The RPI Challenge

“The worst defect weak republics can have is to be indecisive, so that all their decisions are taken out of necessity, and if any good comes to them, it comes through force of circumstance rather than through their own prudence.” - Machiavelli [Discourses, I.38] In a great moment of historic irony, Germany has given into criticisms that it is not sufficiently militaristic. After a large amount of hemming and hawing around the world, where the US refused to send tanks to Ukraine unless Germany...

Until it decided to confront Moscow with an existential military threat in Ukraine, Washington confined the use of American military power to conflicts that Americans could afford to lose, wars with weak opponents in the developing world from Saigon to Baghdad that did not present an existential threat to US forces or American territory. This time—a proxy war with Russia—is different.  Contrary to early Beltway hopes and expectations, Russia neither collapsed internally nor capitulated to the...

Recently the Republican chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee expressed concern that some wayward Republican’s might need some “education” on the dire global consequences if Russia wins the war in Ukraine. Sounding somewhat desperate representative Michael McCaul told CNN’s Dana Bush on “State of the Union” last Sunday that, “We have to educate our members. I don’t think they quite understand what’s at stake.”   He went on to claim that a Russian win would lead to China attacking...

Let me give you a scenario. The United States military occupies Iraq and is trying to quash an Islamic insurgency. We then discover that Iran is providing weapons, vehicles and explosives to those Islamic rebels. Do you think the United States would see that as a casus belli to retaliate against Iran? You bet your ass Washington saw this as an act of war against the United States. The George W. Bush administration started providing funding and support to a terrorist groups in Iran, the MEK,...

Microsoft founder Bill Gates, who served as one of the architects of Covid hysteria and had more of an impact than any other individual on the disastrous global pandemic policies, has finally acknowledged that the mRNA shots he’s been promoting for two years are nothing more than expired pharma junk. In flying his private jet to attend an in person conversation with the Lowry Institute in Australia this week, the supposedly carbon conscious Gates admitted that the shots serve virtually no...

The first anniversary of Russia’s special military operation in Ukraine falls on February 24. The Russian strategy of attrition war has not yet produced the desired political outcome but has been a success nonetheless. The delusional “westernist” notions of the Moscow elite that Russia can be a dialogue partner of the West have dissipated thoroughly, with ex-German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s stunning disclosure recently that the West’s negotiations with Russia regarding the Minsk Agreement...

The Zelenskyy regime is desperate. It is reportedly losing more than 300 soldiers a day in eastern Ukraine. The latest effort by the doomed regime to throw men and foreign war materiel at a slow and overpowering Russian advance in Donbas will completely fall apart. The regime is now busy abducting potential bullet stoppers in the Zakarpattia Oblast (Ruthenia), situated in the Carpathian Mountains of southwestern Ukraine, between Slovakia, Hungary, and Romania. “Due to heavy losses, which...

Not that long ago, my grandparents explained to me why they never discussed politics, religion, or sex in mixed company. Politeness was their currency. And why antagonize people or create ill will over private matters? Fast-forward to 2023, and their advice seems needed more than ever. Today nothing is private; everything is political. And American politics is characterized by a perverse degree of bad faith. Whether the country really is more divided than any time since the Civil War or this...

This week the US government reached its 31.4 trillion dollars borrowing limit, better known as the “debt ceiling.” This led to a showdown among House Republicans, President Biden, and congressional Democrats.House Republicans are demanding that President Biden and Senate Democrats agree to include spending cuts with the debt ceiling increase. However, President Biden and the congressional Democrats are refusing to negotiate with Republicans. Rather, they and their allies in the mainstream...

Hillary versus Trump versus Biden. All three kept classified information at their homes. Who wins the battle to have likely done the most damage to national security? In the end when dealing with the damage done by mishandling classified information it comes down to exposure; who saw it, what was it, when was it seen, and for how long? The “who” part is clear enough; a document left inadvertently on a desk top in an embassy guarded by Marines might not be seen by anyone. A document left on a...

This week, the United States Department of Justice charged in a Utah federal court Michael Kirk Moore, Jr. — a medical doctor — and three other individuals with crimes. The so-called crimes arise from allegation that the individuals helped adults who did not want to take experimental coronavirus “vaccine” shots obtain cards verifying they had taken the shots when shots were instead destroyed, as well as that the individuals provided cards verifying shots along with the injecting of saline...

This Ron Paul column was published in December, 2004. For everyone who has been conditioned by the mainstream media to believe that the problems in Ukraine started last February, here is an important bit of history. -DMPresident Bush said last week that, “Any election [in Ukraine], if there is one, ought to be free from any foreign influence.” I agree with the president wholeheartedly. Unfortunately, it seems that several US government agencies saw things differently and sent US taxpayer...

If you’re watching the World Economic Forum’s annual ruling class confab in Davos this week, you might be surprised by the lack of disagreement among the rich and powerful there. Every panel in Davos acts as a reinforced echo chamber in which there is one problem, one objective, and only one solution. Regardless of who populates these panels and speeches, whether it’s invited corporate media, governmental officials, and/or business executives, there’s never any apparent dissent or difference...

In this age of ubiquitous surveillance, there are no private lives: everything is public. Surveillance cameras mounted on utility poles, traffic lights, businesses, and homes. License plate readers. Ring doorbells. GPS devices. Dash cameras. Drones. Store security cameras. Geofencing and geotracking. FitBits. Alexa. Internet-connected devices. There are roughly one billion surveillance cameras worldwide and that number continues to grow, thanks to their wholehearted adoption by governments...

Among the federal government’s biggest failures is the war on drugs. Despite decades of warfare, the federal government is still a long way from declaring victory. In fact, it’s quite the opposite. Today, the federal government is still fiercely waging the drug war, trying as hard as it can to win. Throughout the decades, drug warriors have lamented that federal officials just haven’t really been serious about winning the drug war. If only they would really “crack down,” the drug war would...