Lew Rockwell Institute

President Donald Trump’s border chief Tom Homan called out Pope Francis for the hypocrisy of his criticism of Trump’s plan to deport illegal immigrants.

In a January 19 appearance on the “Che Tempo Che Fa” program, Francis said that U.S. deportations of illegal migrants would be a “disgrace.” On Friday, Homan pointed out that U.S. policy is consistent with the Vatican’s enforcement of its own borders.

“They have a wall around the Vatican. If you illegally enter the Vatican, the crime is serious,” said Homan during a Newsmax appearance, adding that anyone who enters there illegally will spend time in jail.

NEW: Border Czar Tom Homan responds to Catholic outcry over Trump’s deportation operation, calls out the Pope for living behind massive 30 foot walls.

Homan told the Pope to fix the Catholic church before he starts criticizing the United States.

“They have a wall around the… pic.twitter.com/YTRoZ7DIH5

— Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg) January 25, 2025

In fact, just this past December, the Vatican ramped up penalties for those who illegally enter its restricted areas, which now include fines of about 10,000 to 25,000 euros or $10,200 to $25,700 and jail time ranging from one to four years. Those convicted of illegal entry into the Vatican are banned from the city-state for up to 15 years.

A large portion of Vatican City, including the palaces, gardens, and offices, are surrounded by walls about 40 feet high, and its gates are manned by Swiss Guards who protect the city from intruders.

Homan remarked regarding Francis, “He can protect the Vatican where he lives. He can build a wall where he lives. The American people are not allowed that?”

“Securing the border saves lives,” stressed Homan. “When less people come, less women get raped by the cartel. Less children die in the river. Less Americans die from fentanyl overdoses.”

A report released in October found that child sex trafficking alone tripled under the Biden-Harris administration’s open borders policies.

“I’m a lifelong Catholic. I was born Catholic. I’ve been through Catholic doctrine. Look, he ought to concentrate on fixing the Catholic Church … he’s got big problems there,” Homan said.

“He ought to stick to the Catholic Church and fix that. That’s a mess,” he concluded. Indeed, under Francis’ leadership, the primary papal duty of clarifying and defending Church doctrine has been neglected in favor of a multitude of ambiguous and misleading documents and statements that have given the impression of condoning sin, such as Amoris Laetitia and Fiducia Supplicans, which suggest, respectively, that adulterous “couples” may receive Holy Communion without Confession and that homosexual “couples” may be “blessed.”

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In the spring of 1945, Soviet Red Army forces entered Austria from the east and American Army forces entered Austria from the west, and both closed on the ancient capital city of Vienna. By then it was already evident that as soon as Nazi Germany was defeated, the wartime alliance of the United States and the Soviet Union would give way to a fierce rivalry over the fate of Europe. Austria lay in the middle of this conflict.

To prevent each other from gaining the upper hand in Austria, the American military (along with those of Britain and France) occupied parts of Austria while the Soviet military occupied others. By 1947, U.S. Department of Defense became convinced that withdrawing Western troops would leave the country open to complete Soviet occupation. For their part, the Soviets were far more interested in gaining an advantage in Germany, where the Cold War was intensifying.

Following the death of Stalin in 1953, Soviet Foreign Minister Molotov expressed his willingness to discuss Austrian independence, and he invited Austrian Chancellor Julius Raab to Moscow to discuss the matter.

Wikipedia offers a decent summary of what happened next:

Raab’s visit to Moscow (12–15 April) was a breakthrough. Moscow agreed that Austria would be free no later than 31 December. Austrians agreed to pay for the “German assets” and oil fields left by the Soviets, mostly in kind; “the real prize was to be neutrality on the Swiss model.” Molotov also promised the release and repatriation of Austrians imprisoned in the Soviet Union.

Western powers were stunned. British diplomat and signatory to the treaty, Geoffrey Wallinger reported to London that the deal “was far too good to be true, to be honest”. But it proceeded as had been agreed in Moscow and on 15 May 1955 Antoine Pinay, Harold Macmillan, Molotov, John Foster Dulles, and Figl signed the Austrian State Treaty in Vienna. It came into force on 27 July and on 25 October the country was free of occupying troops. The next day, Austria’s parliament enacted a Declaration of Neutrality, whereby Austria would never join a military alliance such as NATO or the Warsaw Pact, or allow foreign troops be based within Austria.

Russia and the U.S. have honored the Austrian neutrality deal ever since.

