American Digest: The Cities – Reports from the Ground

From American Digest:

Mike on Twitter: “I’ve been exchanging messages with friends about what what’s happening in our cities: NY, Philadelphia and LA especially. A lot of disturbing things are not making the news. Even Republicans aren’t drawing attention to it. Here’s a message from a friend about life in NY today:

“Here’s my neighborhood, Mike: An elderly man, enjoying dinner w/his wife at an outdoor restaurant, punched in the face. A woman waiting for the subway to come stabbed in the back. An older neighbor pausing to catch his breath told to pay two dollars in protection money or get “the fuck off that particular street corner. This is just the ten block radius from where I live in the last six days.” Other friends from NY talk about shattered business districts, drugstores with locked shelves, and hundreds of homeless people and parolees, including sex offenders, being moved into hotels on the Upper West Side adjacent to schools and playgrounds, which are filled with needles again like in the 1970s. Friends in Philadelphia report large homeless encampments in the city center and being robbed at gunpoint.

Friends in LA talk about squatters taking over empty homes in professional class neighborhoods whose residents fantasize about emigrating to Canada. Friends in all three cities have seen police officers refuse to get out of their cars while large-scale lawbreaking takes place in front of them. That’s in addition to the obvious mayhem being perpetrated on a nightly basis in Portland, Seattle and Chicago. Estimates are that up to one million people have already fled New York City — meaning nearly everyone who has the means to leave has left.

Minneapolis is a smoldering ruin that has sustained untold damage to its immigrant neighborhoods. This is not what I am reading. This is what I am hearing from people directly.

Make no mistake about it: America is now in the middle of a 70s style urban crisis whose root is a well-founded fear of violent crime and social collapse in the midst of a pandemic. The destructive spiral that has been unleashed by leftwing play-acting at revolution and pursuit of stupid fantasies of abolishing the police is destroying our greatest cities.

As urban residents vote with their feet, we are being left with empty urban shells with no tax base and no meaningful employment. The fact that the business of Washington DC is the Federal government and the national media is now centered here is blinding our society to what’s actually happening in other big cities across the country.

What’s happening is this: Thirty years of very meaningful social and economic progress in our cities — which has hugely benefited minorities — is being undone by a toxic coalition of professional ideologues and “organizers,” rich kids in Che t-shirts, well-coiffed Mayors, and a National Democratic Party that pretends that the ongoing destruction of minority owned businesses and the social and economic infrastructure that is a primary engine for raising African American and immigrant families into the middle class is somehow about “civil rights” or “racial inequality.” It is not.

It is about a war on the American middle class being waged from above and below by people whose response to the values and the struggles of average American families

The Trumpet: Disunited States – A Lesson We Must Learn

Joel Hilliker at The Trumpet writes about divisions in the USA and whether they will lead to civil war in Disunited States: A Lesson We Must Learn

Is it unjust to prejudge people according to their race? Is it wrong for people in the street to exact vigilante-style “justice” against strangers? Is it wrong to prejudicially condemn people for the sins of their forefathers? Is it criminal to steal and destroy property? Should every citizen be able to live and work free from fear of arbitrary violence? Until rather recently, societal consensus was an unqualified yes to all these questions. But suddenly, they are all topics of fierce contention.

Here is a crucial question: How long can society function if we cannot agree on such basic points?

The fact is that, as alarmed as many people are by the lawlessness plaguing America’s streets today, it seems very few grasp the existential nature of the problem. America is facing civil war. Bible prophecy specifically says it will happen.

One major reason is that we are violating a specific biblical principle of living. This principle is controversial today. But it is a foundational truth. And it vividly illustrates the relevance of the Bible for our day.

In a cbs News interview, here is how Nikole Hannah-Jones, the architect of the “1619 Project” for the New York Times, responded when asked to “interpret” the arson, thievery, criminality and violence in America’s cities: “Yes, it is disturbing to see property being destroyed; it is disturbing to see people taking property from stores. But these are things. And violence is when an agent of the state kneels on a man’s neck until all of the life is leeched out of his body. Destroying property which can be replaced is not violence. And to use the exact same language to describe those two things, I think, really—it’s not moral to do that. I think any reasonable person would say we shouldn’t be destroying other people’s property—but these are not reasonable times.”

To have mainstream voices advocating destruction, lawlessness and insurrection as appropriate and legitimate is unprecedented—and deeply corrosive to society’s survival.

“If somebody decides to loot a Gucci, or a Macy’s, or a Nike, that makes sure that person eats. That makes sure that person has clothes,” Ariel Atkins, the leader of Black Lives Matter in Chicago, told reporters. “That is reparations. Anything they wanna take, take it, because these businesses have insurance. They’re going to get their money back. My people aren’t getting anything.”

A short time ago, such thinking was simply inconceivable. Everyone knew that indiscriminate destruction was evil. There was no controversy over the foundational understanding that arson, theft, looting, physical assault and violence were crimes. Everyone agreed that people should be safe, and their property should be safe. Someone who owns a business should be able to run that business, provide jobs, deliver goods and services to the community, contribute to the economic health of society, and earn a living—without fearing or actually suffering hatred, violence and destruction.

Stunningly, this is no longer something we all agree on. Rioters, journalists, commentators, professors, and even mayors, governors and members of Congress—influential, powerful people—do not believe it. They now insist that criminal destruction of property and assault on fellow citizens is understandable, even acceptable, even righteous, for the sake of “social change” in this “historic moment.”

This spirit is changing America. Prodded by such reasoning, cities are defunding police and allowing the predictable increases in crimes. And even more astoundingly, a growing number of people don’t even recognize these as problems—because they view them as mere symptoms of the real problems of racism and inequality.

Behold the consequences of adopting moral relativism as our society has been for decades—even generations. People have lost their elemental sense of right and wrong. They cannot recognize evil even when it is lighting their own city on fire.

Here is where the Bible is so supremely valuable. It gives us absolute standards—our Creator’s laws of right and wrong—that never change. It is a refreshing contrast to the moral standards of leftists, which change from year to year and sometimes from moment to moment. Yesterday’s heroes are today’s villains. And the most blatant evils are excused or even glorified.

Consider a few examples.

The Bible says God is no respecter of persons. He evaluates based on a person’s character. He judges the heart, not the outward appearance. He holds everyone to the same unchanging standard of right and wrong.

Accepting this truth is critical to a fair, just, stable society. All societies are flawed, but less so the ones that treat each person as a child of God, made in God’s image. This idea is articulated in America’s Declaration of Independence—that all men are created equal, endowed by their Creator with rights that include life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness…(continues)

Click here to continue reading at The Trumpet.

Forward Observer: The End of the Dollar? History Says Yes.

Intelligence analyst Sam Culper of Forward Observer talks briefly about de-dollarization.

On Monday and Tuesday evening, I had the great pleasure of speaking to grassroots political groups up in the Dallas/Ft. Worth area.

My message was pretty simple:

1. The United States is coming up on what will probably be decades of turbulence.

2. Intelligence at the community level will help you prepare for and navigate what could be a hard landing.

Maybe the most shocking thing I told them was the JP Morgan study about the lifespan of world reserve currencies.

From the Portuguese Real in the 1400s to the British Pound of the 19th and 20th centuries, world reserve currencies only last about 100 years. Some countries enjoyed world reserve status for as few as 80 years, some up to 110 years, but they all end in that time frame.

Maybe the U.S. Dollar will become the exception. Given the current trajectory, I wouldn’t bet on it. But maybe.

Otherwise, we could be nearing the end of dollar dominance. If we start the clock at Bretton Woods in 1944, 80 years is 2024 and 110 years is 2054.

Just as it happened with other currencies, as demand for the dollar drops, so will its value.

We could already be in a transition phase for the USD, which is sure to result in declines for purchasing power and the standard of living for the United States.

And that’s going to have a huge impact on our low intensity conflict.

Long time readers of mine will know that I’m not a Chicken Little. I don’t use hyperbole. I do my best to keep an even keel…

That said, I hope you’re buckled up.

Life goes on, but it’s going to be a lot tougher.

Developing a preparedness group, a community, a tribe — call it what you want — is mandatory.

And Intelligence should play a prominent role.

Earlier this year, I recorded a video outlining three things you should be doing now to prepare for what’s to come. I hope you’ll give it a look: Actionable Intelligence

Bloomberg: Russia Ditches the Dollar

Malaysia Today: China confident ‘de-dollarization’ is fast underway amid tense times

Yanasa Ama Ventures: Is a Global Famine Coming?

Yanasa Ama Ventures is a video company run by a ranching couple, focusing on agricultural, wildlife, and conservation videography. Besides offering such services, they also have a wide variety of ranch tutorial, tips, news and opinion pieces on their Youtube channel. Below they talk about a variety of food problems occurring across the globe, and what they may portend for the future. The novel coronavirus and its effect on global supply chains is pretty well known at this point, but there are a host of other issues as well. If you’re not keeping track, China is dealing with droughts, pestilence, and historic flooding, parts of Africa are dealing with droughts and locust plagues, and Russia has been limiting their exports of grains whether to protect domestic supply or for political power. Yanasa Ama talks about some of these topics in the video, as well as the effects of a solar minimum. You can also find articles like this one from NPR, saying there is no need to worry about food shortages, but it relies on computer models which say that because food supply has increased for many years, it will continue to increase for many years. While that may be true over time (much like holding stocks), it doesn’t account for bad years, or deny that there could be famine in some years.

