Lew Rockwell Institute

“The true measure of a nation’s power isn’t found in its politics or economy, but in the most overlooked factor of all: its geography. We reveal how the United States won the geographic lottery and compare its advantages to the immense physical challenges facing Russia, China, and Africa. By the end, you’ll understand how the land itself predetermines which countries rise and fall, and why a nation’s fate is ultimately written on the map.”

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Ginny Garner wrote:

Lew,

For those who couldn’t attend the Peace and Freedom Rally held in Kingston NY on September 27, 2025, the video can be watched on YouTube. Speakers were Scott Ritter, Dennis Kucinich, Judge Napolitano, Ray McGovern, event organizer Gerald Celente, Garland Nixon, Joe Laurie and Diane Sare.

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David Martin wrote:

Which country is leading the charge against the Gaza genocide?

See here.

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Tim McGraw wrote:

HI Lew,

Thanks for publishing my stories and articles, links, and comments. You are very kind. Your cause is good at Mises and LRC. I hope you can continue the fight. I find myself losing interest in DC antics, media lies, and especially Trump’s insanity. It makes me almost miss Biden’s senility. The circus, the barkers, the clowns, the athletes, and the freaks are all starting to bore me and drive me kinda crazy. Will someone please turn off that Circus Calliope? It is giving me a headache.

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Thanks, Tim McGraw.

Timmy Tae’s Thoughts

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Joy Reid warns Americans of MAGA plans: “No income tax, no regulations, earn as much as you want, and leave it to your children with no taxes, that’s the world they want.” That actually sounds like a free society. Unfortunately, it is not a MAGA society, which also includes high tariffs, increased military action at home and abroad, and a doubling down of the drug war.

The post Too Bad This Is Not What MAGA Republicans Really Want appeared first on LewRockwell.

Thanks, Bill Madden

See this and this.

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David Martin wrote:

Got nothing against eye candy, but it is a bit inconsistent with the TPUSA Erika, I should say. She could be illustrating “I Like My Women a Little on the Trashy Side.”  

But as they say, “What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas,” except that it’s on a YouTube video.

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BREAKING: Tyler Robinson CONFIRMED To Be In A CIA Advanced Program For College Students- The Center For Anticipatory Intelligence- As His Defense Considers Waiving The Preliminary Hearing

“If His Lawyers Waive The Preliminary Hearing, Then I Would Say That Tyler Robinson Is In A… pic.twitter.com/Hfzsku6Uf9

— Alex Jones (@RealAlexJones) September 29, 2025

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Click Here:

Infowars

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Chun Pan wrote:

I have been following the progress of the “Global Sumud Flotilla” with intensity. 

The Global Sumud Flotilla is a flotilla of 47 ships sailing to Gaza with humanitarian supplies.  It is within 3-4 days of reaching Gaza.

The confrontation with the Israeli military is imminent.  However, the flotilla is currently protected by warships from Spain and Italy.  Hopefully, these two naval warships will increase the likelihood of success of this mission.

I am truly amazed by the courage of the over 600 humanitarians on these vessels.

To follow the progress of this mission, please go to their website at:

https://globalsumudflotilla.org/

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The news has been filled with reports of assassinations, attempted assassinations, and shootings targeted against law enforcement. The spate of political violence has seriously eroded America’s legitimacy as a moral and decent state. How did we get here?

U.S. state violence on the world stage may help explain the rise of political violence here at home.

The idea of political assassination gained traction with the U.S. intelligence services during World War II, which was viewed (somewhat understandably) as an existential struggle that justified any act, however illegal, that was necessary for the cause.

During the Cold War, that mindset continued, but the illegal killing was hidden because it was inconsistent with the shining-city-on-the-hill propaganda. Certain intelligence agencies secretly supported a number of high-profile political assassinations, such as the 1961 killing of Prime Minister Patrice Lamumba of the Democratic Republic of Congo and the 1963 killing of President Diem of South Vietnam, not to mention a number of attempts to kill Fidel Castro of Cuba. These killings were presented as organic local forces rising up against “corrupt” leaders. Then and now, any leader who was disobedient to the U.S. regime was by definition “corrupt.”

Because of embarrassing press reports of the CIA and FBI’s illegal operations in and out of the United States, the Senate Select Committee to Study Governmental Operations With Respect to Intelligence Activities was formed in 1975 to investigate the abuses of power and direct harm to U.S. citizens. It was conveniently called the Church Committee after the chairman, Frank Church of Idaho.