Since the Munich Security Conference of February 2022—when the Biden administration deliberately insulted Russia by sending the incoherently babbling Kamala Harris as the U.S. representative to the crisis talks—I have been of the firm conviction that an Austrian style neutrality deal should have been proposed for Ukraine. Such a deal could have prevented the deaths of hundreds of thousands of young men.

Three bloody years later, a Ukrainian neutrality deal would require the following:

1). The U.S. to cease its policy—officially commencing in 2015—of sending “defense articles” to Ukraine.

2). U.S. officials to cease talking about some day admitting Ukraine to NATO.

3). The CIA to cease its machinations and puppeteering in Ukraine.

4). Russia to declare its recognition of Ukrainian neutrality and to honor the agreement as it did in the case of Austria.

I suspect the sticking point will be Russia’s already announced condition for peace be that of retaining the ethnically Russian territories of Donetsk, Kherson, Luhansk and Zaporizhzhia oblasts.

Here its worth noting that, back in 1997, George Kennan and other American Cold Warriors warned about the folly of countenancing NATO membership for Ukraine, given its long border with Russia, its proximity to Moscow, and the historic, cultural, and ethnic complexity of this border region between Russia and Western Europe.

Since 2022, many Americans and Western Europeans have developed a curious emotional attachment to the notion that every inch of Ukrainian territory—including the Donetsk, Kherson, Luhansk and Zaporizhzhia oblasts—is so sacred and immutable that it’s worth risking World War III and a possible nuclear war to maintain its integrity.

The origin of this emotional attachment is mysterious, given that few if any Americans had even heard of these contested oblasts prior to 2022. I doubt that keeping these territories under the rule of Ukraine lies in the interest of a single American citizen. I wonder if there is a single American citizen who is willing to give up his life for these territories to remain under the rule of the Kiev instead of Moscow.

I just finished listening to a silly debate between Tucker Carlson and Piers Morgan in which the latter struggled to understand the obvious reality it will be a cold day in hell before the Russians give up Crimea, which was annexed by the Russian Empress Catherine the Great in 1783 from the Ottoman vassal state of Crimea.

The Russians wanted a Black Sea naval base, but Catharine also wanted to put an end to the Crimean slave trade. For centuries, the Crimean Khanate had abducted Eastern Europeans through the Crimean–Nogai slave raids in Eastern Europe. The abducted slaves were transported to the rest of the Muslim world in collaboration with the Ottoman slave trade from the Crimea.

Since 1783, Crimea has been the location of Russia’s Sevastopol Naval Base on the Black Sea. The Russians would no sooner give up this strategic possession than the United States would give up its strategic possession of Oahu, Hawaii (with its Pearl Harbor Naval base). The U.S. more or less stole Hawaii from the Hawaiian Monarchy in 1898. Try telling the Pentagon that it should remove its U.S. Naval base from Oahu and give Hawaii back to the ancestors of the Hawaiian monarchy.

I suggest that President Trump call Vladimir Putin and propose immediate talks to iron out a peace deal for Ukraine, modeled after the Austrian Neutrality deal of 1955.

This originally appeared on Courageous Discourse.

The post A Model for Ending the War in Ukraine appeared first on LewRockwell.

The US will impose 25 percent tariffs on Mexico and Canada, and 10 percent on China, the Trump White House said.  The purpose of tariffs is to protect domestic manufacturers and their work forces.  What American manufacturers and workers are being protected by Trump’s tariffs?  So much of US manufacturing is located offshore, what purpose are the tariffs serving?

The “tariffs” in reality are taxes imposed on imports of foreign produced goods, including the offshored production of US corporations of goods and services sold in the US.  If the tariffs are paid by the consumer rather than by the US corporations that offshore their production for the American market, the effect will be to reduce the quantity demanded because of the higher price. How much this harms the offshore producers depends on whether their products are price elastic or inelastic. Some are one and some are the other. 

This approach to bringing offshored US jobs back to America is incorrect.  It demonstrates the economic ignorance of Trump and his advisors.  Consider, for example, if US auto assembly relies on parts made in Canada,  a 25% rise in parts cost could shutdown auto assembly and result in US unemployment. As best as I can tell, few auto parts are any longer produced in the US, so there is no industry to protect or to supply the parts that tariffs keep out.  Before you can protect industries, you first must have them.

Instead of tariffs, the income tax should be used.  US Corporations that produce domestically using American labor–not H-1B and L-1 imported labor– should have a lower tax rate.  US corporations that produce  abroad with foreign labor goods and services sold in the US should have a higher tax rate. The tax rate should be high enough to more than offset the lower labor and regulatory cost of producing abroad for American markets.  