“Chinese Chairman Xi Jinping’s call for an end to food waste is a sign that the communist country is facing a shortage of grains and pork after months of flooding, insect infestations, the African swine fever (ASF), and the impact of the Wuhan coronavirus (COVID-19).” – Taiwan News

“In 2020, locusts have swarmed in large numbers in dozens of countries, including Kenya, Ethiopia, Uganda, Somalia, Eritrea, India, Pakistan, Iran, Yemen, Oman and Saudi Arabia. When swarms affect several countries at once in very large numbers, it is known as a plague.” – BBC

“Southern Africa is suffering through its worst drought in several decades and perhaps a century. Drought and its associated impacts have been causing critical problems for agriculture, vulnerable communities and overall development for many years in South Africa. This year they need to import more than 100,000 tones of cereal to survive famine. “ – Hualien Tzu Chi Hospital

“The coronavirus has revealed how risky it can be to rely on Russia for grain imports. Despite warnings from the WHO and WTO, Russia imposed an export quota on critical grains such as wheat, barley, and maize as the virus swept across the globe…Whether for domestic food security or international hybrid warfare, Russia’s behavior in 2010 and now during the coronavirus foreshadows new dangers in a warming world. ” – National Interest

Seattle Times: Washington State Stockpiling Food

Derek Sandison, director of the Washington state Department of Agriculture, tours a Fife warehouse Friday that’s packed with nonperishable food the state can tap if demand at food banks and other distribution centers soars amid the pandemic and resulting economic collapse. (Steve Ringman / The Seattle Times)

From the Seattle Times, From peanut butter to applesauce, Washington state stockpiles tons of food for the need ahead. Note that even The Seattle Times references the “resulting economic collapse” as a reason for having food stockpiled.

In Washington state’s new food warehouse, there’s enough Jif peanut butter to make nearly 3 million sandwiches.

Barilla pasta boxes stretch to the ceiling, 100,000 in all. Large stacks of TreeTop applesauce, pancake mix and canned green beans sit on pallets, like soldiers waiting to be sent into duty.

Since the coronavirus crisis first rocked Washington in March, nonprofits and state agencies working in food assistance have been forced to draw a completely new road map for getting food to people who need it.

The warehouse in Fife is part of that new model. After seeing food banks struggle to meet demand once the pandemic hit and the economy tanked, the Washington state Department of Agriculture (WSDA) began preparing to buy and stockpile tons of food to ward off a shortage in the months ahead.

The new stockpile is driven by two major factors: A nearly doubling in demand for food assistance across the state and a national food supply chain that is bogged down amid an overwhelming surge in demand.

As many as 2.2 million Washingtonians — about 30% of the state’s population — are facing food insecurity, according to Katie Rains, WSDA food policy advisor. That’s more than double the 850,000 state residents who sought help from food assistance programs last November, before the pandemic.

“We’ve been in this very desperate situation starting toward the end of March,” said WSDA Director Derek Sandison. “This [warehouse] is a continuation of our efforts to make sure we have fusions of product that will help us to continue to weather the storm.”

The storm took hold in mid-April, Sandison said during a tour of the warehouse on Friday. That’s when the state’s three main food bank distributors — Food Lifeline, Northwest Harvest and Second Harvest — told the WSDA that based on the spike in requests for food assistance, the organizations had roughly a two-week supply of food for hunger relief.

“We went into panic mode,” Sandison said. “That’s not an exaggeration. … So we jumped in with both feet and started active procurement on our end.”

But as the WSDA was trying to buy as much nonperishable food as it could to increase the state’s emergency reserves, so was everyone else.

Not only was the WSDA competing with other states and large national food-assistance programs, it also faced competition from grocery stores as national supplies of products such as pasta and peanut butter were becoming increasingly hard to come by.

“Peanut butter was a very highly wanted and needed commodity,” said Gary Newte, sourcing and product director for Northwest Harvest. “Peanut butter prices have probably tripled in the last three to four months.”

These high costs are having significant effects on the big food bank distributors’ bottom lines.

“Over a seven-month span during this crisis, we’ll spend more on purchasing food than we have for the previous four years combined,” said Thomas Reynolds, CEO of Northwest Harvest.

And six months into the pandemic and economic crisis, those costs haven’t gone down, Newte said. Many food distributors are still waiting on food they ordered months ago, he said…

Click here to read the entire article at The Seattle Times.

Global Research: Toward a US-China War and One World Government?

William Engdahl at Center for Research on Globalization writes Towards a US-China War? The Creation of a Global Totalitarian System, A “One World Government”? in which he opines about the rapid emergence of China and growing concerns over conflict.

If we step back from the details of daily headlines around the world and try to make sense of larger patterns, the dominant dynamic defining world geopolitics in the past three years or more is the appearance of a genuine irregular conflict between the two most formidable powers on the planet—The Peoples’ Republic of China and the United States of America. Increasingly it’s beginning to look as if some very dark global networks are orchestrating what looks to be an updated rerun of their 1939-1945 World War. Only this time the stakes are total, and aim at creation a universal global totalitarian system, what David Rockefeller once called a “one world government.” The powers that be periodically use war to gain major policy shifts.

On behalf of the Powers That Be (PTB), World War II was orchestrated by the circles of the City of London and of Wall Street to maneuver two great obstacles—Russia and Germany—to wage a war to the death against each other, in order that those Anglo-Saxon PTB could reorganize the world geopolitical chess board to their advantage. It largely succeeded, but for the small detail that after 1945, Wall Street and the Rockefeller brothers were determined that England play the junior partner to Washington. London and Washington then entered the period of their global domination known as the Cold War.

That Anglo-American global condominium ended, by design, in 1989 with the collapse of the Berlin Wall and the disintegration of the Soviet Union by 1991.

Around this time, with the onset of the Bill Clinton presidency in 1992, the next phase– financial and industrial globalization– was inaugurated. With that, began the hollowing out of the industrial base of not only the United States, but also of Germany and the EU. The cheap labor outsourcing enabled by the new WTO drove wages down and destroyed one industry after the next in the industrial West after the 1990s. It was a necessary step on the path to what G.H.W. Bush in 1990 called the New World Order. The next step would be destruction of national sovereignty everywhere. Here the USA was the major obstacle.

“A little help from our friends…”

For the PTB, who owe no allegiance to nations, only to their power which is across borders, the birth of the World Trade Organization and their bringing China in as a full member in 2001 was intended as the key next step. At that point the PTB facilitated in China the greatest industrial growth by any nation in history, possibly excepting Germany from 1871-1914 and USA after 1866. WTO membership allowed Western multinationals from Apple to Nike to KFC to Ford and VW to pour billions into China to make their products at dirt-cheap wage levels for re-export to the West.

One of the great mysteries of that China growth is the fact that China was allowed to become the “workshop of the world” after 2001, first in lower-skill industries such as textiles or toys, later in pharmaceuticals and most recently in electronics assembly and production. The mystery clears up when we look at the idea that the PTB and their financial houses, using China, want to weaken strong industrial powers, especially the United States, to push their global agenda. Brzezinski often wrote that the nation state was to be eliminated, as did his patron, David Rockefeller. By allowing China to become a rival to Washington in economy and increasingly in technology, they created the means to destroy the superpower hegemony of the US.

By the onset of the Presidency of Xi Jinping in 2012, China was an economic colossus second in weight only to the United States. Clearly this could never have happened–not under the eye of the same Anglo-American old families who launched the Opium Wars after 1840 to bring China to heel and open their economy to Western financial looting–unless the Anglo-Americans had wanted it.

The same British-owned bank involved in the China opium trade, Hong Kong and Shanghai Bank (HSBC), founded by a Scotsman, Thomas Sutherland in 1865 in the then-British colony of Hong Kong, today is the largest non-Chinese bank in Hong Kong. HSBC has become so well-connected to China in recent years that it has since 2011 had as Board member and Deputy HSBC Chairman, Laura Cha. Cha was formerly Vice Chairman of the China Securities Regulatory Commission, being the first person outside mainland China to join the Beijing Central Government of the People’s Republic of China at vice-ministerial rank. In other words the largest bank in the UK has a board member who was a member of the Chinese Communist Party and a China government official. China needed access to Western money and HSBC and other select banks such as JP MorganChase, Barclays, Goldman Sachs were clearly more than happy to assist.

“Socialism with Xi Jinping Characteristics…”

All told until 2012 when Xi took charge of the CCP in Beijing, China seemed to be willing to be a globalist “team player,” though with “Chinese characteristics.” However, in 2015 after little more than two years in office, Xi Jinping endorsed a comprehensive national industrial strategy, Made in China: 2025. China 2025 replaced an earlier Western globalist document that had been formulated with the World Bank and the USA, the China 2030 report under Robert Zoellick. That shift to a China strategy for global tech domination might well have triggered a decision by the globalist PTB that China could no longer be relied on to play by the rules of the globalists, but rather that the CCP under Xi were determined to make China the global leader in advanced industrial, AI and bio-technologies. A resurgent China nationalist global hegemony was not the idea of the New World Order gang.