The nation was shocked by what was revealed, including operations such as MKULTRA, a mind control experiment on unwitting U.S. citizens who were subjected to destabilizing drug exposure and other abuse. It is believed that much of the really appalling MKULTRA information was hidden and destroyed. Americans also learned about COINTELPRO (acronym for Counter Intelligence Program), a series of  FBI operations aimed to disrupt and harm American anti-war and civil rights groups. The committee also uncovered operations performing illegal assassinations.

For two years, the Church Committee uncovered many disgusting abuses and recommended oversight and controls to end them. But it was not long before the oversight and controls faded.

In 1986, the Iran–Contra scandal exploded and exposed the Reagan administration, which had funneled arms through Israel to our “enemy” Iran to provide funds for anti-communist guerrilla  operations in Central America. It was a huge scandal, and there were indications that it was also a money laundering operation to support other illegal behavior by intel agencies. These embarrassing revelations caused the agencies to be more careful.

The first Gulf War led to the U.S. stationing troops in Saudi Arabia. This was a long term goal of the ZioCons and a provocation to many Muslims in the region.

Then came the big enchilada: The September 11, 2001 attacks on New York and Washington birthed the Global War on Terror.

The previous existential threat of the Cold War had fizzled out with the collapse of the Soviet Union. This new existential threat provided the excuse to invade and wreck a number of nations the ZioCons had had in their sights for decades. Who could argue against fighting terrorists?

Since the GWOT was deemed existential, the George W. Bush administration saw fit to torture and kill suspected terrorists without any due process. Not wanting to be accused of sympathy for terrorists, many politicians and media figures held their tongues or even actively supported the White House. As a result, the U.S. regime’s policy morphed from secretly murdering people to bragging about the number of suspected terrorists killed.

Read the Whole Article

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How do you find your way home when you’re lost and far away? Where do you start? In wilderness survival training, it’s “head downhill.” That will bring you to water, and water will bring you to civilization.

Let’s look at the last two weeks:

1. Charlie Kirk’s assassination.
2. Bombing alleged fentanyl boats heading to the US.
3. Copycat (from Kirk’s assassin, bullet writing) shootings at ICE.
4. Acetaminophen (in some 500 brands, most prominently Tylenol) links to autism.
5. National Guard deployed to cities for crime control.
6. National reading studies: half of Americans are functionally illiterate.
7. AI partners induce psychosis and suicide.
8. Illinois honors student sues a public high school for her illiteracy.
9. RFK, Jr. fires and reorganizes the ACIP board.
10. Florida stops ALL vaccine mandates.

I irritated conservative friends a few days ago by disagreeing with Trump’s bombing of alleged fentanyl boats. What happens when the government decides compost-grown tomatoes are dangerous? Bombing compost piles? A government that can keep me from ingesting fentanyl and methamphetamine can keep me from ingesting raw milk or homemade charcuterie.

As I head downhill in this societal wilderness, I find commonalities in our lostness. More than 80 percent of first-time illicit drug use occurs in public schools. We’re paying $16,000 per student per year and getting a 50 percent functional illiteracy rate. And now we have pregnant women jiving on TikTok binging on Tylenol, and my taxes are supposed to pay for the consequences of that irresponsible behavior? And I’m supposed to pay for the dysfunction of failing public schools? And AI-induced psychosis? And assassins inspired by “gestapo” and “Nazi” and “Fascists” spewed from the mouths of Godless pagans?

How do we find our way home? I suggest it starts by changing our governmental obligations from care to responsibility. How do you develop responsible people? You do it by making them bear the consequences of their decisions. You don’t exercise discernment muscles by making decisions for them or promising to pick up the pieces for bad-decision collateral damage.

My heart breaks for dysfunction, but as terrible as it is, we can’t find our way home if we keep wandering without a plan. So here’s a plan.