The higher after-tax profits from producing at home would bring manufacturing and jobs back to America where they belong.  A country that divorces the consumers of products from the incomes associated with their production, as jobs offshoring does, is stupid and incompetent beyond belief.  No such country can possibly be made great again. 

Some people believe, correctly or incorrectly, that this business model was imposed on America in an effort to destroy us, using threats to finance takeovers of the American firms that refused to abandon their American workforce and cities. In other words, offshoring America’s manufacturing sector was a step in turning America into  third world country that makes nothing and imports its needs.

Is Trump overlooking one important element of making America Great Again?  The moral element. It seems to be the case.  Trump’s support for Israel is disturbing to Americans who still have a moral conscience and are shamed by Trumps support of Israel’s genocide of Palestinians and their country and their ethnic cleansing so that Trump’s son-in-law can become a multi-billionaire by developing Gaza as a resort.

Another problem with Trump’s imposition of tariffs is that it is another encroachment of executive power on the authority of Congress.  It used to be that tariffs were a legislative issue.  For many years the South tried to prevent the North with  the Missouri Compromise, and in other ways,  from gaining a sufficient majority in Congress to impose a tariff on British goods that would require the South to finance in higher prices and lowered agricultural sales abroad the industrialization of the North.  

The Morrill Tariff, a huge increase, was passed the day prior to Lincoln’s inauguration. The Northern congressmen also passed that day a resolution that if the South would stay in the Union and pay the tariff, a Constitutional Amendment would be passed institutionalizing slavery forever. Lincoln endorsed the federal government’s protection of slavery and declared that there would be no war against the South unless the South refused to pay the tariff.  

The agricultural South seeing ruin in the face succeeded from the Union. The tariff, not slavery was the issue. Lincoln called it insurrection and invaded.  That is how the so-called “civil war” happened.  Clearly it was no civil war. The South was not fighting for the control of the government, it had its own government.  The South had to fight as it was invaded.

How did tariffs move from being an legislative issue to an issue of executive orders?  We are witnessing in this transformation of power from the legislature to the executive the transformation of democracy into dictatorship.  It has been going on for a long time:  Lincoln, FDR, George W. Bush, Obama. The United States has become too disunited for Congress to perform its constitutional function.

This is the real problem that America faces, and there is no awareness, no discussion.  The same thing happened to Rome when executive authority took precedence over the Roman Senate.

I look in vain for discussion of the real problem, and I cannot find it. In America despite Trump, or perhaps because of him, insouciance still rules.

The post US To Impose Tariffs on Canada, Mexico, and China on Feb. 1 and Tyranny on America appeared first on LewRockwell.

As noted in my recent “inaugural address”, there isn’t much a president is authorized to do. In a nutshell, he must execute the few constitutional laws Congress passes, and veto the rest.

Repelling and expelling invaders is obviously among the permitted functions of his restricted role. Not only should a president deport anyone who illegally enters American territory; to honor his oath, he has no choice.

If citizens don’t like the laws, they should convince Congress to change them. But if statutes are constitutional (as those ousting illegals obviously are), the president is obligated to execute them. To do otherwise is an impeachable offense.

Misunderstood Amendment

Eliciting recent uproar was Trump’s executive order rescinding “birthright citizenship”. Critics claim this directive violates of the first clause of the 14th Amendment.

But it doesn’t. At least not according to the man who wrote it. Let’s review the relevant language:

“All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.”

Senator Jacob Howard, who authored these words, elaborated on what “subject to the jurisdiction thereof” meant, and to which people it didn’t apply:

“This will not, of course, include persons born in the United States who are foreigners, aliens, [or] who belong to the families of ambassadors or foreign ministers accredited to the Government of the United States, but will include every other class of persons.” [emphasis added]

In other words, Trump is right about this. At the very least, it’s not obvious he’s wrong.

The jurisdiction clause has long been misunderstood, misrepresented, or ignored. It was meant for postwar freedmen, not foreign intruders.

According to the author of the 14th Amendment, any non-citizens with allegiance to another country are not subject to the “jurisdiction” of the United States, so their offspring who happen to be born here would not automatically become Americans.

This was the accepted understanding till the turn of the last century, when the current nonsensical interpretation began to take root.

Not that modern judges will agree. They almost certainly won’t. Unsurprisingly, one has already blocked the order. We’ll see where this goes, tho’ it seems destined to reach the Supreme Court.

“Un-Christian?”

So much for Caesar. What about Christ?