China:2025 combined with Xi’s strong advocacy of the Belt Road Initiative for global infrastructure linking China by land and sea to all Eurasia and beyond, likely suggested to the globalists that the only solution to the prospect of their losing their power to a China global hegemon would ultimately be war, a war that would destroy both nationalist powers, USA AND China. This is my conclusion and there is much to suggest this is now taking place.

Tit for Tat

If so, it will most likely be far different from the military contest of World War II. The USA and most of the Western industrial economies have “conveniently” imposed the worst economic depression since the 1930’s as a bizarre response to an alleged virus originating in Wuhan and spreading to the world. Despite the fact that the death toll, even with vastly inflated statistics, is at the level of a severe annual influenza, the insistence of politicians and the corrupt WHO to impose draconian lockdown and economic disruption has crippled the remaining industrial base in the US and most of the EU.

The eruption of well-organized riots and vandalism under the banner of racial protests across the USA has brought America’s cities to a state in many cases of war zones resembling the cities of the 2013 Matt Damon and Jodie Foster film, Elysium. In this context, anti-Washington rhetoric from Beijing has taken on a sharp tone in their use of so-called “Wolf Diplomacy.”

Now after Washington closed the China Consulate in Houston and China the US Consulate in Chengdu, both sides have stepped up rhetoric. High tech companies are being banned in the US, military displays of force from the US in the South China Sea and waters near Taiwan are increasing tensions and rhetoric on both sides. The White House accuses the WHO of being an agent of Beijing, while China accuses the US of deliberately creating a deadly virus and bringing it to Wuhan. Chinese state media supports the explosion of violent protests across America under the banner of Black Lives Matter. Step-wise events are escalating dramatically. Many of the US self-styled Marxists leading the protests across US cities have ties to Beijing such as the Maoist-origin Revolutionary Communist Party, USA of Bob Avakian…(continues)

Click here to read the entire article at Global Research.

Unconstrained Analytics: The Three Perils Threatening the United States

Former Director for Strategic Planning for the National Security Council Rich Higgins writes The Three Perils Threatening the United States for Unconstrained Analytics, citing internal and external threats.

The Republic is in grave danger.

There, I said it.

Does anyone really doubt it? America is stumbling and the vultures are circling. What is the nature of these perils that afflict us?

America sits atop a global system created at the outset of the 20th century. That century saw the United States elevated to the status of global imperial power, having been victorious in two world wars and the beneficiary of an international monetary system that, post World War II, provided for a vast global, if not regional, peace. Sure, there was a Cold War with the Soviet Union and other limited wars, but no true great global war in which the entire geo-political order came into question.

Times have changed. Today the United States is faced with three enormous perils:

an external threat,

an internal threat, and

a fulcrum on which the two interoperate to synchronize a multi-prong attack on America.

1

The first peril is that China has emerged as a geopolitical and economic challenger to the United States. The simmering geopolitical threat from China is multilateral in nature. In fact, a geopolitical reordering on an historic scale is taking place.

Supported by financial stakeholders, China’s “Belt and Road Initiative” seeks no less than the unification of the Eurasian landmass. This geopolitical and economic reordering has seen China peel off NATO ally Turkey, make common cause with Iran, align with Pakistan, and subsume Hong Kong. Even European Union nations, beneficiaries of 75 years of American security, are drifting into the arms of the Chinese Communists.

2

The second peril, a domestic counter-state, has emerged pressing a Marxist revolutionary insurrection in alignment with China’s objectives. With a century of Marxist subversion in the making, this counter-state manifested as a silent or soft coup attempt in 2017, and subsequently has evolved into a Marxist revolutionary insurrection rising to a boil inside the United States.

This insurrection has both overt and clandestine components, and while the underground remains largely anonymous, much of it is hidden in plain sight and is clearly visible to anyone familiar with unconventional warfare tactics.

One hallmark of this emergent insurrection is the state-within-the-state:

institutional control over executive branch function even when their affiliated political party is out of power,

control over media organs,

state employees elevated above citizens in the application of laws,

selective enforcement of laws based on political affiliation or policy desires (i.e. sanctuary cities), and

the abuse of intelligence, law enforcement, judicial and regulatory structures to punish or control political enemies.

It is important to note that all of the outcomes sought by this insurrection support Communist China’s ambition to see the United States displaced from her perch as global leader.

3

The third peril is a biological-economic crisis brought about by the Chinese, and exacerbated by the domestic revolutionary insurrectionists and their allies in the media and public health sector.

This public health crisis and its derivative economic calamity was spread intentionally throughout the world by China and its allies. COVID-19 has upended the global economic system and decreased the domestic productivity of most nations, thereby increasing governance challenges and opening the door to greater state controls.

Inside the United States, the Marxist insurrection is capitalizing on the virus and the counter-state’s control of the public health system to:

enact draconian population control measures,

extraconstitutional legal maneuvers,

propaganda and psychological warfare operations,

economic warfare targeting the middle-class business owner, and

intermittent escalatory violence including the use of anarcho-communists operating under the rubric of critical race theory.

Never let a crisis go to waste!

Any one of the three perils is potentially lethal in its own right. In the aggregate, this is a crisis of epic proportions.

Unfortunately, the underground revolutionary insurrectionists operating inside the government institutions interfere with executive branch function and make matters much more difficult to qualify, rectify, or even acknowledge. In so doing, these meddling government officials betray their oaths to defend the Constitution.

Many Americans see the vultures circling. The signs are everywhere; debt exploding, unemployment skyrocketing, currency uncertainty, the gold price rising, and record-high gun sales. The herd is nervous. Sides are being chosen. The tectonic plates are rumbling.

People are looking for crisis leadership that comprehends the three perils, is prepared to deal with them, and most importantly realizes that America is worth defending.

The Republic is at risk. There, I said it again.

Now defend it.

Rutherford Institute: The Building Blocks of Tyranny from A to Z

Consitutional law attorney and author John Whitehead of the Rutherford Institute writes about much that is wrong in the USA in P Is for Predator State: The Building Blocks of Tyranny from A to Z

“When a population becomes distracted by trivia, when cultural life is redefined as a perpetual round of entertainments, when serious public conversation becomes a form of baby-talk, when, in short, a people become an audience and their public business a vaudeville act, then a nation finds itself at risk; a culture-death is a clear possibility.” — Professor Neil Postman, Amusing Ourselves to Death: Discourse in the Age of Show Business

While America continues to fixate on the drama-filled reality show scripted by the powers-that-be, directed from the nation’s capital, and played out in high definition across the country, the American Police State has moved steadily forward.

Nothing has changed.

The COVID-19 pandemic has been a convenient, traumatic, devastating distraction.

The American people, the permanent underclass in America, have allowed themselves to be so distracted and divided that they have failed to notice the building blocks of tyranny being laid down right under their noses by the architects of the Deep State.

Trump, Obama, Bush, Clinton: they have all been complicit in carrying out the Deep State’s agenda. Unless something changes to restore the balance of power, the next president—the new boss—will be the same as the old boss.

Frankly, it really doesn’t matter what you call the old/new boss—the Deep State, the Controllers, the masterminds, the shadow government, the corporate elite, the police state, the surveillance state, the military industrial complex—so long as you understand that no matter who occupies the White House, it is a profit-driven, an unelected bureaucracy that is actually calling the shots.

If our losses are mounting with every passing day—and they are—it is a calculated siege intended to ensure our defeat at the hands of a totalitarian regime.

Free speech, the right to protest, the right to challenge government wrongdoing, due process, a presumption of innocence, the right to self-defense, accountability and transparency in government, privacy, media, sovereignty, assembly, bodily integrity, representative government: all of these and more are casualties in the government’s war on the American people.

Set against a backdrop of government surveillance, militarized federal police, SWAT team raids, asset forfeiture, overcriminalization, armed surveillance drones, whole body scanners, stop and frisk searches, and the like—all of which have been sanctioned by Congress, the White House and the courts—our constitutional freedoms are being steadily chipped away at, undermined, eroded, whittled down, and generally discarded.

As a result, the American people have been treated like enemy combatants, to be spied on, tracked, scanned, frisked, searched, subjected to all manner of intrusions, intimidated, invaded, raided, manhandled, censored, silenced, shot at, locked up, and denied due process.

None of these dangers have dissipated in any way.

They have merely disappeared from our televised news streams.

It’s time to get educated on what’s really going on. Thus, in the interest of liberty and truth, here’s an A-to-Z primer that spells out the grim realities of life in the American Police State that no one seems to be talking about anymore.

A is for the AMERICAN POLICE STATE. A police state “is characterized by bureaucracy, secrecy, perpetual wars, a nation of suspects, militarization, surveillance, widespread police presence, and a citizenry with little recourse against police actions.”

B is for our battered BILL OF RIGHTS. In the militarized police culture that is America today, where you can be kicked, punched, tasered, shot, intimidated, harassed, stripped, searched, brutalized, terrorized, wrongfully arrested, and even killed by a police officer, and that officer is rarely held accountable for violating your rights, the Bill of Rights doesn’t amount to much.

