. Wir atmen die Gewalt. Und wieder marschiert die überwältigende Mehrheit mit.

In der Psychologie weiß man, dass wir Menschen schon in unserer Kindheit durch die Erziehung unserer Eltern manipuliert werden, so dass wir dann auf alles eingehen. Und anschließend werden wir durch den Staat und die verschiedenen Institutionen manipuliert. Der Katholik von seiner Kirche. Der Mensch ist schlussendlich zu allem fähig. Es gibt kaum einen Menschen, der heil davongekommen ist. Der Mensch wird so manipuliert, dass er nicht fähig ist, sich klare Gedanken zu machen, sondern er fällt um. Alle fallen um. Auch die Linken versagen immer wieder.

Ohne Psychologie wird die Menschheit nicht weiterkommen

Dieses Phänomen können wir uns nur erklären mit den Erkenntnissen der Tiefenpsychologie. Ansonsten werden wir immer wieder in die Irre gehen. Der Staat, die Kirche, alle Institutionen und die ganze Erziehung gehen davon aus, den Menschen in eine bestimmte Form zu pressen. Dadurch ergibt sich eine gewisse Tendenz in unserem Denken, in unserem Fühlen: Wir kennen keine andere Meinung. Wir sind so manipuliert, dass wir immer wieder auf die Lockrufe der Autorität hereinfallen und zum Beispiel in den Krieg ziehen. Der Mensch ist so erzogen, dass er nicht NEIN sagen kann. Die autoritäre Erziehung ergibt solche Gefühlsreaktionen. Und außer dem Gefühlsmäßigen ist auch das Denken verunstaltet. Die Menschen sind nicht fähig, sich vernünftige Gedanken zu machen. Deshalb haben wir diese schöne Welt vor uns.

Dem Menschen, der durch diese traditionelle Erziehung gegangen ist, können wir aber keinen Vorwurf machen: nicht dem Psychologen, nicht dem Philosophen, nicht dem Pfarrer, nicht dem Bischof und auch nicht dem Papst. Wir können nur an sie appellieren: Sagt NEIN!

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Dr. Rudolf Hänsel ist Diplom-Psychologe und Erziehungswissenschaftler.

Featured image is from Shutterstock 

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***

On Sunday, widespread criticism of Microsoft founder Bill Gates began on Twitter in India with the #ArrestBillGates. Gates is being accused of funding a programme in 2009 of testing and sterilizing indigenous vaccines on tribal children via his NGO Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF).

It is being claimed that the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation conducted an unlawful clinical trial of a vaccine on tribal children, without the consent of their parents.

As per a GreatGameIndia report, a Seattle-based NGO, Program for Appropriate Technology in Health (PATH), with funding by BMGF, conducted trials in Telangana’s Khammam wherein they administered the Human Papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine to 14,000 tribal girls of 10-14 years of age.

The report suggests that many children fell ill and four girls died after being injected with Gardasil. Their families, however, did not know that their children were being administered with it. It is believed that most of the girls’ parents had no knowledge of the trials as the girls lived in government-run hostels.

Hansraj Meena, Socio-Political Activist and Founder of Tribal Army, took to Twitter today to share this news.

This is a story where a foreign entity uses 14,000 Indian tribal girls as guinea pigs. Several died and many had severe side effects. But the company and its drug prosper and make millions. There was a pact of silence globally. #ArrestBillGates https://t.co/7Oo5ds1o7U

— Hansraj Meena (@HansrajMeena) May 30, 2021

Apparently, an article by the Economic Times voiced this news back in 2014.

𝐂𝐫𝐨𝐨𝐤𝐞𝐫𝐲 𝐨𝐟 𝐜𝐥𝐢𝐧𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐥 𝐭𝐫𝐢𝐚𝐥𝐬

Seems like this news got buried in Aug 2014 as there were no outrage at that time but it is covered by prominent news outlets.#ArrestBillGateshttps://t.co/rRRYfR32E2

— Hansraj Meena (@HansrajMeena) May 29, 2021

Today, a furore has arisen on Twitter as Indians are demanding the arrest of the business tycoon for the deaths of tribal girls in India.

Here’s how people are reacting to the news. Have a look.

It is shameful for a person like @BillGates to conduct a vaccine trial on illiterate women of the same caste for centuries. Take strict action soon US administration. Raise the voice of Bill Gates by raising the whole world.#ArrestBillGates @POTUS@KamalaHarris @WhiteHouse pic.twitter.com/o92DfTyGB8

— Sunil Astay (@SunilAstay) May 29, 2021

Bill Gates has sterilized many Indian tribal girls

And have also tested indigenous vaccine on those girls.

Which has ruined the lives of all those girls

How can such a famous man do such a big wrong job?

So today we all demand that#ArrestBillGates pic.twitter.com/6wV4yQNnvO

— MD Umair khan (@Khan____INC) May 29, 2021

It's heartbreaking news
#ArrestBillGates who killed the humility, but sensitive thing who has permitted him in India for the trial of vaccine on tribal girls? It's indicating so many things including the level of degradation looking the highest level of Dracula.@HansrajMeena

— Virendra kumar (@Virendr69180344) May 29, 2021

We want justice ✊

Justice for our Tribal sister #ArrestBillGates

— Chhotubhai Vasava (@Chhotu_Vasava) May 29, 2021

How Bill Gates Funded NGO PATH Killed Tribal Girls In India In Unauthorised Clinical Trials

Justice for our tribal sisters

#arrestbillgates pic.twitter.com/1NXoLyrIm6

— Geetanjali Korram (@GeetanjaliKorr1) May 29, 2021

Finally people are knowning these

Tribe are not a lab rats to test#ArrestBillGates pic.twitter.com/43CigHGv2t

— Venky (@Venky3K_) May 30, 2021

In 2009, Khammam on 14000 Tribals Girls ? 😧 #ArrestBillGates
That’s something serious 🧐 pic.twitter.com/7kmRKilx3j

— Vanam Tejasvi (@TejasviVanam) May 30, 2021

He should be punished for his henious devil act #ArrestBillGates

— GRAVITY 🇮🇳 (@Warrior_prevail) May 30, 2021

In 2009 Bill & Melinda gate Foundation NGO #PATH conducted unauthorized clinical trials on 14,000 tribal girls of #India as guinea pigs. Several d!ed & had severe side effects. Why pact of silence globally & they r making Billions. #RahulGandhi answer plz #ArrestBillGates #BMGF pic.twitter.com/2tcEdNEv33

— Rajveer Yadav (@rajveeryadav00) May 30, 2021

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***

The at-times fiery protests that raged across Belarus throughout 2020 had largely fizzled out by the time local activist and seeming neo-Nazi Roman Protasevich was dramatically arrested in May this year.

Now, the country has been catapulted back to the top of the mainstream news agenda, with new life breathed into controversial self-appointed President Svetlana Tikhanovskaya’s hitherto unheeded calls for Western leaders to recognize her as the legitimate Belarusian leader.

True to form though, not a single outlet has deigned to mention that for many years prior to the unrest’s eruption, London and Washington had funded, trained, and promoted the very elements that took to the streets in opposition to President Alexander Lukashenko.

“Not Worth People’s Blood”

In April 2019, the RAND Corporation—a U.S. government think-tank—published a report, Extending Russia: Competing from Advantageous Ground.

It outlined “a range of possible means to extend Russia,” defined as “measures to bait Russia into overextending itself” in order to “undermine the regime’s stability.”

Drawing on quantitative and qualitative data from Western and Russian sources, this report examines Russia’s economic, political, and military vulnerabilities and anxieties and then “analyzes potential policy options to exploit them—ideologically, economically, geopolitically, and militarily” along with “the likelihood that [these policy options] could be successfully implemented.”

A dedicated section of the 354-page report dealt with “promoting regime change in Belarus.” It noted that, among other welcome outcomes, denying Russia “its one and only true ally” would be “a clear geopolitical and ideological gain for the West,” undermining Moscow’s proposed Eurasian Economic Union, complicating “any attempt to employ military force against the Baltic States,” and further isolating Kaliningrad,” the Russian exclave situated between Lithuania and Poland.

Fomenting unrest in Belarus was said to “present an opportunity to extend Russia by aiding the opposition, removing a long-standing Russian-allied dictator, and supporting liberalization.” Aid to Lukashenko’s opposition “could come in a variety of forms, ranging from public declarations of support by U.S. leaders to more direct financial and organizational assistance helping the opposition parties.”

Such a course of action was nonetheless forecast to be extremely risky, and likely to fail. For one, the Belarusian opposition mounting a “serious challenge” to Lukashenko was considered unlikely, and in any event would likely prompt Russia to “employ political and economic pressure to keep the regime in place,” if not intervene in the situation militarily, and produce “greater local repression” from authorities.

Furthermore, there was little tangible public appetite for democratization. RAND cited a 2015 survey conducted by the Independent Institute for Socio-Economic and Political Research, which found that 78% of Belarusians believed regime change was “not worth people’s blood” and 70% “did not want a Ukrainian-style revolution.”

“People don’t want more freedom. They want more government. They want the better life they used to have,” a Belarusian expert quoted in the report said in 2017.

Promoting liberalization in Belarus was predicted to require European support, and given the bloc faced “a host of other challenges from Ukraine to refugees to Brexit,” Brussels [European Union] “might not want to add Belarus to the mix” and “rock the boat.”

Still, there was perceived value to attempting to precipitate regime change even if the effort ultimately failed as such a campaign would “create apprehensions among Russian leaders,” making them “worry about the prospect of such a movement in their own country.” This would in turn prompt Moscow to reinforce its military presence and political influence within Belarus, burdening Russia with a “weak, corrupt dependency” and possibly even generating “some degree of local resistance,” the report approvingly suggested.

Essentially, were Moscow “to commit resources to preserve its grasp over Belarus,” it would “extend” Russia, by “provoking the U.S. and its European allies to respond with harsher sanctions.” In other words, mission accomplished.

“Shadow Political Structure”

The question of what if any impact this section of RAND’s report had on U.S. policymakers subsequently is somewhat moot, given Washington had for some time prior to its publication provably been engaged in precisely the destabilization efforts proposed therein, by way of the National Endowment for Democracy (NED).

Founded in November 1983, then-U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Director William Casey was central to its creation. He sought to construct a public mechanism to support groups and individuals overseas to engage in propaganda and political action undermining “enemy” governments from within—activities historically organized and paid for clandestinely by the Agency—under the bogus aegis of democracy and human rights promotion.

In 1991, senior NED official Allen Weinstein acknowledged that “a lot of what we do today was done covertly 25 years ago by the CIA,” and NED’s work often directly complements Langley’s cloak-and-dagger work.

[Source: chinadaily.com.cn]

For example, during the Reagan administration’s brutal secret war against Nicaragua’s progressive Sandinista government during the 1980s, in which tens of thousands died, NED allocated millions of dollars to “civic opposition” entities—including La Prensa, the country’s primary anti-Sandinista newspaper.

Concurrently, the CIA trained, funded, and armed the Sandinistas’ fascist opponents, the Contras. In particular, the Agency’s “Tayacan” manual on guerrilla warfare was highly influential, leading the group to incite mob violence, “neutralize” government officials and civilian leaders, and attack “soft targets” such as schools and hospitals, among other hideous atrocities.

Publicly available data indicates the NED funded at least 159 civil society initiatives in Belarus, costing $7,690,689, from 2016 to 2020 alone.

While the projects have innocent-sounding titles—“strengthening regional youth initiatives; fostering freedom of the media; promoting civic journalism”—the example of Ukraine indicates such endeavors can have highly incendiary results.

As investigative journalist Robert Parry documented after the March 2014 Maidan coup, the NED bankrolled 65 projects in Ukraine in the years prior to that uprising, in the process creating “a shadow political structure of media and activist groups that could be deployed to stir up unrest when the Ukrainian government didn’t act as desired.”

Six months prior, long-time NED chief Carl Gershman wrote a chilling op-ed for The Washington Post in which he documented Moscow’s growing troubles in its “near abroad”—the constellation of countries that formerly comprised the Soviet Union—and how his organization was exploiting them to the full. Hailing Ukraine as “the biggest prize,” he explained that “Russian democracy” could also “benefit” from Kiev being absorbed into the Western fold.

“Ukraine’s choice to join Europe will accelerate the demise of the ideology of Russian imperialism that Putin represents,” Gershman wrote. “Russians, too, face a choice, and Putin may find himself on the losing end not just in the near abroad but within Russia itself.”

Further underlying the insidious efficacy of NED’s “democracy-promotion” activities, in May 2021 a pair of Russian pranksters posing as Belarusian opposition figures successfully duped high-ranking NED representatives into bragging about their involvement in the ongoing unrest in Belarus at the start of 2020.

Among many startlingly frank disclosures, Nina Ognianova, who oversees the NED’s work with opposition groups in the country, revealed that “a lot of the people” who were “trained” and “educated” via the organization’s various endeavors in Minsk were pivotal to “the events, or the build-up to the events, of last summer.”

Gershman added that the organization was working with Svetlana Tikhanovskaya and her team “very, very closely.”

“Malicious” Violator

U.S. meddling in Belarus dates much further back than 2016. Five years earlier, an official White House press release on U.S.-Polish “efforts to advance democracy worldwide” had a dedicated section on the pair’s work to “pressure” the Lukashenko government and “support civil society,” which stated the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) would work with the Warsaw-based Belsat TV station “to develop content and programming on democracy education.”

Founded in December 2007 by the Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Belsat dubs itself “reminiscent of” U.S. propaganda outlets Radio Free Europe and Voice of America—assets of BBG [now U.S. Agency for Global Media]—describes its mission as “promoting democratization processes” in Minsk, and boasts that events in Ukraine “have shown Belsat TV has influenced the public opinion not only in Belarus, but elsewhere in the region, too.”

Belsat may well have influenced political action and policy too, with lethal consequences. For example, in May 2015 it broadcast a slick documentary about a young man who went to fight in the war in Donbas for “Tactical Group Belarus,” a Belarusian volunteer group spun out of Ukraine’s notorious “Right Sector,” a pro-government neo-Nazi militia.

The film was billed as the stirring tale of a brave protagonist “[risking] his life … because he believes that the fate of his homeland depends on it,” while every day facing potential extradition back to Minsk and years in prison, as his presence in Ukraine was illegal. Perhaps unsurprisingly, Lukashenko has repeatedly stated there is no place in Belarus for citizens who fight in the Donbas, and hundreds have been prosecuted for taking part in the conflict to date.

The documentary’s politically charged subtext could not be more blatant, and six months after transmission, the government of then-President Petro Poroshenko answered its seeming call, amending the law to allow foreigners to legally serve in the Ukrainian armed forces, and instructing police and migration services to assist would-be recruits in joining.

This development was enthusiastically welcomed by Belsat–in an article heralding the move, the broadcaster went to the shocking extent of providing the email and phone number of “Tactical Group Belarus” for any reader who wanted to “help the guys.”

How many Belarusians answered this call to arms, and went on to kill and/or be killed on the front lines, is an open question, although this obvious consideration clearly did little to dent the station’s standing with Western powers.

On an official visit to Warsaw in late 2017, then-UK Prime Minister Theresa May allocated£5 million of UK funding to Polish organizations to “detect and counter the spread of Russian information operations,” with some of the money specifically earmarked for Belsat.

UK Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (FCDO) files leaked by hacktivist collective Anonymous shed some light on the support provided by London to the station via Thomson Reuters Foundation (TRF), the internationally renowned newswire’s charitable arm.

In all, Belsat received 150 days of intensive consultancy in a three-month period—“of which 97 were delivered in-country”—from consultants, interpreters, and project and finance managers, among them Reuters staff.

If TRF sought to greatly ramp up Belsat’s propaganda capabilities, then its counsel was certainly successful. A Media IQ monitoring report on the station’s compliance with journalistic standards “when reporting public-political news” September-December 2019 was utterly damning, finding it to be a “malicious” violator in respect to separating fact from opinion, a staggering 75% of its current affairs output contravening this basic principle during the period assessed.

“Countering Malign Kremlin Influence”

It seems likely TRF’s guidance was informed by the findings of an extensive “target audience analysis” of Belarusian citizens’ perceptions and motivations conducted in January 2017, which sought to “identify opportunities” to “appropriately communicate” with them. The study was commissioned by the FCDO in January 2017, under the auspices of a £100 million Whitehall effort to weaken Russia’s influence in its “near abroad.”

In particular, London was interested in Belarusians’ “existing or potential grievances against their national government” that could be leveraged, and “channels and messages” through which the UK government could “appropriately engage with different sub-groups.”

The FCDO’s “target audience analysis” was carried out by long-time Whitehall contractor Albany Associates, central to a number of London’s covert information warfare operations aimed at Russia.

In one such connivance, the firm sought to “develop greater affinity” among the region’s Russian-speaking minority for the UK, European Union, and NATO. In another, it collaborated with French NGO IREX Europe to “promote media plurality, balance and literacy in Central Asia.”

FCDO Main Building in London, seen from Whitehall. [Source: wikipedia.org]

In its submissions to the FCDO, Albany noted IREX had been working in Belarus since 2006 “with print, online and radio outlets,” to “improve the quality of their coverage,” and “increase their understanding of the EU and EU member states.” As part of its youth audience offering in the country, the organization was said to have founded Warsaw-based Euroradio, along with online outlet 34mag.

IREX is closely connected with the NED, and created Euroradio in 2006 with funding from the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), another entity that has frequentlybeen used to insidiously undermine governments in Washington’s crosshairs. Just like the FCDO, USAID—now under the direction of war hawk Samantha Power—operates a multi-faceted program targeted at Russia’s “near abroad,” Countering Malign Kremlin Influence, “in alignment with U.S. national security strategy.”

A 2015 report on backing provided by IREX to “independent” media across Eastern Europe under the terms of its “cooperative agreement” with USAID details Euroradio’s exponential rise following its launch. Within four years, it was also receiving sizable funding from the European Union and numerous foreign governments, and running elaborate promotional multimedia campaigns.

By 2008, it was sponsoring 300 events in the region annually, receiving “significant free exposure” by “placing its banners at music and cultural events,” including the annual Right to be Free concert in Lviv, Ukraine. Bands from Belarus, Ukraine, and elsewhere played to a 10,000-strong crowd, “with many bused in from Belarus.”

During the 2010 election, it broadcast live footage of protests following the vote via the web, Skype, and various instant messaging platforms, “interviewed leading opposition candidates, reported on the arrests of protesters, reported from the election commission, and provided reports from six regions through regional stringers,” tailoring its “content and marketing efforts” specifically for 17-35-year-olds.

These activities among others cemented Euroradio as Belarus’s “leading external radio broadcaster” and, come 2012, its “potential audience for terrestrial broadcasts” was two million, more than one-fifth of the country’s population, the website receiving hundreds of thousands of visitors monthly.

“Sugar Daddy of Overt Operations”

Throughout 2020 and beyond, Euroradio almost endlessly published footage of violent crackdowns on protesters in Minsk, which in turn was routinely aired by the mainstream media. The BBC went to the extent of issuing an open call for activists on the ground to submit pictures and videos for use in its coverage, which Euroradio enthusiastically amplified.

It would be entirely unsurprising if much of the content featured in Western news reporting on the unrest was created by individuals and organizations secretly in receipt of funding and training from Open Information Partnership (OIP), the “flagship” strand of the FCDO’s multi-pronged propaganda assault on Russia.

OIP maintains a network of 44 partners across Central and Eastern Europe, including “journalists, charities, think tanks, academics, NGOs, activists, and factcheckers.”

Internal Whitehall documents reveal one of its primary objectives is influencing “elections taking place in countries of particular interest” to the FCDO. It achieves this disruption by helping organizations and individuals produce slick propaganda masquerading as independent citizen journalism, which is then amplified globally via its network.

In Ukraine for example, OIP worked with a dozen online “influencers” to “counter Kremlin-backed messaging through innovative editorial strategies, audience segmentation, and production models that reflected the complex and sensitive political environment,” allowing them to “reach wider audiences with compelling content that received over four million views.”

Similarly, in Russia and Central Asia, OIP established a network of YouTubers, helping them create videos “promoting media integrity and democratic values.”

Participants were taught to “make and receive international payments without being registered as external sources of funding” and “develop editorial strategies to deliver key messages,” while the consortium minimized their “risk of prosecution” and managed “project communications” to ensure the existence of the network, and OIP’s role, were kept “confidential.”

Belarus, along with Moldova and Ukraine, is referred to in the leaked files as “the most vital space in the entire [OIP] network,” and a “high-impact priority” country for London. This suggests its 2020 election was very much “of interest”—and the shock results of Moldova’s November 2020 presidential vote suggest OIP’s informational influence can be decisive.

That election pitted upstart pro-Western Maia Sandu against incumbent pro-Russian leader Igor Dodon, with the former emerging victorious in a win widely acknowledged by the Western media to be surprising. Two Moldovan organizations, the Association of Independent Press and Newsmaker, are fellow OIP network members, and could well have served as conduits for FCDO-funded, pro-Sandu, anti-Dodon material.

Slovakian OIP member MEMO 98, coincidentally also funded by NED, published an extensive study of the election campaign, attributing Sandu’s upset to her social media Nous.

MEMO 98 similarly kept a close eye on the Belarus protests, publishing several analyses of media reporting and social media activity related to the strife, in the process drawing particular attention to the output of none other than Belsat, praising its “extensive coverage of protests and related intimidation of activists.”

In September 1991, The Washington Post published an article on the subject of “spyless coups” abroad, in which it referred to the NED as the “sugar daddy of overt operations,” and noted that throughout the late 1980s, it had “dispensed money to anti-communist forces behind the Iron Curtain.”

“Covert funding for these groups would have been the kiss of death, if discovered. Overt funding, it would seem, has been a kiss of life,” the newspaper concluded.

NED funding has very clearly been a “kiss of life” to a large number of oft-dubious opposition actors within and without Belarus, in turn unleashing all manner of chaos—and what’s more, its “sugar daddy” status is now being challenged by a number of other spectral, malign Western actors.

Whether these efforts ultimately fail or succeed in unseating the Lukashenko government is immaterial to the individuals and organizations responsible for instigating them–for merely attempting to do so serves the purpose of “extending,” and thus internationally isolating, Minsk and Moscow alike.

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Featured image: Protesters in Minsk supporting opposition to Alexander Lukashenko and Russia. [Source: pbs.org]

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TrialSite has learned of material information regarding mRNA vaccine safety revealed by a freedom of information act (FOIA) request filed by a group of Canadian physicians. These doctors have become concerned about COVID-19 mRNA vaccine safety. This new safety information involves the Pfizer mRNA-based vaccine known as BNT162b2 or “Comirnaty.”

The FOIA documents reveal animal study results demonstrating that the Pfizer mRNA-based vaccine does not remain at the injection site, but rather appears to spread widely after injection. 

According to the documents, pre-clinical studies show that the active part of the vaccine (mRNA-lipid nanoparticles), which produce the spike protein, spreads throughout the body and is then concentrated in various organs, including the ovaries and spleen. 

The FOIA-produced data sets are incomplete, so the full meaning of these data cannot be determined at this time. TrialSite has also learned via regulatory documents that apparently (at least in their European Medicines Agency submission), Pfizer did not follow industry-standard quality management practices during preclinical toxicology studies during vaccines, as key studies did not meet good laboratory practice (GLP). The full panel of industry-standard reproductive toxicity and genotoxicity studies were apparently also not performed. But does this matter in light of the risk-benefit analysis associated with regulatory emergency use authorization (EUA)?

Recently, there has been speculation regarding potential safety signals associated with COVID-19 mRNA vaccines.  Many different unusual, prolonged, or delayed reactions have been reported, and often these are more pronounced after the second shot. Women have reported changes in menstruation after taking mRNA vaccines. Problems with blood clotting (coagulation) – which are also common during COVID-19 disease – are also reported.

Among the most critical tests, which must be performed prior to testing any drug or vaccines in a human being, is whether it can cause mutations in the DNA (genotoxicity), or whether it could cause problems with cells or tissues of the reproductive tract – including ovaries (reproductive toxicity). In the case of the Pfizer COVID mRNA vaccine, these newly revealed documents raise additional questions about both the genotoxicity and reproductive toxicity risks of this product. Standard studies designed to assess these risks were not performed in compliance with accepted empirical research standards. Furthermore, in key studies designed to test whether the vaccine remains near the injection site or travels throughout the body, Pfizer did not even use the commercial vaccine (BNT162b2) but instead relied on a “surrogate” mRNA producing the luciferase protein.

These new disclosures seem to indicate that the U.S. and other governments are conducting a massive vaccination program with an incompletely characterized experimental vaccine.

It is certainly understandable why the vaccine was rushed into use as an experimental product under emergency use authority, but these new findings suggest that routine quality testing issues were overlooked in the rush to authorize use.

People are now receiving injections with an mRNA gene therapy-based vaccine, which produces the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein in their cells, and the vaccine may be also delivering the mRNA and producing spike protein in unintended organs and tissues (which may include ovaries). Unfortunately, there is no way to know if this is related to vaccine safety signals or reports of menstrual irregularities; the required studies were either not done or not done properly.

How mRNA Vaccines are Believed to Work

The current mRNA vaccines are theorized to act locally in draining lymphoid tissue. Formulated lipid nanoparticles that contain mRNA able to produce the spike protein are syringe injected into a muscle such as the deltoid (shoulder muscle). Once the injection occurs, the muscle cells near the injection site are impacted by the mRNA-based vaccine (e.g. the lipid nanoparticles), while much of the dose moves into the intracellular fluid surrounding the muscle cells and consequently drains to lymph nodes (see for example here).

According to this theory, a properly functioning mRNA-based vaccine is delivered into and drives production of the SARS-CoV-2 Spike protein in muscle and lymph node cells. The cells then produce the Spike protein, which is then moved to the surface of these cells where it becomes attached.

The foreign virus Spike protein then triggers the immune system to recognize and attack any cell in the body that is either infected by SARS-CoV-2 or has Spike protein on its surface. The vaccine was designed so that the Spike protein is affixed via a transmembrane anchor region, so that it cannot circulate around the body via the bloodstream (see here). The same general scenario applies to all mRNA-based vaccines as well as recombinant adenoviral vectored vaccines (such as the J&J vaccine) designed to use gene-therapy technology to express Spike protein in cells and tissues. This general strategy is designed to reduce the risk that any residual vaccine dose that does somehow end up in the bloodstream (or organs and tissues) ends up not being a safety risk due to unintended biologic effects. Spike protein will remain affixed to cell surfaces, and therefore is not released into the blood where circulating Spike might cause problems by binding to its natural target, ACE-2 receptors. However, any cell that has Spike protein (or protein fragments) anchored on its membrane or displayed on MHC antigen-presenting molecules becomes a target for vaccine-activated immune cells and antibodies, which would then attack, damage or kill those cells in the same way that SARS-CoV-2 virus-infected cells would be attacked. In other words, if very active mRNA delivery particles or recombinant adenoviral-vectored vaccines spread throughout the body, the resulting production of the vaccine antigen (Spike, in this case) will both stimulate immunity and also cause those same cells to be attacked by the immune system. If this actually happens, the resulting “vaccine reactogenicity” could resemble clinical symptoms seen with autoimmune syndromes.