1. Eliminate all government funding for education, from kindergarten to college; no college grants; that drops 80 percent of first-time drug use. Colleges have to fund themselves.
2. Eliminate all government health advice; let folks find their own path. Yes, eliminate the Dept. of Health and Human Services; let us find our own way, thank you very much.
3. Eliminate all government involvement in health care; folks can decide what they want and shop, learn, and share their own findings. Wouldn’t it be neat if TikTok shared various positives and negatives about competing therapies? Think how informed we’d become.
4. Legalize all drugs; if you mess up your life with drugs, you can suffer the consequences. No government agency will help you pick up the pieces. No Medicare; no Medicaid; no doctor licensing; it’s all privatized on the free market; no government manipulation, corruption, fraud, and extortion, no prescription licenses.
5. Eliminate the IRS and go to a 10 percent flat tax. If 10 percent is good enough for God’s tithe, it should be good enough for society.
6. Cut the federal government by 90 percent; pay off the debt; bring back sound money backed by gold; no more government borrowing, period. Like a business, the government must live within its means.
7. Eliminate prisons and institute Singapore’s caning punishment; fast and cheap.
8. Shut down every foreign military base; bring our boys and girls home.
9. Food Emancipation Proclamation–let neighbors transact food commerce without asking the government’s permission.
10. Eliminate zoning laws so folks can generate income from their properties without bribing government officials.
11. Eliminate all government grants, loans, aid, etc. Foreign and domestic, from agriculture to ammunition.
12. Extend voting privileges ONLY to folks who pay more to the governnment (taxes) than they receive in benefits; these are the true stakeholders of a culture and the only ones truly invested in its overall functionality.

This is not a comprehensive list, but you get the overall drift. What we need is MARA–Make Americans RESPONSIBLE Again. How do we do that? We make ourselves live with the consequences of our decisions. That’s the way home. America was great when the government was smaller. The bigger the government, the smaller we as a people become.

What I see instead are rabbit trails of little tweaks here and there, but the rich get richer and the poor get poorer and the sick get sicker and the have-nots proliferate because nobody ever told them it’s up to them. Sometimes the best hand up is a swift kick in reality’s seat of the pants. No free lunch. Make your own destiny. I’m glad to help you, but pick up your feet if I’m carrying you. God don’t make no junk, so quit acting like you’re junk. And government, quit incentivizing junk behavior and junk decisions.

What do you consider the first “downhill way home” path?

This article was originally published on Brownstone Institute.

The post The Way Home appeared first on LewRockwell.

President Trump has said on several occasions that he supports the death penalty for drug dealers. His recent actions show that the death penalty he seeks is not the result of an arrest, prosecution, trial, conviction, and sentencing. He prefers the death penalty by extrajudicial murder.

Back in 2018, Trump said during a phone call with Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte: “I just wanted to congratulate you because I am hearing of the unbelievable job on the drug problem. Many countries have the problem, we have a problem, but what a great job you are doing and I just wanted to call and tell you that.”

This is the Rodrigo Duterte who was just charged by the International Criminal Court (ICC) with “violent acts including murder to be committed against alleged criminals, including alleged drug dealers and users.” He is now being held at an ICC detention facility in the Netherlands.

On September 2, Trump ordered the U.S. military to conduct “a kinetic strike” against “terrorists” in “international waters transporting illegal narcotics, heading to the United States.” Eleven “terrorists” were killed, but “no U.S. Forces were harmed in this strike.” Trump declared: “Please let this serve as notice to anybody even thinking about bringing drugs into the United States of America. BEWARE!”

On September 15, Trump announced that the U.S. military destroyed a second boat in international waters “trafficking illicit narcotics.” A third lethal strike was carried out on another boat on September 19.

Regardless of how one feels about whether marijuana or other drugs should be legal for medical or recreational use, Trump’s actions are simply extrajudicial murder. There was no search, seizure, arrest, indictment, arraignment, prosecution, trial, conviction, or sentencing. There is no proof of what exactly was on the boat. Neither the boat nor its occupants posed any threat to the United States. The boat was in international waters and nowhere near American territory. Violating drug laws is not a death-penalty offense. Nevertheless, Trump took it upon himself to be judge, jury, and executioner.

Oh, but Trump didn’t kill anyone. Correct. He just ordered his personal attack force of the U.S. military to kill for him. But drug smuggling is a criminal offense, not an act of war that requires a response by the U.S. military.

If Trump can order the execution of people in international waters who are not even violating U.S. drug laws, then what is to stop him from ordering the execution of people in the United States who are actually violating U.S. drug laws?

Conservatives—including many conservative Christians—generally support Trump’s extrajudicial murder because they have the simplistic mindset of drugs: bad, military: good.

Trump’s actions are excused by the vast majority of conservatives because he labeled the people murdered by the U.S. military as “narco-terrorists.” But the war on drugs is just as bogus as the war on terrorism. They are both reasons why Americans increasingly live in a national security, police state instead of a free society. The real narco-terrorists are the military personnel who murder for Trump.