C is for CIVIL ASSET FORFEITURE. This governmental scheme to deprive Americans of their liberties—namely, the right to property—is being carried out under the guise of civil asset forfeiture, a government practice wherein government agents (usually the police and now TSA agents) seize private property they “suspect” may be connected to criminal activity. Then, whether or not any crime is actually proven to have taken place, the government keeps the citizen’s property and it’s virtually impossible to get it back.

D is for DRONES. It was estimated that at least 30,000 drones would be airborne in American airspace by 2020, part of an $80 billion industry. Although some drones will be used for benevolent purposes, many will also be equipped with lasers, tasers and scanning devices, among other weapons—all aimed at “we the people.”

E is for EMERGENCY STATE. From 9/11 to COVID-19, we have been the subjected to an “emergency state” that justifies all manner of government tyranny and power grabs in the so-called name of national security. The government’s ongoing attempts to declare so-called national emergencies in order to circumvent the Constitution’s system of checks and balances constitutes yet another expansion of presidential power that exposes the nation to further constitutional peril.

F is for FASCISM. A study conducted by Princeton and Northwestern University concluded that the U.S. government does not represent the majority of American citizens. Instead, the study found that the government is ruled by the rich and powerful, or the so-called “economic elite.” Moreover, the researchers concluded that policies enacted by this governmental elite nearly always favor special interests and lobbying groups. In other words, we are being ruled by an oligarchy disguised as a democracy, and arguably on our way towards fascism—a form of government where private corporate interests rule, money calls the shots, and the people are seen as mere economic units or databits.

G is for GRENADE LAUNCHERS and GLOBAL POLICE. The federal government has distributed more than $18 billion worth of battlefield-appropriate military weapons, vehicles and equipment such as drones, tanks, and grenade launchers to domestic police departments across the country. As a result, most small-town police forces now have enough firepower to render any citizen resistance futile. Now take those small-town police forces, train them to look and act like the military, and then enlist them to be part of the United Nations’ Strong Cities Network program, and you not only have a standing army that operates beyond the reach of the Constitution but one that is part of a global police force.

H is for HOLLOW-POINT BULLETS. The government’s efforts to militarize and weaponize its agencies and employees is reaching epic proportions, with federal agencies as varied as the Department of Homeland Security and the Social Security Administration stockpiling millions of lethal hollow-point bullets, which violate international law. Ironically, while the government continues to push for stricter gun laws for the general populace, the U.S. military’s arsenal of weapons makes the average American’s handgun look like a Tinker Toy.

I is for the INTERNET OF THINGS, in which internet-connected “things” monitor your home, your health and your habits in order to keep your pantry stocked, your utilities regulated and your life under control and relatively worry-free. The key word here, however, is control. This “connected” industry propels us closer to a future where police agencies apprehend virtually anyone if the government “thinks” they may commit a crime, driverless cars populate the highways, and a person’s biometrics are constantly scanned and used to track their movements, target them for advertising, and keep them under perpetual surveillance…(continues)

Click here to continue reading at the Rutherford Institute.

ARRL: Hurricane Watch Net Re-Activating as Isaias Approaches Carolinas

Update 8/3/20 from ARRL: Hurricane Watch Net Reactivates as Hurricane Warning Posted for the Carolinas

With the National Hurricane Center (NHC) expecting Tropical Storm Isaias to become a hurricane again later today and make landfall this evening, the Hurricane Watch Net (HWN) reactivated at 1600 UTC on 14.325 MHz. HWN Manager Bobby Graves, KB5HAV, said the net will shift operations at 2300 UTC to 7.268 MHz, where it will remain until no longer needed by the NHC. A hurricane warning is in effect from the South Santee River in South Carolina to Surf City, North Carolina.

“The center of Isaias will then approach the coast of northeastern South Carolina and southern North Carolina within the hurricane warning area later today,” the NHC said. The center will then move inland over eastern North Carolina tonight, and move along the coast of the mid-Atlantic states on Tuesday and into the northeastern United States by Tuesday night.”

The HWN initially activated on July 31 at 1500 UTC, when Isaias was about 245 miles southeast of Nassau. “During the next 41 hours, we relayed the latest advisories to those in the Bahamas, south Florida, as well as mariners and shortwave listeners, Graves said. “Because Isaias was forecast to regain strength to a Category 1 hurricane, and hurricane watches and warnings remained in effect for the Florida coast as well as areas in the Bahamas, the Net remained activated.” After the NHC dropped all hurricane watches and warnings on Sunday morning, and the storm was no longer believed to become a hurricane, the HWN secured operations on Sunday, August 1.

“During the course of 41 hours, we never received any reports from the Bahamas,” Graves said. “We did hear from many south Florida stations, but the storm was not yet close enough at the time for [that area] to be adversely affected.

As of 1500 UTC, Isaias is forecast to make landfall tonight as a Category 1 hurricane and is expected to bring strong winds and heavy rainfall from the eastern Carolinas to the mid-Atlantic coast tonight and Tuesday. The storm was some 90 miles east-southeast of Brunswick, Georgia, and some 220 miles southwest of Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. Maximum sustained winds are 70 MPH, just a shade below Category 1 hurricane strength.

“We are slowly moving into the heart of the 2020 Atlantic Basin Hurricane Season, so, please do not drop your guard,” Graves advised. “If you haven’t done so already, now would be a good time to review your Family Emergency Plan and review your Emergency Supply Checklist. We have links to download both on our website.”

South Carolina Amateur Radio Volunteers Ready

Although Isaias hasn’t turned into a monster hurricane, radio amateurs from all over South Carolina have been preparing for days as the South Carolina Emergency Operations Center geared up for the storm. Isaias was predicted to make landfall on the border of North Carolina and South Carolina.

“We have been in direct communication with our emergency support function (EFS-2) partners along with many other organizations to ensure our level of readiness is sufficient. Radio checks have been performed at SCEMD (South Carolina Emergency Management Division) and more conference calls among ARES leadership are planned,” said ARRL South Carolina Section Emergency Coordinator Billy Irwin, K9OH. Irwin said information about frequencies in use may be found in the Tactical Guide on the South Carolina ARES website.

From the American Radio Relay League on 7/31/20, Hurricane Watch Net Activating as Hurricane Isaias Approaches US East Coast:

The Hurricane Watch Net (HWN) activated on 14.325 MHz on July 31 at 1500 UTC as Hurricane Isaias [pronounced: ees-ah-EE-ahs] heads toward the US on an uncertain trajectory. The Volusia County, Florida, and State emergency operations centers were reported at a Level 3 (Monitoring) status.

“For years I’ve said, ‘Just when you think you have Mother Nature figured out, she changes her mind,’” HWN Manager Bobby Graves, KB5HAV, said. “Shortly after Advisory 11 for then-Tropical Storm Isaias was issued [at 0300 UTC], an Air Force Reserve hurricane hunter aircraft found that the tropical storm had strengthened to a hurricane. The maximum winds had increased to 80 MPH with higher gusts making the storm a Category 1 hurricane.”

The National Hurricane Center (NHC) forecast for 0900 UTC called for Isaias to strengthen into a Category 2 hurricane during the next 24 hours.

“Unfortunately, Isaias appears to be taking a somewhat similar track along the US east coastline, such as Matthew in 2016 and Dorian in 2019,” Graves said. “Interests throughout the Bahamas, Florida, Georgia, South and North Carolina, and farther north need to keep a close watch on Isaias. This means the Hurricane Watch Net could be running another marathon activation.”

An NHC Advisory issued at 1500 UTC included a Hurricane Watch for portions of the Florida east coast from north of Deerfield Beach northward to the Volusia-Brevard County Line. A Tropical Storm Warning has been issued for portions of the Florida east coast from north of Ocean Reef northward to Sebastian Inlet and for Lake Okeechobee.

As of 1500 UTC, the NHC said the center of Hurricane Isaias was located near latitude 21.7 N, longitude 74.5 W, moving toward the northwest near 16 mph (26 km/h), and a general northwestward motion with some decrease in forward speed is expected for the day or so followed by a turn toward the north-northwest. On the forecast track, the center of Isaias will continue to move near or over the Southeastern Bahamas today. Isaias is forecast to be near the Central Bahamas tonight, and move near or over the Northwestern Bahamas Saturday and near the east coast of the Florida peninsula Saturday afternoon through Sunday.

“On the forecast track, the center of Isaias will continue to move near or over the Southeastern Bahamas today. Isaias is forecast to be near the central Bahamas tonight, and move near or over the northwestern Bahamas on Saturday and near the east coast of the Florida peninsula Saturday afternoon through Sunday.

“Tropical storm conditions are possible along portions of the Florida east coast beginning Saturday, and a tropical storm watch remains in effect. While storm surge watches are not currently needed for this area, they may be required later today, if the forecast track shifts closer to the coast. Heavy rains associated with Isaias may begin to affect south and east-central Florida beginning late Friday night, and the eastern Carolinas by early next week, potentially resulting in isolated flash and urban flooding, especially in low-lying and poorly drained areas. Isolated minor river flooding is possible in the Carolinas early next week,” the NHC said. “Hurricane conditions and dangerous storm surges are expected in portions of the Bahamas today and Saturday, and hurricane warnings are in effect for these areas. Preparations to protect life and property should be rushed to completion.”