EMA Pfizer/BioNTech Vaccine Distribution Studies

As standard practice, the European Medicines Agency (EMA) discloses their assessment of investigational new drug (IND) submissions. In the case of the Pfizer-BioNTech “Comirnaty” vaccine, the EMA assessment can be found on the Web here. This document includes a summary of EMAs evaluation of the non-clinical vaccine distribution studies reported to EMA by Pfizer-BioNTech. These studies were carried out using two methods: 1) use of mRNA producing the luciferase protein and 2) use of radioactive label to mark the mRNA (a more sensitive approach). These studies reveal that the majority of radioactivity initially remains near the injection site. However, within hours, a subset of the stabilized mRNA-containing particles become widely distributed throughout the bodies of test animals.

Upon inspection of the EMA summary document, TrialSite found evidence suggesting that the issue of biodistribution and pharmacokinetics of the “Comirnaty” BNT162b2 vaccine was not thoroughly examined in accordance with industry norms prior to the EMA review of the BNT162b2 IND/CTD. The reviewers share an explicit admission that “No traditional pharmacokinetic or biodistribution studies have been performed with the vaccine candidate BNT162b2.” Rapporteur (Filip Josephson) and Co-Rapporteur (Jean-Michael Race) suggest, however, that Pfizer used “a qualified LC-MS/MS method to support quantitation of the two novel LNP excipients” and suggest that “the bioanalysis methods appear to be adequately characterized and validated for use in the GLP studies.” However, the studies that were performed and submitted were non-GLP. Additionally, the EMA document states “Biodistribution: Several literature reports indicate that LNP-formulated RNAs can distribute rather nonspecifically to several organs such as spleen, heart, kidney, lung and brain. In line with this, results from the newly transmitted study 185350, indicate a broader biodistribution pattern.” This EMA observation corresponds with what appears to be a growing number of adverse events and aligns with data TrialSite observed via the FOIA showing concentrations of LNP-formulated RNAs in the spleen, for example.

To obtain independent reviews of these EMA regulatory documents, TrialSite contacted both Dr. Robert W. Malone, MD, MS, and another expert that wished to remain anonymous, and provided them copies of the EMA analysis and the FOIA documents. Dr. Malone was the original inventor of the mRNA vaccine technology back in the late 1980s. He currently advises several companies in regulatory affairs and clinical development. One of TrialSite’s other sources is a senior regulatory specialist who currently serves as the President of a prestigious European association.  When asked to review and comment on the EMA assessment, Dr. Malone noted that normal pharmacokinetic and pharmaco-toxicology studies had not been performed before EUA authorization for the product. “I was particularly surprised that the dossier of regulatory documents indicates allowance for use in humans based on non-GLP PK and Tox studies relying on formulations which are significantly different from the final vaccine.“ After completing a review, TrialSite’s other source noted the following:

“A quick review the Toxicology Section (2.3.3) of The European Medicines Agency (EMA) Assessment Report on Comirnaty (COVID-19 mRNA vaccine) issued on 19 February 2021, raises concerns about data applicability of preclinical study findings to clinical use:

To determine the biodistribution of the LNP-formulated modified mRNA (modRNA), the applicant did study distribution of the modRNA in two different non-GLP studies, in mice and rats, and determined the biodistribution of a surrogate luciferase modRNA.

Thus, one might question the validity and applicability of non-GLP studies conducted using a variant of the subject mRNA vaccine.

In addition, no genotoxicity data were provided to EMA.”

Based on the FOIA documents, the biodistribution results (which are not disclosed in the public EMA summary document) suggest that the delivery technology results in mRNA delivery and significant concentration of the delivery lipids in ovaries, spleen, and other tissues and organs.

Urgent Emergency?

The discovery and review of the biodistribution and pharmacokinetics data obtained by the FOIA request underscores the reservations disclosed in the public EMA assessment. Although not performed to industry GLP standards, these results seem to indicate that lipid/mRNA nanoparticles, which code for the Spike protein, circulate throughout the body and then collect in a variety of organs and tissues, including the spleen and ovaries.  This means that the vaccine is not remaining localized near the injection site and draining lymph nodes, but rather is also circulating in both blood and lymph and is subsequently concentrating in important organs. If this results in Spike protein being produced in unintended places including the brain, ovaries, and spleen, it may also be causing the immune system to attack these organs and tissues.

What’s the Risk?

According to official government accounts, minimal risk is associated with this vaccine when compared to the risks of COVID-19 infection. That’s why the U.S. FDA approved the Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) based on a risk-benefit analysis. TrialSite, a vaccine proponent, only raises the issue to ensure full disclosure of any material safety implications to our readership, including clinicians, clinical research safety committees, and public health professionals.

While, according to the CDC’s VAERS database, over 4,000 deaths have been entered in association with all the vaccines, the US government argues that none of these deaths are formally linked to the jabs. About 291 million people have been vaccinated to date, hence overall reported adverse event risk is low. While it is true that many people are completely unscathed, the discovery of these documents and associated information may alter the risk-benefit assessment underlying the EUA decision.

TrialSite is aware that one must be particularly cautious about publishing or communicating speculations that might raise skepticism about vaccine use. Should researchers handle findings differently when there is a chance they might frighten the public? Perhaps small, inconclusive, worrying studies should not be published because they could do more harm than good. Dr. Paul Offit, Director of the Vaccine Education Center at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, states: “Knowing that you’re going to scare people, I think you have to have far more data.”

One could argue that even an inconclusive paper can be important, as it can spur the larger, more definitive studies that are needed. It should be “put out there for the scientific community, to look at it, see it, know about it, refine study design and go and look again,” says Gregory Poland, a renowned Mayo Clinic vaccinologist and the Editor-in-Chief of Vaccine. It is crucial, though, for researchers to carefully explain such results in their papers and regulatory filings to prevent misinterpretation or misunderstandings.

Other Relevant New Data

A recent study led by researchers at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and the Harvard Medical School measured longitudinal plasma samples collected from 13 recipients of the Moderna vaccine. The manuscript has been accepted for publication by “Clinical Infectious Diseases” and the pre-print is available here. Out of these individuals, 11 revealed detectable levels of SARS-CoV-2 protein as early as day one right after first vaccine injection. The authors considered that to be normal clearance.

Clearance of detectable SARS-CoV-2 protein correlated with production of IgG and IgA. Measured mean S1 peak levels were 68 pg/mL ±21 pg/mL, and mean spike peak level was 62 pg/mL ± 13 pg/mL.  Assuming an average adult blood volume of approximately 5 liters, this corresponds to peak levels of approximately 0.3 micrograms of circulating free antigen for a vaccine designed to only express membrane-anchored antigen. For comparison purposes, most influenza vaccines administer a total of about 15 micrograms of HA antigen per influenza strain. Total levels of antigen expressed by the experimental SARS-CoV-2 mRNA vaccines currently administered to patients are not known.

Root Cause Analysis Suggested

A root cause assessment is suggested to better understand if any of this information adjusts or modifies the EUA risk-benefit analysis. TrialSite suggests that regulators and pharma manufacturers at least review and assess the risk that foreign mRNA-based spike protein delivery and expression in tissues and organs distal to the actual injection site may be contributing to the unusual reactogenicity and adverse event profile associated with these products. The uptake in vaccination rates has slowed in the United States in part due to vaccine hesitancy. However, such a phenomenon can be overcome with acknowledgment, transparency, and continuous commitment to risk mitigation.

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Turkey has not said its last in northern Syria, as the situation appears to be escalating.

On June 12th, at least 22 people, mostly civilians, were killed in heavy shelling in the Turkish-occupied city of Afrin.

At least 35 were injured in the attack.

The bombing of the city of Afrin also caused huge material damage to civilian property, including homes, cars and shops.

The targeting of the Al-Shifa Hospital led to it closing down, and victims were reported among the hospital staff.

It is unclear who carried it out, but initial blame was laid on Kurdish groups and namely the Afrin Liberation Forces positioned in many of the surrounding villages.

Some sources alleged that the Turkish forces bombed the city, citing Ankara’s efforts to exploit the bombing and its victims on the eve of the Erdogan’s meeting with Biden.

The response came rather swiftly, when Turkish forces and the Ankara-backed militants carried out extensive and large-scale bombings towards the villages outside of their control and where the Afrin Liberation Forces are deployed.

On June 13th, Turkey’s efforts continued.

A series of Turkish strikes hit the Syrian town of Tell Rifaat and its outskirts in the northern countryside of Aleppo.

There are conflicting reports, with some claiming that Turkish drones carried out the strikes, while others said that the drones were simply used to correct Turkish artillery fire.

The Turkish Ministry of National Defense held the SDF responsible for the deadly attack on Afrin.

In its initial response, the Turkish military fired more than 180 rockets and shells on positions of the Kurdish-led group around Tell Rifaat.

The SDF denied responsibility for the attack despite having a track record of firing rockets at Afrin city.

On February 17, 13 people, including six children and three women, were wounded when the group fired a barrage of rockets at Afrin.

On May 2, a 5-year-old girl was killed and her parents were wounded in another rocket attack on the city.

Meanwhile, Turkey is also preparing to push back in Idlib, in responce to the heavy shelling and airstrikes by the Syrian Arab Army with Russian support on Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham militants.

Turkey is reportedly preparing for an offensive.

The Turkish military has stepped up ammunition shipments to the militants.

At least 12 trucks loaded with shells and rockets arrived in the town of al-Bara in southern Idlib from Turkey through the Kafer Lusin border crossing.

HTS is also amassing its forces on several frontlines in Greater Idlib in preparations for a large-scale offensive.

The al-Qaeda-affiliated group has deployed dozens of fighters as well as several battle tanks.

The entirety of Syria’s north – both the Kurdish-populated areas, and Greater – Idlib may be heading towards chaos orchestrated by Turkey.

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Few could have expected that one of America’s top allies anywhere in the world would so seriously disagree with its patron, but that’s exactly what happened after Polish officials publicly expressed deep concern over the US’ recent recalibration of relations with Russia, prompting observers to wonder exactly how far everything will go and towards what ultimate ends.

Poland is widely regarded as one of America’s top allies anywhere in the world and with good reason considering that it’s marched in lockstep with its patron ever since the end of communism in 1989 with only a single exception.

That was the Obama-era “Reset” with Russia, which Poland regarded as a betrayal of its national security interests even though that policy eventually failed. History is once again repeating itself, however, after Polish officials publicly expressed deep concern over the Biden Administration’s recent recalibration of relations with Russia which some fear might be even more disastrous for their country’s national security than Obama’s plans to change the nature of the US’ missile defense shield in this geostrategically positioned Central & Eastern European (CEE) country.

Poland was surprised by the Biden Administration’s decision to waive most Nord Stream II sanctions last month, with different officials describing this move as a “threat” to energy security and even a “gas bomb placed under European integration”. Prime Minister Morawiecki very loudly condemned what he called the US’ “180-degree change of policy” towards Russia in an exclusive interview that he recently gave to Newsweek, which was followed by his Foreign Minister expressing deep “regret” over Biden’s refusal to meet with CEE leaders ahead of his summit with President Putin. The end result is that Poland is presently in a very serious geostrategic predicament after proverbially putting all of its eggs into the basket of Trump’s re-election. This was the culmination of a series of counterproductive policy calculations that I elaborated upon earlier in the month.

In summary, Poland’s practically pathological expression of “negative nationalism” vis-a-vis Russia was responsible for it obsessively doing everything in its power to undermine its Great Power neighbor in the contested “sphere of influence” between them in Belarus and Ukraine ever since 2013.

This absolutely ruined relations with Russia and therefore made it impossible for Poland to take advantage of the opportunity to “balance” between East and West in pursuit of better deals from both of its neighbors. Instead, it eagerly submitted itself to the US’ regional strategic designs, only to have Biden pull the rug out from under its leaders’ feet in recent weeks as America once again pursued its own interests at Poland’s expense. I forecast the larger consequences of this for Eurasia in my latest analysis for the Russian International Affairs Council (RIAC).

It also deserves mentioning that the Polish leadership’s conservative-nationalist worldview is the ideological opposite of the present American’s liberal-globalist one, a point that was further emphasized in Morawiecki’s interview where he envisioned a “Europe of homelands” instead of the “United States of Europe” that the US is nowadays more in favor of. Although this prompted an RT contributor to wonder whether a “Polexit” might be in the cards sometime later this decade if the ideological contradiction between Warsaw and EU-leader Berlin isn’t resolved soon enough, it’s highly unlikely that anything of the sort will ever transpire because the CEE leader immensely benefits from the bloc’s free movement of goods, services, and people. Rather, it’s much more likely that Poland might seek to turn its “Three Seas Initiative” into less of a complement to the European project like Morawiecki told Newsweek that it is and more of an intra-organizational ideological competitor.

It’s too early to say whether that’ll happen, but it’s already undeniable that Poland has suddenly become much more isolated on the European stage due both to its deliberately counterproductive policies towards Russia as well as the bloc’s leading members like Germany supporting the US’ pragmatic recalibration of relations with Moscow. Morawiecki also mentioned in his earlier cited interview that while he’s concerned about some of China’s growing influence, he nevertheless “believe(s) that competition is good and some competition coming from China—not the sort that is subsidized or where there is price dumping or industrial output via slave labor, but outside those abuses, competition is not bad for us. And we are open for the Chinese investments strengthening our intelligence competitive capacities and our abilities to defend vis-à-vis their attacks.” This suggests a possible economic pivot towards China if relations with the US can’t be repaired.

That said, the US probably isn’t going to ever abandon Poland and thus open up the possibility of it economically pivoting towards the People’s Republic. Biden will probably retain his country’s recently bolstered military presence in Poland or at the very least ensure that some robust NATO presence remains in order to symbolically reassure its leadership that the US hasn’t “sold it out to Russia” like they increasingly fear. At the same time, however, American pressure on Poland might increase, including through more covert US support for the German Hybrid War on Poland that’s seen Berlin back a rolling Color Revolution over the past few years which aims to replace its target’s conservative-nationalist government with liberal-globalist puppets.

With any improvement of relations with Russia being politically impossible especially in light of recent so-called “spy scandals” (one of which is arguably paranoid persecution of a genuine human rights activist), the only realistic policy option for Poland in the event of worsening ties with America (or at the very least growing mistrust and associated suspicion of its “ally’s” grand strategic motives vis-a-vis Russia) is to focus on accelerating the comprehensive expansion of ties with China. Poland is already China’s top partner in CEE by virtue of its enormous population, strong economy, and geostrategic position, so it wouldn’t be difficult in principle for Warsaw to strategically partner with Beijing if the political will is present.

It should also be remembered that China is pioneering a high-speed railway from the Hungarian capital of Budapest to the Greek port of Pireaus which could even expand as far northwards as Warsaw and Helsinki by the end of the decade so the People’s Republic certainly has an interest in cultivating more strategic partnerships in CEE, especially with Poland. If Poland already believes (whether rightly or wrongly) that the US “sold it out to Russia” and that Washington might even soon throw more of its covert weight behind Berlin’s ongoing Hybrid War, then Warsaw wouldn’t really have anything to lose by at the very least beginning to seriously explore this policy proposal.

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This article was originally published on OneWorld.

Andrew Korybko is an American Moscow-based political analyst specializing in the relationship between the US strategy in Afro-Eurasia, China’s One Belt One Road global vision of New Silk Road connectivity, and Hybrid Warfare. He is a frequent contributor to Global Research.

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***

Dear fellow citizens, do not march along again as the citizens of Germany marched along with Hitler in the 1930s and 1940s.

Say NO to the machinations of the new dictators and their accomplices. These have already begun to “thin out” humanity with their Corona emergency measures and killer vaccines and plunge it into economic and social chaos. Educate yourself in the alternative media so that you know about the gigantic deception of humanity regarding the Covid-19 virus.

Although more and more of this is coming to light, these psychopaths will not let up and will continue to try to push through their plans. The current psychological warfare is only the prelude to the next diabolical move, the “no-alternative” decimation and absolute control of humanity due to a trumped-up climate crisis. Read the well-founded articles of  expert colleagues.

The manipulated human being marches along with the dictators

For a long time, mankind has lived by believing what the priest and the church said. New thoughts were not allowed, they were punished. For some centuries now, we have had the time of reason. But what does this time of reason look like?

There is still murder, violence, manslaughter and dictatorships.

And how have people reacted to these dictatorships? In Hitler’s Germany – as in other dictatorships – wasn’t everyone in on it: the workers, the employees, the Reds, the Blacks, the psychologists, the philosophers, the churchmen? Everyone marched along with Hitler – except for a few personalities who did not want to join in. Violence lived in society – and it still lives today. We breathe the violence. And again, the overwhelming majority march along.

In psychology we know that we humans are already manipulated in our childhood by the upbringing of our parents, so that we then respond to everything. And then we are manipulated by the state and the various institutions.

The Catholic by his church. Man is ultimately capable of anything. There is hardly a human being who has escaped unscathed. Man is manipulated in such a way that he is not capable of thinking clearly, but falls down.

Everyone falls over.

Even the leftists fail again and again.

Without psychology, humanity will not progress

We can only explain this phenomenon with the insights of indepth psychology. Otherwise we will always go astray.

The state, the church, all institutions and the whole of education proceed from the assumption that man is to be pressed into a certain mould.

This results in a certain tendency in our thinking, in our feeling: We know no other opinion. We are so manipulated that we always fall for the lure of authority and go to war, for example. Man is brought up in such a way that he cannot say NO. Authoritarian education results in such emotional reactions. And apart from the emotional, the thinking is also deformed. People are not capable of thinking rationally. That is why we have this beautiful world before us.

But we cannot blame the person who has gone through this traditional education: not the psychologist, not the philosopher, not the priest, not the bishop and not even the Pope. We can only appeal to them: Say NO!

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Dr. Rudolf Hänsel is a qualified psychologist and educationalist.

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***

Eight people in Maine have died with COVID after being fully vaccinated, according to the latest numbers from Maine’s Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), which confirmed a total of 457 breakthrough cases in the state.

Initial data suggest breakthrough cases in Maine are more common in older individuals and people with underlying health conditions — the same populations that, among the unvaccinated, are most at risk of hospitalization or death from the virus.

About half of the vaccinated people in Maine who tested positive for COVID had not experienced symptoms when contacted by case investigators, according to the Maine CDC.

In Maine and other states, anyone who tests positive for SARS-Cov-2 two weeks after receiving the single-dose Johnson & Johnson shot or completing the two-dose Moderna or Pfizer vaccination is recorded as a breakthrough case.

The daughter of one Maine woman who died from the virus despite being vaccinated said she wishes there was more information available about breakthrough cases. If she had known more, she said, she would have taken more precautions despite her mother’s vaccination status and been more insistent that she seek testing and treatment when she first had symptoms.

On June 3, Napa County California announced a fully vaccinated woman, who was more than a month past her second Moderna shot, died after being hospitalized with COVID. The 65-year-old woman had underlying conditions and tested positive for the Alpha variant, The New York Times reported.

“I’m very sad that she had a sufficiently severe illness that it actually led to her death,” said Dr. William Schaffner, medical director of the National Foundation for Infectious Diseases and a vaccine expert at Vanderbilt University. But “we expected to have the occasional breakthrough infection,” he said.

As of June 9, there had been more than 5,723 breakthrough COVID cases identified in California, according to the California Department of Public Health (CDPH).

Of the 5,723 cases, at least 417 people were hospitalized and least 47 died. Approximately 48% of cases were missing hospitalization data. It is not known if the primary cause of hospitalization or death was COVID or if there were other causes.

There is little data about COVID vaccines’ effectiveness in people with underlying health problems, especially immune impairment, because they weren’t included in the vaccines’ initial trials, CDPH said. But there is growing evidence people who are immunocompromised may not mount a strong response to the vaccine.

As The Defender reported last month, emerging research shows 15% to 80% of people with certain medical conditions aren’t generating many antibodies, if any, after receiving a COVID vaccine.

According to NBC News, people taking medications that suppress their immune system, those on medication for inflammatory disorders and those with blood cancers showed a significantly weaker antibody response to the vaccine.

An organ transplant study published in JAMA found 46% of 658 transplant patients did not mount an antibody response after two doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna vaccines. Researchers think the lack of reaction is probably a result of taking a class of immunosuppressive drugs, called antimetabolites.

Other states continue to report breakthrough cases, among them Texas, which recorded  more than 768 breakthrough COVID cases through June 1, with 8% (61 cases) resulting in death.

In Washington, the state’s Department of Health reported 1,837 cases of breakthrough infection through June 9. Of those, 10% resulted in hospitalization and 31 people died from COVID-related illness. The majority of cases occurred in the 35 to 49 age group.

CDC stops counting breakthrough cases unless they result in hospitalization or death

The CDC says it is working with state and local health departments to investigate COVID vaccine breakthrough cases — yet unlike state health departments, as of May 1, the agency said it is tracking only those breakthrough cases that result in hospitalization or death.

The CDC said it made the change in how it counts breakthrough cases to “maximize the quality of the data collected on cases of greatest clinical and public health importance.”

But according to Dr. Robert H. Shmerling, senior faculty editor of Harvard Health Publishing, there could be other reasons for the CDC’s decision. “First, there’s the challenge of messaging around encouraging people to get vaccinated,” Shmerling wrote. “Focusing on breakthrough cases may send a misleading impression that the vaccines aren’t effective. This might complicate efforts to battle vaccine hesitancy.”

The change in breakthrough reporting results in a lower overall number of reports of breakthrough cases in the U.S.

According to CDC data, a total of 10,262 SARS-CoV-2 vaccine breakthrough infections had been reported from 46 U.S. states and territories as of April 30, including 995 hospitalizations and 160 deaths.

The CDC’s website states actual vaccine breakthrough numbers are likely substantially higher as the surveillance system is passive and relies on voluntary reporting from state health departments and may not be complete. In addition, some breakthrough cases will not be identified due to lack of testing. This is particularly true in instances of asymptomatic or mild illness.

As of June 7, the CDC received 3,459 reports from 47 U.S. states and territories of COVID vaccine breakthrough infection that resulted in hospitalization or death. Of the 3,459 reports, 1,691 (49%) occurred in females, 2, 642 (76%) occurred in people 65 or older, 3,275 (95%) resulted in hospitalization and 603 (17%) died.

As with previous reporting, the CDC said reported breakthrough infection was likely an undercount of all SARS-CoV-2 infections among fully vaccinated persons and was a snapshot that could be used to help identify patterns and look for signals among vaccine breakthrough cases.

People who get COVID have long-lasting natural immunity

As The Defender reported, a new preprint study by the Cleveland Clinic found people previously infected with SARS-CoV-2 were less likely to be reinfected than fully vaccinated individuals who never had the virus — suggesting the vaccine is of no benefit to people who already had COVID.

The study, available on medRxiv, provides insight into how the immune system protects the body once a COVID infection is confirmed.

The clinic studied 52,238 employees. Of those, 49,659 never had the virus and 2,579 had COVID and recovered. Of the 2,579 who previously were infected, 1,359, or 53%, remained unvaccinated, compared with 41%, or 22,777 who were vaccinated.

Of all infections during the study period, 99.3% occurred in participants who were not infected previously and remained unvaccinated. In contrast, 0.7% of infections occurred in participants who were not previously infected but were currently vaccinated. Significantly, not one of the 1,359 previously infected subjects who remained unvaccinated had a SARS-CoV-2 infection over the duration of the study.

To better understand immune memory of SARS-CoV-2, researchers led by Drs. Daniela Weiskopf, Alessandro Sette and Shane Crotty from the La Jolla Institute for Immunology analyzed immune cells and antibodies from nearly 200 people who had been exposed to COVID and recovered, The Defender reported.

The results, published in Science, showed the immune systems of more than 95% of people who recovered from COVID had durable memories of the virus up to eight months after infection. Previous studies showed that natural infection induced a strong response, but this study showed that response lasted, Weiskoph said.

Another study in Nature assessed the lasting immunogenic effect of T-cell reactivity to SARS and SARS-2. Data showed that natural immunity was very robust — and likely more robust than any immunity derived from a vaccine.

The Defender previously reported on breakthrough cases in Washington, Florida, South Carolina, Texas, New York, California, Minnesota and the Island of Seychelles, which has fully vaccinated more of its population against COVID than any other country in the world.

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Megan Redshaw is a freelance reporter for The Defender. She has a background in political science, a law degree and extensive training in natural health.

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***

Some expected that during the G7 summit (which took place in England this weekend), some advances would be made towards solving the current Northern Ireland (NI) crisis. That wasn’t so. British Prime Minister Boris Johnson held meetings with French President Emmanuel Macron, with German Chancellor Angela Merkel, and with top officials. However, he complained the European Union (EU) simply was not taking a “sensible or pragmatic” approach to the issue, and he even threatened (should the bloc not compromise) to employ an emergency clause to suspend agreed upon rules.

The EU demands the British government implement the new checks on goods coming into NI from the rest of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (UK). However, such checks impose a heavy burden on local businesses and have been disrupting trade and causing protests – and thus are a threat to peace in a region with a long record of conflicts. Johnson is in fact worried about British territorial integrity.

The new arrangements were aimed at keeping an open border in the island (between NI, which is part of the UK, and its southern neighbor, the Republic of Ireland). This is an important issue because bringing back a wall within Ireland would be a painful reminder of years of conflict – after such a hard-won peace. It is a peculiar situation today, because, with Brexit, the rest of the UK, that is, Great Britain (GB) – which comprises England, Wales, and Scotland – has left the European Union bloc; however, Northern Ireland remained a part of the bloc, together with neighboring Republic of Ireland (R.O.I.). Thus, both Irish states have an open border because they share a Common Travel area, and both are participants in the European Single Market, which Britain has left. That has made the Irish sea a kind of de facto frontier between the two islands, that is between GB and the island of Ireland.

The NI unionists (or loyalists) are worried because, they claim, the current scenario weakens their ties with Britain. Those are mostly Protestant working class Northern Irish people who consider themselves British-Irish and oppose both Republicanism and the unification of Ireland (the Republic of Ireland is mostly Catholic).

On Saturday, German Chancellor Angela Merkel called for a “pragmatic solution” to the post-Brexit border issues with the UK and NI. On Wednesday, there was already a four-hour meeting in London between (Johnson’s Brexit minister) Lord David Frost and the European Commission Vice President Maroš Šefčovič to discuss the Withdrawal Agreement Joint Committee, as part of the Northern Ireland Protocol (a protocol to the Brexit agreement covering the special case of Northern Ireland). London blames Northern Ireland while Brussels blames Brexit itself. There is an ongoing trade issue, and Brussels has also threatened retaliatory actions should London not implement the protocol. Those could include targeted tariffs, and some are already talking about an EU-UK sausage war. EU-UK relations are clearly deteriorating and Northern Ireland is back in the Trans-Atlantic agenda.

