The economic forces – those post war strong tailwinds – that have shaped the last 35 years, and which accelerated gilded journeys through the western “plentiful era,” are no longer blowing in a favourable direction. They were already slowing, but now are reversing. The winds now have shifted 180° in direction – they are gusting headwinds. This is a structural shift within a long cycle. There are no quick “silver bullet” solutions. The “Cabaret” good-time years are gone. We will have to “make...

Russia’s aerial attack on the Ukrainian city of Khmelnytskyi is catching quite a bit of attention because of reports of a spike in Gamma rays following multiple, massive explosions. Educated speculation believes that the increase in Gamma radiation may be a consequence of Russian bombs blasting British supplied depleted uranium rounds into dust. The photo above shows the intact weapons storage facility just outside Khmelnytskyi taken some time before the Russia strike. Khmelnytskyi sits 217...

Gun control advocates continue to claim that only restrictions on gun ownership will keep people safe from mass shooters and other criminals. However, good people with guns can stop bad people with guns. And bad people will still have guns despite gun control laws. Further weakening the argument that restricting private firearms ownership will reduce violent crimes is the fact that states with “constitutional carry” — where individuals are free to exercise their Second Amendment rights without...

One maddening feature of foreign policy debates in the United States is how frequently journalists and policy experts fail to challenge dominant narratives even when those narratives have glaring defects. Such malfeasance has facilitated a growing list of Washington’s policy blunders and outright debacles. Yet the tendency to accept the US government’s version of the issues at stake in any new crisis appears to be getting worse rather than better. An examination of developments just during the...

Below is my column in The Hill on the continued media blackout on evidence of influence peddling and corrupt practices by the Biden family. The coverage of the recent disclosure of dozens of LLCs and bank accounts used to funnel up to $10 million to Biden family members captured the growing concerns over a de facto state media in the United States. Under the current approach to journalism, it is the New York Times that receives a Pulitzer for a now debunked Russian collusion story rather than...

One of the interesting aspects of the Russia-Ukraine war is that the regimes in both countries have resorted to conscription to get soldiers to “serve their country.” One would think that if a war is just, citizens would not have to be forced to fight in it.With conscription, the state commands a citizen to report to a military facility, where he is forced to become an employee of the state, at a wage set by the state. Even worse, his forced labor consists of killing people. Thus, conscription...

How far would you really go to secure the nation’s borders in the so-called name of national security? Would you give the government limitless amounts of money? Surround the entire country with concrete walls and barbed wire? Erect a high-tech, virtual wall of AI-powered surveillance cameras and drones that does a better job of imprisoning those within its boundaries than keeping intruders out? Empower border police to trample on the rights of anyone who crosses their path, including legal...

From a geopolitical perspective, the Turkish presidential election on Sunday may appear to be one of the most crucial non-violent political events of this year. But appearances can be deceptive in Turkish politics.  In the surcharged polarisation of “West versus Rest” in international politics, western media is rooting for the defeat of incumbent President Recep Erdogan so that one of the leading proponents of multipolarity and strategic autonomy in the emerging world order who is setting a...

An especially damaging development in the history of US foreign policy was President Dwight D. Eisenhower’s promulgation of the domino theory. Adoption of its assumptions led directly to America’s disastrous military intervention in Vietnam. Although the simplistic doctrine was widely ridiculed after the Vietnam debacle, it has continued to have its adherents. Worse, the domino theory has seemed to make a full comeback with respect to Washington’s current attitudes toward both Russia and the...

Hours after Russian writer and activist Zakhar Prilepin was nearly killed in a targeted car bomb, a popular Ukrainian news agency submitted a poll that asked its readers, “Who do you think should be next in the Russian pantheon of scum propagandists?” It’s open season on Russian intellectuals supportive of the government’s war effort, according to Ukrainian news agency UNIAN. Following a car bomb intended to kill Russian novelist Zakhar Prilepin in the Nizhny Novgorod region of Russia, the...

The sense that things are bad, and getting worse, is palpable. There is an undeniable eschatological tint to today’s zeitgeist. Spiralling geo-political factors all suggest extreme turbulence ahead. Biden and the Democrats discover – to their surprise – that they are in a “bind”: Having thought to run in 2024 on “the Biden economic record,” Biden’s Team finds prospects dissolving in the face of accelerating events. And Ukraine – which was to be precursor to the toppling of Russia per se –...

NATO’s post-Cold War history is that of an organization far past its “sell-by” date. Desperate for a mission after the end of the Warsaw Pact, NATO in the late 1990s decided that it would become the muscle behind the militarization of “human rights” under the Clinton Administration.Gone was the “threat of global communism” which was used to justify NATO’s 40-year run, so NATO re-imagined itself as a band of armed Atlanticist superheroes. Wherever there was an “injustice” (as defined by...

(bigger)“One should bear in mind that there is nothing more difficult to execute, nor more dubious of success, nor more dangerous to administer, than to introduce new political orders. For the one who introduces them has as his enemies all those who profit from the old order, and he has only lukewarm defenders in all those who might profit from the new order.” - Machiavelli [The Prince, VI] Introduction: Two Paths for a Nation on Two Continents The first round of the Turkish Presidential...

So U2 singer Bono is literally just doing illustrations for the imperialist propaganda rag The Atlantic now, because that’s the sort of thing that happens in a dystopian civilization during the death throes of a globe-spanning empire. A Washington Post article titled “Bono likes to sketch Atlantic covers, so the magazine hired him” reports that “Bono is into Atlantic cover fanfic — so much so that he was invited to illustrate the magazine’s June cover featuring Ukrainian President Volodymyr...

Last night, President Joe Biden did what is a relatively rare thing. He sat down with an actual reporter ostensibly to answer questions. While earlier promising a “major press conference” for the media as a whole to ask him questions, Biden instead did a low-risk interview with MSNBC’s Stephanie Ruhle. In the interview, Ruhle briefly touched on the possible criminal charges awaiting Hunter Biden. Despite reports of a whistleblower alleging a bribery scandal involving the President, Ruhle...

We are not sure what the Murdochs were smoking last Monday morning when they shot the immensely profitable Fox News Channel in the kneecaps, but we do know that Tucker Carlson was one of a kind among commentators in the vast journalistic wasteland otherwise known as television news. Indeed, on issue after issue in recent years Tucker treaded forthrightly where his MSM competitors in both print and broadcast media feared to go. Perhaps that was because he was deeply informed, historically read...