The HWN seeks “observed ground-truth data from those in the affected area,” including wind velocity and gusting, wind direction, barometric pressure, and, if available, rainfall, damage, and storm surge. “Measured weather data is always appreciated, but we do accept estimated,” Graves noted.

Alt-Market: Martial Law Is Unacceptable Regardless Of The Circumstances

This article is a reminder from Brandon Smith at Alt-Market that Martial Law Is Unacceptable Regardless Of The Circumstances

Back in 2014, hundreds if not thousands of conservatives and liberty movement activists converged on a farm in rural Clark County, Nevada. The purpose was to protest the incursion of federal government agents onto the property of the Bundy family, who had defied pressure from the Bureau of Land Management to stop allowing their cattle to feed on “federal land” in a form of free ranging. It was a practice that had been going on for decades and one that was required for the Bundy farm to survive, ended abruptly by environmental laws protecting a tortoise.

The Bundy family had been improving on the area with water sources and other measures for generations without interference. The claim by the BLM and other agencies was that the farmers were destroying wildlife habitat with their cattle, yet the Bundy’s land improvements had actually allowed wildlife to THRIVE in areas where animals would find life difficult or impossible otherwise.

The federal government became fixated on the Bundy’s, and decided to make an example out of them. Their defiance of the crackdown on their use of the land was met with extreme measures, including their cattle impounded, their farm being surrounded and sniper teams placed in the hills nearby. The liberty movement saw this as the last straw, and so reacted at a grassroots level. The concern was that Bundy Ranch could become another Waco. They locked and loaded and went to defend the Bundy’s.

I completely agreed at the time with the efforts surrounding Bundy Ranch and I still agree with them today. The federal government had overstepped its bounds on multiple occasions when it came to rural farmers in sagebrush country and everyone had finally had enough. The feds were faced with a group of armed liberty movement members and eventually ran away. They even gave the Bundy’s back the cattle the feds had initially tried to confiscate. This event showcased the power of the people to repel tyranny when necessary.

The claim that the public is impotent against government force was summarily trounced. The action was not perfect, and there were many internal disputes and a plethora of mistakes, but overall it had achieved its goal. It sent a message to the establishment that if you try to assert unconstitutional force against the citizenry there is a chance a Bundy Ranch scenario might happen again, and next time it might not simply be a defensive measure.

I mention Bundy Ranch because I want to remind conservatives of their roots. We are a constitutional movement. We are a small government movement. We believe in individual rights, states rights and the 10^th Amendment, as well as strict limitations placed on the federal government and state governments when they try to violate the Bill of Rights. If you don’t believe in these things, you are not a conservative or a constitutionalist.

No government, whether state or federal, supersedes the boundaries placed upon them by the constitution. Once they violate those boundaries, they must be put in check by the citizenry, for the constitution is merely an object that represents an ideal. It can’t defend itself. If a government undermines constitutional protections, it is not a failure of the constitution, it is a failure by the public to act.

Sadly, there are “conservatives” out there who supported the efforts at Bundy Ranch in 2014, but are now calling for federal overreach and martial law today. The very same people who argued vehemently against unconstitutional actions back then are arguing for bending or breaking the rules of the constitution now. This is something I have been warning about for years…

The greatest threat to freedom is not the government, extreme leftists or the globalist cabal; the greatest threat is when freedom fighters foresake their own principles and start rationalizing tyranny because it happens to benefit them in the moment. If freedom fighters stop fighting for freedom, who remains pick up the mantle? No one. And thus, the globalists and collectivists win the long game.

Right now there are two sides calling for martial law-like restrictions on the public, and both sides think they are doing what is best for society at large. They both believe they are morally justified and that totalitarian actions are necessary for “the greater good”. Both sides are wrong.

The Pandemic Puritans

On one side, we have a group made up primarily of political leftists but also some conservatives who say that the coronavius pandemic creates a scenario in which medical tyranny must be established to protect the public from itself. Leftists enjoy control in general and the pandemic simply offers an opportunity for them to act out their totalitarian fantasies in real life.

These are the people who wag their fingers at others on the street or in the park or at the beach for not “social distancing” properly. These are the people that inform on their neighbors, or inform on local businesses for not following strict guidelines. These are the people that get a thrill from forcing other people to conform.

This is not to say that precautions are not warranted, they certainly are. However, these precautions MUST be up to individuals, not enforced by bureaucracy. The moment you hand government ultimate power to dictate people’s health decisions, personal daily activities, freedom of assembly and their ability to participate in the economy, you have given the government ultimate power to destroy our very culture. No government should be allowed to have that kind of influence.

The issue here is one of the greater EVIL, not the greater good. What is the greater evil? To avoid unconstitutional measures, avoid violating individual rights and allow the virus to spread faster than it normally would? Or, to completely throw out the Bill of Rights, individual liberty and economic security in the name of a brand of “safety” that is ambiguous and undefined?

As I write this, the state of New Jersey among others is implementing a draconian response against businesses that defy lockdown orders. NJ just arrested the owners of a gymnasium in Bellmawr who refused to close down. Even though they used social distancing measures and applied their own guidelines, the state has decided that citizens are children that must be controlled rather than adults that can make their own choices. This sets a dangerous precedence for the whole country.

Understand that small businesses that are not deemed “essential” by arbitrary decree from the state are on the verge of bankruptcy and collapse. Millions of people are having their livelihoods threatened by the lockdowns. Millions of jobs are at risk. Is the coronavirus really worth destroying our own economic system? Because that is EXACTLY what is happening right now. The US economy was already suffering from destabilization, and now the pandemic response is putting the final nail in the coffin.

If the economy tanks far more people will die from the resulting crisis of poverty, crime and civil unrest than will EVER die from the coronavirus pandemic. When you look at the big picture, how can anyone justify medical tyranny and martial law measures? There is simply no logical explanation for violating the economic and personal freedom of Americans in response to a disease. If some people die from the virus, so be it. Its a small price to pay to keep our freedoms intact. Furthermore, I would stand by that argument even if I get sick from the virus.

Sock Puppet Conservatives

There are people out there that like constitutional rights and civil liberties “in theory”, but in practice they view these rights as inconvenient to their goals. For these so-called “conservatives”, the Bill of Rights is only for peacetime. When war or domestic conflict rolls around, our rights are suddenly forfeit.

I use this particular metaphor often but I really can’t find a better one:

Government power is like the “one ring” in Lord Of The Rings. Everyone desperately wants control of it. The side of evil thirsts for it. The side of good thinks that if only they had it they could use it for honorable ends; they think they can use it to defeat evil. They are wrong.

The “one ring” (government power) corrupts ALL. It cannot be controlled. It cannot be used for good. Eventually, it warps the minds of those who hold it, twisting them into something grotesque. Good people who exploit the ring end up becoming the very monsters they were trying to defeat, and evil wins.

Right now through the Trump Administration conservatives are being tempted with the “one ring”. We are being tempted with ultimate government power. The leftist hordes and their actions are egregious. They act irrationally and foolishly. Their communist ideology and mindless zealotry is destructive and they openly seek the collapse of western civilization. But in the end this doesn’t matter. They are nothing more than useful idiots for a greater agenda.

It’s interesting that the only solution I see being presented in conservative circles lately is the use of federal power to crush the protests and riots. Again, this might seem like a reasonable action in the face of so much lawlessness, but if taken too far the implications are horrifying.

Some conservative groups are cheering the deployment of federal agencies to cities like Portland in the name of stopping civil unrest, but there is a fine line between law enforcement and martial law. And by martial law, I mean ANY government force that is designed to suppress or break civil protections. This does not only include a military presence, it can also include federal agencies overstepping their bounds, just as they did at Bundy Ranch.

In Portland and other cities like New York, federal agents and police have been snatching protesters off the street in unmarked vans without identifying themselves. Essentially, they are black-bagging people. This is the kind of behavior which real conservatives traditionally despise.

Yes, some of these protesters did in fact loot or participate in property damage; and some of them did absolutely nothing. This is being done under 40 US Code 1315 which was signed into law by Neo-con president George W. Bush after the 9/11 attacks as part of the tidal wave of unconstitutional Patriot Act measures that were railroaded through during mass fear and panic.

Conservatives have been warning for years about the potential for misuse of these laws to violate people’s rights. Will we now support them because they are being enforced against people we don’t like? I will say this: If an unmarked van with unidentified armed people tried to grab me off the street, I would do everything in my power to put a bullet in each and every one of them. And, I would not hold it against any person who did the same, even if they were my ideological opponent.

Some conservatives are calling for much more, including the deployment of the National Guard or a standing military presence. The use of such tactics opens the door to serious consequences, and I believe if we allow the federal government to bend the rules now, we set the stage for expansive martial law in the near future. By extension, labeling looters or rioters as “terrorists” also has dangerous implications. Those of us that were activists during the Obama years know how freely that label is thrown around by government and the media.