We know that “constitutional” and “Christian” aren’t synonymous. As with the 16th Amendment, they’re occasionally at odds.

A decade ago, Pope Francis denounced Donald Trump as “not Christian” for proposing a wall on the border and desiring to deport anyone who illegally crossed it.

There are as many reasons to assume Donald Trump isn’t Christian as to affirm Joe Biden isn’t Catholic (tho’ the Bishop of Rome was always strangely silent on the latter litany).

But is it “un-Christian” to want to build barriers and deport criminals? Isn’t that what locked doors, local police, and private security are all about? I was unaware trespassing was a noble virtue, or that inhibiting and punishing it were Christian vices.

So, apparently, was St Thomas Aquinas.

Aquinas on Immigration

St Thomas was smart enough to notice that not all foreigners are alike. Among other distinctions, some are hostile and others peaceful.

As such, Aquinas recognized every nation’s right (and responsibility) to discern which potential immigrants would be beneficial or baleful, rather than blindly letting all of them in.

Rules of entry and repulsion should be adopted and enforced based on what’s best for those living legally within the territory being protected.

Obviously migrants think they’ll be better off in their desired destination. Otherwise, they wouldn’t try to go there. But the criteria for entry should be whether these arrivals will help the hosts, not if access benefits outsiders wishing to cross the border.

Aquinas affirms the rule of national law in dealing with both peaceful and pernicious immigration. He continues by insisting migrants wanting to remain in a new land must express a sincere desire to integrate fully into the culture of that country.

Newcomers need to adapt to their adopted nation, and becoming a citizen takes some time. Aristotle suggested it could require as much as three generations. Aquinas offered no timeframe for acclimation, but did explain why a lengthy interim was warranted:

“The reason for this was that if foreigners were allowed to meddle with the affairs of a nation as soon as they settled down in its midst, many dangers might occur, since the foreigners not yet having the common good firmly at heart might attempt something hurtful to the people.”

Aquinas recalled that ancient Israelis didn’t treat all immigrants equally since those from nations nearer to them more easily assimilated than those from more remote realms. Hostile peoples were to be excluded entirely due to their enmity toward the Jews.

This common sense was once an integral component of US policy. Till the 1960s, new arrivals were carefully curated to not disrupt national unity. They were selected based on the likelihood they’d seek assimilation, not engender disruption.

Immigrants were expected to learn English, appreciate Western culture, and adopt American traditions. This is why applicants from European Christendom were given priority.

But this is no longer the case.

Strictest in the World

Pope Francis condemns anyone (well… Westerners, at least) who resist unrestricted immigration, going so far as to accuse those turning migrants away of committing “grave sin.” No word whether this censure applies to places like Israel, Korea, Iran, Japan, … or the Holy See itself.

Denouncing a desire to dispel intruders is particularly ironic from a man ensconced in a fortified city behind a series of walls. If random “migrants” can’t just venture thru the Vatican, why should a smorgasbord of interlopers from scores of countries be able to wantonly wade, walk, or ride into America?

Francis added that “We can all agree on one thing: Migrants should not be in those seas and in those lethal deserts.” Well, yes. We can all agree on that.

But it doesn’t logically follow that these nomads therefore have a right to reside wherever they want, or that every nation is obliged to let them in. The Argentine Jesuit should understand that better than anyone.

Vatican immigration policy (which Francis tightened in 2023 and toughened again just a couple weeks ago) is among the strictest in the world. The Leonine Wall essentially circumscribes the city, which is protected by 104 armed soldiers of the Swiss Guard. Only citizens (of whom there are fewer than 800) can reside in the Vatican. Penalties for illegal entry include fines, imprisonment, and permanent bans.

Protecting Refugees

But let’s be fair. Just because some who insist illegal aliens shouldn’t be resisted or returned are hypocrites doesn’t mean they’re wrong. Catholics acknowledge that travelers and strangers (assuming they possess humility and gratitude) should be met with charity and goodwill.

Pope Pius XII agreed that each nation is the proprietor of its territory, but that it mustn’t too eagerly seal its borders to those who reasonably ask to enter. His Holiness insisted that persecuted refugees be given special consideration.

During the Second World War, Pius gave it to them. He opened the Castel Gandolfo to anyone wishing to enter. Risking the wrath of the Nazis (who’d repeatedly threatened to arrest or kill him), the pope welcomed 12,000 refugees displaced by fierce fighting in Italy.

Granted, these weren’t illegal immigrants. But they were desperate people in need. Pius opened his gates and asked no questions. No baptismal certificates were requested, nor any particular political affiliation required. Under the pope’s protection came many Roman Jews.