In this context, anti-protocol parades go on all over NI and they bring back concerns that “maximum instability” could arise, involving paramilitary groups. On Monday (7), for example, a parade took place in Portadown, Co Armagh. Masked men took part, some carrying a UVF flag (the Ulster Volunteer Force, a loyalist paramilitary group). Such protests could escalate leading to a campaign of civil disobedience (against the Northern Ireland Protocol), thereby causing great instability.

Meanwhile, talks between the EU and the UK over the issue of the protocol, as we have seen, seem to be going nowhere. Both David Foster and Maroš Šefčovič stated they would work towards achieving a solution before 30 June when a ban on certain meats (including sausages) is supposed to come into force. For Boris Johnson the goal remains avoiding a border on the Irish island while at the same time protecting trade with the UK, even after Brexit. US President Joe Biden (who proudly claims Irish roots) has been pressuring the UK to compromise on border checks.

Tom sum it up, the Brexit arrangements have come to a deadlock over the issue of the Northern Ireland Protocol regarding the so-called Brexit Trilemma – the impossible task of simultaneously ensuring that there is no hard border on the Irish island; and no customs border in the Irish Sea; while Britain, in its turn, leaves both the European Union Customs Union, and the European Single Market. The UK government chose to sacrifice the second item, thus creating a de facto sea frontier, which is causing many problems for the Northern Irish population. And this, in its turn, has reactivated unhealed old quarrels.

The core of this great divide is a political-ideological conflict (between Republicanism/Irish nationalism and Monarchism/British loyalism). Irish nationalism historically intersects with left-wing politics – as espoused by the Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP) or by the more radical Sinn Féin – while unionism has a long history of cooperating with the so-called far-right. However, the left-right paradigm cannot be applied smoothly to the Irish situation, nor can the concept of ethnic conflict – although many sociologists have pointed out a tendency towards the ethnicization of Irish protestants (in a context of educational segregation), as in the case of Ulster-Scots ethnolinguistic revival.

The irony is that while Boris Johnson voices his concern about the situation in Donbass on the Russain-Ukrainian border, he might have to deal with his own potential political conflict – with ethnic and religious overtones – within the UK. And such is far from over.

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Uriel Araujo is a researcher with a focus on international and ethnic conflicts.

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***

With the exception of his perseverance in a long overdue withdrawal from Afghanistan, President Joe Biden has been assiduously pursuing policies that make the world a more dangerous place for Americans, up to and including opening up the country’s southern border to waves of illegal immigration. Ironically, if an opinion poll were to be taken in the United States it would likely show that most respondents regard the Republicans as America’s designated conflict-friendly party based on the fact that the GOP is considered to be more “conservative” and therefore more likely to resort to force. But that assumption is not actually true as the Republican Party historically has been reluctant to embrace foreign engagements while presidents like Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush and even Donald Trump were measured in their responses to developing international crisis situations. Trump, for all his aggressive language and several missteps, actually started no new wars and may even have been genuine in his desire to extricate from foreign conflicts only to be circumvented by his advisers and the entrenched government bureaucracy. He was widely condemned as a “Putin puppet” even though the bilateral relationship actually worsened during his time in office due to his inability to overcome the Establishment forces lined up against him.

Historically speaking, it is the Democrats who can be credited with conniving to enter both the First and Second World Wars while more recently entering into wars that served absolutely no national interest in places like Libya and Syria. They can also get credit for increasing the use of one-off cruise missile attacks supplemented by terrorism-like tactics that might reasonably be construed as war crimes, to include killing civilians using drones based solely on the target fitting a “profile.”

It might be reasonably argued that Washington has only one really important bilateral relationship and that is with Russia since Moscow alone has the capability to destroy the United States. There too it was the Democrats who seemingly deliberately sought to turn a post-Cold War reconstruction of Russia into a looting of the country’s natural resources combined with an encroachment of NATO right up to the Russian border, both initiated and implemented under Bill Clinton. The relationship has been suffering ever since, nearly leading to war when Barack Obama’s Administration spend $5 billion overthrowing a government friendly to Russia in Kiev in 2014. Russia has repeatedly claimed, not without some justification, that successive American administrations have continued that process, using various means to undermine and replace the Putin government.

The Democrats also were the driving force behind the Magnitsky Act, which was sponsored by Russia-phobic Senator Ben Cardin and signed by President Barack Obama in 2012. Using the Act, the US asserted its willingness to punish foreign governments, particularly Russia, using sanctions and other means for claimed violations of human rights. Russia reacted angrily, noting that the actions taken by its government internally, notably the operation of its judiciary, were being subjected to outside interference. It reciprocated with sanctions against US officials as well as by increasing pressure on foreign non-governmental pro-democracy groups and western media operating in Russia, which meant that the Act was actually counter-productive. Tension between Moscow and Washington increased considerably as a result and Congress subsequently approved a so-called Global Magnitsky Act as part of the 2016 annual defense appropriation bill. It expanded the use of sanctions and other punitive measures against regimes guilty of egregious human rights abuses though it has never been applied against well documented serial human rights violators like Saudi Arabia and Israel. It was also sponsored by Senator Ben Cardin and was clearly intended to threaten Russia.

More recently there has been the totally fabricated Russiagate that was intended to place the blame for Hillary Clinton’s defeat by Donald Trump on the Kremlin and Russian President Vladimir Putin. And the pro-Democratic Party media has been working hard to come up with other “news” pieces that depict Moscow as the enemy du jour, including the now discredited claim that the Kremlin has been paying Afghan fighters “bounties” to kill American soldiers.

Now Joe Biden is preparing to meet with Vladimir Putin in Geneva on June 16^th and the prospects are not good even if one discounts Biden’s having labeled Putin as a “killer” lacking “soul” as little more than hyperbole. The meeting was requested after a phone call to Putin arranged by Biden in April, at a particularly tense moment when Ukraine was threatening to retake the Crimea from Russia, using its supply of lethal weaponry from the United States to do the job. Washington and the NATO alliance also declared that their support for Kiev was “unwavering” even though they recognized that Ukraine would have little to no chance of defeating the Russian army. The Kremlin responded to the threat by rushing troops to its border and the US sent warships to Turkey to enter the Black Sea, though it quickly withdrew them when Putin made clear that their appearance offshore of Russian territory would be considered a major provocation.

Some rational voices in the US government are, however, prepared to step back from the precipice. William Burns, currently Director of the CIA and Ambassador to Russia under George W. Bush, reported concisely how Moscow viewed the Ukraine situation. He observed in a cable entitled “NYET MEANS NYET: RUSSIA’S NATO ENLARGEMENT REDLINES” that “Russia would view further eastward expansion as a potential military threat. NATO enlargement, particularly to Ukraine, remains ‘an emotional and neuralgic’ issue for Russia…” But even the New York Times is having difficulty in finding a positive outcome that will result in better “management” of the bilateral relationship, reporting that “The meeting comes at the worst point in Russian-American relations since the fall of the Soviet Union about 30 years ago.”

To be sure the spin surrounding the meeting has been intense, with the US media running stories about new cyberattacks on America’s infrastructure, attributing them to Russia with scant evidence, while Putin responded by declaring publicly that he does not expect any breakthroughs, observing that the fractured bilateral relationship has unfortunately become “hostage to internal political processes in the United States itself.” Putin has said repeatedly that he wants his country to be treated with respect by a US that perversely perceives itself as “an exceptional nation, with special, exclusive rights to practically the entire world…I cannot go along with that.”

Biden for his part is also piling on the rhetoric, pledging that he will “stand up to Putin…from a position of strength.” Upon arrival in Britain at the start of his European trip, where he is desperately seeking to be relevant, he pledged to strengthen ties with America’s allies, an interesting objective as it has been recently revealed that the US has been aggressively spying on its closest friends in Europe. He also warned Russia that it will suffer “robust and meaningful” consequences if it engages in “harmful activities.” It was not a good starting point for a meeting intended to establish a modus vivendi between two adversaries. And there is additional noise coming from the Democrats. Former CIA Senior Russia Analyst Ray McGovern asks whether Democratic Party “Representative Jason Crow, really believe[s] that ‘Vladimir Putin wakes up every morning and goes to bed every night trying to figure out how to destroy American democracy.’ And what does Speaker Nancy Pelosi mean exactly, as she keeps repeating ‘All roads lead to Putin’? Are we correctly informed that Hillary Clinton suggested President Putin was giving President Trump instructions on January 6^th as [the] Capitol building was attacked?”

The most recent hint of what Biden will want to discuss to make points with the media is that it will be heavy on “human rights,” which is, of course, the issue to raise when all else fails. Human rights means Magnitsky-plus and the subject of imprisoned Russian dissident Alexei Navalny, who is likely an agent of both the CIA and a number of other western intelligence agencies, will undoubtedly come up. That suggests that Washington will yet again be seeking to interfere with Russian internal politics, which will in turn mean that the discussion will go nowhere.

The Times and some other analysts speculate in somewhat positive terms that the meeting might actually be mostly about establishing channels of communication that will enable the two countries to deal confidently with each other, closing the door on any possible surprises that might inadvertently lead to war. Putin has said that he is prepared to “work with Biden” while both Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan have indicated that that will be looking for areas of agreement, to start relations moving in the right direction. If so, it will of necessity avoid any detailed discussions of Ukraine and Syria, where the US and Russia have opposing views, though in both those cases it might benefit from some clarification of where the “red lines” are for the two sides. Areas that are likely to be common ground might well include climate change and combatting COVID and it is hoped that those areas of agreement might lead to other lines of communication.

Sergei Lavrov has in fact to a certain extent set the tone for the gathering, complimenting the US foreign policy team of Secretary of State Toni Blinken and Jake Sullivan for communicating “frankly” and “respectfully” at previous meetings in Reykjavik and Anchorage. Lavrov also made clear that the Biden people, though sure to be highly critical of Russia, might be expected to be more predictable than the Trump rotating cast of characters at cabinet level who frequently contradicted themselves.

But all of that said, it is highly unlikely that Biden will try to mitigate the major irritants between the two countries, even though that is what he has promised to do, because that would mean treating Russia as an equal. Of prime importance are the disagreements that could lead to war, including future status of Ukraine and also Georgia, the bump in the road caused by the current situation in Belarus, and the role of Russia in the Middle East. Biden will also lean heavily on the cybersecurity issue as that is currently popular in the media, but as Putin has already denied any Russian hand in the hacking that discussion is likely to go nowhere. Likewise, any claims that Moscow interfered yet again in US politics during the 2020 election will only poison the discussion.

At the end of the day, the hostility of the Democratic Party towards Russia, which has been festering ever since 2016, will prevail and it is likely that nothing dramatic will come out of the meeting of the two presidents. It is clearly in the United States’ national interest to disengage from those areas like Ukraine which Russia sees as vital and which are of no value to the US, but it is unlikely that Biden or any of his closest advisers can see that far. The Democratic Party in power and controlling both houses of Congress as well as the presidency can only be relied upon to deal with any developing crisis involving Russia with a heavy hand.

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This article was originally published on The Unz Review.

Philip M. Giraldi, Ph.D., is Executive Director of the Council for the National Interest, a 501(c)3 tax deductible educational foundation (Federal ID Number #52-1739023) that seeks a more interests-based U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East. Website is https://councilforthenationalinterest.org address is P.O. Box 2157, Purcellville VA 20134 and its email is [email protected]

He is a frequent contributor to Global Research.

Featured image is from The Unz Review

Video: Bill Gates’ Vaccine Experiment with Indian Tribal Girls in 2009

By Global Research News, June 14, 2021

Indian tribal girls were used as guinea pigs. With 1.3 billion people, India is a good base for pharmaceutical companies to make a killing and also kill a lot of people in the process. The manipulation of people by the media.

Biden’s Message to NATO Summit: U.S. Has Sacred Obligation to Article 5 War Clause

By Rick Rozoff, June 14, 2021

Voice of America today ran a story about the tenor and theme of President Joe Biden’s presentation at tomorrow’s NATO summit in Brussels with the headline Biden to Reassure Allies of US Commitment to NATO Mutual Defense Clause.

International Alert Message about COVID-19. United Health Professionals

By United Health Professionals, June 14, 2021

Stay home, save lives » was a pure lie. Remove the following illegal, non-scientific and non-sanitary measures : lockdown, mandatory face masks for healthy subjects, social distancing of one or two meters. The lockdown not only killed many people but also destroyed physical and mental health, economy, education and other aspects of life.

Shock Therapy: How Austerity and Privatisation Destroy Nations

By Rod Driver, June 14, 2021

Politicians from rich countries have tried to forcefully ‘persuade’ other countries to use an extreme economic system with few public services and very little regulation of big companies. This is usually called neoliberalism. The rights of big business and investors have priority over everything else.

Pity the Poor Billionaire

By Klaus Marre and DonkeyHotey, June 14, 2021

It’s been a mixed week for billionaires. On the one hand, ProPublica revealed that many of them don’t pay their “fair share” in taxes (unless you think the fair share for somebody with a net worth of $100,000,000,000 is to pay nothing or very little).

Joe Biden and Boris Johnson Team Up to Develop U.S./U.K Partnership on 6G Development that Includes A.I. 

By B.N. Frank, June 14, 2021

A 2019 survey revealed that 82% of Americans thought Artificial Intelligence (A.I.) technology would be more harmful than helpful.  They seem to have been onto something as warnings about A.I. keep pouring in.

Truthful Accounts: A View from Nicaragua on Propaganda and Corporate Media Journalists

By Stephen Sefton, June 14, 2021

Efforts to depict journalism as if it ever existed in the idealized form of its propagandists have become increasingly ridiculous. Journalism, like accountancy, is just another sub-category of reporting. Like accountancy and other reporting activities, journalistic reporting can be good or bad, exceptional or mediocre, honest or criminal.

CDC Caught Cooking the Books on COVID Vaccines

By Dr. Joseph Mercola, June 14, 2021

For many months now, we’ve known the COVID-19 pandemic was the result of statistical manipulation and a fraudulent testing strategy. I detailed this scheme in “COVID-19 Testing Scandal Deepens” and “Astonishing COVID-19 Testing Fraud Revealed.”

Nigeria’s Buhari-Twitter Spat: Big Tech Power, “Hate Speech” and National Sovereignty

By Adeyinka Makinde, June 14, 2021

Buhari’s tone was in keeping with the violent culture of Nigeria’s security apparatus which as the SARS protests highlighted is one which has been historically disproportionate in response and undiscriminating in effect on guilty parties and innocent bystanders.

Nightmare Scenario: Vaccinated Children Developing Myocarditis, a Debilitating Form of Heart Inflammation, at Alarming Rates

By Teodrose Fikremariam, June 14, 2021

In a stunning new development, the CDC announced this morning that they will convene an “emergency meeting” on June 18th after an alarming number of children developed myocarditis—a condition that causes an inflammation of the heart—after they were “vaccinated”; this debilitating ailment was especially prevalent in young boys.

Video: Toxicologist Dr. Janci Chunn Lindsay to the CDC: Stop Vaccinations

By Dr. Janci Chunn Lindsay and Kristina Borjesson, June 14, 2021

A veteran toxicologist and mechanistic biologist, Dr. Lindsay explains the science and troubling evidence behind her recent public plea before the Center for Disease Control and Prevention’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices to stop all covid gene therapy vaccine campaigns.

Video: Elections Celebrations and Cruelty of Western Sanctions Against Syrian People

By Eva Bartlett and Syria Insider, June 14, 2021

Yes. Well, I would start by noting that the countries that I am from America and Canada, before the last presidential elections in 2014, they closed the Syrian embassy specifically to prevent Syrians from exercising their right to participate in democratic presidential elections.

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Voice of America today ran a story about the tenor and theme of President Joe Biden’s presentation at tomorrow’s NATO summit in Brussels with the headline Biden to Reassure Allies of US Commitment to NATO Mutual Defense Clause. In the report it cites a pledge Biden made in an address to American Air Force service members at the Royal Air Force Mildenhall base on June 9: “In Brussels, I will make it clear that the United States’ commitment to our NATO Alliance and Article 5 is rock solid. It’s a sacred obligation that we have under Article 5.” Today the White House posted an online fact sheet on the summit which contained in its opening paragraph this stark statement: “During the Summit, the President will reaffirm the enduring Transatlantic bond through NATO and underscore the United States’ ironclad commitment to Article 5 – an attack on one is an attack on all and will be met with a collective response.” 

In the Mildenhall speech Biden also celebrated the fact that the U.S. and his host country, the United Kingdom, were founding members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. He failed to add they’re both nuclear powers and have fought together in NATO’s wars in the Balkans, Afghanistan and Libya. NATO was characterized by the American commander-in-chief as “the strongest military and political alliance in the history of the world,” adding, “that’s not hyperbole.” Both points rare instances of veracity from him. NATO in fact is unique in a manner that cannot be exaggerated. It is unique in the following ways:

• it is the only military alliance in the world
• it is the longest-lasting military bloc in the modern history of the world, this year marking its 72nd anniversary
• it is the largest military bloc ever, with 30 members and 40 partners on all six inhabited continents (up from 16 members and no partners 30 years ago)
• it maintains military relations with as many more nations, including the 55-nation African Union and Troop Contributing Countries from the Asia-Pacific region and Latin America that served under its command in Afghanistan
• it has waged war in three continents (Yugoslavia in Europe, Afghanistan in Asia and Libya in Africa)
• it is the only military alliance to have ever included more than one nuclear power (the U.S., Britain and France) and to openly proclaim itself a nuclear alliance
• it is the only military alliance that has defined outer space as an operational domain as well as air, land, sea and cyberspace, and that has just opened a Space Centre (in Germany)

There are several other aspects of NATO and its activities that are unprecedented in scope and nature. Not the least important of which is its Article 5 mutual military assistance provision, the essence of which is:

“The Parties agree that an armed attack against one or more of them in Europe or North America shall be considered an attack against them all and consequently they agree that, if such an armed attack occurs, each of them…will assist the Party or Parties so attacked by taking forthwith, individually and in concert with the other Parties, such action as it deems necessary, including the use of armed force, to restore and maintain the security of the North Atlantic area.”

There is no greater threat to peace, to world peace in the nuclear age, than for a military alliance of 30 nations (and growing) to be prepared to go to war (including against nuclear powers) at the request of any of its member states.

It is that collective defense obligation that Biden has focused on since taking office in January and that he will highlight at tomorrow’s thirty-nation summit. It is in fact a central theme, arguably the main one, of his foreign policy.

In his virtual address to the annual Munich Security Conference in February he said:

“We continue to support the goal of a Europe whole and free and at peace. The United States is fully committed to our NATO Alliance, and I welcome Europe’s growing investment in the military capabilities that enable our shared defense.

“You know, to me and to the United States, and to us, we’ll keep article – we’ll keep faith with Article 5. It’s a guarantee. An attack on one is an attack on all. That is our unshakable vow….”

In an opinion piece in the Washington Post on June 5, Biden wrote (or had attributed to him):

“As new technologies reshape our world in fundamental ways, exposing vulnerabilities like ransomware attacks and creating threats such as invasive AI-driven surveillance, the democracies of the world must together ensure that our values govern the use and development of these innovations – not the interests of autocrats.

“Those shared democratic values are the foundation of the most successful alliance in world history. In Brussels, at the NATO summit, I will affirm the United States’ unwavering commitment to Article 5 and to ensuring our alliance is strong in the face of every challenge, including threats like cyberattacks on our critical infrastructure.”

Dividing the world into NATO allies, partners and affiliates against the four nations that Washington and Brussels have branded autocrats, authoritarians and threats to the rules-based international order – Russia, China, Iran and North Korea (now five with diminutive Belarus) – is being done in the name of a global Manichean struggle between democracy (us) and autocracies (them). At the Mildenhall air base Biden also said:

“I believe we’re at an inflection point in world history – the moment where it falls to us to prove that democracies will not just endure, but they will excel as we rise to seize the enormous opportunities of a new age.

“We have to discredit those who believe that the age of democracy is over, as some of our fellow nations believe. We have to expose as false the narrative that decrees of dictators can match the speed and scale of the 21st [century] challenges.”

And after offering obligatory diplomatic platitudes about preferring to get along with Russia (if it would only change its ways; all its ways), he canceled out that message with these assurances:

“But I’ve been clear: The United States will respond in a robust and meaningful way when the Russian government engages in harmful activities. We’ve already demonstrated that. I’m going to communicate that there are consequences [for violating] the sovereignty of democracies in the United States and Europe and elsewhere.

“I’m going to be clear that the Transatlantic Alliance will remain vital – a vital source of strength for the UK, Europe, and the United States. And I’m going to make sure there’s no doubt as to whether the United States will rise in defense of our most deeply held values and our fundamental interest.”

A European and ultimately a global crusade by history’s most formidable military bloc to make the world safe for democracy in the face of tyrants, despots, autocrats, dictators and authoritarians – most bearing Russian surnames.

The U.S. chargé d’affaires at NATO headquarters (Biden is yet to name an ambassador), Douglas Jones, further clarified U.S. international military priorities in recently stating that while NATO needs to confront challenges presented by China, Russia remains the “most immediate threat to the common security of the allies.”

Speaking to Euronews, Jones confirmed that Biden’s main message to his 29 allies at the NATO summit will concentrate on “recommitting the United States to NATO and expressing the iron-clad commitment of the United States to Article 5.”

NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg, speaking recently in the U.S. at an Atlantic Council event, asserted this concerning alleged cyberattacks of the sort regularly attributed to Russia:

 “In a way it doesn’t matter whether it’s a kinetic attack or a cyberattack, we will assess as allies whether it meets the thresholds for triggering Article 5. It sends a message that we regard cyberattacks as seriously as any other attack.”

For all its assertions that it is a political-military alliance, NATO is a military bloc with Article 5 as its bedrock.

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Rick Rozoff, renowned author and geopolitical analyst, actively involved in opposing war, militarism and interventionism for over fifty years. He manages the Anti-Bellum and For peace, against war website

He is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization.

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***

Iran hawks are pulling out all the stops in their campaign to prevent Iran and the United States from returning to full compliance with the 2015 nuclear accord. 

The latest effort comes in the form of an opinion piece published last week in Politico Europe by Foundation for Defense of Democracies fellows Benjamin Weinthal and Alireza Nader, purporting to show that Iran is currently seeking to develop nuclear weapons, and therefore, they claim, American diplomats should “take a timeout” from the JCPOA negotiations.

Weinthal — whose portfolio includes harassing people on Twitter — and Nader cite “European intelligence findings about the Islamic Republic’s illicit atomic weapons activities” which “make it clear that Tehran sought technology in 2020 for constructing nuclear weapons or other weapons of mass destruction.”

It’s a clever presentation that could easily fool a casual reader into believing that Iran is indeed developing nuclear weapons under the noses of U.S., European, Russian, and Chinese diplomats (if you can believe that Weinthal and Nader of all people know something they don’t). But the evidence they culled from these European intel reports — which are public, by the way — prove no such thing.

The first piece of evidence they cite is a public Swedish Security Service report that has concluded the following:

“Iran also conducts industrial espionage, which is mainly targeted against Swedish hi-tech industry and Swedish products, which can be used in nuclear weapons programs. Iran is investing heavy resources in this area and some of the resources are used in Sweden.”

The key line they want you to focus on here is “which can be used in nuclear weapons programs” — or in other words “dual use” technologies. But the report does not state outright that Iran is using this stolen tech for nuclear weapons, just that it’s possible.

What Weinthal and Nader also don’t mention is that the Swedish intel report also said that Russia, China, and Iran have tried to “gather information and knowledge from Swedish universities and colleges,” but it only singled out Russian and Chinese activities, i.e. not Iranian, as focused on “military research.”

Next the FDD fellows claim that Dutch intelligence has concluded that “Iran’s regime sought technology for nuclear and possibly other WMD weaponry.” But here again, the evidence they present does not support their conclusion.

They quote a Dutch intel report saying, “The joint Counter-Proliferation Unit of the AIVD and the MIVD [the country’s Military Intelligence and Security Service] is investigating how countries try to obtain the knowledge and goods they need to make weapons of mass destruction. Countries such as Syria, Pakistan, Iran and North Korea also tried to acquire such goods and technology in Europe and the Netherlands last year.”

Again, Weinthal and Nader are seemingly relaying this information because they want you to focus on the term “weapons of mass destruction,” which does not necessarily mean nuclear weapons. And they don’t say what the Dutch mean by that either.

The reality is that what constitutes WMD is quite broad. For example, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security defines WMD as “a nuclear, radiological, chemical, biological, or other device that is intended to harm a large number of people,” while the FBI says WMD can be defined simply as “[a] destructive device, such as an explosive or incendiary bomb, rocket, or grenade.”

But what makes this particular piece of evidence — that is meant to prove “Iran’s intention to develop nuclear weapons” — even weaker is the Dutch don’t say what Iran has done specifically, only that it, along with three other countries, have engaged in some very general activities aimed at acquiring “knowledge and goods” for unspecified WMD.

Continuing this trend, Weinthal and Nader then claim that intelligence reports from two German states, Bavaria and Schleswig-Holstein, “outlined Tehran’s efforts to obtain weapons of mass destruction material on German soil in 2020.”

But here again, Iran is lumped in with North Korea, Syria, and Pakistan as conducting general nefarious activities related to non-specified WMD. They write:

“Proliferation-relevant states like Iran, North Korea, Syria and Pakistan are making efforts to expand their conventional arsenal of weapons through the production or constant modernization of weapons of mass destruction,” the state of Bavaria’s agency wrote in its report. The German state of Schleswig-Holstein disclosed in its intelligence report the deceptive methods Iran uses to cover up its efforts to secure illicit technology for the world’s most deadly weapons: “Proliferation-relevant countries such as Iran, North Korea and Syria, but also Pakistan, try to circumvent safety precautions and legal export regulations and to disguise illegal procurement activities. To do this, they turn to mostly conspiratorial means and methods,” the intelligence agency wrote.

In no way do any of these intel reports that Weinthal and Nader cite say explicitly that Iran is, in their words, seeking technology “for constructing nuclear weapons.”

But even if that was true, it’s unclear why that would mean the United States has to pause its pursuit of rejoining the JCPOA, which would prevent Iran from using any of this technology it has supposedly illicitly acquired to build a nuclear bomb.

Of course what Iran is up to in Europe based on these public intel reports is not good, which is why what Weinthal and Nader propose — “[a] joint U.S.-EU task force … with its findings released, at a minimum, to Congress” — isn’t that crazy of an idea. But why does that have to come at the expense of diplomacy to officially, and permanently, limit Iran’s nuclear program?

The article concludes by claiming that International Atomic Energy Agency Director Rafael Grossi is also “sounding a warning” and they quote him saying that the IAEA “found traces of uranium that has (sic) been subject to industrial processing in different places, which had not been declared by Iran.”

But what Weinthal and Nader don’t tell you is that Grossi is sounding an alarm about something completely different from what they claim these Europan intel agencies are reporting. The IAEA chief was not talking about current Iranian activities. He’s referring to what Iran had done prior to the cessation of its weapons program back in 2003 and the need for Iran to come clean about those activities, which of course it should.