This is yet another reason why Americans—and especially American Christians—should not join the military. If you join the military, there is no guarantee that you won’t be ordered to murder for Donald Trump. Just like there was no guarantee that you wouldn’t have been ordered to murder for George H. W. Bush, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, Barack Obama, or Joe Biden.

If you join the military, you will be expected to unconditionally follow orders and to help carry out a reckless, belligerent, and interventionist U.S. foreign policy. You will not be defending the country, the Constitution, or American freedoms. You will be part of the president’s personal attack force and a pawn in the hands of Uncle Sam.

Yet, criticism of the military is seen by most Americans as criticism of America itself, as Jeffrey Polet, director of the Ford Leadership Forum at the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Foundation recently said:

In contemporary America, one complains about the size and status of the military to one’s own peril. We are constantly asked to defer to the militarization of our daily lives, from flyovers at ball games to military salutes at public concerts to allowing military personnel to board planes before us—throughout even our daily lives, we are slowly bent at the knee. We now find ourselves in a world where to criticize the military is to criticize America itself, and thus it goes with empires.

I couldn’t have said it any better myself.

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“If you catch 100 red fire ants as well as 100 large black ants, and put them in a jar, at first, nothing will happen. However, if you violently shake the jar and dump them back on the ground the ants will fight until they eventually kill each other. The thing is, the red ants think the black ants are the enemy and vice versa, when in reality, the real enemy is the person who shook the jar. This is exactly what’s happening in society today. The real question we need to be asking ourselves is who’s shaking the jar… and why?”

The above observation by Shera Starr cannot be improved upon.

And yet, the answer to the question is fairly simple.

But let’s first take a look at this anomaly. It’s natural to identify with some individuals more than others. That tendency occurred before Homo sapiens came into being. In addition, the tendency for animals to group into families or packs also predates humans.

We tend to want to be around those who behave the way we do and have the same perceptions as we do. That only makes sense. We wish to surround ourselves with those who are unlikely to surprise and possibly even endanger us by behaving in a fashion that we would not ourselves choose.

This is the basis of trust – an essential in group or herd mentality. And being a part of a group or herd brings to us increased safety.

So, what then, of those who are not within our group or herd? How do we relate to them?

Well, any nature programme that covers animals gathered around a water hole can provide that answer.

We see a small group of wild pigs drinking alongside a group of wildebeests. Neither species is predatory, so they learn to recognise that, even though one group is made up of savannah-living grazers and the other are forest-living foragers, they can easily co-exist, which will increase the ability of both species to use the water hole at the same time.

We might also see a group of hyenas using the water hole, but we notice that the prey animals all seek to keep a distance between themselves and the predatory hyenas. Everyone understands that they are all at the water hole for the same reason and it makes sense to share, even if, in another situation, they are natural enemies.

In fact, in most of nature, we see that species adapt to a condition of mutual tolerance in order to be able to coexist.

No surprise, then, that Homo sapiens got on the mutual tolerance bandwagon in its formative stages and, for the most part, has remained that way.

But it is also true that predators develop dual habits. They may exercise tolerance at the water hole, but at some point, they mean to make a meal of their water hole neighbours.

And when doing so, many species create associations with others of their kind to hunt.

This, too, is true of humans. Most of humanity seeks to live in a spirit of cooperation with others.

In the countryside, people erect walls and fences to establish boundaries, then find it expedient to respect such divisions in order to live in peace. Even in cities, people who live cheek by jowl in the same building respect each other’s privacy for the most part. Even if they do not become friends, they either remain polite or ignore each other.

Although there are always exceptions, for the most part, mankind behaves in a manner that is based upon “getting along.” He might argue with others, but for the most part, he understands that cooperation generally should be the objective, as it’s in his best interests.

But why, then, are we seeing in so many of the countries of the First World, a rapidly increasing polarity amongst people. Ms. Starr is exactly correct. Those who would be most inclined toward mutual tolerance have, in recent years, become so polarised that they cannot so much as get together with their own families for the holidays without getting into heated arguments.

Why are people of today so solidly in one of two camps?

Can this be blamed on the rise of the internet? Well, no, the internet has become the source of a plethora of opinions and perceptions. And more than closing people off to polarised “A” and “B” choices, the internet has served to broaden public discourse.

Of course, most people express distrust for the media, particularly those networks that purportedly deal in “news.” What passes for news today is far from objective information that the viewer can then assess at his leisure.