We might feel righteous in violating the civil liberties of social justice Marxists because of their insane behavior and the threat they pose to the stability of the country, but, what happens when the roles are reversed? During Bundy Ranch, conservatives were also being labeled “terrorists”, and who is to say we won’t find ourselves in that position again? Would defying the pandemic lockdowns also be considered an existential threat to the country?

Uncomfortable Questions

There are some questions in all of this that are either not being asked or are being deliberately avoided. For example:

1) Why is it that the Trump Administration has not bothered to go after the elites and globalists FUNDING Antifa and BLM groups behind the unrest? Why does George Soros and his Open Society Foundation get to operate in the US with impunity? And what about the Ford Foundation? Members of that institution openly admit that they have been funding and organizing the social justice cult for decades. Shouldn’t the men behind the curtain paying for the entire thing be targeted first, instead of going after the useful idiots? Perhaps the fact that Trump is surrounded by those very same elites in his cabinet has something to do with it…

2) If we support martial law measures, WHO are we giving that power to? Is it Trump, or the deep state ghouls that advise him daily? People like Wilber Ross, a New York Rothschild banking agent, Mike Pompeo, a long time Neo-con warmonger and promoter of mass surveillance, Robert Lightheizer, a member of the globalist Council On Foreign Relations, Steve Mnuchin, former Goldman Sachs banker, Larry Kudlow, former Federal Reserve, etc. Even if you think Trump has the best of intentions, can anyone honestly say the same for his cabinet?

3) When the left is “defeated” and the riots stop, will martial law simply fade away, or, is it a Pandora’s Box that can never be closed again? And if it doesn’t end, will supporters justify fighting against not just leftists, but also conservatives who will not tolerate it? I for one will be among the people that will not tolerate it.

Real Solutions

There are other much better solutions than martial law when confronting the leftist riots or the pandemic.

For the pandemic, stop trying to dictate public behavior. If individuals feel they are at risk from the virus, then they can take their own precautions. The only other option is to continue on the path of shutdowns and an informant society that will destroy this nation in a matter of months.

Foe the leftists, communities that stage an armed presence in the face of protests have ALL escaped riots and property damage. Sometimes Antifa and BLM decide to not even show up. We DON’T NEED a federal presence or a military presence to get the job done. We can do it ourselves. We already have proof that this strategy works.

And, if the lefties want to burn down their own neighborhoods and cities and local governments don’t want to stop them, then I say let it happen. It’s sad for the people in these places that had no dog in the fight, but maybe this will teach the locals to speak out against BLM or Antifa instead of remaining silent or virtue signaling their support in the hopes that their businesses won’t be attacked. Maybe they should look for better government officials as well.

Finally, it’s far past time to go after the elites that fund and engineer such groups. Remove their influence and I suspect many people will be shocked at how fast all this unrest and chaos suddenly disappears. Isn’t this what people wanted Trump to do from the very beginning? And yet, nothing happens to the vampires at the top.

Only cowards demand everyone else give up their freedoms just so they can feel safe. The establishment is trying to pit the American people against each other as a means to pave a path to tyranny. I believe what the elites want more than anything else is to trick conservatives into forsaking their own principles. If we do, we become hypocrites that can no longer sustain a movement for freedom. By becoming the monster to fight the monster we hand our enemies victory. This is unacceptable.

Doom and Bloom: Covid Fatigue and the Second Wave

The Altons at Doom and Bloom Medical have an article up about Covid Fatigue and the Second Wave. A second spike in cases is coming.

COVID-19 cases may again be on the rise as a second wave of infections coincide with the reopening of many businesses throughout the United States.

Perhaps the first thing I should mention is that a second wave is going to occur as society reopened. I repeat: Regardless of the timing or the measures taken, at one point or another there is going to be a second spike in cases. This is to be expected; It’s what many pandemics do. Health officials and political policies can do little to stop it.

If we look at previous infectious disease outbreaks, like the Spanish Flu of a century ago, it’s clear that there were, not two, but three waves in Spring and Fall of 1918 and winter of 1918-19. Each wave claimed its share of victims.

Most health officials have long stated that more cases are expected. Social distancing, face coverings, and other important measures to prevent spread of infection may be breaking down. In some cases, it’s because of what I call “COVID fatigue”. People are weary of staying home, donning personal protection equipment, and avoiding the restaurants, movie theaters, malls, and other staples of normal American society. The New Normal compares poorly to the “good old days”.

Not an example of social distancing

Even for those who have adjusted to pandemic prevention guidelines, current headlines have sparked nationwide mass protests which are spilling over internationally. As you can imagine, large demonstrations don’t follow the rules of social distancing and hamper efforts to stop the spread of infection.

Public policy may also play a part. Reopening too quickly due to COVID fatigue-fueled anger may cause large numbers of new cases, while staying in semi-permanent lockdown must eventually throw the nation into a major economic depression. The balance is so delicate that a perfect solution is almost impossible to achieve. Either option is fraught with risk.

All of the above factors make it more likely that a second wave will be significant, but how significant? Will we see just a ripple in the pond or a massive tidal wave?

One expert, Dr. Lawrence Kleinman of Rutgers University, says: “I think people mistake the idea of society reopening with the idea that society is safer, but things are no safer today than they were weeks ago when we were in full lockdown,” said Dr. Lawrence Kleinman, MD MPH of Rutgers University. He goes on to say that the recipe for personal safety doesn’t change even as society opens up.

Others aren’t as pessimistic. Columbia University virologist Dr. Vincent Racaniello said, “I’m hoping we can continue our lives without having to go back into quarantine in the fall, because we’ve learned that distancing and face masks can really make a difference.”

Indeed, we have learned much about SARS-CoV2, the virus behind the COVID-19 pandemic. Besides social distancing, we have come to realize the importance of mass testing, and keeping close track of contacts. With a contagious disease, we have to know who is capable of spreading it. With workplaces beginning to reopen, this information becomes essential.

We have also realized the importance of having personal protection items in our medical kits. Surgical and N95 masks are considered to be for medical workers only, leaving the average citizens with a limited array of less-effective cloth coverings. These were endorsed by health officials, but only because of the lack of standard supplies.

Yet, many folks ended up becoming “medical workers” when someone in the family came down with a mild to moderate case of COVID-19. You can bet that there will be more face masks to go around in future outbreaks; many of these will be made in the U.S.A…(continues)

Forward Observer: Is This a Revolution?

Intelligence analyst Sam Culper of Forward Observer asks Is this a revolution?

Last night, a veteran friend and I were talking about our takes on the protests and riots.

Is this a civil war? A revolution? A rebellion or insurrection?

My initial assessment is that this actually is a revolution, in the sense of the Maidan or Tahrir Square, where organizers attempt to foment a popular uprising against the government.

Maidan, of course, was Ukraine’s 2014 revolution. Tahrir Square, Egypt’s during the 2011 Arab Spring. In both cases, mass protests and violence eventually succeeded in forcing the resignation of the countries’ leaders. There were other cases, too: Puerto Rico, South Korea, Spain, Iceland, and Finland each had their own bouts of widespread protests that led to political change.

All the way back in 2017, which now seems like 20 years ago, a U.S.-based militant socialist web magazine began promoting the idea of mass protests and small scale direct action as a means to bait President Trump into cracking down on Leftists nationwide.

The anticipated iron fist reaction would rally support for the Leftist cause, the authors explained, and expand the class conflict against capitalism and the state.

Since then, the idea of mass mobilization has become regular fare for both liberal and leftist think-pieces.

Rising to its highest popularity during the impeachment debacle, left wing authors encouraged mass protests where millions of Americans would fill the streets in major cities across the country, demanding an end to the Trump administration. According to this calculus, only mass mobilization could produce enough sustained political, social, and economic pressure to force President Trump’s resignation.

The country’s proponents of class conflict saw this push as a launching pad for socialist revolution. That mass mobilization effort fizzled along with impeachment, but what we’re seeing now is the result of the same organizing.

Riding on top of the protests against police brutality and the death of George Floyd is the socialist class war against law enforcement, capitalism, and the state. This is their revolution — not a singular event but a process.

In response to the protest demands, some municipalities are cutting police budgets. In some cases, there’s serious talk about dissolving police departments altogether. Ostensibly, this is to reduce police violence and redirect budgetary savings to social programs.

For the socialist revolution, without police, there are no evictions. There’s no one to stop looting, theft, and the forced redistribution of goods. Without police, there’s no one to enforce laws that protect the exploitative capitalist class against expropriation and violence from the proletariat, so the theory goes.

Now let’s answer the question: is this an actual revolution? Yes, for a few reasons.

1. These aims are nothing short of revolutionary.
2. The proponents of these political, social, and economic policy changes believe this is a revolution and describe themselves as revolutionaries.
3. We’re seeing some signs of success towards these revolutionary aims.

Success isn’t assured through electoral politics. This is why “dual power” exists. This is the concept of developing both political and social power. Institution-building in oppressed communities, outside of politics, is a form of power that can accomplish what politics often can’t. According to the theory, social power eventually grows larger than the opposition’s political power, and that becomes the basis for socialist revolution.

The bottom line is that the conflict here and it’s going to get much worse as the other side responds. Welcome to the next phase of our low intensity conflict.