The reality is that Weinthal and Nader already have a conclusion in mind and they are in search of evidence to support it. In fact, they provide a subtle hint that their presentation is completely bogus when they complain that these European intel reports “have gotten relatively little attention from Western journalists.” Indeed, there’s a reason for that: most Western journalists’ BS detectors probably started flashing red when presented with this information.

Moreover, the “Annual Threat Assessment of the U.S. Intelligence Community” issued in April concluded: “We continue to assess that Iran is not currently undertaking the key nuclear weapons-development activities that we judge would be necessary to produce a nuclear device.”

The bottom line is this article isn’t meant to present facts in an objective, good faith manner, but instead its purpose is to provide another piece of flimsy ammo for opponents of diplomacy with Iran to get back on the path to regime change and/or war.

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***

COVID-19 has been a pandemic of false positive tests; the thing that kept the fraud going was the fact that laboratories were using excessively high cycle thresholds (CTs) when processing the PCR tests, resulting in false positives

Now, as over 100 million Americans have been “vaccinated” against COVID-19, the CDC is lowering the CT from 40 to 28, but only when diagnosing vaccine breakthrough cases — cases where fully vaccinated individuals are diagnosed with COVID-19

To make matters worse, the CDC also will no longer record mild or asymptomatic infections of those who were immunized as “COVID cases.” The only cases that now count as COVID cases for someone immunized with the COVID-19 vaccine are those that result in hospitalization or death

While healthy people continue to be misdiagnosed as having COVID-19 when they really don’t, thanks to an excessively high CT, the CDC is simultaneously minimizing the number of breakthrough cases by using a CT that will minimize the number of false positives

Other countries are also manipulating data to boost COVID-19 vaccine efficacy and hide breakthrough cases. In the U.K., COVID-19 will only be listed as the cause of death if the patient actually died from an active case of COVID-19 and nothing else

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For many months now, we’ve known the COVID-19 pandemic was the result of statistical manipulation and a fraudulent testing strategy. I detailed this scheme in “COVID-19 Testing Scandal Deepens” and “Astonishing COVID-19 Testing Fraud Revealed.”

Now, as the infection has become endemic in most parts of the world and the mass vaccination drive is in full swing, U.S. health authorities are massaging data and revising testing recommendations yet again — this time to hide the ineffectiveness of the vaccines. As reported by Off-Guardian, May 18, 2021:¹

“The US Center for Disease Control (CDC) is altering its practices of data logging and testing for ‘Covid19’ in order to make it seem the experimental gene-therapy ‘vaccines’ are effective at preventing the alleged disease …

The trick is in their reporting of what they call ‘breakthrough infections’ — that is people who are fully ‘vaccinated’ against SARS-Cov-2 infection, but get infected anyway. Essentially, COVID-19 has long been shown — to those willing to pay attention — to be an entirely created pandemic narrative built on two key factors:

Without these two policies, there would never have been an appreciable pandemic at all, and now the CDC has enacted two policy changes which means they no longer apply to vaccinated people.”

CDC Is Cooking the Books on COVID Breakthrough Cases

Originally, the CDC recommended labs use a CT of 40³ when testing for SARS-CoV-2 infection. This despite using a CT above 35 was known to create a false positive rate of 97%.⁴ In short, by using an exaggerated CT, healthy people were deemed stricken with COVID-19, and the fraud was further propped up by introducing the fallacy that asymptomatic carriers were responsible for a large portion of the spread.

Now, the CDC has suddenly lowered the CT considerably — from 40 to 28 or lower⁵ — in what appears to be a clear effort to hide COVID-19 breakthrough cases in those injected with the COVID-19 vaccine.

To understand just how significant of a change this is, consider that the CT refers to the number of cycles the PCR test is run at, and each cycle doubles the magnification of the viral RNA fragment that the test supposedly looks for.

That means a switch from 40 to 28 reduces the magnification, i.e., the sensitivity of the test, by more than 4,000 times. The end result is far fewer positive test results. However, this only applies to people who are being tested for breakthrough infection.

So, as vaccinated individuals are contracting the illness, they’re now less likely to register as positive cases, which makes the “vaccine” appear more protective than it might be in actuality.

Had a CT of 28 been used all along, we would have had nowhere near the number of “cases” currently touted and the pandemic would have been declared over sometime in 2020. Conversely, were a CT of 40 or higher used to diagnose breakthrough cases, you can be sure the numbers would be far higher than currently reported.

Mild Infections No Longer Count

To boost the appearance of vaccine efficacy even further, the CDC also will no longer record mild or asymptomatic infections in vaccinated individuals as “COVID cases.” The only cases that now count as COVID cases — if the patient has been vaccinated against COVID-19, that is — are those that result in hospitalization or death.⁶

Meanwhile, if you’re unvaccinated and come down with a mild case, or if you test positive at a higher CT and have no symptoms, you still count as a COVID case. As explained by Off-Guardian:⁷

“The CDC has put new policies in place which effectively created a tiered system of diagnosis. Meaning, from now on, unvaccinated people will find it much easier to be diagnosed with Covid19 than vaccinated people. Consider…

Person A has not been vaccinated. They test positive for Covid using a PCR test at 40 cycles and, despite having no symptoms, they are officially a ‘covid case.’

Person B has been vaccinated. They test positive at 28 cycles, and spend six weeks bedridden with a high fever. Because they never went into a hospital and didn’t die they are NOT a Covid case.

Person C, who was also vaccinated, did die. After weeks in hospital with a high fever and respiratory problems. Only their positive PCR test was 29 cycles, so they’re not officially a Covid case either.”

As of April 30, 2021, the CDC had received a total of 10,262 reports of vaccine breakthrough infections,⁸ which it admitted was a “substantial undercount,” as they’re using a passive surveillance system that relies on voluntary reporting from state health departments.⁹ May 17, 2021, the number of breakthrough cases was slashed to 1,949, as the new guidance that only takes hospitalizations and deaths into account took effect.¹⁰

Double Standards Drive Public Abuse

By keeping the old rules for unvaccinated people — which results in a large amount of false positives and an overcount of “cases” — and applying new rules for vaccinated individuals that result in a significant number of false negatives and an undercount of cases, you end up with statistics that conform to the propaganda of the mainstream media, which falsely suggests COVID-19 is far more prevalent among unvaccinated people and that the vaccine works far better than it actually does.

All of this is to support getting as many people vaccinated with this worse than worthless, dangerous “vaccine.” As noted by Off-Guardian:¹¹

“This is a policy designed to continuously inflate one number, and systematically minimize the other. What is that if not an obvious and deliberate act of deception?”

When asked why the CDC would not include asymptomatic or mildly symptomatic cases if they’ve been vaccinated, CDC director Dr. Rochelle Walensky said that it’s because vaccinated asymptomatic and mildly symptomatic people carry very little virus.¹²

Convenient isn’t it? This reply was never given when they were counting asymptomatic, falsely positive COVID tests as “cases,” equating them instead to deaths to increase fear in order to drive people to get vaccinated.

As I’ve explained on many previous occasions, in order to be infectious, you need a sufficiently high viral load, and the viruses must be live in order to replicate. A significant problem with the PCR test is it cannot differentiate between dead or inactive viral debris and live virus.

The reason a healthy person can test positive for COVID-19 is because the test, when used at a high CT, will magnify noninfectious or harmless segments of DNA that are not related to infectious viral particles. So, again, the CDC is now admitting asymptomatic people pose no real infection risk, but they only apply this logic to those who have been vaccinated while continuing the lying charade for the unvaccinated.

Lockdowns Should Not be Based on Mass PCR Testing

More and more information is coming out showing how PCR testing has been misused. As noted in one German study, posted on the preprint server medRxiv, May 19, 2021:¹³

“RT-PCR testing as a tool for mass screening should not be used alone as a base for pandemic decision making including measures such as quarantine, isolation, and lockdown.”

They based this conclusion on the fact that only 40.6% of positive test results had used a CT of 25 or lower. At this low CT, a positive test result has a decent chance of being accurate, which means even if symptoms are mild, the patient is likely to be infectious.

The remainder of positive tests, 59.4%, were using a CT above 25, which means they were more likely to be false positives. As detailed in “The Insanity of the PCR Testing Saga,” to obtain 100% confirmed real positives, you have to use a CT of 17.

Clearly, self-quarantining and lockdowns are irrational if nearly 60% of so-called COVID cases are noninfectious. The PCR test can also detect dead viral RNA for months after an active infection, making the test even more unreliable.

One country that has acknowledged the madness of mass PCR testing is Sweden which, at the end of November 2020, stopped relying on this test to determine cases. As noted on the Swedish Public Health Agency’s website (translated from Swedish):^14,15

“The PCR technology used in tests to detect viruses cannot distinguish between viruses capable of infecting cells and viruses that have been neutralized by the immune system and therefore these tests cannot be used to determine whether someone is contagious or not.

RNA from viruses can often be detected for weeks (sometimes months) after the illness but does not mean that you are still contagious. There are also several scientific studies that suggest that the infectivity of COVID-19 is greatest at the beginning of the disease period.

The recommended criteria for assessing freedom from infection are therefore based on stable clinical improvement with freedom from fever for at least two days and that at least seven days have passed since the onset of symptoms. For those who have had more pronounced symptoms, at least 14 days after the illness and for the very sickest, individual assessment by the treating doctor.”

A COVID-19 working group met April 19, 2021, to discuss whether these rules needed to be updated in light of new variants. It was decided that no change in rules was needed.^16,17

UK Is Also Manipulating Data to Hide Vaccine Failure

Signs that other countries are starting to manipulate data to hide vaccine failure are also evident. For example, in the U.K., they’ve now dropped the rule that anyone having tested positive for SARS-CoV-2 within 28 days of dying is to be counted as a COVID-19 death.

Now that vaccines are out, COVID-19 will only be listed as the cause of death if the patient actually died from an active case of COVID-19 and nothing else. As reported by iNews:¹⁸

“The modelling sub-group of the Government’s scientific advisory committee Sage says that the 28-day definition was useful before widespread vaccination, because deaths in hospital within a month of a positive test were most likely due to COVID-19.

However now that tens of millions of the UK population have received their jabs, deaths from other causes could still show up in the daily data if they have previously tested positive for coronavirus.

A senior Sage source said: ‘If the definition remains the same, these people would be counted as ‘vaccine failures’, whereas the vaccine prevented death from COVID, but they really died from something else.'”

An Undeclared War Against the Public

While many people around the world still believe COVID-19 has been one of the deadliest pandemics in modern history and those of us who have survived are the lucky ones, the facts indeed tell a very different story.

When you look at how case rates and death statistics have been collected and reported, and how those parameters have changed along the way, you realize that the pandemic was a mirage, created through the manipulation of data and nothing else.

More than a year and a half has been stolen from us in an undeclared war against the public. Even with mounting awareness of the facts, the deep state players responsible for this cruel hoax are not likely to call it quits. They have a long-term goal, and that is the complete takeover and control of the global wealth and population.

So, as we move forward, we can expect more cover-ups, more obfuscation, more attempts to whitewash the truth and protect the guilty parties. Case in point: The COVID Commission Planning Group, tasked with planning the creation of an “independent” investigative commission like that for 9/11,¹⁹ is filled with people who have serious conflicts of interest.

As reported by the Miller Center,²⁰ the COVID Commission Planning Group is backed by charitable foundations that have been part of a technocratic alliance that for years, in some cases decades, have been plotting and planning for the wealth redistribution and global power grab we’re now experiencing.

The chosen leader of this new planning group is Philip Zelikow, former executive director of the 9/11 Commission²¹ and a member of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation’s Global Development Program Advisory Panel.^22,23

Zelikow, a former director of the Miller Center of Public Affairs at the University of Virginia, is also a current strategy group member of the Aspen Institute,²⁴ a technocratic hub that has groomed and mentored executives from around the world about the subtleties of globalization.

He also directed the Markle Foundation’s Task Force on National Security in the Information Age,²⁵ the focus of which has been to make information relating to potential security threats discoverable and accessible to officials.²⁶

Bioterror Is the New Never-Ending War

In a May 16, 2021, article, Off-Guardian details Zelikow’s conflicts of interest, and why the COVID-19 pandemic is unlikely to be resolved anytime soon, at least if the technocratic deep state looking for a Great Reset can prevent it:²⁷

“Zelikow’s involvement, among other things, suggests we are in the second phase of a long war of terror waged with two weapons – military and medical – whose propaganda messaging is carried out by the corporate mainstream media in the pursuit of the World Economic Forum’s Great Reset …

You can be certain it won’t end soon and that the new terrorists are domestic dissidents … the commission justifying the government’s claims about COVID-19 and injections (aka ‘vaccines’) will be hard at work writing their fictive report that will justify ex post facto the terrible damage that has occurred and that will continue to occur for many years …

‘Now is the time to just do what you are told,’ as Anthony Fauci so benevolently declared … The authorities have told us what’s coming. Pay attention. Don’t be fooled. It’s a game they have devised. Keep people guessing. On edge. Relieved. Tense. Relaxed. Shocked. Confused.

That’s the game. One day this, the next that. You’re on, you’re off. You’re in, you’re out. We are allowing you this freedom, but be good children or we will have to retract it. If you misbehave, you will get a time out.”

Indeed, fear has been weaponized with devastating effect over the past year, and it is what allows the destruction of our freedoms.

The Time to Stand for Freedom Is NOW

In 2007, Naomi Wolf published “The End of America: Letter of Warning to a Young Patriot,” in which she lays out the 10 steps to tyranny. She’s now warning everyone, everywhere, that we are at Step 10. Once Step 10 locks into place, there’s no going back. It’ll be too dangerous to fight back.

The good news is the would-be tyrants have not won yet. That said, we have no time to spare. We have no time to remain idle, hoping it will all just go back to normal on its own. The answer is peaceful mass civil disobedience. It’s time to say NO to any and all pandemic measures.

We must also rally behind legislation that prevents the alteration of laws that safeguard our freedoms. To that end, Wolf has started the Five Freedoms Campaign, which you can find on her Daily Clout website.

The campaign focuses on creating legislation to preserve key freedoms and prevent emergency laws from infringing on our freedom to assemble, worship, protest and engage in business. Legislation is also being crafted to open schools, remove mask mandates and eliminate requirements for vaccine passports.

I have no doubt that we will ultimately stop the globalists’ drive toward loss of personal freedoms and global tyranny. It’s not going to be easy. It may take years, and it may get far worse before it gets better, but if we unite, there’s no doubt we will win.

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***

In a stunning new development, the CDC announced this morning that they will convene an “emergency meeting” on June 18th after an alarming number of children developed myocarditis—a condition that causes an inflammation of the heart—after they were “vaccinated”; this debilitating ailment was especially prevalent in young boys. The onset of heart inflammation in children post-injection was so prevalent that Seattle Children’s Hospital issued a guidance that instructed health providers to inquire about the “vaccination” status of patients who are admitted to the Emergency Room with complaints of chest pains.

Even as they acknowledge this horrifying development where children who are perfectly healthy one second end up being stricken with heart palpitations, shortness of breath, electrocardiogram (EKG) changes and elevated cardiac biomarkers, the CDC and the medical establishment writ large continueto encourage parents to get their children injected with experimental “vaccines”. In the very guidance Seattle Children’s Hospital published to ring the alarm about myocarditis in kids, they note that the CDC “continues to recommend COVID-19 vaccination for people 12 years and older”.

It’s one thing for adults to gamble with their lives and subject themselves to gene therapy cocktails that are not fully approved by the FDA and enroll themselves in ongoing clinical trials by by turning their arms into sacrificial limbs, but pushing mRNA and adenovirus tainted needles into the arms of children is malicious in ways that is indescribable. As horrific as Covid-19 has been, a point I acknowledge because I lost my mother to this dreaded virus last year, the fact is that children have by and large been spared from this cursed pandemic. According to the CDC, the Covid-19 mortality rate of people 21 years or younger is 0.08%. Given this indisputable truth, encouraging and manipulating children to get jabbed with a “vaccine” that neither prevents contraction nor transmission is truly the stuff of Josef Mengele.

As much as I want to express a sense of relief that the CDC and their enablers in mainstream media are finally paying attention to the perils that these biotech snake oils present, I know full well that the “emergency meeting” will be nothing more than a dog-and-pony show. Beyond the fact that they announced this news on Friday, which is a day governments and public personalities dump bad news so it can be lost in the shuffle over the weekend and be forgotten by the time Monday arrives, there is broader question that is begging to be asked. Why in the hell are they waiting nearly a week to convene a meeting to address this terrifying development that is scaring the hell out of millions of parents instead of jumping on calls immediately?

More reports of kids hospitalized for myocarditis after the second vax dose… so the CDC says there going to have an emergency mtg NEXT WEEK?!? How about TONIGHT. Zoom works in the evening. My oped out today https://t.co/8NyVIOfhmn

— Marty Makary MD, MPH (@MartyMakary) June 11, 2021

Far from taking bold steps to address this public health emergency, the CDC will pretend to be concerned, hem and haw like they are seriously studying this crisis only to issue an edict that children coming down with heart inflammation is not related to the “vaccines” and will quickly go back to promoting the “vaccination” of children. They are already doing this exact thing before their sham meeting is convened; Tom Shimabukurom a CDC “vaccine safety official”, has started to minimize this grim development by trying to diminish the frequency of myocarditis in children post-“vaccination”.

The crutch they will be leaning on to discredit what hospitals throughout America are witnessing is a statistical gimmick; they note that more than 300 million doses of Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna’s “vaccines” have to be administered and that “only 226 cases” of myocarditis or pericarditis have been confirmed in people younger than the age of 30 after they were jabbed. What this deceptive statement omits is that the CDC’s Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System—the tool the CDC uses to document vaccine injuries and deaths—only captures 1% of all adverse events related to vaccinations. To this point, most cases where children develop heart inflammations are not reported; the true figure could be exponentially greater than 226 cases.

But even if we assume that “only 226” children were harmed by the “vaccines”, that is nothing to sneeze at given that only 100 cases of myocarditis would be expected for this age group. The risk of developing heart inflammation is more than twice as likely in kids who are jabbed versus those who are not. Fisher-Price recalled their Rock ‘n Play inclined baby sleeper after 50 babies were killed as a result of their shoddy product yet here we are with at least 226 children who have been grievously injured by Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna’s mRNA “vaccines” yet the CDC continues to recommend the use of these deadly nostrums.

The CDC’s actions have gone beyond negligence and are now firmly in the realm of wanton endangerment. A few months ago, they tweeted that people who recovered from Covid-19 should nonetheless get “vaccinated”. This statement is blatantly false, researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis stated:

“It’s normal for antibody levels to go down after acute infection, but they don’t go down to zero; they plateau. Here, we found antibody-producing cells in people 11 months after first symptoms. These cells will live and produce antibodies for the rest of people’s lives. That’s strong evidence for long-lasting immunity.”

This fact has been affirmed by none other than the National Institute of Health in a study they published January 26th, 2021. They state “after people recover from infection with a virus, the immune system retains a memory of it”. They go on to affirm “immune cells and proteins that circulate in the body can recognize and kill the pathogen if it’s encountered again, protecting against disease and reducing illness severity.” The CDC, WHO and the duplicitous organizations who are pushing this “vaccination” agenda are suppressing good news when it comes to natural immunization, alternative approaches and early treatment in order to gas light people into getting jabbed needlessly.

The heads of CDC, NIH, and FDA as well as every Biotech executive and political leaders who have taken part in this intentional campaign to mass-inject over 2 billion people globally should face charges in Nuremberg Trials 2.0. This is especially true given that the evidence points to the fact that Covid-19 was created at either the Wuhan Institute of Virology, Fort Detrick or both and funded by factions within the US government. Biden, Gates, Fauci et al have the blood of over 650,000 Americans and 3.5 billion plus people globally on their hands.

As to the safety and efficacy of the “vaccines”, Pfizer-BioNTech, Moderna, AstraZeneca, Johnson & Johnson, Sinopharm and Sputnik’s products have yet to be proven safe and effective. The aforementioned VAERS has been in use for close to two decades; the number of injuries and deaths documented for nearly 20 years has been surpassed by the number of injuries and deaths attributed to these “vaccines” in less than a year. As Dr. Richard Urso and I discussed in an interview that aired two days ago, these  experimental boosters are causing more damage than they are ameliorating the risk of Covid-19. Consequently, doctors who recommend these gene therapy injections are breaking their Hippocratic oath and doing harm by encouraging their patients to engage in acts of self-harm.

After people like Robert Kennedy Jr, Naomi Wolf, Cynthia McKinney and I have been maligned for months and dismissed as “conspiracy theorizing” anti-vaxxers by mainstream media and their benighted followers, what we have been saying all along is now coming to fruition. I questioned the origins of Covid-19 only to be censored mercilessly as Facebook, Twitter, Reddit and LinkedIn all deleted my accounts even though the establishment now acknowledge that the virus was most likely manmade after “fact-checking” this reality to be false not too long ago.

This same treatment of silencing dissent has been given to millions of people who dared to question the safety and efficacy of these “vaccines” in a fascist attempt to suppress information that threatens to eviscerate biotech corporations’ talking points. In a land that prides itself for being a beacon of free-speech and cherishes the rights of a free-press, the Second Amendment is being shredded by internal enemies who have zero allegiance to America nor humanity and instead have fidelity to only their globalist master. The truth is finally coming out; this is but the tip of the iceberg, five months from now, we could very well be experiencing a global holocaust.

I take no joy in writing this article; I know that there are many people who might end up reading this article who have either gotten jabbed or had children or loved ones “vaccinated”, including my own family members whom I love dearly and pray that my apprehensions about these boosters never come to pass. The last thing we need at a time like this is divisions; now, more than ever, is a time that calls for unity irrespective of our differences. To this end, I hope that we can debate this topics without reverting to ad hominem and letting conversations devolve into food fights. More importantly, I sincerely pray that we don’t demonize one another and instead treat each other like fellow human beings.

As I noted earlier, adults have the right to get jabbed or refuse to participate in clinical trials as they choose; just as much as I ask people who believe the way I do to respect folks who got jabbed, I likewise ask the “vaccinated” to speak against mistreatments like partitioned restaurants and segregated concerts like the one being held in Madison Square Garden this weekend that is reserved “for jabbed people only”. I also appeal for both sides of the debate to find middle grounds of agreement even if we disagree on the broader point. I would like to think that “vaccinating” children without their parent’s notification, presence or consent is one such common cause. As more news emerges about the dangers these “vaccines” present to children, another area of consensus could be the end of injecting children all together until these particular “vaccines” are proven safe and effective over time.

Though all of us have been carrying the cross of Covid-19 for more than 18 months, children have been particularly impaired by this nightmarish pandemic. As if it’s not bad enough that we force children to wear masks indoors and wound them emotionally, psychological and potentially physically in ways that could lead to an unimaginable mental health crisis when they get older, we are now turning them into lab animals. Another doctor I was talking to a couple of days ago noted that we are living in a society that is suffering from a collective PTSD and that this level of trauma leads to mind-boggling errors of judgment. Before we do further harm to ourselves and our children, let us pause and reassess the way forward and stop listening to politicians, pundits and opinion leaders who are make more money the more we endure tribulations.

If you are a parent, I beseech you to not let your children get “vaccinated”. As mentioned earlier, the overall mortality rate of Covid-19 is less than 1% to begin with; this figure drops to near zero for people under the age of 21. This insane “vaccination” agenda has nothing to do with science or public safety, it’s all about money and other the pernicious desires that people like Bill Gates have expressed publicly to reduce the global population as evidenced at the 4:30 mark of this TedTalk he gave in 2010. Children have their whole lives ahead of them, do not cripple or kill them to “protect” them for a virus that is barely touching them.

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The MoD’s internal think-tank, the Development, Concepts and Doctrine Centre (DCDC) along with the German Bundeswehr Office for Defence Planning (BODP) has published a disturbing new report urging greater investigation of – and investment in – human augmentation for military purposes. The following is a brief summary of the 100+ page document with short comment at the end.

‘Human Augmentation – The Dawn of a New Paradigm’ argues that humans are the ‘weakest link’ in modern warfare, and that there is a need to exploit scientific advances to improve human capabilities.

“Increasing use of autonomous and unmanned systems – from the tactical to the strategic level – could significantly increase the combat effect that an individual can bring to bear, but to realise this potential, the interfaces between people and machines will need to be significantly enhanced. Human augmentation will play an important part in enabling this interface.”

Suggested human augmentation to explore for military purposes includes the use of brain interfaces, pharmaceuticals and gene therapy.  Humans, argues the report, should be seen as a ‘platform’ in the same way as vehicles, aircraft and ships, with three elements of ‘the human platform’ to be developed: the physical, the psychological and the social (see image below).

The report defines human augmentation as ‘the application of science and technologies to temporarily or permanently improve human performance.’ It then differentiates between human optimisation which can “improve human performance up to the limit of biological capabilities without adding new capabilities” and human enhancement which can take the humans “beyond the limits of biological potential.”  While noting that night vision googles and binoculars should be technically be included in the definition of human augmentation, the reports states it is focusing  “on the implications of novel science and technology that are more closely integrated with the human body.”

The authors of the report argue:

“We want ‘war fighters’ – whether they be cyber specialists, drone pilots or infantry soldiers – to be stronger, faster, more intelligent, more resilient and more mobile to overcome the environment and the adversary. As technology has become more sophisticated our thinking has become more focused on the machine rather than the person, but this needs to change if we are going to be effective in the future.”

Although “advances in artificial intelligence, robotics and autonomy mean that human processing power, speed of action and endurance are being rapidly outpaced by machines” say the report, it accepts that machines “have weaknesses of their own.” Suggesting that  humans have ‘an advantage in the areas of creativity and judgment,’ the report argues that human augmentation is needed in order to take greater advantage of the developments in these areas:

“Future wars will be won, not by those with the most advanced technology, but those who can most effectively integrate the unique capabilities of both people and machine… Human augmentation is the missing part of this puzzle.”

High-end augmentation

After outlining the basics of human optimisation such as sleep, nutrition and dietary supplements, the report turns to what it calls ‘high-end augmentation’.  It outlines and discusses four ‘core human augmentation technologies’ that it suggests are crucial to explore in this context: genetic engineering, bioinformatics, brain interfaces and pharmaceuticals.” It then turns to their implications for the military.

Arguing that the deployment of armed forces is being made increasingly difficult by the proliferation of long-range precision weapons, the report suggests that greater use of unmanned systems in conjunction with lighter, mobile and more versatile ground forces is the solution. “Human augmentation will directly support these solutions” the report asserts. Through brain interfaces, personnel will be able “to increase the combat power they can bring to bear by networking them with autonomous and unmanned systems.”