On one network, we view unceasing diatribes against one political party. Then we turn the channel and view unceasing diatribes against the opposing party.

In turning on the News, we arrive at Indoctrination Central.

But if we really pay attention objectively, we discover that the same programmes are dictating to us that it is either our humanitarian duty to vax, or that vaxxing will enslave us to globalists who will inject us with microchips.

They are also our source for the opposing beliefs that warfare is essential to protect us against those who seek to destroy us, or that it will be the wars themselves that will destroy us.

In fact, all of Ms. Starr’s concerns find their source in the media. When we ask the question, “Who is shaking the jar… and why?” we find that those who control the media are at the source of the polarisation of people, especially in the First World.

As to the “Why?” the answer is so simple that it’s often overlooked. Like the ants, the more a people can be made to fight each other, the easier it is to subjugate them.

And since the effort to polarise people has become so massive, we can only conclude that the ultimate objective will be to implement a far greater level of subjugation, in an abnormally short period of time.

Liberal vs. Conservative. Black vs. white. Man vs. woman. Divide and conquer.

In such a socio-political climate, the challenge will be to keep your wits about you. As the jar is shaken on a daily basis, it will be vital to recognise that those who control the media are creating a war between the pigs and the wildebeests. This is something that is not desired by either species, but as Hermann Goering stated, “Why, of course the people don’t want war.” They must be goaded into it if those who are pulling the stings are to achieve greater subjugation.

In the coming years, this trend can be expected to become far worse than at present. The challenge will be to escape the jar if you can. Find a location where the state of warfare is less pronounced, or if this is not possible, seek a location within the jar that’s away from the fray.

Those who fall for the bait – who buy into rabidly supporting one political party or another, or who allow themselves to be angered at an entire race, or who are conned into hatred of an entire gender – will prove to be the greatest casualties of subjugation.

Reprinted with permission from International Man.

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In “Government by Judiciary: The Transformation of the Fourteenth Amendment” Raoul Berger argues that the Fourteenth Amendment is treated by activist judges as a platform for “social and political revolution.” In theory, the role of the courts is to interpret the Constitution not to amend it. Nevertheless, by treating the Fourteenth Amendment as a “vague and elastic” tool designed to forge a brave world of racial equality, progressive judges have conferred revolutionary powers on themselves.

Progressive courts, while purporting merely to enforce the equal protection of the law, have reasoned that in order to give effect to equality it is necessary to “incorporate” the Bill of Rights into the Fourteenth Amendment. This then allows the Bill of Rights to be litigated in anti-discrimination cases brought by civil rights activists against state governments. For example, the incorporation doctrine was relied on in the recent federal court ruling that schools named after Confederate generals violate the First Amendment free speech rights of black students by constituting a form of “compelled speech”.

David Gordon has also pointed out that the incorporation doctrine is not found in the Constitution itself, but has been crafted by activist judges as a way of centralizing federal power in a manner that is inimical to individual liberty. As Gordon observes,

Critics of incorporation such as Raoul Berger have persuasively argued that the doctrine has scant basis; additionally, it strikes at the states as independent sources of authority to the federal government. Is it not likely that more is lost to individual liberty by the increased subordination of the states to federal courts than is gained by decisions that on occasion strike down bad state laws?

Berger notes that the Fourteenth Amendment began life as political measure in the tumult of the Reconstruction Era but soon grew in such leaps and bounds that it is now “probably the largest source of the [Supreme] Court’s business and furnishes the chief fulcrum for its control of controversial policies.” This is a far cry from the original intention of the amendment. It was originally “intended only to protect the freedmen from southern Black Codes that threatened to return them to slavery” by ensuring that freedmen would have “the right to contract, to own property, and to have access to the courts.”

It is certainly true that these basic liberties, which are protected at federal level by the Fifth Amendment due process clause, struck many observers in 1865 as essential to give effect to the abolition of slavery. As an originalist, Justice Clarence Thomas has emphasized this aspect of the amendment, but he argues that it has extended over time far beyond its original purpose. In Medina v. Planned Parenthood, he commented on the misuse of the procedural provisions of the Civil Rights Act of 1871 (the Ku Klux Klan Act) which were intended to enable freedmen to protect their constitutional rights from violation by states in order to ensure that the equal protection clause could be meaningfully enforced. Justice Thomas outlined the legislative history of this law in Medina, further observing that

The 1871 Act was designed “to enforce the Provisions of the Fourteenth Amendment … in response to an ongoing pattern of violence and intimidation” against former slaves … [to provide] a means by which private plaintiffs could obtain redress from state and local officials for certain constitutional violations.