Unz Review: The Systemic Collapse of the US Society Has Begun

The Saker has written an article for The Unz Review on the failing state of the USA, The Systemic Collapse of the US Society Has Begun. Other writers who have been featured on this site (such as John Mosby of Mountain Guerrilla) have been writing about the slow collapse of the US for some time. Empires collapse. The decline often takes place over decades with periods of slower or faster decline. Perhaps one day we’ll be saying that the US failed slowly, slowly, then all at once. Only time will tell.

Cops in DC

I have lived in the United States for a total of 24 years and I have witnessed many crises over this long period, but what is taking place today is truly unique and much more serious than any previous crisis I can recall. And to explain my point, I would like to begin by saying what I believe the riots we are seeing taking place in hundreds of US cities are not about. They are not about:

Racism or “White privilege”

Police violence

Social alienation and despair

Poverty

Trump

The liberals pouring fuel on social fires

The infighting of the US elites/deep state

They are not about any of these because they encompass all of these issues, and more.

It is important to always keep in mind the distinction between the concepts of “cause” and “pretext”. And while it is true that all the factors listed above are real (at least to some degree, and without looking at the distinction between cause and effect), none of them are the true cause of what we are witnessing. At most, the above are pretexts, triggers if you want, but the real cause of what is taking place today is the systemic collapse of the US society.

The next thing which we must also keep in mind is that evidence of correlation is not evidence of causality. Take, for example, this article from CNN entitled “US black-white inequality in 6 stark charts” which completely conflates the two concepts and which includes the following sentence (stress added) “Those disparities exist because of a long history of policies that excluded and exploited black Americans, said Valerie Wilson, director of the program on race, ethnicity and the economy at the Economic Policy Institute, a left-leaning group.” The word “because” clearly point to a causality, yet absolutely nothing in the article or data support this. The US media is chock-full of such conflations of correlation and causality, yet it is rarely denounced.

For a society, any society, to function a number of factors that make up the social contract need to be present. The exact list that make up these factors will depend on each individual country, but they would typically include some kind of social consensus, the acceptance by most people of the legitimacy of the government and its institutions, often a unifying ideology or, at least, common values, the presence of a stable middle-class, the reasonable hope for a functioning “social life”, educational institutions etc. Finally, and cynically, it always helps the ruling elites if they can provide enough circuses (TV) and bread (food) to most citizens. This is even true of so-called authoritarian/totalitarian societies which, contrary to the liberal myth, typically do enjoy the support of a large segment of the population (if only because these regimes are often more capable of providing for the basic needs of society).

Right now, I would argue that the US government has almost completely lost its ability to deliver any of those factors, or act to repair the broken social contract. In fact, what we can observe is the exact opposite: the US society is highly divided, as is the US ruling class (which is even more important). Not only that, but ever since the election of Trump, all the vociferous Trump-haters have been undermining the legitimacy not only of Trump himself, but of the political system which made his election possible. I have been saying that for years: by saying “not my President” the Trump-haters have de-legitimized not only Trump personally, but also de-legitimized the Executive branch as such.

This is an absolutely amazing phenomenon: while for almost four years Trump has been destroying the US Empire externally, Trump-haters spent the same four years destroying the US from the inside! If we look past the (largely fictional) differences between the Republicrats and the Demolicans we can see that they operate like a demolition tag-team of sorts and while they hate each other with a passion, they both contribute to bringing down both the Empire and the United States. For anybody who has studied dialectics this would be very predictable but, alas, dialectics are not taught anymore, hence the stunned “deer in the headlights” look on the faces of most people today.

Finally, it is pretty clear that for all its disclaimers about supporting only the “peaceful protestors” and its condemnation of the “out of town looters”, most of the US media (as well as the alt media) is completely unable to give a moral/ethical evaluation of what is taking place. What I mean by this is the following:

By repeating mantras about how “Black anger is legitimate” the US liberal media is basically placing a seal of approval on the violence and looting. After all, if Black “anger” is legitimate, and if “White privilege” is real, then it is quite “understandable” that this “anger” “sometimes” “boils over” and leads to “regrettable” “excesses”. Just take a look at this image of Biden kneeling down before a Black demonstrator:

Of course, Biden and his supporters will claim that Biden was only kneeling before a cute little girl and her peacefully protesting father, but when combined with the attacks against Trump’s “law and order” rhetoric by Biden and his supporters (including four former US Presidents!), I believe that these kinds of photo-ops are sending a very different message: keep “protesting” as we are on your side which, coming from a guy like Biden, the ultimate symbol of the 1%er elites and a perfect example of “White privilege”, just goes to show that the hypocrisy of US politicians really knows no bounds or limits.

I have to note here that these riots also represent a potential danger for both factions of the Uniparty in power: for the Demolicans the riots probably represent the very last chance to prevent a Trump-reelection, but if the Demolicans are too obvious in support of the riots, then it could backfire against them and turn all the frightened “law and order” types against them. But if they do not support the riots, then the Demolicans will alienate their core constituency (a hodgepodge of various “minorities” pushing their narrow identity-politics agenda). Likewise, for Trump this is an opportunity to show his “law and order” credentials and promise the White people and the relatively fewer Blacks of his base that he will protect them. However, if he is too direct about this and if Trump orders what might be seen by many as unfair or excessive force (of which there has been a lot almost everywhere), then he risks pushing many moderate Republicrats over the edge and side with the Demolicans (or, at least, withhold their vote). In other words, both factions of the Uniparty feel that the riots are both an opportunity and a threat and this is why neither faction can come out and speak truthfully about the real causes of the riots.

The exact same message of weakness and even submissive impotence is, I believe, sent every time a cop kneels when confronting even peaceful demonstrators like on this photo. While this might be intended as a message of compassion, and maybe even an apology, the only thing the rioters will see here is a powerful sign of surrender of the local authorities and I find that extremely dangerous.

Yes, there are plenty of racist, violent and otherwise incompetent cops in the USA. And yes, many of my Black friends reported feeling singled out and treated rudely by cops. But having extensively traveled the world, I want to assure you that the US most definitely does not have the worst cops out there. In fact, I believe that most US cops are decent people. Much more importantly, these cops are the “thin blue line” which protects society against criminals. And while I do believe that US policemen ought to be better educated, better trained, better led and better supervised, I also realize that there is also no short term alternative to them. It is all very fine to dream about educated, peaceful and non-racist cops, but if you remove the existing police force from the equation, there are no other alternatives (the national guard or the regular armed forces do not qualify and don’t have the correct training to deal with civilians anyway), especially in those states which have successfully killed the 2nd Amendment by means of what I call “death by a thousand regulatory cuts” (including NY and NJ)…(continues)

Forward Observer: Where Do We Go from Here? Riot Edition

Intelligence analyst Sam Culper at Forward Observer discusses riots and low intensity conflict in Where to we go from here?

Are these protests and riots the beginning of something larger in our country’s low intensity conflict? I’m going to try to answer that question here in a few points…

First, let’s start with a simple fact: These riots are what we consider “low intensity conflict,” which exists below the threshold of conventional war (tanks and bombers) but above routine, peaceful competition. This is a gray zone between the black and white of war where we see both violent and nonviolent activity that fails to meet the definition of declared war.

The United States is in a low intensity conflict and has been since at least 2016, if not 2008.

Second, these riots are a continuation of a broader conflict. While many were rather pure in their desire to protest the death of George Floyd, there were other elements using the opportunity to take other action.

Those who committed violence over the past several days can be separated into four categories.

1. Opportunistic actors who sought personal gain.

2. Social conflict actors who expressed their anger over the death of George Floyd and used violence as a means to coerce the political class into making desired changes.

3. Class conflict actors who committed acts of violence in their class struggle against the capitalist system. As one professor recently put it, “[L]ooting is an expression of power.”

4. And, yes, I’ve seen plenty of criticism over some of law enforcement’s heavy handed tactics. This violence should not go unnoticed, because police forces are a part of this conflict, too.

(I’ve also seen some claims that “white supremacists” were in some way responsible for the violent rioting, which comes as no surprise when one considers the outlets pushing that narrative. Pressed on that claim, Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison said over the weekend that “nobody really knows” the political motivations behind the violence. It didn’t stop him from making that claim prior to the interview. I’ll wager a guess: those responsible for the violence weren’t doing it on behalf of white supremacy.)

Third, it’s important to note the development of soft power. Some on the Right minimize the capability of the Far Left because the Far Left is largely unarmed. This is a mistake.

Aside from hard power — the ability to project force — there’s soft power, which exists on the moral and information plane of conflict.

Over the weekend, we saw much of mainstream media excuse the behavior of the rioters and deflect responsibility for what’s happening.

CNN’s Don Lemon complained on his show that America’s power class weren’t coming to the defense of the protestors and rioters.

“Why aren’t they helping these young people? These young people are out there standing on a platform at the edge of an abyss by themselves… Get on television or do something and help these young people instead of sitting in your mansions and doing nothing. And have some moral courage and stop worrying about your reputation and your brand,” Lemon begged.

That’s soft power. Money and funding, influence, moral support and framing the moral authority — these are the elements that enable hard power. And Don Lemon pleaded with celebrities and the donor class to help develop this soft power.

