Russia and Ukraine: War Coming? With RPI's Daniel McAdams
Saturday April 10, 2021
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Russia and Ukraine: War Coming? With RPI's Daniel McAdams
Saturday April 10, 2021
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How Bellingcat Launders National Security State Talking Points into the Press
Saturday April 10, 2021
Investigative site Bellingcat is the toast of the popular press. In the past month alone, it has been described as “an intelligence agency for the people” (ABC Australia), a “transparent” and “innovative” (New Yorker) “independent news collective,” “transforming investigative journalism” (Big Think), and an unequivocal “force for good” (South China Morning Post). Indeed, outside of a few alternative news sites, it is very hard to hear a negative word against Bellingcat, such is the gushing praise for the outlet founded in 2014.
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Young People Are Particularly Vulnerable To Lockdowns
Friday April 9, 2021
In response to the Covid-19 pandemic governments across the world implemented an unprecedented and untested strategy to slow the spread of the disease. Colloquially known as lockdowns, these public health interventions effectively shut down most normal societal functions through the use of stay-at-home orders, school closures, business closures, bans on large gatherings, and travel restrictions. This policy apparatus effectively relegated the vast majority of people to a form of self-quarantine and completely upended the standard social functioning of society. Although these measures were advertised in the United States as a short-term measure, the now infamous two weeks to flatten the curve policy to shut down societal functions to control the spread of Covid-19 dragged on for over a year.
The damage to society was certainly extensive, with a 3.5 percent annualized economic retraction record in 2020 and a 32.9 percent decline in Q2 of 2020, making this one of the sharpest economic declines in modern history. However, the level of suffering and trauma caused by these policies cannot be appropriately expressed by economic data alone.
Lockdown policies may have caused a substantial amount of financial damage but the social damage is just as concerning, if not more so. Across the board, there have been increased reports of mental health issues, such as depression and anxiety, that are linked to social isolation, substantial life disruptions, and existential dread over the state of the world. Unlike lost dollars, mental health problems leave real and lasting damage which could lead to complications later in life, if not self-harm or suicide. For young people, a drastic increase in suicides has claimed more lives than Covid-19. That is because they are far less vulnerable to Covid than older segments of the population but far more negatively impacted by lockdowns.
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Biden To Boost Already Bloated Pentagon Budget With Proposed $715 Billion
Friday April 9, 2021
Despite progressive lawmakers in his own party long demanding a serious reduction in the Pentagon's notoriously bloated budget, President Biden on Friday is expected to request a whopping $715 billion for the Pentagon for fiscal year 2022.
This is a slight increase from the prior year as Politico noted late Thursday in reporting the news: the Pentagon budget topline to be presented to lawmakers represents "a roughly 1.5% increase in defense spending from the current year's [$704 billion] level, making it effectively an inflation-adjusted budget boost."
However, it's a slight decrease from what Trump had reportedly planned to propose for this next fiscal year, which was $722 billion.
According to Bloomberg Government:
A $715 billion discretionary top-line would amount to a decrease of about 0.4% in real terms, adjusting for inflation from this year’s enacted appropriations of about $704 billion. That’s in contrast to a push for 3% to 5% real annual increases in national security spending endorsed by then-Defense Secretary James Mattis in 2017.
As for the aforementioned progressive pushback, they are pointing to the astounding waste that in the reality has little to do with defending the American people, but more to do with handing out huge contracts and fattening up the military-industrial complex.
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'New Normal'? Davos Billionaire Crowd Pushes Orwellian 'Smart Mask'
Thursday April 8, 2021
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Biden’s Inhumanity on Syria
Thursday April 8, 2021
For a time after Joe Biden took office not quite three months ago, among the questions raised was how the new administration would address the Syria question. I do not think we will have to wonder about this much longer. It is early days yet, but one now detects the Biden’s administration’s Syria policy in faint outline. From what one can make out, it is bleak, it is vicious, it is unconscionably cruel to the Syrian people.
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Texas Covid Crashes - Fauci Dumbfounded
Wednesday April 7, 2021
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Israel's Troubling 'Green Pass' Post-Coronavirus System
Wednesday April 7, 2021
Israel is almost completely opened for business. But to participate in the post-coronavirus bustle, you need a Green Pass, a government-sanctioned document that says the carrier has been vaccinated.
And that’s troubling, to say the least.
This post-coronavirus world is more and more moving to be all about the collective, zero about the individual.
According to a report in The New York Times, individuals who show a Green Pass — the government’s downloadable special OK for the vaccinated — can stay in hotels, dine inside restaurants, attend events of mass gatherings, to include religious services and sports’ games, visit places of tourism and cultural significance, gather for weddings and funerals, work out in fitness centers, swim in swimming pools, vacation in crowded places and more.
Those without the pass?
Maybe not.
Maybe they have to stay home.
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Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity on Avoiding War in Ukraine
Wednesday April 7, 2021
MEMORANDUM FOR: The President
FROM: Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS)
SUBJECT: Avoiding War in Ukraine
Dear President Biden,
We last communicated with you on December 20, 2020, when you were President-elect.
At that time, we alerted you to the dangers inherent in formulating a policy toward Russia built on a foundation of Russia-bashing. While we continue to support the analysis contained in that memorandum, this new memo serves a far more pressing purpose. We wish to draw your attention to the dangerous situation that exists in Ukraine today, where there is growing risk of war unless you take steps to forestall such a conflict.
At this juncture, we call to mind two basic realities that need particular emphasis amid growing tension between Ukraine and Russia.
First, since Ukraine is not a member of NATO, Article 5 of the NATO Treaty of course would not apply in the case of an armed conflict between Ukraine and Russia.
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New York's Vaccine Passport Program is Already Failing
Wednesday April 7, 2021
Liberty advocates, rejoice! The idiocracy is going to save us from another form of COVID tyranny. Thanks to a combination of bungling authoritarians and decaying legacy corporations, these entities are simply too incompetent to pull off a functioning vaccine passport program.
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