This is a classic example of laws being enacted to resolve an emergency, which subsequently continue in force long after the emergency is over, being put to various new uses that were never originally contemplated. When the Ku Klux Klan Act was passed to deal with the violence of the Reconstruction Era, it created emergency powers that would not usually be accepted by citizens. For example, it gave the President power to suspend habeas corpus. These emergency powers were temporary, and it was never contemplated that this law would leave behind in its wake a permanent new source of ever expanding power to be wielded by the federal courts over state legislatures. Yet, as Berger shows, “for the better part of a century the Supreme Court had been handing down decisions interpreting the Fourteenth Amendment improperly, willfully ignoring or willfully distorting the history of its enactment.”

In his foreword to the second edition of the book, Forrest McDonald observes that although Berger’s interpretation was predictably contested when it was first published in 1977, those who favor the centralization of constitutional authority soon decided that it does not matter anyway even if the courts have willfully distorted constitutional history. As they see it, it has all been distorted for a good cause – in the service of creating a better world. Progressives see that as a salutary effort on the part of the activist courts. They regard all this power-mongering by federal judges as indeed exemplary, as they believe federal oversight of state authorities is to be welcomed – in their view, credentialled federal judges fresh out of the Marxist law schools are far more trustworthy than the unreconstructed state legislators that the voters of the South might elect. It is an example of a pattern of progressive strategy which is becoming all too familiar – they begin by denying that they have subverted the law, but, when their protestations fail, they soon begin arguing that the subverted law is actually good. It’s not happening, but if it’s happening that’s very good! McDonald explains:

From the outset, the law reviews teemed with attacks on Government by Judiciary, some of them cautious and considered, many slipshod and semihysterical … So thoroughly did Berger rout his critics that, after a decade or so, they virtually stopped trying. Instead, advocates of judicial activism began to assert that neither the words of the Constitution nor the intentions of the framers are any longer relevant.

As McDonald argues, Berger’s analysis, first published in 1977, has stood the test of time in showing that the Supreme Court uses the Fourteenth Amendment as a method of “continuing revision of the Constitution under the guise of interpretation.” In doing so, the courts stray far from their constitutional role and take upon themselves the mantle of social and political revolutionaries.

Note: The views expressed on Mises.org are not necessarily those of the Mises Institute.

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This exploitation is indeed profitable, but there is a very high price to be paid for abusing our trust.

Price and Value–now there’s a twisted tale. We’ve been trained to compare price and buy the lower priced option as the better value, but price doesn’t reflect value, and we’re paying a very steep price as individuals and as a nation for confusing the two.

In economic theory, price is a signal, a flow of information between the producer, seller and buyer. Like all economic theory, this sounds nice, but what’s left out of this information flow is the value of the product or service, which is opaque / unknowable to the buyer.

Price can be low, but value can be lower–or even negative. Consider the aggregate / lifetime “value” of a diet of junk food, fast food, sugary beverages and ultra-processed snacks and foods. The price was presented as “a good value,” but what’s the “value” of a diet that generates chronic diseases that degrade our lives and cost a fortune to treat?

The “value” of a diet of junk food, fast food, sugary beverages and ultra-processed slop is extremely negative, for the aggregate health consequences are extremely negative and the eventual price of treating the chronic diseases is extremely high.

Every single-use plastic product was a “good value,” and now there’s micro-plastics everywhere, including our bodies. The full consequences have yet to be tallied, but it’s already clear that the “value” of single-use plastic products is extremely negative.
Microplastics Could Be Weakening Your Bones, Research Suggests: The review of more than 60 scientific articles showed that microplastics, among other effects, can stimulate the formation of osteoclasts, cells specialized in degrading bone tissue. (WIRED.com)

What is the “value” of an appliance that breaks down in a few years compared to the “value” of an appliance that lasts for decades? I’ve often noted the collapse of durability in appliances and other products that has tracked globalization and corporations’ exploitation of the fact the value of their products are unknown and therefore a matter of trust: we trust there’s value, and that trust can be easily exploited.

So 20 years ago we could buy an appliance that would last 20 years, and now we can no longer do so. The warranties are now one year, and appliances routinely fail in a few years.

This is a catastrophic collapse in value, so what “signal” is price telling us? What price is telling us is that we’re chumps, marks conned by corporations who exploit our naive trust that the products and services they’re selling have some sort of value that doesn’t turn out to be negative.