The increasing use of computers and AI in warfare means that the “cognitive load on personnel is likely to increase, particularly for those involved in command and control.”  It suggests that ‘bioinformatics’ – the  study and analysis of large amounts of biological data – could help at the recruitment stage by “identifying commanders and staff with the right aptitude for command and control roles.”  It goes on:

“Brain interfaces, pharmaceuticals and gene therapy could all play a significant part in optimising and enhancing command and control proficiency. In the short term, non-invasive brain interfaces could improve performance by being used to monitor cognitive load, develop better processes and improve training. In the longer term, brain interfaces could network brains with headquarters providing a completely shares operating picture, improving the quality and speed of decision-making.”

However, the report acknowledges that such human augmentation will have an impact on personnel as they prepare for life after the military.

“The use of invasive human augmentation may require surgery to remove or downgrade implants that may not be permitted in civilian life. Reintegration to society could be complicated from a technical perspective but learning to live without military-grade augmentation could present even bigger mental health challenges.”

Attempting perhaps to put a positive spin on it, the reports goes on: “equally, veterans who have benefitted from human augmentation in Service life may be highly sought after by civilian employers.”

A scant look at ethics

In a relatively short section on ethical considerations, the report states that it does not address larger ethical questions about human augmentation as they “rightfully continue to be the subject of wider debate.”  It does, however, make clear arguments in favour of military use. In particular it declares:

“Defence cannot wait for ethics to change before engaging with human augmentation – we must be in the conversation from the outset to inform the debate and understand how ethical views are evolving.”

In a sign of how it is going to make its argument in the debate, it likens opposition to human augmentation to the opposition by some to vaccines, saying that the discovery of smallpox saved millions of lives but was condemned at the time by some of the world’s leading thinkers.  “We cannot assume human augmentation will be automatically effective or accepted in its intended use, no matter how beneficial its effects may be. Human augmentation may be resisted by elements in society that do not trust the effectiveness and motive of augmentation.

At the same time, the authors of the report make clear that military developments in this area should not wait for public agreement or ethical debate but be “based on the national interest in terms of prosperity, safety and security.”

“The imperative to use human augmentation may ultimately not be dictated by any explicit ethical argument, but by national interest. Countries may need to develop human augmentation or risk surrendering influence, prosperity and security to those who do.”

Ominously, the report argues that “relationships with industry and academia will be key to understanding how emerging augmentation technologies could be repurposed or developed for Defence.”  Life sciences, unlike nuclear physics or cryptography has “relatively little experience of classified research and its links with national security apparatus are less developed.”  This relationship – including with “government departments responsible for health and social care” – need to be “revised” declares the report, urging a move towards “a more sophisticated relationship between the public and private sector” in this area.

The report does not underestimate the opposition to such moves, but insists, as ever in these type of discussions, that if  we do not develop these systems, our enemies we be able to use such squeamishness against us:

“Successfully exploiting human augmentation will require Defence and society to face up to uncomfortable ethical and legal dilemmas. So far, Defence organisations in liberal democracies have adopted a ‘wait and see’ approach, choosing to let ethical debate and technical developments play out. This passive stance will cede momentum to our adversaries and cause Defence to miss opportunities to improve the well-being and effectiveness of our Armed Forces.”

Eroding humanity from warfare

The argument, as this report makes, that we are weak and ineffective in the face of sophisticated and deadly enemies is far from a new one. It has been used for centuries to develop and sell tools to increase our lethality and reach in order to project deadly force around the globe. But there is a qualitative difference between equipping a soldier with night-vision goggles or a high-powered rifle and implanting a computer interface in the brain of a drone pilot in order to increase data processing or network with an AI. That is before we get to the idea of somatic gene engineering to reduce pain thresholds or increase cognition.

The increasing use of computers, robotics, unmanned and remote systems in warfare is – in part – about enabling the erosion of humanity from warfare. Eroding hesitation, empathy, risk to oneself. Eroding the possibility of capture rather than kill. Eroding public knowledge and understanding of what is happening on the ground thousands of miles away.  Such remote warfare distances us, in different senses, from the consequences of our warfare.

Human augmentation – as the report acknowledges – could change our understanding of what it means to be human. But using human augmentation to eliminate so-called weaknesses in order to increase our aptitude for organised violence also threatens our humanity. The notion that humanity  is a weak link to be eradicated in order to be more lethal is simply appalling.

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Politicians from rich countries have tried to forcefully ‘persuade’ other countries to use an extreme economic system with few public services and very little regulation of big companies. This is usually called neoliberalism. The rights of big business and investors have priority over everything else. Public and community interests are ignored. People’s lives, their health, their jobs, pollution, the environment – all of these things become irrelevant when businesses are not properly controlled. This post summarises the policies that poor countries have adopted, due to violence, threats, bribes or personal self-enrichment, for much of the last 50 years. Note that these policies are very different from the policies that advanced nations used during their development.

Many critical writers had been saying this for many years, but were mostly ignored. In the year 2002 the former chief economist of the World Bank, Joseph Stiglitz, wrote a landmark book entitled ‘Globalization and its Discontents’, which brought these criticisms to a wider audience.

a) Spend Less – Cut the heart out of the patient 

We saw in earlier posts that government spending is at the heart of every successful economy. Despite this, poor countries are told that the government must spend less on public services, even when military spending is sometimes increased. This means that less is spent on water, sanitation, education and healthcare, in countries where the existing systems are already inadequate. Teachers, doctors and nurses lose their jobs. Some children cannot get an education, so they have no way of getting themselves out of poverty, and many poor people cannot get treatment for even the most basic medical problems. The government is also encouraged to cut wages and end assistance to the poor, such as food subsidies. The current word for this is austerity.(1)

b) Remove Controls on Money – Cut off the blood supply

Poor countries are advised to allow money to flow into the country, so rich people from other countries can invest more easily. More than anything else, those with money want a global system where money can flow freely between countries with no controls. Unfortunately this usually means that money can also flow out of poor countries very quickly, creating instability. Giving up control of money flows is a bit like cutting off a patient’s blood supply. In the past, many readers would have found it difficult to understand how flaws in the financial system can devastate economies. However, the 2007 global financial crisis affected even the wealthiest countries. The financial system, and control of money, is so important that it is discussed in other posts.

c) Privatise – Selling off the Family Jewels

Privatisation is where industries that are owned and run by the government, such as water and electricity, are given or sold to private owners. They claim that profit motivates them to be more efficient. This is propaganda. The US has one of the most privatised healthcare systems of any advanced nation, yet it is far more expensive than any other country’s, without noticeably better results. When the world’s steel industries were compared, the most efficient steel companies were found to be the government-owned businesses in South Korea and Taiwan.(2)

Privatisation in the developing world usually means a small number of big companies taking control of a whole industry. (This is known as oligopoly). These companies can be from overseas, or owned by rich locals with government connections. The process of handing over these industries is extremely corrupt and has been called ‘briberisation.’(3) The end result is that they can charge high prices, even for providing basic essentials.

A good example of the downsides of privatisation could be seen in Bolivia in the year 2000. The water supply had been privatised and prices immediately tripled. Locals were not even allowed to collect rainwater. They were expected to pay for every drop of water they used. The American company in charge was Bechtel, which has powerful connections in the US government, notably through former US Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld. Large numbers of people protested because they could not afford the water. Eventually Bechtel and their business partners were forced to leave the country.(4)

In African countries where the water system has been privatized, and even very poor people have been charged for water, it was found that some of those people would sooner walk for four hours each day to get free water, rather than pay for it. After privatisation in South Africa, many people found their water bills cost one-third of the family’s income. In Johannesburg, 22,000 people were disconnected each month because they could not pay their water bills. This led to an outbreak of Cholera, on a scale not seen for many years, because hygiene standards declined so much.(5) The importance of clean water cannot be stressed enough. A certain minimum amount of water has to be provided to the poorest people for free.

There are many examples of unsuccessful privatisations throughout the world. One of the most notorious was the Californian electricity system. This led to the collapse of major corporations, such as Enron. The senior people at Enron realised that at certain times of the day, there was enough demand for electricity that by closing down a power station for unnecessary ‘maintenance’, demand would exceed supply. It was then possible to charge much more for electricity. The price increased dramatically.(6) US politicians had been ‘bribed’ to deregulate the energy markets. Politicians in poor countries can be bribed just as easily as in the US.

There is a very good reason for electricity, gas, water, sanitation, phone lines, roads and railways being owned and run by a government. They are known as natural monopolies because each requires an expensive infrastructure. There is no point in ten companies all building railway lines between two towns, each being used by a tiny fraction of the population. It is better to have a single rail line used by everyone. However, if the single line is privately owned, the owners will overcharge users in order to make bigger profits.

Austerity and privatization are connected.(7) Austerity decreases the quality of public services. This makes it easier for private companies, and their supporters in government, to use propaganda to mislead the public into believing that a private system is better.

The final set of policies that have been forced upon poor countries is known as free trade. This is so important that it will be discussed in a later post.

Shock Therapy

Rich countries try to insist that poor countries adopt these policies very quickly. This is known as ‘shock therapy’. Unfortunately, rapid economic and social change creates hardship for large numbers of people, even in countries with social safety nets.(8) Without these safety nets, the results are much worse. The usual outcomes of this whole system include the creation of a small number of wealthy locals, and poverty for a large segment of the population. The transfer of wealth from the poorest to the richest happens not only between countries, but also within the country. Each nation loses control of its finances. Many people struggle to afford even the basics.

The End Result – Poverty and Death

When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1989, US advisors tried to persuade the Russian government that Russia could quickly change from its existing Communist system to an extreme version of capitalism. As with almost every other country that has tried this, poverty increased throughout the country. In 1992, the price of bread increased 100-fold in less than a year.(9) It has been estimated that the number of people in poverty increased by over 70 million people. Life expectancy in Russia declined at a rate that would normally only be seen during wartime, with one commentator describing the extra deaths as economic genocide.(10) A handful of people with strong government connections took over many state-run businesses, such as gas and oil companies, and became billionaires. They were known as the Oligarchs.

One of the leading economic advisors who helped to implement these policies, Jeffrey Sachs, admitted years later that he eventually realised that the extreme policies recommended to Russia were about “finishing off the cold war.”(11) This meant that senior planners in the US government wanted to destroy Russia’s government-backed industry, and replace it with an economic system where US companies could access resources and exploit the people.

Similar results can be seen in most countries that followed these policies. When they were applied in Peru in 1990, the price of bread increased 12-fold overnight. When they were applied in Mexico from 1980-2000, the spending power of many Mexicans dropped to a quarter of what it had been previously.(12) One of the leading experts, Jason HIckel, has described these policies as the largest single cause of impoverishment in the 20th century.(13) In each country that adopts these policies, a handful of people get rich very quickly. This was particularly notable in Mexico and Argentina, where billionaires were created almost overnight. If a group of people from one country suddenly become rich, it is usually because they have stolen the wealth of the nation. As one writer put it:

“This system is just another rigged game to enable the movers and shakers to get richer.”(14)

Advanced Countries Are Now Being Destroyed Too

Before 2008, the focus of these policies was on developing countries. However, since the global financial crisis the same policies have been applied to advanced nations. We have seen extreme austerity applied to Greece with catastrophic consequences. They have also been applied to Britain, with austerity leading to significant underfunding of social services and the National Health Service (NHS). At the same time there has been a gradual, stealthy privatisation of the NHS. Ever more wealth is being concentrated in the hands of the super rich. Inequality is rising to levels that we have not seen for a century. There are more and more people queueing at foodbanks and sleeping rough on the streets.

These outcomes are not accidental. The economic policies that create them are deliberate choices by governments. There is no evidence that austerity is ever necessary. These governments are gradually destroying state-run services to encourage people to use private alternatives, ultimately to make rich people richer. Since 2008 it has become more and more obvious that many governments, including those of the US and Britain, do not represent their people. Enriching themselves and their cronies is clearly their priority, irrespective of the harm this does to society more generally.

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Rod Driver is a part-time academic who is particularly interested in de-bunking modern-day US and British propaganda, and explaining war, terrorism, economics and poverty, without the nonsense in the mainstream media. This article was first posted at medium.com/elephantsintheroom

Notes

1) Isabel Ortiz and Thomas Stubbs, ‘More austerity for developing countries: It’s bad news and it’s avoidable’, Inter Press Service, Nov 2019, at http://www.ipsnews.net/2019/11/austerity-developing-countries-bad-news-avoidable/

2) Joseph Stiglitz, Globalization and its Discontents, p.54

The evidence that private monopolies are more efficient than state ones is also very weak. John Kay, The Truth About Markets, 2004 

3) Joseph Stiglitz, cited in Greg Palast, ‘The Globalizer Who Came In From The Cold’, 3 Sep 2001, at http://www.twf.org/News/Y2001/0903-Economist.html 

4) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cochabamba_Water_War

5) 10 Million Water Cuts After South Africa’s Water Privatization, Nov 4, 2002, at www.afrol.com/html/News2002/sa024_water_private.htm 

6) Enron Scandal at-a-Glance, Aug 22, 2002, at http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/1780075.stm

7) Michael Hudson, J is for junk economics, p.265

8) Michael Chossudovsky, The Globalization of Poverty

9) Michael Chossudovsky, The Globalization of Poverty, p.207

10) Naomi Klein, The Shock Doctrine, p.238

Notzon et al, ‘Causes of Declining Life Expectancy in Russia’, Journal of the American Medical Association, March 1998, at https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/9508159/ 

11) Jeffrey Sachs, Interviewed by Tim Sebastian on BBC Hardtalk, 22/01/03

Episode unavailable but its existence is confirmed at http://www.bbc.co.uk/pressoffice/pressreleases/stories/2003/01_january/22/hardtalk_sachsjeffrey.shtml 

12) David Bacon, ‘World labor needs independence and solidarity, 4 March 2000, at www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/26/206.html

13) Dinyar Godrej, ‘A brief history of impoverishment’, 20 April 2020, at https://newint.org/features/2020/02/10/brief-history-impoverishment

14) James S. Henry, Blood Bankers, p.289

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It’s been a mixed week for billionaires. On the one hand, ProPublica revealed that many of them don’t pay their “fair share” in taxes (unless you think the fair share for somebody with a net worth of $100,000,000,000 is to pay nothing or very little). On the other hand, heroic lawmakers like Mitt Romney (R-$280 million) in the Senate and Josh Gottheimer (D-$9 million) in the House have indicated that they have no interest in changing that — certainly not for something as silly as fixing the country’s crumbling infrastructure and giving the economy a much-needed boost.

It’s pretty clear that the uber-rich are getting a raw deal here. People should just leave these captains of industry alone so that they can focus on what they do best: sitting back and watching their vast fortunes grow by leaps and bounds. After all, this is how our trickle-up economy is designed to work.

And that’s something the detractors of these courageous capitalists conveniently overlook as they rail about this perceived injustice: These billionaires are just following the letter of the laws they paid others to write.

So let’s take a look at some of the unfounded criticisms directed toward these modern-day moguls and debunk them once and for all.

First, it’s false to say that these titans of trade pay no taxes. Sure, maybe they are paying a much lower income tax rate than the employees of their companies or their maids, butlers, dog walkers, dog tutors, dog hairdressers, chauffeurs, gardeners, pool cleaners, yacht captains, private jet pilots, or spaceship commanders, but they do pay the sales tax. That means when they buy a pack of gum, they pay exactly the same rate as any of the above. That’s the very definition of fairness.

Photo credit: DonkeyHotey / WhoWhatWhy (CC BY-SA 2.0)

In addition, nobody is talking about the sacrifices these admirable tycoons have to make. Sure, compared to non-rich Americans, they pay only a fraction of income taxes, but they also were not eligible for the stimulus checks most people got earlier this year. And did you hear Jeff Bezos or Bill Gates complain about this? You did not, because they are true team players.

Then there is the specious argument that the well-deserved riches these bold stewards of the economy have accumulated could be used for something better than space travel, sports teams, planes, extravagant homes, or simply sitting in bank accounts.

For example, these commie critics say that, with just a fraction of the wealth the 10 richest Americans amassed in the past year (a measly $521,000,000,000 between them), it would be easy to eradicate world hunger for 12 months, which is estimated to cost $116 billion — i.e., about one-fourth of the extra money these ten philanthropists made in the year of a pandemic.

Is that reasonable? Of course not. Let’s get real, folks. How many of the hundreds of millions of starving people in the most impoverished countries would get a Facebook account or buy a Tesla? Not many. Then why would Mark Zuckerberg spend even a dime of the extra $59 billion he is now worth on helping them? And why would Elon Musk give even a penny of the $147 billion he earned through his hard work?

And, sure, this would prevent countless people from starving to death… but it would also prevent them from picking themselves up by their bootstraps.

It’s also important to note that the extra $1.615 trillion that America’s billionaires made last year is simply a reflection of their hard work.

The annual median income of a full-time American worker is nearly $55,000. Now, based on the figure above, Zuckerberg made one million times as much last year. Some people think that shows that the system is completely out of whack, but were these naysayers at the Facebook offices all year? How can they say for sure that Zuckerberg didn’t work one million times harder than a teacher or a factory worker?

Speaking of the Zuckster, a video went viral this week of him throwing spears and shooting arrows. We can only assume that this is his way of getting ready to fight off a mob of jealous peasants who believe in the rhetoric that the current system is somehow “unfair.”

Is that really how we want him to spend his time — getting ready for some type of reverse Hunger Games — instead of helping erode US democracy or providing a platform for radicalizing Americans? Certainly not.

This brings us to the final argument the enemies of tried-and-true American capitalism are making: that there is an increasing “wealth gap” that is “bad” and “divisive.”

Really???

Then explain this: If these billionaires are so divisive, how do they manage to keep uniting a deeply partisan and sharply divided Congress on the most important issue of our time — ensuring that the richest Americans and their businesses can continue to pay next to nothing in taxes.

It’s commendable how the super-rich can bring Republican and Democratic lawmakers together — through sheer determination, having truth and justice on their side, and making gazillions in campaign contributions to both parties.

It’s truly admirable, and they deserve a lot of credit for that… Even better, let’s make it another tax credit.

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Efforts to depict journalism as if it ever existed in the idealized form of its propagandists have become increasingly ridiculous. Journalism, like accountancy, is just another sub-category of reporting. Like accountancy and other reporting activities, journalistic reporting can be good or bad, exceptional or mediocre, honest or criminal. Among the most insidious fables people in the West tell themselves is that European and North American countries promote honest reporting and freedom of expression. However, countries from Libya, Iran and Syria to Cuba, Nicaragua and Venezuela offer undeniable examples of how absurd that fiction really is.

A personal anecdote relating to Nicaragua encapsulates the reality of reporting in the West. Recently, I asked a very well regarded freelance foreign journalist who has covered Latin America for decades, mainly for European media outlets, if they might be available to interview a well known Sandinista in Nicaragua about this year’s elections. This reporter replied that they’d like to, but could not because the media with which they work rejected reporting on Nicaragua giving what this person regarded as a true and fair view of events here. The implications of that are at once both very sinister and notably commonplace.

On one level, to be able to secure work with practically any media outlet, reporters generally have to accept the outlet’s editorial policy and ideological leanings and comply with them. Nowhere in the world is that unusual. But taken to another level, this reality is very sinister because it means reporting honestly on, in this case, Nicaragua, but it could be Syria or any country under attack from the US and its allies, is subject to abrupt and brutal professional, economic and social repression. Not only does any professional journalist determined to report honestly on countries like Nicaragua risk losing work and income. The knock on effect is that they might end up ostracised by colleagues unwilling to be contaminated by association, thereby risking their own professional status, economic well being and social stability.

Nor does it make sense to try and pretend this is merely a matter of some isolated chilling effect with no implications beyond a few media outlets. Corporate political power in North America and Europe suffocates public life so completely that it is practically economic suicide and certainly a recipe for isolation for people engaged in almost any kind of reporting to defy the limits set by the two dominant varieties of political consensus. Neither the neoliberal fascism of right wing politicians like Donald Trump or Boris Johnson nor the neoliberal fascism of more social democrat politicians like Hillary Clinton or Angela Merkel tolerate dissent. Everything is subordinate to the marriage of corporate and political power and the imperatives that union engenders.

Stepping out from under the protection of the respective broad political mafia networks those flavors of fascism afford, guarantees economic hardship, social isolation and, in extreme cases like those of Julian Assange, Craig Murray and many others, criminal prosecution. This is so most obviously for media journalists and people working in Western NGOs or major international institutions headquartered in the West. But it is also true for research scientists, economists and other financial professionals, academics of all kinds, anyone engaged in reporting that one way or another affects corporate elite interests and the policies they favor, including their respective countries’ foreign policy. More than ever, the ethos is one of ultimatums “you’re either with us or against us” or, in its even more overt gangster version, “do what we want, or else…”

Thus, reporting is deliberately made subservient to very broad but generally unacknowledged political allegiance. In the United States, Democrat party aligned media like National Public Radio, the Public Broadcasting System, the New York Times, the Washington Post, CNN, MSNBC and the plethora of similar outlets, and more so their Republican aligned opposites, will never report the truth about Nicaragua or any other country resisting US and EU government wishes. Nor will their counterparts in Europe like the BBC, the Guardian, El País, Deutsche Welle, Le Monde, the Irish Times nor any other similar undeservedly prestigious European media outlet. The foreign affairs reporting of all such media consists generally of blatant pro-US propaganda.

The same is true of the reporting sources that feed these media. In the area of human rights, Amnesty International, the International Federation for Human Rights and Human Rights Watch, for example, undeniably skew their reporting to attack the targets of the US and the EU governments and correspondingly downplay abuses by US and EU allies. This is clear from any just comparison between these NGOs reporting on the violent guarimbas in Venezuela or on Nicaragua during the violent failed coup attempt of 2018 and their reporting on the repression of legitimate mass protest by the narco-terror authorities running Colombia.

What is extraordinary about the case of Nicaragua is how readily even self-styled anti-imperialist reporting outlets ape the aggressive coverage of their mainstream counterparts. The experience of writers supporting Nicaragua’s Sandinista government against US and EU government efforts at regime change has been salutary. No matter how carefully one presents the facts nor how thoroughly one references one’s arguments to authoritative sources, the general consensus among even a great many self-styled progressive media, in either English or Spanish, is to reject out of hand any effort at a true and fair view of events in Nicaragua. In effect, these self-styled anti-imperialist media outlets actively support the aggressive imperialism of the US government and its allies against Nicaragua.

One way to counter this culture of absurd falsehood is to publish first hand interviews with Nicaraguans at grass roots rendering personal accounts of their own experiences, lives and opinions. Such genuine testimony is readily verifiable, freely given and rooted in personal, daily reality. This material contrasts greatly with the kinds of false witness confected under subornment and duress so typical of accounts rendered in Nicaragua’s opposition aligned media and non profits virtually all of which are funded by the US government and its corporate owned non profits. This is so not just in the case of Nicaragua but also for Syria, Cuba, Venezuela, Iran, anywhere under economic, diplomatic and psychological warfare attack from the US and its allies

Most writers in solidarity with Nicaragua’s Sandinista Revolution write because we love Nicaragua and its people and completely reject efforts by the corporate owned US and EU governments to overthrow its very successful socialist government. No one pays us to write in defense of Nicaragua’s right to self-determination. We do so because US and allied attacks on Nicaragua are illegal and unjust. For that reason, because we are genuinely independent, no one is able to intimidate us with the implicit threat of unemployment and poverty. We write out of conviction based on diligent research and irrefutable testimony.

By contrast, most reporting on Nicaragua is by corporate owned media journalists, corporate funded NGOs and Western government financed institutional bureaucrats working under a ruthless system of intimidation and effective censorship. They never corroborate their reports with genuinely independent sources and they consistently omit facts contradicting their accounts. They permanently recycle false reports from Nicaragua’s opposition aligned NGOs and media, all financed directly or indirectly by the governments of the United States and the European Union. With complete cynicism, they describe these highly compromised sources as independent. Western reporting on Nicaragua confirms that North America and Europe have practically no genuinely independent media nor do they have a culture of freedom of expression.

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“Many of those misbehaving today are too young to be aware of the destruction and loss of lives that occurred during the Biafra war. Those of us in the fields for 30 months, who went through the war, will treat them in the language they understand.” – Tweet issued at the account of Muhammadu Buhari.

I have a nuanced view about the action taken by Twitter to remove the tweet by the Nigerian President earlier this month.

1. I understand the anger and displeasure felt by many because:

(a) Buhari’s tone was in keeping with the violent culture of Nigeria’s security apparatus which as the SARS protests highlighted is one which has been historically disproportionate in response and undiscriminating in effect on guilty parties and innocent bystanders.

(b) Buhari’s comments were appropriated from an earlier speech in which he was specifically responding to the violent acts against state personnel and property in the South East of the country by the Eastern Security Network (ESN), an armed counterpart of the secessionist organisation, the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB). His choice of words relating to the “language they understand” is seen by many in the ethnic Igbo-dominated South East as the reflecting the sentiments of the atypical Northern Nigerian oligarch who orchestrated the murder and maiming of thousands of innocent Igbos in the North during the pogroms of the 1960s.* The ensuing civil war with secessionist Biafra which witnessed mass starvation, is still viewed by many Igbos as a continuum of the brutality that had been unleashed on them prior to the war.

(b) Many pointed out that Buhari’s tone in relation to the acts of lawlessness in the South East is missing when he has addressed issue of the Islamist perpetrators of mayhem in the North East of the country where an insurgency by Boko Haram and lately the Islamic State has led to continuing instances of mass murder and a large level of population displacement. They also charge Buhari with being silent about the atrocities perpetrated by Fulani herdsmen in clashes with farming communities around Nigeria. Himself an ethnic Fulani, Buhari is often accused of tribalism and ineptitude in his handling of this matter, which like the Islamist insurgency is becoming one of longstanding duration.

2. However, the other important aspect of this incident concerns the power of the Big Tech corporations Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube, which are all monopolies. Their interference in the privacy rights of their subscribers is well known. But another pernicious aspect of the conduct of these corporations is the power which they attempt to wield in relation to countries. For just as they have cooperated with the US government and powerful corporations in infringing the privacy rights of their subscribers, so it is the case that the Big Tech companies have been accused of interfering in the affairs of sovereign nation states by either doing the bidding of the United States government and its intelligence community** or by pushing a decidedly “liberal agenda” on the rest of the globe.

It is worth concentrating the mind on whether they are qualified to act as an arbiter in what they claim to have been a form of “hate speech”, but which others see as the inalienable right of the head of a government to address the violent actions of a proscribed organisation.

So, while I understand the doubts of some and the revulsion of others at the words of President Buhari, it is important to bear in mind the wider issues related to the intolerable attitude of the Big Tech giants whose self-designated powers pertaining to censorship and political umpireship must be scrutinised and where appropriate should be challenged.

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This article was originally published on the author’s blog site, Adeyinka Makinde.

Adeyinka Makinde is a writer based in London, England. He is a frequent contributor to Global Research.

Featured image: President Muhammadu Buhari of Nigeria (Credit: Nigeria Presidency/Handout via Adeyinka Makinde)

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***

Observers are divided over whether Nigeria’s decision to ban Twitter in response to the platform deleting a controversial tweet by President Buhari directed against southeastern separatists is a principled move in support of national sovereignty or an anti-democratic one aimed at stifling growing dissent.