Finally — let’s look at where we could go from here because the worst might still be ahead for at least two reasons.

First, over the past few days, I’ve seen numerous examples of protestors and rioters saying they want to go to the suburbs next.

With the exception of the one video that was linked to the Drudge Report, the evidence has been on social media, with organizers and influencers putting out these suggestions to those who want to continue the protest outside of urban areas.

I read most of these comments with some skepticism, but I’m completely open to the possibility that protests and violence do migrate in some instances. That would be a mistake, in my opinion.

Today (Sunday), Attorney General Bill Barr published a press release in which he warned that the Department of Justice and the states will “reestablish law and order” through a large scale presence of police and the National Guard.

Barr also threatened that federal law enforcement is out for “violent radical agitators,” and labeled the antifascists as engaging in acts of domestic terrorism. The Department of Justice is working with all 56 regional Joint Terrorism Task Forces (JTTF) to facilitate this action.

The risk in either of these cases is that violence is escalated.

For one, some suburbs might make easy targets in the beginning, but just as we saw militias forming to protect businesses, the suburbs are likely to become harder targets for would-be rioters and looters. If it develops, this scenario obviously brings a likelihood of violence.

And two, law enforcement actions, to include arrests or raids on the homes of “violent radical agitators,” are going to aid the argument that the United States has descended into fascism. That could spark more protests and more unrest.

Mises Institute: Three Ways Lockdowns Paved the Way for Riots

Ryan McMaken at the Mises Institute has an article on Three Ways Lockdowns Paved the Way for These Riots

There were many reasons to oppose the COVID-19 lockdowns.

They cost human lives in terms of deferred medical treatment. They cost human lives in terms of greater suicide and drug overdoses. Domestic abuse and child abuse have increased. There is also good reason to believe that lockdowns don’t actually work. The lockdown activists capitalized on media-stoked fear to push their authoritarian agenda based not on science, but on the whims of a handful of experts who insisted that they need not present any actual evidence that their bizarre, draconian, and extreme scheme was worth the danger posed to human rights, health, and the economic well-being of billions of human beings.

Those who lacked the obsessive and irresponsible tunnel vision of the prolockdown people warned that there were other dangers as well, in terms of social and political conflict.

It didn’t require an especially clear crystal ball to see that destroying the livelihoods of countless millions while empowering a police state to harass and arrest law-abiding citizens would create a situation that maybe—just maybe—could lead to greater social and political conflict.

Specifically, there are three ways in which the lockdowns laid the groundwork for our current state of unrest.

The Lockdowns Created an Economic Disaster

The COVID-19 stay-at-home orders, business closures, and other forms of coerced social distancing have so far led to job losses for well over 30 million Americans. The unemployment rate has risen to levels not seen since the Great Depression. Food banks are under strain as Americans line up for free food. Thanks to government moratoria on evictions in many areas, it is still unknown to what extent homeowners and renters are unable to pay mortgages and rents, but a wave of delinquencies is almost certainly coming.

To advocates of lockdowns, this is all “worth it” even though these sorts of economic stresses often lead to suicide, stress-induced disease, and death. But impoverishment, unemployment, and financial ruin are all merely “inconvenient,” as described by head lockdown advocate Anthony Fauci.

To someone who isn’t enamored of lockdowns, however, it is clear that millions of job losses are likely to worsen a variety of social ills, sometimes even resulting in violence. Moreover, the current job losses appear to be affecting the young and those who earn lower incomes most.

Lockdown advocates have attempted to avoid responsibility for all this by claiming that it is the pandemic itself that has caused the current economic disaster, and not the lockdowns. This is a baseless assertion. As has been shown, neither the pandemics of 1918 or 1958 led to the sorts of job losses and decline in economic growth that we’re now seeing.

The Lockdowns Destroyed Social Institutions

Another outcome of the lockdowns has been the destruction of American social institutions. These institutions include schools (both public and private), churches, coffee shops, bars, libraries, barbershops, and many others.

Lockdown advocates continue to claim that this is no big deal and insist that people just sit at home and “binge watch” television shows. But researchers have long pointed to the importance of these institutions in preserving peace and as a means of defusing social tensions and problems.

As much as lockdown advocates may wish that human beings could be reduced to creatures that do nothing more than work all day and watch television all night, the fact is that no society can long endure such conditions.

Human beings need what are known as “third places.” In a 2016 report, the Brookings Institution described what these places are:

the most effective ones for building real community seem to be physical places where people can easily and routinely connect with each other: churches, parks, recreation centers, hairdressers, gyms and even fast-food restaurants. A recent newspaper article on McDonald’s found that for lower-income Americans, the twin arches are becoming almost the equivalent of the English “pub,” which after all is short for “public house”: groups of retirees meeting for coffee and talk, they might hold regular Bible study meetings there, and people treat the restaurant as an inexpensive hangout.

Third places have a number of important community-building attributes. Depending on their location, social classes and backgrounds can be “leveled-out” in ways that are unfortunately rare these days, with people feeling they are treated as social equals. Informal conversation is the main activity and most important linking function. One commentator refers to third places as the “living room” of society.

The lockdown advocates, in a matter of a few days, cut people off from their third places and insisted, in many cases, that this would be the “new normal” for a year or more.

Yet, these third places cannot simply be shut down—and the public told to just forget about them indefinitely—without creating the potential for violence and other antisocial behavior.

Indeed, third places act as institutions that provide a type of social control that is key to a well-functioning society. In his trenchant book The Revolt of the Elites and the Betrayal of Democracy, historian and social critic Christopher Lasch described the importance of third places in communicating political and social values and conventions to young people, and in setting the bounds of acceptable behavior within the community. Lasch notes that these institutions are also important in defusing violent impulses among the young. Also of great importance is the fact that third places provide a means of social control that is voluntary and not a form of state coercion.

Writing in the 1990s, Lasch was lamenting the decline of third places, although he emphasized their importance even in their modern reduced form. Thanks to the lockdowns, however, these places have been crippled far beyond what Lasch might ever have imagined.

The Lockdowns Empowered the Police State

The lockdowns have created a situation in which millions of law-abiding citizens have been deemed criminals merely for seeking to make a living, leave their homes, or engage in peaceful trade.

In many areas, violations of the lockdown orders have been—or even still are, in many places—treated as criminal acts by police. This has greatly increased negative interactions between police and citizens who by no moral definition are criminals of any sort.

Many have already seen the stories: police arresting mothers for using playground equipment, police arresting business owners for using their own property, police beating people for the “crime” of standing on a sidewalk.

Complicating the issue is the apparent fact that police have not enforced social distancing edicts “uniformly.” Some have alleged, for example, that the NYPD has lopsidedly targeted nonwhites in enforcement:

of the 40 people arrested [for social distancing violations in Brooklyn between March 17 and May 4], 35 were African American, 4 were Hispanic and 1 was white. The arrests were made in neighborhoods—Brownsville, Bedford-Stuyvesant, Cypress Hills and East New York—which have large concentrations of blacks and Latinos.

This may or may not reflect the reality of the general situation, but the fact is that the lockdowns created the perception among many that this is just yet another case of law enforcement targeting certain populations over small-time violations.

Moreover, it is quite plausible that lower-income populations have more often been on the receiving end of state harassment in the name of social distancing. After all, compliance with lockdowns is something of a luxury reserved for higher-income, white-collar residents who can work from home and remain comfortable for long periods in their roomy houses. Working-class people and those with fewer resources are far more likely to need to find income and venture outside during lockdowns. This attracts the attention of police.

Lockdown advocates, apparently in their usual state of extreme naïvete, perhaps believed that further empowering police to violently enforce government decrees against petty infractions would not lead to any unfortunate side effects down the road. Yet criminalizing millions of Americans and subjecting them to heightened police harassment is not a recipe for social tranquility.

Worsening a Volatile Situation

Of course, my comments here should not be interpreted as making excuses for rioters. Smashing up the property of innocent small business owners—or worse, physically harming innocent people—is reprehensible in all circumstances. But this isn’t about making excuses. We’re talking about avoiding extreme and immoral government policies (i.e., police-enforced lockdowns) that remove those institutions and conditions which are important in helping minimize conflict.

Some may insist that the riots would have occurred no matter what, but it’s easy to see how the lockdowns made a bad situation worse. Yes, some of the rioters are lifelong thugs who are always on the lookout for new opportunities to steal and maim. But experience suggests that the pool of people willing to engage in riots is often larger during periods of mass unemployment than during other periods. In addition, those people who exist on the margins of criminality—the sorts of people for whom third places serve an important role in moderating their more antisocial tendencies—are more likely to be swept up in these events when third places are abolished. And, as we have seen, lockdowns also create more opportunities for police abuse that ignite riots of the sort we’ve seen in recent days.

It’s true the responsibility for the riots lies primarily with the rioters. But we cannot deny that policymakers fuel the flames of conflict when they outlaw jobs and destroy people’s social support systems by cutting them off from their communities. It’s also wise to not provoke people by pushing for widespread human rights violations and additional police harassment. But this is what lockdown advocates have done, and their imprudence should not be forgotten.