The nation is paying a steep price for the “low prices” of offshoring critical industrial supply chains. Corporations rushed to offshore production to reduce quality and durability (i.e. value) as the easy way to boost profits: the consumer, unable to discern the actual value of the product, was conned by the “low price” into believing it was therefore a “good value.”

So now the nation is dependent on frenemies for essentials–a catastrophic collapse of national security, something whose value is incalculable.

Reducing value and jacking up prices has done wonders for corporate profits. That these profits are the direct result of obscuring the decline of value–or the negative value over a longer time-frame–who cares, for all the matters now is corporate profits are rising and so the stock market bubbles higher.

What economists don’t dare say is that corporations boost profits by exploiting their reduction of value and obscuring the negative value of their products and services. This exploitation is indeed profitable, but there is a very high price to be paid for abusing our trust: the eventual collapse of trust in a system that glorifies exploitation because it’s so profitable.

There’s another price to be paid: the eventual cost of all the negative value is far greater than the initial price paid. Rebuilding our national security is not cost-free, and all the horrific health consequences of a negative-value diet and lifestyle have price tags so high no nation can possibly afford them.

Read the Whole Article

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A former Trump administration national security advisor suspects that people near the president are pushing him into a war with Russia.

Retired Gen. Michael Flynn said in a social media post on Monday that people within President Donald Trump’s orbit may be luring him into “a trap” that could cost American lives. Recent public rhetoric from high-ranking administration officials appears to support Flynn’s analysis.

On Fox News Live’s Sunday Briefing, U.S. Special Envoy to Ukraine Gen. Keith Kellogg told White House correspondent Jacqui Heinrich that Trump is giving Ukraine permission to launch long-range missiles into Russia. At first, Kellogg walked around Heinrich’s question about long-range strikes, prompting the host to ask for clarification. “Are you saying, though, that it is the president’s position that Ukraine can conduct long-range strikes into Russia — that that has been authorized by the president?” Heinrich asked. Kellogg answered:

I think reading what he has said, and reading what Vice President [J.D.] Vance has said as well as Secretary [of State Marco] Rubio, the answer is yes. Use the ability to hit deep. There are no such things as sanctuaries.

President Trump has authorized long-range strikes into Russia, Special Envoy to Ukraine General Keith Kellogg says — but occasionally Ukraine has not been granted authority by the Pentagon to carry them out.

KELLOGG: “Everybody should follow what the President says. He’s the… pic.twitter.com/Zx36foTgnP

— Jacqui Heinrich (@JacquiHeinrich) September 29, 2025

Ukraine Needs Western Permission

Ukraine needs American approval to launch U.S. weapons deep into Russia. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has in the past asked the U.S. for long-range missiles so he can take the fight directly to the Kremlin. He has asked for Tomahawk cruise missiles, which can hit targets more than 1,500 miles away. Before Kellogg’s statement to Fox, Vance said that Trump was “certainly looking” at another Ukrainian request for U.S.-made Tomahawks.

The Russians said they would “carefully analyze whether any American Tomahawk missiles that might be supplied to Ukraine were fired using targeting data supplied by the United States,” according to reports.

Russian head of state Vladimir Putin has said that if Western nations allow Ukraine to strike deep within Russia, it will be considered an act of war. Putin said a year ago:

This [lifting of restrictions on Ukraine’s use of longer-range Western missiles] will mean that NATO countries — the United States and European countries — are at war with Russia. And if this is the case, then, bearing in mind the change in the essence of the conflict, we will make appropriate decisions in response to the threats that will be posed to us.

Kellogg’s comments came in the midst of intense fighting between these sibling nations. “Russia launched more than 600 drones and dozens of missiles at Ukraine on Saturday night and Sunday morning,” according to reports. The Ukrainians volleyed back a strike of their own, on Moscow. “The Russian Defense Ministry said its forces intercepted 84 Ukrainian drones across several regions between late Sunday and early Monday,” Russian media reported.

Trump Pressuring the Kremlin?

Last week, Trump posted a statement on social media suggesting he had shifted his stance in support for continued fighting in Ukraine. “With time, patience, and the financial support of Europe and, in particular, NATO, [Ukraine’s reclaiming] the original Borders from where this War started, is very much an option,” Trump said September 23. Trump also insulted the Kremlin’s military might, calling Russia a “paper tiger.”