Africa’s most populous nation of Nigeria recently banned Twitter in response to the platform deleting a controversial tweet by President Buhari directed against southeastern separatists. He threatened to “treat them in the language they understand”, which was interpreted by the company as “abusive behavior” and thus a violation of its community standards. The background context is complex but an admittedly oversimplified explanation is that the oil-rich southeastern region is once again experiencing a rise in separatist sentiment led by the so-called “Indigenous People Of Biafra” (IPOB). This is attributed to a confluence of factors including seemingly growing economic inequality there and increased displeasure with the perception of northern Muslims wielding disproportionate influence over this majority-Christian region.

The modern-day nation of Nigeria has always been roughly divided between the Muslim North and Christian South since its colonial-era unification under the British. This fault line is responsible for a myriad of Hybrid War threats that were elaborated upon by the author in his detailed strategic risk study on the country back in early 2017. Just like Africa’s second most populous nation of Ethiopia on the other side of the continent which is presently suffering from a revival of separatist violence, so too does Nigeria seem destined to fall back into this historical pattern as well. Cosmopolitan countries such as these, especially ones with such massive population sizes, usually find it very difficult to maintain national unity for prolonged periods of time. These preexisting tensions are also sometimes exploited by foreign forces, but it’s unclear if that’s the case with both right now.

The point to pay attention to though is that Nigerians are becoming increasingly confident with publicly expressing their dissent against the status quo, be it through last fall’s regrettably chaotic protests against the Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS) that some blame on provocateurs and/or the state itself or the spate of separatist violence that’s been observed in the southeast. This is simply an observation and no value judgment is being made about either of these movements or the many others that are popping up across the country. On top of that, Nigeria is still struggling with its campaign against Boko Haram terrorists in the northeast and also fears the creation of a black hole of instability along its border with Cameroon in the event that so-called “Ambazonian” separatists there join forces with the neighboring “Biafran” ones.

Absent a radical political solution which seems extremely unlikely due to the state’s unwillingness to compromise on issues that it regards as integral to its national security, it’s very possible that the situation might eventually spiral out of control, including through the worst-case scenario of a more robust crackdown on the southeast that could raise fears of rekindling the bloody civil war of 1967-1970 that killed an estimated several million people. Against this backdrop, it’s somewhat understandable why President Buhari would talk tough on Twitter against IPOB, but the potential consequences of the darker scenarios that he might be implying also explain why Twitter decided to delete his tweet. At the same time, though, both of their responses can also be constructively criticized.

President Buhari’s controversial tweet could have been interpreted as a dog whistle by some nationalist forces to carry out attacks against some of the people from the southeast, while Twitter’s hypocritical claim that access to its platform is a so-called “essential human right in modern society” is debunked by its banning of Trump and many others (mostly his supporters) for purely political reasons. Observers can also rightly argue that Twitter’s deletion of President Buhari’s tweet represents a form of Western meddling in the country’s affairs, which explains why his decision to indefinitely ban Twitter is a principled one. Nevertheless, it’s also likely that he plans to exploit this opportunity to stifle growing dissent seeing as how that platform is increasingly used to organize protests and perhaps even militant/terrorist actions against the state.

It’s therefore inaccurate to describe his move as being either a completely principled one in support of national sovereignty or an anti-democratic one since it compellingly incorporates both elements. It’s within Nigeria’s sovereign rights to ban Twitter, with or without the company’s provocation against its President, but that doesn’t mean that ulterior motives related to stifling rising dissent aren’t also served by this measure. Twitter was clearly meddling in Nigeria’s domestic affairs, which created the perfect pretext for the country to opportunistically exploit for other ends. It’s unclear exactly how long the ban will remain in effect, but it’s obvious that it serves immediate security needs related to the state’s attempt to regain control of the country’s socio-political dynamics that have been slipping from its grasp.

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This article was originally published on OneWorld.

Andrew Korybko is an American Moscow-based political analyst specializing in the relationship between the US strategy in Afro-Eurasia, China’s One Belt One Road global vision of New Silk Road connectivity, and Hybrid Warfare. He is a frequent contributor to Global Research.

Featured image is from OneWorld

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***

Privately-operated non-profit and for-profit charter schools[1] run by unelected officials are legal in 45 states, Washington DC, Puerto Rico, and Guam.

According to a 2018 state-by-state information chart from the Education Commission of the States, more than 25 states (including Washington, DC) either do not require charter school teachers to be certified or allow charter schools to hire a large portion of teachers with no teaching certification (see this).[2]

And, on average, charter school teachers have fewer years of teaching experience and fewer credentials than their public school counterparts. They also tend to work longer days and years than public school teachers while generally being paid less than them. Further, many charter school teachers are not part of an employee retirement plan and are treated as “at-will” employees, which is linked to why nearly ninety percent of charter school teachers are not part of any organization that defends their collective interests.

A few examples of charter schools with uncertified teachers are worth noting. A May 30, 2019 article in The Palm Beach Post titled, “Underpaid, undertrained, unlicensed: In PBC’s largest charter school chain, 1 in 5 teachers weren’t certified to teach,” points out that the Renaissance Charter School chain in Florida routinely employed large numbers of substitute teachers and operated many schools where a quarter to a third of the teachers were not certified to teach.

Several years ago, one of the main charter school authorizers in New York State unilaterally further lowered teaching qualifications for teachers in charter schools. It willfully ignored numerous public demands to not further dilute teaching standards, prompting a lawsuit against its arbitrary actions. An October 18, 2019 press release from New York State United Teachers (NYSUT) titled, “Court rejects fake certification scheme for charter school teachers,” reads in part:

“After the union fought back against ‘fake’ certification for some charter school teachers, a midlevel appeals court this week ruled the SUNY Charter Schools Committee does not have the authority to set its own standards for certifying teachers. NYSUT President Andy Pallotta said the court ruling is a big win for the union and the profession. ‘This is about preserving what it means to be a teacher in New York State’, Pallotta said. ‘This would have created a two-tiered certification system and allowed unqualified educators to practice in some charter schools’.”

While public school teachers in North Carolina have to be trained and certified to teach in public schools, charter schools are exempt from such requirements and can hire uncertified non-educators to teach (see this). And while they enroll a significant percentage of youth, in Arizona “Teachers at charter schools are not required to have any certification” (see this). Many other examples from across the nation could be given.

Taken together, these facts help explain why there is such persistently high teacher turnover rates in the crisis-prone charter school sector—a situation that does not serve students and families well. It is no accident that there has been an uptick in recent years in the number of charter school teachers striving to unionize. The most recent example comes from Chicago (see this).

It is not possible to build a modern society and nation by creating more corporatized schools that are segregated, non-transparent, deregulated, run by unelected officials, and staffed with a large number of uncertified teachers. Such neoliberal arrangements lower the level of education and are a slap in the face of thousands of teacher education students around the country who spend years and thousands of dollars training to become effective certified teachers.

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Shawgi Tell, PhD, is author of the book “Charter School Report Card.” His main research interests include charter schools, neoliberal education policy, and privatization. He can be reached at [email protected].

Notes

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***

A 2019 survey revealed that 82% of Americans thought Artificial Intelligence (A.I.) technology would be more harmful than helpful.  They seem to have been onto something as warnings about A.I. keep pouring in (see 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9).

In 2019, telecom executives gave U.S. congressional testimony that they had NO independent studies proving that 5G is safe.

Later that year, Biden was confronted with this fact while he was campaigning and said:

WATCH: A woman in Iowa tells @JoeBiden the 5G in the area is making people sick and their "minds are breaking down."

Biden replies: "There is a lot of debate in the scientific community of whether or not 5G does what you are saying. It should be studied thoroughly…" @CBSNews pic.twitter.com/dE2xVivS86

— Bo Erickson CBS (@BoKnowsNews) December 29, 2019

Full video:

Since taking office, there has been no indication that Biden has ordered any studies to thoroughly study 5G.  He has also not addressed American concerns about reduced property value (see 1, 2, 3) and increased energy consumption (see 1, 2) as well as risks to cybersecurity, privacy (see 1, 2), public safety (see 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8), health (see 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9), and the environment.  Last monthscientists submitted a letter to President Biden asking him to protect the public from 5G and other unsafe technology.  Instead he’s already working on developing 6G and implementing more controversial A.I.

From Fierce Wireless:

U.S., U.K. team to tackle 6G

The U.S. and U.K. announced plans to develop a detailed science and technology partnership agreement, which is set to include a provision for strategic collaboration on the development of 6G technology.

Over the next year, the countries said they will define a statement of intent focused on advancing “proposals on future technology such as 6G” and strengthening cooperation on “digital technical standards.”

The partnership will be part of an updated Atlantic Charter deal signed by U.S. President Joe Biden and British Prime Minister Boris Johnson. The original version of the document was signed in 1941 by President Franklin D. Roosevelt and Prime Minister Winston Churchill to outline a vision for the post-World War II world.

Beyond 6G, the revamped charter will cover collaborations to improve critical supply chain resilience; boost emerging fields such as artificial intelligence (AI) and quantum technology; and enhance the accessibility and flow of data to support economic growth, public safety and scientific processes.

U.K. Digital Secretary Oliver Dowden said in a statement the revised charter “marks a new era of cooperation with our closest ally, in which we commit to using technology to create prosperity and guarantee the safety and security of our citizens for years to come.”

The announcement came just days after researchers in Finland and Japan struck a deal to collaborate on 6G.

Read full article

5G opposition is worldwide due to economic, environmental, health, and safety risks.  Cities AND entire countries have taken action to ban, delay, halt, and limit installation AS WELL AS issue moratoriums.

The majority of scientists oppose 5G deployment.  Since 2017, doctors and scientists have been asking for moratoriums on Earth and in space (see 1, 2).  Since 2018 there have been reports of people and animals experiencing symptoms and illnesses after 5G was installed (see 1. 2, 3, 4).

Americans opposed to 5G may click here to sign a letter asking the Biden administration to stop deployment immediately.

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Summits often feature grand statements and needless fripperies.  In Cornwall, the leaders of the G7 countries were trying to position and promote their relevance as the vanguard of democratic good sense and values.  They, the message went, remained relevant, valuable and essential to the order of the earth, despite challenges posed by the autocrats. 

Never let contradiction get in the way of such a united front.  Babbling about liberal democratic values matters little when it comes to crusty realpolitik.  The UK and the US continue to supply armaments to their favourite theocracy, Saudi Arabia, even as they take issue with Russia and Chinese actions they deem aggressive, cruel or authoritarian.   Germany’s position on dealing with Russia remains distinct within the grouping, not least on the issue of energy politics and the Nord Stream 2 gas project.  Nor does the G7 necessarily share the same attitude in dealing with China, each having had its slant in coping with Beijing’s actions in recent years.

The China Syndrome has produced some form of united response at the summit.  Welcome, then, to the Build Back Better World (B3W) initiative.  This will entail, according to a White House factsheet, “a values-driven, high-standard, and transparent infrastructure partnership led by the major democracies to help narrow the $40+ trillion infrastructure need in the developing world, which has been exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic.”  The initiative will also involve “the G7 and other like-minded partners” coordinating and mobilising “private-sector capital in four areas of focus – climate, health and health security, digital technology, and gender equity and equality – with catalytic investments from our respective development finance institutions.” 

A senior official in the Biden administration told Reuters that, “This is not just about confronting or taking on China.  But until now we haven’t offered a positive alternative that reflects our values, our standards and our way of doing business.”    

Since 2013, President Xi Jinping’s multi-billion dollar Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) has niggled the sphere of influence watchers.  While the developed world went into something of an investment coma after the Great Recession of 2007-9, notably in developing economies, China took its wallet out.  Attached conditions to the investment would be few; questions about human rights, freedoms and business transparency would not be obstacles.  As this was happening, high-income states went into chatter mode while keeping their shut purses, formulating principles for quality infrastructure investments.

The BRI infrastructure program, currently featuring 2,600 projects, is China’s geopolitical bridge to developing states, linking Beijing through an assortment of road, maritime and rail projects.  These include the $100 billion China-Myanmar Economic Corridor, and the $62 billion China Pakistan Economic Corridor.  Over time, the initiative has moved into 5G technologies and fiberoptic networks. 

The BRI initiative is also a way of jostling out countries long presumptuous about keeping their backyard free of competition.  (Australia, for instance, has shown alarm that its long standing position as Pacific bruiser and charity giver is facing dethroning.)  And it has worried recipient states initially warmed by Chinese offers of investment.  In 2016, Pakistani Senator Tahir Mashhadi, chairman of the Senate Standing Committee on Planning and Development, issued a warning.  “Another East India Company is in the offing; national interests are not being protected.  We are proud of the friendship between Pakistan and China, but the interests of the state should come first.”   

The G7 states have been doing much head scratching as to how to rival and blunt the BRI.  In 2019, the Trump administration, along with Japan and Australia, suggested their own counter: the Blue Dot Network, the principles of which underpin B3W.  The BDN initiative seeks to promote “equality infrastructure investment that is open and inclusive, and transparent, economically viable, financially, environmentally sustainable and compliant with international standards, laws, and regulations.”  The inaugural meeting of the Blue Dot Network’s Executive Consultation Group took place on June 7.

While not specifically referencing the BDN (anything deemed worthy by President Donald Trump is to be assimilated rather than acknowledged), US President Joe Biden has been making regular sprays about, as he told reporters in March, establishing “a similar initiative coming from the democratic states, helping those communities around the world.”  

In April, Biden and his Japanese counterpart, Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga, met to discuss “practical commitments” in establishing an alternative to BRI projects.  There was a special emphasis on promoting and protecting “the technologies that will maintain and sharpen our competitive edge” based on “democratic norms that we both share – norms set by democracies, not autocracies.”

Cornwall has become the site for similar assurances.  The B3W is all about, as the Biden administration claims, “offering a higher-quality choice”.  The choice will be offered “with self-confidence … that reflects our shared values”.  Kaush Arha, who worked as the US G7 sherpa for the Blue Dot Network in 2020, sees the way paved “for BDN to earn the endorsement of the G7” and feature at the 26^th United Nations Climate Change Conference of the Parties in November.

The details of this new plan, for all its claims to transparency, remain opaque.  In the first place, it places strong emphasis on private sector contributions that are supposedly drawn in an open, accountable manner.  Robert Daly, director of the Wilson Centre’s Kissinger Institute on China and the United States asks the question “whether this is going to be actually new funding, new capacity to build infrastructure in the region, or is this a repurposing and repackaging of resources that are also available.”  Eventually, the participating powers will have to show the money.

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Dr. Binoy Kampmark was a Commonwealth Scholar at Selwyn College, Cambridge.  He lectures at RMIT University, Melbourne. He is a frequent contributor to Global Research and Asia-Pacific Research. Email: [email protected]

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It became clear early on that children and teens are at very low risk from COVID-19, with a 99.997% survival

Masking, social distancing and virtual schooling persisted nonetheless, even as experts sounded the alarm about their probable implications, including physical, psychological and behavioral adverse effects

Speaking at the Advanced Medicine Conference May 30, 2021, Leila Centner, chief executive officer and co-founder of Centner Academy in Miami, Florida, detailed many of the risks posed to children by COVID-19 school guidelines, along with the inconsistencies and lack of research behind their use

A number of states have now banned mask mandates in schools, often as the result of public outcry; Stand for Health Freedom has a form you can use to ask your governor and department of education to lift harmful COVID-19 guidelines in your child’s school so students can return to normal, healthy learning environments

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Click the image on the right to watch the video.

Children may end up being among the greatest casualties of the COVID-19 pandemic — not because of the virus but due to the restrictions placed upon them over the last year, which have interrupted mental, social and emotional development in unprecedented ways. It became clear early on that children and teens are at very low risk from COVID-19, with a 99.997% survival.¹

Masking, social distancing and virtual schooling persisted nonetheless, even as experts sounded the alarm about their probable implications, including physical, psychological and behavioral adverse effects.²

Speaking at the Advanced Medicine Conference May 30, 2021, Leila Centner, chief executive officer and co-founder of Centner Academy in Miami, Florida, detailed many of the risks posed to children by COVID-19 school guidelines, along with the inconsistencies and lack of research behind their use.³

Centner made headlines in April 2021 after informing teachers that if they’ve been vaccinated for COVID-19 they can’t work at the school due to the unknown effects the experimental drug could be having on unvaccinated individuals.⁴

CDC COVID Guidelines May Be Harming Children

In the U.S., the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s operational strategy for K-to-12 schools continues to recommend the “consistent use of prevention strategies, including universal and correct use of masks and physical distancing.”⁵

Any intervention, including mask usage, which may cause adverse effects, must have benefits that outweigh the risks, but no research has been done to ensure that universal masking of children is safe or effective. Despite this, one of the two key prevention strategies recommended by the CDC for schools to prevent the transmission of SARS-CoV-2 is the requirement for “universal and correct use of masks.”

The Centner Academy did not require masks at any point during the pandemic, but did not have any hospitalizations from COVID-19. While they did have cases, most that occurred among students were asymptomatic, Centner said.

It’s important to note that Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute for Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), has flip-flopped on the usefulness and need for masks multiple times, from “Americans shouldn’t be wearing masks because they don’t work,” to masks definitely work and should be worn by everyone, to you should wear not just one but two, for safe measure.

He’s gone from promising a mask-free existence once the vaccine rolls out, to insisting mask-wearing is still necessary after vaccination because vaccine-resistant variants might pop up, to proposing we might need to wear masks every flu season in perpetuity. Yet, signs are increasing that masks do pose risks, including to children.

At the University of Witten/Herdecke in Germany, an online registry was set up where parents, doctors, pedagogues and others can enter their observations about mask wearing in children. Using data on 25,930 children,⁶ with an average mask wearing time of 270 minutes per day, 24 health issues were reported.⁷ A majority of parents (68%) reported impairments in their children due to wearing a mask. They recorded symptoms that:⁸

“… included irritability (60%), headache (53%), difficulty concentrating (50%), less happiness (49%), reluctance to go to school/kindergarten (44%), malaise (42%), impaired learning (38%) and drowsiness or fatigue (37%).”

They also found 29.7% reported feeling short of breath, 26.4% being dizzy and 17.9% were unwilling to move or play.⁹ Hundreds more experienced “accelerated respiration, tightness in chest, weakness and short-term impairment of consciousness.” The researchers concluded:¹⁰

“The frequency of the registry’s use and the spectrum of symptoms registryed indicate the importance of the topic and call for representative surveys, randomized controlled trials with various masks and a renewed risk-benefit assessment for the vulnerable group of children.”

Masks Cause Anxiety, Panic Attacks, Headaches and More

Centner’s presentation featured Dr. Jim Meehan, an ophthalmologist and preventive medicine specialist who has performed more than 10,000 surgical procedures and is also a former editor of the medical journal Ocular Immunology and Inflammation. He has conducted an evidence-based scientific analysis on masks, which shows that not only should healthy people not be wearing masks but they could be harmed as a result.¹¹

In the video, Meehan warned universal masking of children is experimental and the safety hasn’t been proven. Further, he says the official change in guidelines from first telling people to avoid mask-wearing to later mandating it in many places wasn’t the result of “new science” but rather was the result of lobbying.

In his practice, Meehan said he’s seen horrendous harm as a result, with dozens of children facing health problems including:¹²

• Anxiety
• Facial rashes
• Oral ulcers
• Panic attacks
• Infections
• Cavities
• Struggling to breathe
• Dental problems
• Throat abscesses

Meehan previously compiled 17 ways that masks can cause harm, which include:¹³

• Medical masks adversely affect respiratory physiology and function
• Medical masks raise carbon dioxide levels in the blood
• Medical masks trap exhaled virus in the mouth/mask, increasing viral/infectious load and increasing disease severity
• The furin cleavage site of SARS-CoV-2 increases cellular invasion, especially during low blood oxygen levels
• Wearing a face mask may give a false sense of security
• Untrained and inappropriate management of face masks is common
• Masks collect and colonize viruses, bacteria and mold
• Contact tracing studies show that asymptomatic carrier transmission is very rare
• Face masks are dangerous and contraindicated for a large number of people with pre-existing medical conditions and disabilities
• Medical masks lower oxygen levels in the blood
• SAR-CoV-2 has a “furin cleavage” site that makes it more pathogenic, and the virus enters cells more easily when arterial oxygen levels decline, which means wearing a mask could increase COVID-19 severity
• SARS-CoV-2 becomes more dangerous when blood oxygen levels decline
• Cloth masks may increase the risk of contracting COVID-19 and other respiratory infections
• Masks compromise communications and reduce social distancing
• Masks worn imperfectly are dangerous
• Wearing a face mask makes the exhaled air go into the eyes
• Face masks and stay at home orders prevent the development of herd immunity

Centner also featured Dr. Lawrence Palevsky, a New York pediatrician, who warned that masks could be harming children’s brain development. By promoting fear, stress, panic and anxiety, it keeps children in the “fight or flight response” driven by the brain. This influences the capacity of development and higher functions of the brain.¹⁴

Children’s Mental Health Is Suffering

Rates of suicide in youth increased during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 compared to 2019. Significantly higher rates of suicide-related behaviors, including suicide ideation and suicide attempts, corresponded to times of increased COVID-19-related concerns, according to research published in the journal Pediatrics.¹⁵ Social isolation imposed during the pandemic has been cited as reason for pushing some children with mental health issues “over the edge.”¹⁶

Centner also highlighted a May 2021 announcement by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), through the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA), which will make $14.2 million from the American Rescue Plan available to expand mental health care access to children.¹⁷ In a news release, HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra said:¹⁸

“Children are struggling with a range of emotional and behavioral challenges arising from the COVID-19 pandemic, especially those in families with lower incomes or who face other obstacles to health care.”

It’s estimated that 22% of U.S. children between the ages of 3 and 17 are suffering with a mental, emotional, developmental or behavioral condition.¹⁹

Dr. Peter Breggin, a Harvard-trained psychiatrist, was also featured in Centner’s presentation. A former consultant at the National Institute of Mental Health, Breggin has called COVID-19 restrictions placed on children a “crime against humanity” and an experiment in social engineering aimed at creating docile pawns in a “global predatory system.” Speaking with Wilson County News, Breggin said:²⁰

“I was a kid during World War II, and I never saw anything like these even back then. Americans have never been docile like this, even in wartime. And the more you can mask a child, the less they can connect, and less they connect the more docile they become.

Similarly, the more that you teach them to do absurd humiliating things, the more they give in to anything you demand. Ultimately, the more freedom you take away from them as children, the more you can take away their freedom as adults.”

States Are Banning Masks in Schools

A number of states have now banned mask mandates in schools, often as the result of public outcry. An executive order prohibiting government entities from mandating masks in Texas took effect June 4, 2021.²¹

A similar bill was enacted in Iowa in May 2021, which also bans school mask mandates. In a statement, Iowa Governor Kim Reynolds stated, “The state of Iowa is putting parents back in control of their child’s education and taking greater steps to protect the rights of all Iowans to make their own health care decisions.”²²

In similar moves, Arkansas plans to ban mask requirements for schools by the end of summer 2021,²³ and South Carolina issued an executive order that allows parents to opt their children out of mask requirements at school.²⁴

A number of Wisconsin school districts have also lifted mask requirements,²⁵ while Florida’s education commissioner Richard Corcoran sent a memo to district superintendents stating face masks should be voluntary for the 2021-22 school year because “they serve no remaining good at this point in our schools.”²⁶

Indeed, even during the height of the pandemic, a CDC study found mask requirements for students had little effect on COVID-19 incidence at Georgia schools, while improved ventilation, such as opening a window, reduced cases more than mask mandates for staff and teachers.²⁷

Take a Stand for Health Freedom

If you’d like to get involved, Stand for Health Freedom, a nonprofit organization dedicated to protecting basic human rights, constitutional rights and parental rights, has a form you can use to ask your governor and department of education to lift harmful COVID-19 guidelines in your child’s school so students can return to normal, healthy learning environments.²⁸

They’ve also created the Putting Our Kids First presentation to take to your school board officials, which contains data and video testimony from doctors, parents and children about the harms of COVID restrictions in schools.²⁹ Many of the school districts that have lifted mask requirements have done so in response to requests from parents and the public, showing that every person has the ability to make a difference in their community.

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Notes

¹ NBC 26 October 20, 2020

^2, 7, 9 Montana Daily Gazette, January 25, 2021

^3, 12 Odysee June 1, 2021

⁴ Slate April 27, 2021

⁵ U.S. CDC May 15, 2021

^6, 8, 10 Research Square, 2021; doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-124394/v2

^11, 13 MeehanMd.com November 20, 2020

¹⁴ Center for Early Childhood Mental Health Consultation, Stress and the Developing Brain

¹⁵ Pediatrics March 2021

¹⁶ Penn State Health February 3, 2021

^17, 18, 19 HHS.gov May 20, 2021

²⁰ Wilson County News March 9, 2021

²¹ Office of the Texas Governor May 18, 2021

The Killer in the Bloodstream: the “Spike Protein”

By Mike Whitney, June 13, 2021

The Spike Protein is a “uniquely dangerous” transmembrane fusion protein that is an integral part of the SARS-CoV-2 virus. “The S protein plays a crucial role in penetrating host cells and initiating infection.” It also damages the cells in the lining of the blood vessel walls which leads to blood clots, bleeding, massive inflammation and death.

The Elephant in the Room: Cell Phones

By Edward Curtin, June 13, 2021

The elites who consider themselves gods, such as those at the World Economic Forum, the World Health Organization, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Google, and their ilk throughout governments, corporations, media, etc., know that cell phones are fundamental to their plan for a fully digitized world.

The Copenhagen Summit for Democracy: The New Nazis

By Christopher Black, June 13, 2021

On May 10-11 a conference was presented by the “Alliance of Democracies” in Copenhagen that claimed to “unite free peoples” against authoritarianism, to promote the rule of law, to advance the “technological control of democracy,” freedom of expression and US leadership.

Netanyahu’s Last Hurrah?

By Stephen Lendman, June 13, 2021

After extremist settlers and other far-right elements were denied permission for an unacceptable march through Occupied East Jerusalem’s Old City, Netanyahu OK’d what’s virtually sure to heighten tensions more than already.

Lawsuit Claims Merck’s Gardasil Papilloma Virus Vaccine Caused Severe Injuries to Teen

By Robin McCall and Dr. Gary G. Kohls, June 13, 2021

The national law firm of Baum, Hedlund, Aristei & Goldman filed a Gardasil lawsuit against Merck today on behalf of a 19-year-old woman, alleging the company misled the FDA, legislators, doctors and moms about the safety and efficacy of its Gardasil vaccine.

Peru: What Will be the Nature of a Pedro Castillo Government?

By Prof Michel Chossudovsky, June 13, 2021

Pedro Castillo is a trade-union leader and former school teacher from the Northern Andean region of Cajamarca. He is committed to poverty alleviation and job creation. Exacerbated by the Covid crisis and the lockdown, Peru is currently in a state of mass unemployment, extreme poverty and despair beyond description.