The statement prompted the question of whether the president’s comments were part of a strategy to pressure the Kremlin into being more open to a peace deal, or the true sentiments of a president who is frustrated that, despite the talks, despite rolling out the red carpet for Putin, the fighting has only intensified.

Flynn: Work Harder at Seeking Peace

Regardless, Gen. Flynn is worried that his former boss is being led down a disastrous path. In a social media post on Monday, Flynn asked: “Is Ukraine is a foreign policy dead end or a trap?” He also said that someone near the president suggested that another nation’s leader be eliminated, presumably Russia’s. And he addressed Trump directly: “Donald Trump we want you to be the PEACE PRESIDENT.”

In his post, Flynn implied that the Eurocrats are pushing for escalation. “The NATO & EU need this war to shift their internal problems away from themselves and place it on an enemy who has massive physical capabilities and will use them (don’t underestimate this guidance),” he said. He has made similar accusations in the past.

Flynn also opposes selling weapons to NATO:

Selling weapons to “NATO” may make us feel good but never forget, we are NATO. if NATO gives those weapons to Ukraine, are we not in a PROXY WAR against Russia? Are we not now directly involved? Who provides the guidance systems, the intelligence, the information operations, cyber, space — warfare is multi-domain activity and not a simple bullet or missile flying through the air.

The longtime general then issued the reminder that “there remain peaceful solutions to ending this war” and that “we must work harder at seeking these.” He added that those who are pushing for war aren’t offering all the options.

Hegseth’s Gathering

This is all happening as Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is bringing hundreds, if not thousands, of the top generals and admirals in the U.S. military to a Marine Corps base in Virginia for a meeting on Tuesday. Trump is also attending.

The unusual summoning has prompted a lot of questions. The president said there’s nothing ominous about the gathering. He told NBC, “It’s really just a very nice meeting talking about how well we’re doing militarily, talking about being in great shape, talking about a lot of good, positive things.” One official told news outlets that Hegseth plans to “highlight military accomplishments and to discuss the future of the Defense Department under his leadership.” But skepticism abounds, as this kind of information is usually communicated via memos or teleconferences.

“Is It Our Fight?”

Just days before Russia invaded Ukraine, TNA asked in our Feb. 14, 2022 print issue, “Russia vs. Ukraine: Is It Our Fight?” We noted that the eastern regions of Ukraine that Russia occupies either completely or partially are overwhelmingly ethnically Russian, and the local sentiment has been “decidedly in favor of either independence from the corrupt, kleptocratic, and discriminatory Ukrainian government, or of outright annexation by ‘Mother Russia’.” We also acknowledged that Russia is being encircled by NATO nations. The point of NATO, we noted, is to “prepare for the eventual consolidation of regional military alliances into a global military,” which we dubbed an “indispensable ingredient of a consolidated global government.”

But Russia and China, we said, might not be willing to go along with a Western-led global government:

Russia and China, their other deficiencies aside, remain extremely nationalistic and resistant to assimilation into existing international systems. Both countries are very reluctant to enter into any type of binding agreement or treaty with other countries or with any international authority, and typically flout the rules of any international organization that they do end up joining. And both countries are large enough and well-enough armed that even a Gulf War-style international coalition might not be able to compel them to accede to the demands of the “international community.” Thus the ultimate objective of the so-called international community, i.e., the internationalists whose policies and priorities completely dominate the foreign-policy agenda in the West, including the United States, is the establishment of a single world government — by consent if possible, but by force if necessary.

The globalists followed both 20th-century world wars with attempts at world government, first via the League of Nations, then, with more success, the United Nations, which continues to pose a threat.

People Learning About Globalism

But over the last decade, anti-globalist sentiment has grown exponentially around the world. A large reason for that is that more people have simply learned about the globalist threat. And an effective teacher was the Covid-19 experience. As the governments of “free” societies imposed overtly tyrannical measures, it prompted citizens to ask questions. And that asking led many to realize that an international infrastructure of control had been in the works for a long time, and that what they were experiencing was a result of it.

So, perhaps, the globalists are working to foment an event that brings devastation of a level so disastrous that it will render people desperate enough for order and security that they’ll accept anything — even globalism, which will be pitched as a way to prevent another world war. And perhaps they’ve encircled Trump with warmongers who flatter the president while egging on insane moves that could result in a hot war with Russia.

As we said back in 2022, “Risking a third world war, complete with nuclear weapons, over a territorial dispute in Ukraine might seem to be the very definition of insanity.”

This article was originally published on The New American.

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