The West should Embrace a Multipolar World Order

By Megan Sherman, June 13, 2021

There have been many obvious signs of Western defensiveness, protectiveness and isolationism against the emergence of a multipolar BRIC ascendancy, which is interpreted as a threat to hegemon America’s unilateral geopolitical strategy, so brutally imposed on the ever evolving politics of world order, to the understandable dismay of humanitarian diplomats.

How Washington is Positioning Syrian Al-Qaeda’s Founder as Its ‘Asset’

By Ben Norton and Max Blumenthal, June 13, 2021

March 2021 marked the 10th anniversary of the Western regime-change war on Syria. And after a decade of grueling conflict, Washington is still maneuvering to extend its longstanding relationship with the Salafi-jihadist militants fighting Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

Is a “Climate Lockdown” on the Horizon?

By Kit Knightly, June 13, 2021

If and when the powers-that-be decide to move on from their pandemic narrative, lockdowns won’t be going anywhere. Instead it looks like they’ll be rebranded as “climate lockdowns”, and either enforced or simply held threateningly over the public’s head.

Fakery and Covid Insanity: Must Mankind Bow to “False Gods”?

By Julian Rose, June 12, 2021

We are living in the land of fake-believe.  Nothing is as it seems in this virtual world invented and monopolised by deceivers. A world in which warriors of truth are named ‘conspiracy theorists’ and masters of the lie are named ‘upholders of the truth’. And all the while, a largely hypnotized humanity bows down its head to this vainglorious game. This game of thrones.

The “Great Zero Carbon” Conspiracy

By F. William Engdahl, June 11, 2021

The globalist Davos World Economic Forum is proclaiming the necessity of reaching a worldwide goal of “net zero carbon” by 2050. This for most sounds far in the future and hence largely ignored. Yet transformations underway from Germany to the USA, to countless other economies, are setting the stage for creation of what in the 1970’s was called the New International Economic Order.

This is How Doctors are Puppets for Vaccine Manufacturers

By Global Research News, June 13, 2021

Some “GRAS” (acronym for Generally Recognized as Safe) substances are not revealed due to trade secrets. This includes many oils, including peanut oil. This is one reason why there are millions of people in the world who are allergic to peanuts and other vaccine ingredients.

All Global Research articles can be read in 51 languages by activating the “Translate Website” drop down menu on the top banner of our home page (Desktop version). 

Visit and follow us on Instagram at @crg_globalresearch.

***

Transcript below.

Speaker 1 [00:00:00] Ladies and gentlemen, I would like to welcome in our program Syria Insider Weekly, the distinguished Canadian American journalist Eva Bartlett, who is well known for her objective coverage of the events of Syria, especially her sincere efforts to expose the Western falsehoods and fabrications about Syria. Eva Bartlett, I’m glad to have you here on our program. Thank you very much. Thank you. I would like to begin by asking you about the Syrian presidential elections held last week since you have been here on the ground witnessing and covering the voting process. How do you see the high turnout among Syrian voters? And what is the message sent by the Syrians to those you call Syria haters after President Assad’s landslide victory?

Speaker 2 [00:00:47] Yes. Well, I would start by noting that the countries that I am from America and Canada, before the last presidential elections in 2014, they closed the Syrian embassy specifically to prevent Syrians from exercising their right to participate in democratic presidential elections. So my comment about Syria haters has to do with that. And in general, the coverage of Syria, which in Western media has excluded the vast majority of Syrians, not giving them a voice. And by doing so, they’re excluding the fact on the ground the reality that Syrians overwhelmingly chose the president, Bashar al-Assad, and respect and love him. And I consistently tell people outside of Canada or outside of Syria, I should say, that this is the reality. I mean, I’ve been hearing this since I came here in 2014. So for me, the the importance of these elections was both to both a show of defiance to the West and allied nations that have been warring upon Syria for a decade. And also just something beautiful. I mean, I’ve seen in the course of my many visits to Syria, I’ve seen and heard many terrible things. And Syrians have paid a great price in defending their sovereign state. And again, all respect to the martyrs in Syria who have defended your country, so you’ve paid a heavy price. But on Election Day, in the days after, it was just a joyous scene, just seeing Umayyad Square near us, it’s filled with Syrians celebrating. And so for me, this is what was really most momentous.

Speaker 1 [00:02:21] So in your opinion, what is the importance of the of the reelection of President Assad despite the uproar, all the uproar in the West?

Speaker 2 [00:02:32] Well, it just shows the West that they can fund and arm and send terrorists from around the world into Syria. But they and like I said, they can make Syrian civilians and Syrian soldiers and all of Syria pay a heavy price. But they could not succeed in their mission to install a puppet government to rule Syria. So Syrians have spoken of the very loud and unified voice saying, no, we decide our future and our future right now is with President Bashar al-Assad.

Speaker 1 [00:03:06] So do you expect any major change in the way the US and Europe deal with Syria after millions of Syrians took to the streets saying no to the Western imperialist hegemony of their country?

Speaker 2 [00:03:19] I’m sorry to say no. I don’t expect a change. I would like to be naively optimistic and say I do. But the fact is, America continues to occupy Syrian soil, as does Turkey, as you know. And the EU is talking about, you know, like they’re all imposing sanctions on the Syrian people the EU wants to send money to areas not under the control of the Syrian government. So it’s clear that, unfortunately, they want to extend the pain and suffering of Syrians. I do hope, though, however, the alliance that Syria has built with their regional allies will continue to bring positive changes to Syria in the infrastructure, in enabling Syrian refugees to return home and in a positive political developments.

Speaker 1 [00:04:06] So why do you think the Western governments hate to hear the truth about Syria? You have been yourself subject to harsh criticism because of your role in exposing the lies and the false videos of the White Helmets about the alleged chemical weapons in Syria.

Speaker 2 [00:04:27] The West hates to hear the truth about Syria because, again, they had this project, as we all know now, by twenty twenty one and should have known fairly early on in the war against Syria. They had a project to destabilize your country, to divide your country, to make it into a sectarian nation which Syrians rejected and the project failed. And so when somebody speaks the truth, when somebody says actually this is what Syrians want, they don’t want these foreign actors to come into the country and rule over them in and impose Sharia law over them. They want to be able to live as they’ve always lived. So, of course, the West would hate to hear those truths and attacking the messengers, not myself only. Of course, many, many journalists and people have spoken out about Syria have been severely smeared. But, you know, at the end of the day, it doesn’t matter because we know that what we’re saying is the truth.

Speaker 1 [00:05:21] So the EU has just extended the legal and immoral sanctions on Syria. What is the message to those governments who claim to be defending democracy while at the same time they are inflicting suffering starvation on the Syrian people? I mean, ordinary Syrian people?

Speaker 2 [00:05:41] Absolutely. The message is those governments are liars and hypocrites. They don’t care about Syrians. And by imposing more and more sanctions against the Syrian people, they say they’re they’re doing it to target that the government. I won’t use the word that they use because it’s disrespectful, but they know full well that they’re attacking your economy and they know full well that’s going to create incredible pain among ordinary Syrians. And so this is why I say, again, those governments, including my own especially, are hypocrites. And if they ever cared about Syrians, they would stop occupying your land and lift the sanctions.

Speaker 1 [00:06:20] Finally, a word that you want to tell to the Syrians who are watching us and who feel grateful for your effort to expose the truth.

Speaker 2 [00:06:31] Now, it’s the other way around. We around the world feel grateful to Syrians. This might sound corny, but really, people around the world were amazed at the resilience of Syrians, again, both Syrian civilians, army and leadership, because it’s been 10 years of war against you all with the most powerful nations on Earth. And you stood strong and tall. So you really gave people gave people outside of Syria hope that that things can change, that the hegemony of America cannot continue. So I would say on behalf of people who follow my work, thank you to Syrians.

Speaker 1 [00:07:08] Thank you for your time. And we wish you all the best. Thank you. Thank you.

*

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Foreign embassies are reopening in Damascus, Syria.  Many shut down after the armed conflict began in 2011.  A handful of embassies remained open throughout the conflict, such as China, Russia, Iran, and the Czech Republic.

The Czech Republic was the only European Union country to remain steadfastly open in Damascus throughout the conflict. At least eight Czech officials are currently based in Damascus, including economic and political attaché, as well as a Military and Air Attaché and Adjutant Defense Attaché.

In August 2012, the Czech Republic accepted a request by the United States to be its “protecting power” in Syria. The arrangement allowed Washington to engage in backchannel communications with the Syrian government, an indication that Washington trusted Czech diplomacy.

Hungary resumed limited embassy duties last year, and Cyprus has rented a building for use as their new embassy location.  Greece has raised its flag, and that of the EU over its embassy; however, has not yet completed the process of reopening.  Serbia has sent its diplomat to Damascus amid plans to reopen its embassy.

Besides all the routine refurbishing and maintenance which goes into reopening a building of historic importance in Damascus, there are the new precautions of living with COVID-19 amid a pandemic. New protocols will have to be put into place to serve the public.

Bouthaina Shaaban, the political and media adviser to President Assad, said on May 26, “Efforts are being made to upgrade ties with Saudi Arabia, and may soon have positive results.”

Saudi Arabia is expected to reopen its embassy soon.  A high-level meeting was held in Damascus and a follow-up meeting was proposed. Saudi Arabia is recognized as one of the most important Arab nations.  Having good Syria-Saudi relations would be a breakthrough and pave the way to restoring Syria to the Arab League.

Shaaban also mentioned the visit by Syrian Tourism Minister Mohammed Rami Martini to Saudi Arabia in the first such trip by a Syrian minister to the kingdom in recent years.

Martini traveled to Riyadh to attend the 47th meeting of the World Tourism Organization Committee for the Middle East on May 26 and 27 and met with his Saudi counterpart, who had issued an official invitation from the Saudi Tourism Ministry and the World Tourism Organization Committee for the Middle East.

Oman had kept its embassy open throughout the conflict, and in 2020 appointed a new ambassador to Damascus.

The UAE reopened its embassy in 2019, and Abkhasia and Libya (eastern section) opened their embassies in 2020.

Germany began sending Syrians back home after it was determined that Damascus is now safe from terrorist attacks. However, they limited this plan to Syrians with a criminal record in Germany.

Denmark has begun a process of refusing to renew residency permits. Citing improved security situation, and the war being over, the move began to quickly deport Syrians as part of a 2019 immigration bill.  The law makes it clear that residency permits are for a limited period, and are dependent on the security situation in their home country.

President Bashar al-Assad won over 90% of the vote on May 26.  Some of those voting for him believed that he could bring back the stability and peace they lost in 2011 after the US-NATO plot to overthrow the government began.  While Obama, Cameron, Sarkozy, and others have lost their seats of power, President Assad remains in Damascus fighting terrorists who follow Radical Islam, the same ideology which President Macron of France has declared won upon.

The war is over, but there is one battlefield that is now dormant but may heat up. The last remaining area occupied by Jibhat al-Nusra, the Al Qaeda affiliate in Syria, is parts of Idlib province in the northwest.  Turkey’s support of the Radical Islamic ideology keeps Idlib locked in a status quo.  At some point, the civilians will have to be freed, either through negotiations or through a military operation.

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This article was originally published on Mideast Discourse.

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

Featured image is from Mideast Discourse

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***

A veteran toxicologist and mechanistic biologist, Dr. Lindsay explains the science and troubling evidence behind her recent public plea before the Center for Disease Control and Prevention’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices to stop all covid gene therapy vaccine campaigns.

Dr. Lindsay is joined by dozens of other leading scientists and doctors calling for a halt to the use of these vaccines.

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Remember the Space Force?

You know, the sixth branch of the U.S. military, officially created in 2019, “establishing space as a warfighting domain and guaranteeing that the United States will dominate in that environment just like all others.”

Thus declared President Donald Trump at the time, unleashing a Hollywood script on the global and perhaps the intergalactic future. John Wayne lives, and he’s wearing a space suit!

But what if — so it occurred to me the other day — advancing human technology actually opened up a deeper awareness in the human soul? What if, for instance, the powers that be — the militarists, the politicians, the issue-defining media — found the world they thoughtlessly perpetuated, the world cluttered with borders and enemies, broken wide open by this awareness? What if we found ourselves on the brink of profound, not superficial, awareness . . . and this awareness was the dawn of evolutionary change?

I believe this is actually the case. But cynicism and superficial certainty keep too many people from seeing it.

There may be no better example of this institutionally sanctioned certainty (a.k.a., ignorance) than the Space Force. It hasn’t been in the news much since its inception, but a group of military leaders, scientists and other “space professionals” had a three-day meeting — “U.S. Space Force Space Futures Workshop” — earlier this month. A report from the meeting is forthcoming. My guess is that it won’t be too much different from the report that was publicly issued following a similar meeting two years ago.

Among the conclusions from that report, titled “The Future of Space 2060 and Implications for U.S. Strategy,” is this baby:

“A failure to remain a leading space power will place U.S. national power at risk. To avert this, the U.S. coalition must promote and optimize the combined civil, military, and commercial exploitation of space to best serve the nation’s interests.”

The report also quoted Lyndon Johnson, who once said: “Control of space means control of the world.”

Yee-haw! Launch those missiles, boys!

My guess is that the poet Archibald MacLeish wasn’t quoted by any of the space professionals at the meeting. MacLeish, on Christmas day in 1968, just after the Apollo 8 astronauts had shown the world the photograph known as Earthrise — Planet Earth rising over the moon — wrote the following:

“To see the Earth as it truly is, small and blue and beautiful in that eternal silence where it floats, is to see ourselves as riders on the Earth together, brothers on that bright loveliness in the eternal cold — brothers who know now they are truly brothers.”

Yeah, I know, this is just “art” — fancy, decorative sentiment to hang in your living room or whatever. It has nothing to do with the real world, which is full of communists and wild Indians and, oh yeah, Chinese, who seem to think it’s their turn to rule the world (and maybe the solar system).

The problem here isn’t so much the military and its impenetrable mindset focused on strategic advantage and victory. The problem is the media, which generally fails to establish a larger context for this discussion, to challenge the military mindset with an Earthrise consciousness or, indeed, to acknowledge the existence of this consciousness: that Planet Earth, a vulnerable superorganism afloat in the universe, is the home of all of us.

The planet is alive. We are one. How might this possibility — this reality — impact national and global planning for the future, both within and beyond the planet? Is this not a question we’re capable of asking at, and beyond, a national level?

Is it not possible that the time has come for us to start learning what we already know?

Consider, for instance, the concept of national borders — which is the delusionary “reality” the Space Force sees its mission as protecting out there in the Great Beyond. These demarcation lines, often violently established and maintained, basically slice the planet into random pieces of itself.

Todd Miller, in his book Build Bridges, Not Walls: A Journey to a World Without Borders, asks: “What if we were to see borders not as shields, but as shackles keeping the planet in an unsustainable status quo of inequality, racial divide, and climate catastrophe?”

And philosophy professor Michael Marder, writing last year in the New York Times (quoted by Miller), notes: “Survivalism has always followed a trajectory parallel to that of virulent nationalism. . . . Following the trail of the theological doctrine of salvation reserved for the select few, this attitude abstracts human beings from the environmental, communal, economic and other contexts of their lives.

“As panic sets in in some quarters, personal border closure imitates the knee-jerk political gesture: Food and medical supplies are hoarded, while the wealthiest few prepare their luxury doomsday bunkers. But what the novel coronavirus demonstrates, in contrast to these survivalist fictions, is that borders are porous by definition; no matter how fortified, they are more like living membranes than inorganic walls. An individual or a state that effectively manages to cut itself off from the outside will be as good as dead.”

Shouldn’t all this be part of the discussion? And I don’t mean in some abstract and marginalized way. The point of the Space Force, I fear, has nothing to do with protecting the planet’s future, or even its partial future (known as U.S. interests). Its point is to extend the planet’s random borders beyond the stratosphere.

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Israel’s move to shut down a key healthcare body in the occupied territories will have “catastrophic consequences” for Palestinians in need of medical attention, global rights group Amnesty International warned.

Israeli army forces raided the Palestinian Union of Health Workers Committee (UHWC) headquarters in Ramallah on Wednesday, breaking down the door, confiscating computers and memory drives, and issuing a military order forcing the office to close for six months.

The UHWC runs hospitals and health clinics for marginalised communities and has repeatedly been targeted by Israeli forces, Amnesty said.

Employees have faced harassment and arrest for the health providers’ alleged affiliation with the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, a political party with an armed wing.

“Israel’s shutdown of its headquarters will have major consequences for the provision of essential health services to thousands of Palestinians, a programme for women’s health that was at the headquarters has now stopped,” Saleh Higazi, Amnesty’s deputy director for the Middle East and North Africa, said in a statement.

Read the full article on Al Jazeera.

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The late Palestinian scholar and activist Edward Said wrote in 1996 that the phrase ‘complex situation’ “too often is a rhetorical signal given before a lie is to be pronounced, or when a grave and immoral complicity with injustice is about to be covered up.” Both-sides-ism appears often: we saw it in Charlottesville in 2017 as Trump declared “good people on both sides.” We saw it on May 4, 2021 when Mississippi police killed a father and his baby boy, then referred to the father’s ‘murder suspect’ status and contorted a baby into a ‘juvenile’ to obfuscate blame and undermine the gravity of the harm. 

Edward Said was specifically targeting liberals’ use of ‘complex situation’ in the above quote. Reading it my mind went immediately to Palestine, a situation that, despite its constant portrayal as complex, is fundamentally one of occupier and occupied.

It’s as simple as this: in a video on my Twitter feed Saeed Odeh’s father huddles over his sixteen-year-old child’s lifeless body, planting kiss after kiss on his face, sobbing. One of the men present with him, and then another, and another, rest their hands on the father’s back, to comfort this friend or neighbor or—I don’t know what these men are to each other, but in this moment they are each other’s anchor. Habibi habibi habibi, the father says to his son, as the men remind him, so gently, to keep it together. One of them tells him there’s time for one more bawsi, one more kiss goodbye.

Or this: Saeed’s sister, a small girl with a messy pony tail, is crying in every photo I come across. In one image she holds a phone that is almost bigger than her forearm as she faces a poster of her brother. She is trying so desperately to hold on to this image of him, alive, even while I know she has seen his shrouded body, and she will never not remember this day. I wonder what memories will carry her through the days and years ahead.

We live in a world where certain people have to display their suffering for their humanity to have a chance at plausibility. And one where this humanity, granted by self-appointed gatekeepers, is a precondition for the legitimation of resistance against injustice. Saeed’s family, like every family, should have the right to grieve in private. Neither I nor anyone else outside his community should know how this boy looks dead, or what this father sounds like when he cries.

In an occupying ethno-state, the occupier is ipso facto innocent. We have seen in Sheikh Jarrah Israeli forces form human shields to protect Jewish Zionist settlers as they assault the Palestinian inhabitants whose homes they are trying to occupy (via ethnic cleansing). And we have seen these same Israeli forces repress and attack the inhabitants of Sheikh Jarrah themselves.

Meanwhile the occupied are by-default guilty—and less-than-human, as testifies the ease with which the occupier issues collective punishment and displaces and restricts rights. If Palestinians, when they suffer Israeli state-sanctioned terrorism, do not offer their bodies, their children’s bodies, as evidence of the breadth of the injustice they face, their aggressors will have won twice. Stilling the life, then silencing its aftermath.

Circumstances dictate what details about a person warrant mention, and what we remember. Were Saeed to introduce himself, he might have said he was a footballer, played on his local team. Liked school or didn’t, dreamed to be something more precise than alive in the future. I can’t ask him, I don’t know.

Instead, from news sources we learned a sixteen-year-old boy named Saeed Odeh from Odalah, a village near Nablus, was shot twice in the back with live ammunition by Israeli forces. He was prevented from receiving medical care for fifteen minutes at least. Another boy, who tried to help Saeed, was shot by soldiers and injured also. In a photo from the night her son died, Saeed’s mother can be seen sitting in the passenger seat of a car, barely conscious. The funeral procession the next day stopped in front of Saeed’s school, where rows of men prayed before his body, draped with a Palestinian flag.

Erasure of Palestinian life, since before the mass expulsion of Palestinians from their homes in 1948, remains ongoing. This erasure is material: massacre-propelled ethnic cleansing, home demolition, carpet bombing.

And the erasure is also narrative, via social media censorship, as when Instagram and Facebook continue to mass-delete reporting on the violence in Sheikh Jarrah and Al-Aqsa.

As when The New York Times and other outlets referred to the ongoing forced expulsions of Sheikh Jarrah families from their homes as “evictions,” or when the Israeli Foreign Ministry referred to ethnic cleansing (gently termed “Judaizing,” or preservation of Israel’s “Jewish character”) as a “real-estate dispute.”

As when The Jerusalem Post wrote a teenager had been shot in the midst of “violent clashes,” a favorite buzzword for both-sides-ism, and didn’t so much as mention his name.

As when Israeli forces stormed Al-Aqsa mosque on May 7, 2021, using stun grenades and firing rubber bullets at close-range with, as usual, intention to maim (at least one person was blinded, 200+ others wounded). They attacked worshipers, then attacked makeshift medical spaces where the injured were being treated, and media outlets and American officials called all of this what? “Clashes.” A “scuffle.” “Confrontations.” “Tensions.” A “face off.”

As when Israeli forces attacked Al-Aqsa again on May 10, throwing tear gas and stun grenades and firing rubber-coated bullets into one of Islam’s holiest sites, this time injuring hundreds and killing at least one person inside the mosque, all while denying medics access to the wounded. Against 10,000 armed Israeli troops who attacked them in order to vacate the mosque during Ramadan for Jewish settlers celebrating Jerusalem Day, Palestinians had rocks to defend themselves and their holy space; still, the media insisted on ‘clashes.’ Reuters opened an article with the breathtakingly irrelevant line,  “Palestinian protesters threw rocks and Israeli police fired stun grenades and rubber bullets in clashes outside the al-Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem on Monday as Israel marked the anniversary of its capture of parts of the city in the 1967 Arab-Israeli war.” Opening with Palestinians first (as ‘protesters’ rather than ‘civilians’) to imply cause-and-effect in the wrong direction? Wedging a historical moment in to suggest ideological–Arab vs Israeli–rather than immediately material–police attacking civilians–cause of the violence? Writing in the title that violence ‘erupted’–another both-sides-ism favorite–as though the violence wasn’t ongoing? All these framings imply two equal sides, and obscure the gross power imbalance systems rooted in supremacy necessitate by definition.

The erasure is also of memory. I have watched clips of Palestinian parents mourn over their children’s bodies since I was a child. Enough time has passed that it is now easier to see myself in the parents. Israeli occupation forces killed a child on May 6, 2021. Israel has killed thousands of Palestinian children, deemed terrorists-in-the-making, disabled thousands of others. And it will continue to do so. As Saree Makdisi wrote, “it is not possible for a settler-colonial regime to racially enable one people at the expense of another people without the use of violence.”

Part of Israel’s propaganda is to reduce these children to faceless statistics, numbers obscuring personhood. The goal is not so much erasure of blame as of the victim in their entirety. As the numbers of injured and dead rise, the magnitude of the suffering somewhat paradoxically becomes harder to fathom, as the singularity of a life collapses into anonymity. This is why in the face of aggression these videos and images are invaluable: the reality of loss is each time and for each person specific, and it is heartbreaking, and it is unforgettable.

His name is Saeed Odeh. I will not write, ‘he loved life,’ because that implies some of us do not. I will not write ‘peaceful’ because I have already written ‘child,’ and because I want no part in systems that require some of us to qualify our existence or earn our humanity. I will tell you he was murdered. And I will tell you there will be no accountability, no consequences for those who, when the ‘complexity’ settles, killed a child.

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Mary Turfah was born and raised in Dearborn, MI, to a Palestinian and Lebanese family. She graduated from Yale University and is concurrently a medical student at the University of Michigan and an master’s student at Columbia University in the MESAAS department.

Featured image: A photo of Saeed Odeh that is being shared on social media. (Twitter)

First published on August 24, 2020

It is vitally important to acknowledge that the same so-called “experts” in the medical/academic/scientific community, many of whom have serious undisclosed financial conflicts of interest at the NIH, the CDC, the NIAID, the FDA, the WHO, Medical Schools, teaching hospitals and many state Departments of  Health (not just Rhode Island) that are currently advising politicians, presidential candidates, presidents, senators, congresspersons, governors, mayors, educators and journalists about the experimental, fast-tracked Covid-19 vaccines are the very “experts” that pushed Merck’s Fast-tracked Gardasil (and GlaxoSmithKline’s Cervarix HPV Vaccine).

–Gary G. Kohls, August 24, 2020

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The national law firm of Baum, Hedlund, Aristei & Goldman filed a Gardasil lawsuit against Merck today on behalf of a 19-year-old woman, alleging the company misled the FDA, legislators, doctors and moms about the safety and efficacy of its Gardasil vaccine. The lawsuit asserts Merck purposely downplayed the risk of Gardasil’s ingredients, including a proprietary aluminum compound (a potent neurotoxin) and secret and potentially hazardous DNA particles. Plaintiff Julia Balasco alleges she suffered and continues to suffer severe and permanent physical injuries such as an autoimmune disease known as postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome (POTS) after receiving multiple injections of the human papillomavirus (HPV) Gardasil vaccine.

Attorneys Bijan Esfandiari, Nicole K. H. Maldonado, Michael L. Baum, co-counsel Robert F. Kennedy, Jr and local counsel Christopher E. Hultquist of Hultquist Law in Providence, filed the lawsuit in U.S. District Court for the District of Rhode Island on behalf of Ms. Balasco, who alleges her vaccine injuries were so severe and debilitating, she was physically unable to attend most of high school. The case number is 1:20-cv 00364.

The complaint against defendants Merck & Co. Inc. and subsidiary Merck Sharp & Dohm Corp., both of New Jersey, seeks damages based on the following causes of action:

• Negligence
• Strict Liability (Failure to Warn)
• Strict Liability (Manufacturing Defect)
• Breach of Warranty
• Common Law Fraud
• Violation of Rhode Island’s Deceptive Trade Practices Act

The lawsuit also seeks punitive damages against Merck.

According to the complaint, Merck failed to properly test Gardasil before the HPV vaccine was fast-tracked and administered to millions of young girls and boys throughout the United States and the world. Furthermore, Merck knew or had reason to know that its vaccine was defective and ineffective, but instead of warning the medical community and the public, the company wrongfully concealed information and further made false statements concerning the safety and efficacy of Gardasil.

What is Gardasil?

In 2006, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved the Gardasil HPV vaccine after being “fast-tracked” in just six short months. The FDA’s fast-track process is designed to facilitate the development and expedite the review of drugs or vaccines to treat serious conditions and fill an unmet medical need like providing a treatment for an epidemic which has no existing treatment. Gardasil met neither of these criteria. Cervical cancer was far from epidemic status and the existing PAP smear plus follow up removal of abnormal cervical tissue had substantially controlled most cervical cancers. In fact, according to the National Cancer Institute’s Surveillance, Epidemiology and End Results Program (“SEER”), the incidence of deaths from cervical cancer prior to the introduction of Gardasil in the U.S., was on a steady decline with a rate of 2.4 per 100,000 women.

Notwithstanding, in its bid to fast-track Gardasil and prove that the vaccine treats a serious condition and fills an unmet medical need, Merck allegedly presented misleading data to the FDA suggesting that HPV infections and some abnormal cervical tissue–cervical interepithelial neoplasia (CIN) lesions–inexorably result in cancer, hence the urgent need for the HPV vaccine. The complaint indicates those contentions are untrue.

Merck sought and received FDA approval for Gardasil based on its theory that HPV alone causes cervical cancer, and that Gardasil could eliminate cervical cancer and other HPV-associated cancers. According to Balasco’s attorneys, however, Merck’s theory is unproven – Gardasil has never been shown to prevent cervical cancer, itself. On the contrary, studies have shown that systemic administration of Gardasil leads to increased rates of cervical cancer and other serious health issues.

According to the complaint, Gardasil contains a host of hazardous ingredients, including at least one ingredient that Merck failed to disclose to regulators and consumers. Gardasil contains a secret DNA adjuvant and potentially hazardous ingredient, HPV LI-DNA fragments, to make the vaccine more potent. According to the allegations, Merck used this hidden adjuvant to prolong the immunological effects of the vaccine, but illegally omitted it from its list of substances and ingredients in the vaccine.

Gardasil also contains a particularly toxic aluminum-containing adjuvant – Amorphous Aluminum Hydroxyphosphate Sulfate (AAHS), which is a potent neurotoxin created by Merck, that can result in very serious harm, according to the complaint. Studies show that AAHS can trigger autoimmune disorders and other serious conditions and has never been proven safe. Federal law requires that manufacturers cannot add adjuvants to vaccines that have not been proven safe.

Gardasil also contains borax, polysorbate 80, and genetically-modified yeast, all of which can cause adverse events, the lawsuit alleges. Merck never tested any of these added ingredients for safety in vaccines.

Gardasil Clinical Trial 

In clinical trials, those who receive the active medication are compared with those who receive a placebo. This is to measure the vaccine’s safety against an inactive (inert) placebo, such as an injection of a saline (saltwater) solution.

Merck’s Gardasil clinical trials, however, did not use a true placebo, the complaint alleges. Instead, the company “spiked” the placebo with AAHS and the vaccine’s other additives, which resulted in approximately equal numbers of subjects in the vaccine group and the placebo group suffering adverse reactions. This gave the impression that the Gardasil HPV vaccine was “as safe as a placebo” when, in fact, significant numbers of subjects in both treatment groups suffered many serious medical conditions, including symptoms of autoimmune disease, the lawsuit maintains.

Teenage Girl Developed POTS After Two Gardasil Injections

According to Julia Balasco’s complaint, she was 13-years-old when she received a Gardasil shot for the first time in August of 2014. A happy, healthy girl with a love for cheerleading, Julia had never experienced serious medical issues before her first Gardasil injection.

Julia’s mother, Michaela, allowed her daughter to receive the Gardasil shot after years of exposure to relentless online, print, and television marketing by Merck representing that Gardasil is very safe, that Gardasil prevents cancer, and that “good mothers” must vaccinate their pre-teen daughters with the Gardasil vaccine. Little did she know that Merck had engaged in “Disease Mongering” and used false advertising and scare tactics to enhance Gardasil sales. A year later, Rhode Island mandated the Gardasil vaccine for all school children before 7^th grade entry.

Within hours of receiving the first dose, Julia experienced flu-like symptoms, including achiness, headache, nausea, and low-grade fever. The symptoms lasted for approximately 24-48 hours. In the weeks that followed, Julia experienced ear pressure, tinnitus, and headaches. Her symptoms were atypical and over-the-counter medication did not bring her any relief.

A few months later, Julia experienced more frequent and severe ear pain and tinnitus. Her mother took her to her doctor who prescribed Julia steroids. She received her second dose of Gardasil during this visit and proceeded to experience the same flu-like symptoms as before.

As months passed, Julia began to experience headaches of varying seriousness and continued to deal with ear pain and tinnitus. She also complained of fatigue and body aches. Her symptoms were severe enough to increasingly keep her from attending school.

Julia and her mother visited multiple specialists to understand why she was experiencing these “spells” that caused severe dizziness, headaches, ear pressure, and tinnitus. No one could give them a satisfactory answer or relief, and her symptoms continued unabated.

When Julia was due for her third Gardasil injection, her mother started to believe that Gardasil may have been the cause of her daughter’s symptoms. The family doctor agreed that the timeline following each of the shots and the symptoms Julia experienced was suspicious but could not say for certain that Gardasil was the cause.

Julia was put on several different medications over the next several months but nothing alleviated her symptoms. She continued to miss school regularly and saw her quality of life diminish. Her mother helped her change her diet and altered her school schedule to include online learning in the hopes of reducing her stress and improving her symptoms. Nothing worked.

After being diagnosed with fibromyalgia and years of struggle, Julia’s life continues to be altered in very dramatic ways. Now 19, she struggles to keep up with friends and cannot participate in many of the things she used to enjoy. She was forced to stop cheerleading because she could no longer participate, and has switched to online learning exclusively instead of attending in-person classes.

“This is no life for anyone,” her mother says.

According to the complaint, Gardasil caused Julia Balasco to develop serious and debilitating autoimmune disease, including POTS, and a constellation of adverse symptoms, complications, injuries, and adverse events.

POTS is an autoimmune disorder that can be incapacitating; it affects a branch of the nervous system that regulates functions we do not consciously control, including blood pressure, heart rate, perspiration, and body temperature. People with POTS often experience fainting, migraine headaches, anxiety, and  other life-altering health issues.

If Mrs. Balasco had been informed about the known safety risks associated with Gardasil, she never would have allowed her daughter to receive the HPV vaccine.

Gardasil, the Most Expensive Vaccine on the Market, Also Causes the Most Injuries 

Julia’s symptoms after receiving Gardasil, are far from unique. According to data from the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS), more than 64,000 case reports of adverse events have been reported after individuals received the Gardasil vaccine. Experts estimate that only one percent of vaccine adverse events are actually reported.

According to the complaint, Gardasil now has more reported injuries than any other vaccine, and the Vaccine Injury Compensation Program has paid out millions of dollars in damages for Gardasil-induced injuries and deaths.

Gardasil is also the most expensive vaccine on the market; two doses of Gardasil 9 presently cost about $450, plus the cost of two office visits. In 2018, Merck made $2.2 billion from Gardasil sales in the U.S. alone. In 2019, Merck made $3.7 billion in worldwide Gardasil revenue.

Ms. Balasco seeks to hold Merck accountable for its alleged negligent, reckless, and fraudulent conduct, and for causing her physical and emotional injuries and harms as a result of Gardasil. Today’s lawsuit alleges the company willingly placed Gardasil’s profits ahead of patient safety. Ms. Balasco is requesting that exemplary (punitive) damages be assessed against Merck to deter the company and other would-be defendants from engaging in similar alleged reprehensible conduct.

Additional General Allegations Against Merck

• Merck provided financial incentives to legislators to attempt to make the Gardasil vaccine mandatory in all school children;
• Merck pushed Gardasil using trusted doctors and third party front groups;
• Merck deceived regulators and the public by classifying many serious adverse events, which afflicted nearly half of all study participants, as coincidences;
• Merck manipulated the study protocols to block participants and researchers from reporting injuries and designed the studies to mask any long-term adverse events
• Merck deceived regulators and the public about its pivotal Gardasil Clinical Trial (Protocol 018);
• Contrary to Merck’s representations, Gardasil may actually cause and increase the risk of cervical and other cancers;
• Merck has concealed the fact that Gardasil (including its adjuvants and ingredients) induce and increase the risk of autoimmune diseases;
• The Gardasil vaccines’ harms are not limited to the United States, rather the vaccines have injured patients all over the world:

1. In light of Gardasil’s serious and debilitating adverse events, the Japanese government rescinded its recommendation that girls receive Gardasil;
2. Denmark has opened specialized clinics specifically focused on treating Gardasil-induced injuries, including Gardasil-induced autoimmune diseases;
3. Gardasil-induced adverse events caused the government in Colombia to conclude that Gardasil would no longer be mandatory;
4. India halted Gardasil trials and accused Merck of corruption after the death of several young girls who were participants in the trial.

About Baum Hedlund Aristei & Goldman

Baum Hedlund Aristei & Goldman is one of the nation’s leading law firms representing victims harmed by the Gardasil HPV vaccine. In practice since 1973, our firm has won more than $4 billion in verdicts and settlements on behalf of more than 20,000 clients in personal injury and wrongful death claims across the nation, including cases against major pharmaceutical companies.

The firm has repeatedly been honored and awarded for its $2.24 billion groundbreaking and landmark jury verdicts against Monsanto (now Bayer) for its Roundup weed killer causing cancer.

Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. is co-counsel on this case. Mr. Kennedy has been fighting for safer vaccines for years. He is not “anti-vax” as some would label him, but is a staunch advocate for safe and effective vaccines. His reputation as a resolute defender of the environment led him to be named by Time magazine as one of the “Heroes for the Planet.” As a protector of waterways around the world, Mr. Kennedy has sought to alleviate mercury pollution and prevent mercury contaminated fisheries. As he says, this does not make him anti-fish, he is anti-mercury in fish. Likewise, he is not against safe and effective vaccines, he is opposed to toxin contaminated vaccines.

Mr. Kennedy was also co-counsel with Baum Hedlund on the Monsanto Roundup cancer cases. He is Founder and President of Waterkeeper Alliance and Founder of Children’s Health Defense, an organization devoted to promoting childhood health by exposing and reducing toxic exposures that harm children’s health.

Baum Hedlund is at the forefront of the Gardasil vaccine lawsuits and is in the beginning stages of litigation. So far, we represent two dozen clients but expect to see these numbers grow rapidly as we are receiving hundreds of calls now that the word is out that plaintiffs can sue Merck in civil court if cases do not resolve in vaccine court.

It is important to note that, while there is currently a great deal of controversy surrounding vaccines, our firm wishes to stress that we and our clients are not against vaccines. They have the potential to eradicate disease and save millions of lives.

We are, however, against intentional efforts to mislead consumers about the safety and effectiveness of a drug or vaccine. Our firm has always fought—and will continue to fight—for the rights of consumers to be fully and honestly informed about risks associated with any drug, vaccine, chemical or medical device. We will work tirelessly to ensure those rights are defended and victims of injustice are compensated for their injuries.

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Featured image: Julia Balasco, Gardasil Plaintiff (Source: ExpertClick)

On May 10-11 a conference was presented by the “Alliance of Democracies” in Copenhagen that claimed to “unite free peoples” against authoritarianism, to promote the rule of law, to advance the “technological control of democracy,” freedom of expression and US leadership. It was heralded as a forum for guests to hear from prominent individuals on “the frontlines of defending democracy.”

On the cusp of being replaced as Israeli prime minister, Netanyahu isn’t going quietly into that good night — far from it.

After extremist settlers and other far-right elements were denied permission for an unacceptable march through Occupied East Jerusalem’s Old City, Netanyahu OK’d what’s virtually sure to heighten tensions more than already.

His aim is all-about inciting clashes between Occupied Palestinians and Israeli extremists who want the city for exclusive Jewish use.

After senior Hamas official Khalil al-Hayya warned on Monday “against letting the march approach East Jerusalem and the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound,” a Tuesday statement by the Netanyahu regime said the following:

“The parade will take place (on June 15) in a format to be agreed between police and the parade’s organizers.”

By aiming to incite violence in Occupied East Jerusalem, Netanyahu likely seeks to involve Hamas as a way to resume war on the Strip that unnamed senior IDF officials said left unfinished business after 11 days of Israeli aggression ended.

Netanyahu likely hopes that resumed conflict throughout the Occupied Territories is his best chance to halt transition of power by aiming to shift support of one or more 8-party opposition bloc members — at the 11th hour — from a Lapid/Bennett government to him.

At this time, Knesset members will vote up or down on transition of power this Sunday.

With a one-seat majority advantage, the opposition bloc is set to end Netanyahu’s 12-year reign of terror if he’s unable to stop what appears inevitable.

While a new government — if Sunday’s swearing in goes as planned — can reverse Netanyahu’s permitted March, opposition bloc member Gilad Kariv denounced his disruptive move, saying:

It’s “another chapter in (his) attempt to leave a scorched earth.”

Because prime minister-designate Naftali Bennett is heavily pressured by ultranationalist hardliners, he may permit the march to avoid a tumultuous start to his tenure.

With heightened tensions in Occupied East Jerusalem, a spark or threatened one could ignite violence in the city that could spread throughout the Occupied Territories.

If held, the so-called Flag March was scheduled to pass through Damascus Gate into the Muslim quarter of East Jerusalem’s Old City.

While likely to be along an alternate route at this time, the risk of inciting conflict is high if the unacceptable march takes place.

According to Haaretz, Netanyahu and supportive “Religious Zionism racists Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben-Gvir are trying to set the region aflame” in attempt to block transition of power or disrupt it straightaway if he’s unseated.

Since a 61-seat opposition bloc was formed to replace Netanyahu-led Likud, he’s gone all-out to undermine transition of power.

Last Sunday, he told Likudniks that “journalists are taking part in (what he called a) propaganda machine enlisted in favor of the left (sic), but you don’t have to be afraid of laying into” its elements (sic), adding:

Israelis are “witnessing the biggest election fraud in the history of the country (sic)…”

He condemned what he called “violence from every side (sic), even as others are silent as incitement rages against us (sic).”

“You cannot consider criticism from the right as incitement (sic) and criticism from the left as a legitimate act of freedom of expression (sic).” 

“This is an attempt to frame the right as something violent and dangerous to democracy (sic)” — that’s nonexistent in Israel and throughout the West.

It’s “not too late” to vote against what he falsely called a “dangerous left-wing government (backed by) terror-supporters (sic).”

If Lapid/Bennett replace him on Sunday, he vowed to “bring (the new government) down very quickly,” adding:

“This is a government that will not be able to resist the return of the US to the dangerous nuclear agreement with Iran (sic), which will allow it to develop an arsenal of nuclear bombs that will threaten our very existence (sic).” 

A “government that depends on supporters of terrorism (sic) will also not be able to act in a systematic and consistent manner against the terrorist organizations in Gaza (sic).”

Inflammatory rhetoric by him and his extremist supporters is likely to continue through Sunday’s swearing in ceremony and after a new government replaces him.

Hardline extremists like Netanyahu never quit, express regret for their unacceptable actions, or comply with the rule of law they disdain.

VISIT MY WEBSITE: stephenlendman.org (Home – Stephen Lendman). Contact at [email protected].

My two Wall Street books are timely reading:

“How Wall Street Fleeces America: Privatized Banking, Government Collusion, and Class War”

www.claritypress.com/product/how-wall-street-fleeces-america/

 Stephen Lendman is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization

First published in November 2014, this incisive article raises several important issues pertaining to vaccines.

Of relevance to the covid-19 crisis, Vac Truth points out the following: 

“Manufacturers hide information from doctors about ingredients and conceal their sinister plans for vaccine production so that doctors will continue to feel comfortable recommending vaccines.”

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Doctors have no possibility whatsoever of knowing the complete composition of vaccines, nor do health authorities – or, in fact, anyone else.

Here are some of the methods manufacturers use to conceal the presence of ingredients in vaccines:

Trade Secrets

Some “GRAS” (acronym for Generally Recognized as Safe) substances are not revealed due to trade secrets. This includes many oils, including peanut oil.

This is one reason why there are millions of people in the world who are allergic to peanuts and other vaccine ingredients. [1] 

Dispensation from Labeling Requirements

Incredibly, the presence of almost any substance may be concealed on the condition that manufacturers apply for dispensation to official labeling requirements.

This exemption applies even to the presence of neurotoxic substances such as aluminium, which is included in many vaccines to stimulate immune response.

Regarding concealment of the presence of aluminium in vaccines, Dr. Paul King states:

“Because aluminum adjuvants are “regulated” substances used in vaccines before the FDA came into existence, they are subject to the regulations set forth in 21 CFR Sec. 610.15a.

However, the FDA has added a subsection (d) to these requirements that states,

(d) The Director of the Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research or the Director of the Center for Drug Evaluation and Research may approve an exception or alternative to any requirement in this section. Requests for such exceptions or alternatives must be in writing.”

Mercury in “Mercury-Free” Vaccines

“Many vaccine manufacturers voluntarily began producing ‘supposed’ mercury-free vaccines in 1999. The June 2006 lab result from Doctor’s Data run counter to vaccine manufacturers’ claims. For example, some product inserts currently claim that a trace amount of mercury exists in the final product but the amount has been greatly reduced. Others claim to be producing completely mercury-free products. All four vaccine vials tested contained mercury despite manufacturer claims that two of the vials were completely mercury-free. All four vials contained aluminum, one contained nine times more than the other three, tremendously enhancing the toxicity of mercury.” (Health Advocacy in the Public Interest, 8/12/04)

Presence of Traces of Food Protein is Concealed

“Only the FINAL culture is listed on the package insert. Until then they use FOOD WASTE! This is another source of minute traces of food protein that some unlucky child will get in a vaccine. Every food oil known to man can be used in the vaccines. They are highly refined which only means not all children will get a food allergy, only the unlucky ones who get the remaining protein particles in their vaccine. The oils and who knows what else fall under “self-affirmed generally recognized as safe ingredients,” not even our government is entitled to know what is in the vaccines.”

“Charles Richet, a Nobel Prize winning doctor discovered (over a hundred years ago) that proteins injected into the bloodstream will result in the development of allergy to that protein. In other words, food proteins in vaccines can cause the development of food allergies!” (Barbara Feick Gregory) [1]

Foreign DNA Residue in Vaccines

Manufactures are aware that vaccines contain residue from culture media used in production. This includes tissue from insect cells; yeast; mouse brains; tissue from pigs, guinea pigs, rabbits, dogs, and calf lymph; hens’ eggs; chick embryos; monkey kidney and testicle cells; retinal cells; aborted human fetal cells; and cancer cells. [2]

Impossible to Remove All Foreign DNA Residue

“Manufacturers have been instructed to ensure the final vaccine contains less than 1 million residual animal cells and the amount of stray DNA is less than 10 ng per vaccine dose. These regulations admit that animal DNA is injected into human babies and adults with every shot.” [3]

Presence of Foreign DNA May Be Unknown Even to Manufacturers

As analysis methods have become more advanced, some ingredients are unexpectedly discovered long after vaccines have been marketed.

One of many examples is SV40 DNA in polio vaccines, which has been administered to millions. [4] [5] It has been detected in human malignancies and can be passed through generations.

Other examples of contamination include the unexpected discovery of pig virus DNA in rotavirus vaccines and retrovirus avian (bird) leukosis virus in a measles vaccine. [6]

An independent researcher discovered aluminium-bound recombinant DNA in Gardasil, classed as a biohazard. The consequences are unknown and may be horrific. [7] [8]

Doctors do not know the amount in each dose of the following:

Mercury:

Mercury in the form of thimerosal is included as a preservative in multi-dose vials. If vials are not shaken thoroughly between each dose withdrawal, the last doses will contain large amounts of mercury. This is because mercury is heavier than water and sinks to the bottom of the vials.

Latex allergen:

Amounts vary according to the degree of leaching from rubber components of syringes and vial stoppers.

Microbial contamination:

Increases according to the number of times doses are withdrawn from vials.

Virus antigen:

May be in the form of particles which are suspended in the vaccine fluid. The amount of antigen varies according to the technique of the person who administers the vaccine.

As more doctors pose pertinent questions, manufacturers and health authorities are planning to conceal even more information from them so that doctors may feel comfortable and positive about vaccines.

Sinister Plans For Manufacture of Vaccines From Human Cancer Tumors Will Be Kept Secret From Doctors

At a meeting of the Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee (VRBPAC) on September 19, 2012, at which FDA and vaccine manufacturers were represented, the topic was Consideration of the Appropriateness of Cell Lines Derived From Human Tumors For Vaccine Manufacture.

Part of the transcript of the meeting was salvaged and has revealed that authorities and manufacturers are concerned that doctors may feel uncomfortable about the intention to use human cancer tumors for vaccine production.

There was a discussion, as follows, about several ways to conceal this information from doctors and the public, including its omission from package inserts and how to present the disgusting method of vaccine production to doctors so that they may find it acceptable:

DR. DAUM (Chair, VRBPAC):

“ … a few people have said it directly — is the scientific community’s perception, including the practicing medical community, and also the lay public. They are going to hear that we are recommending or that you are doing or that the manufacturers are making vaccines with tumorigenic cell lines and say, oh, my God, even if there’s no scientific basis to say, oh, my God.

I think we’re better off heading that discussion off at the pass and starting some of the ideas that Dr. Marcuse said, which is a Scientific American type of article informing practitioners — and I had some lunch conversations with other people that talked about some of the vaccine-consuming community that might perceive a very great difference even if scientifically there isn’t one.”

Conclusion

• Relevant information is intentionally hidden from doctors so that they may feel more comfortable about recommending vaccines.
• It is impossible for doctors and health authorities to know the complete composition of vaccines.
• The moral ethics of vaccine promoters, including health authorities and doctors who recommend or administer vaccines should be questioned, when the compositions of vaccines are unknown.
• The legal justification for official approval of vaccines should be questioned when the ingredients are not known.
• “Informed consent” is impossible when relevant information is concealed.

As we go to press,  June 11, 2021, the results published by Peru’s National Electoral Processes Office (ONPE) point in favor of Perú Libre’s candidate José Pedro Castillo Terrones against Fuerza Popular’s Keiko Fujimori. 

Right wing candidate Keiko and daughter of former president Alberto Fujimori (who is currently serving a jail term),  has claimed fraud and has requested “to annul around 200,000 votes”. 

Uncertainty  prevails. The election observation mission of the Organization of American States (OAS) which constitutes a de facto mouthpiece of the US administration has “called on authorities to wait until challenges to the vote had been resolved before calling a winner”.  

***

Exacerbated by the Covid crisis and the lockdown, Peru is currently in a state of mass unemployment, extreme poverty and despair which is beyond description.

Pedro Castillo is a progressive trade-union leader and former school teacher from the Northern Andean region of Cajamarca. He is committed to poverty alleviation and the implementation of an extensive program of job creation.

The country is in a neoliberal straight-jacket.

The World Bank so-called estimates of poverty in Peru are “fake” (27 % of the country’s population  below the poverty line). Independent analysis suggests that at least 70% of Peru’s population is below the poverty line, and extreme poverty is of the order 35% to 50%. 

Will Castillo be in a position to reverse the tide of corrupt US sponsored politics which goes back to the presidency of Alberto Fujimori (1990-2000)? Will he be able to implement a progressive economic and social project?   

What will be the nature of a Castillo government? Will Castillo gain the support of the Biden-Harris administration? 

What is important is to assess José Pedro Castillo’s political entourage. He has already made a number of commitments. His advisory team [equipo tecnico] has already been chosen. This is standard procedure in Latin American elections.

Pressured by Washington, there are indications that a Castillo government would adopt what might be described as a “progressive” neoliberal agenda, with the support of the Left, as well as the tacit endorsement of the Biden Administration with certain pre-conditions, prior to his inauguration on July 28, 2021

It is worth noting that the OAS has overseen the election process (on behalf of Washington) and has not reported any “irregularities” in favor of Castillo.

If Washington had been opposed to socialist candidate Pedro Castillo, the US State Department would have instructed the OAS to question the legitimacy of the election results as they did in Bolivia in November 2019, resulting in a de facto US sponsored coup d’état which compelled President Evo Morales to resign and leave the country.

Pedro Castillo is supported by Veronika Mendoza, the leader of Nuevo Perú (Bloomberg, June 9, 2021). What is at stake is a strategic political alliance between Castillo’s Perú Libre and Mendoza’s Nuevo Perú.

Mendoza is a progressive figure in Peruvian politics. Her party is backing Castillo. An agreement was signed between the two parties. Mendoza has appointed a “team of professionals” to draft a government plan (See Bloomberg, June 9, 2021, emphasis added)

What this suggests is that Castillo has already accepted an advisory team, appointed by Mendoza, who is slated to play a central role in the Castillo government. During the second round election campaign, Castillo’s chief economic adviser  is  Pedro Franke, a former World Bank economist.

Leading up to the second round, Pedro Franke has largely been involved in public relations statements in support of Castillo’s candidacy.

While Franke has a populist rhetoric, he is nonetheless committed to mainstream “free market” economics. The question is whether a Pedro Castillo government would conform to “The Washington Consensus”.

The country is already in the hands of foreign creditors. The latter are also providing “financial assistance” in relation to the covid crisis.

Continuity: A de facto and ongoing neoliberal package of economic and social interventions (under the auspices of the World Bank, the IMF and the Inter-American Development Bank (ADB))?

Neoliberalism with a Human Face

Pedro Franke has already put forth a people’s market economy on behalf of Pedro Castillo whom he compares to Luis Ignacio da Silva.

While he endorses Castillo’s program of mass employment creation,  he is committed to “fiscal prudence and inflation-targeting, and is opposed to nationalization of companies”.

“Fiscal Prudence”? What this suggests is that a Castillo government will not be able to create employment without the endorsement of Peru’s external creditors:

“We don’t want to nationalize the mining and oil industries, or other sectors, said Franke.

We don’t want generalized price controls or a dual foreign-exchange rate or to impose currency controls like Chavez did.”

These statements suggest that the Castillo government would not confront the foreign mining conglomerates, it would also  abide by IMF-World Bank conditionalities.

The issue of price controls is of course crucial. Recall the adoption by Alberto Fujimori of the IMF shock treatment economic agenda in August 1990. The retail price of gasoline increased 30 times overnight.

IMF “economic medicine” invariably triggers increases in the prices of essential consumer goods, while freezing wages. Under present conditions (covid crisis) this would precipitate a large sector of the Peruvian population into extreme poverty and despair.

In a press Conference on June 2, 2021. Pedro Franke stated:

“The three essential measures are:

A broad program of credit at low interest rates that reaches agriculture.”

Second, a public investment program that will generate direct and indirect employment.

Another measure that will be taken will be to “defend and promote local production.”

“We insist that the potato –a national product– must be promoted, (as well as) the national production of rice. … 

The industrialization of the country is essential, as well as the support for entrepreneurs and innovation ”, he said. …

Franke dispels the possibility of creating employment through monetary policy: “Our proposal is responsible with a responsible fiscal and monetary policy. Our proposal includes a fiscal balance …  ” namely “austerity measures”.

See his TV interview in Spanish

The foregoing statement confirms that foreign creditors rather than the government will call the shots on employment creation. In an interview on June 8, Pedro Castillo confirmed that:

“he would respect the central bank’s authority and that he was not planning nationalizations or expropriations, but added a tax overhaul on mining was needed to help pay for planned healthcare and education reforms.” (Reuters, June 8, 2021)