Pius provided additional sanctuary at the cloistered Roman monasteries of Santi Quattro and Santa Susanna, which the pope ordered “to hide all people wanted by the Nazis, especially Jews.” Similar papal decrees were issued to all parishes and religious houses in Rome.

This is how legitimate refugees should be accommodated. But unfortunately, persistent abuse of the US system by migrants (or their advocates) who fraudulently claim to be seeking “asylum” undermines access for those who genuinely need it.

Rights and Privileges

Pius XII recognized a “right to migrate.” So do I. But that doesn’t imply a “right to enter.”

Emigration is a right. Immigration is a privilege. My right to leave my house doesn’t entail a prerogative to enter someone else’s.

Open-border Catholics often equate illegal aliens entering the US with the Holy Family fleeing Herod. But that analogy is absurd.

Joseph and Mary violated no Egyptian laws. They never left the Roman Empire. They were more akin to Californians escaping to Arizona than to Salvadoran gangs travelling to Texas.

And the Holy Family wasn’t planning to remain in Egypt. When their peril passed, they returned home.

The comparison of Jesus, Joseph, and Mary to illegal aliens in the US is silly. Not because the Holy Family weren’t refugees. They were (Pius XII called them “the archetype of every refugee family”). But because our “undocumented migrants” aren’t.

Political refugees aren’t the object of deportation orders. Yet this false equivalence is one many Catholics…including cardinals, bishops, priests, and the pope… love to indulge. But they’re selective about how they do so.

And where.

As we noted, Vatican immigration laws are among the most stringent in the world. They’re justified as being necessary to “protect [the Vatican’s] small population and the sanctity of its grounds.”

Exactly. The purpose of any law should be to improve conditions for the citizens inhabiting the region where it’s applied. So why is America guilty of “grave sin” when it does the same?

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Despite all the steps people will insist on taking to create union with God, clearing away whole lumberyards of spiritual debris along the way, intimacy with God has never really been about us to begin with. Having a relationship with God is not something we do but rather Someone we receive. And it is He who takes the initiative. Even our prayers are prompted by Another. That is, when we do pray. Too often our prayer life is rather like those “enchanted cigarettes,” of which the writer Balzac speaks—that is, the books we hope someday to publish but never actually get around to writing.

In other words, it’s not as if our prayers were like Shakespeare’s “bootless cries to heaven,” heartfelt but never answered; it’s that our cries are never sent at all. Or that our lament, as Hopkins writes, “Is cries countless, cries like dead letters sent / To dearest him that lives alas! away.” It’s that we’re not sending any letters at all.

Pascal was surely on to something when he told us that it was God Himself, “who instituted prayer in order to confer upon his creatures the dignity of becoming a cause”—that by our prayers, we literally cause things to happen. But unless the grace of God moves us to pray in the first place, we’re not going to cause anything to happen except maybe more sinning.

And the point of all this? I mean, what has this got to do with Augustine? Well, where did we last leave him? Sunk in the same Manichaean sinkhole he first dug himself into, that’s where. Nine long years, he tells us, “During which I wallowed deep in the mire and the darkness of delusion.” An unholy novena, you might say, from which there would appear to be no end in sight. After all, will a man caught in the grip of delusion even know how to pray, much less whether or not he needs to? The answer does not lie with Augustine who, for all his good intentions, appears far too prostrate to do anything, much less pray to God for release. But it does lie with his mother, who has not for a single minute ceased to pray for her errant son.

In fact, it is Monica whom we find at the heart of Book III. And thank heaven Augustine has the good sense to see it that way, as witness the following sentence set down right at the beginning of Chapter 11: “You sent down your help from above,” he exclaims, quoting Psalm 143,

and rescued my soul from the depths of this darkness because my mother [emphasis added], your faithful servant, wept to you for me, shedding more tears for my spiritual death than other mothers shed for the bodily death of a son.

Indeed, so plentiful were her tears, Augustine adds, that in streaming down from her face they “watered the earth in every place where she bowed her head in prayer.” How else, he asks, can he account for the dream she had, “with which you (God) consoled her, so that she agreed to live with me and eat at the same table in our home,” despite having long refused to do so “because she loathed and shunned the blasphemy of my false beliefs”? And the dream? It was, quite simply, a vision of a smiling young man who, seeing her in tears for the sins of her son, tells her “to take heart for, if she looked carefully, she would see that where she was, there also was I.”

Augustine is much moved by this, knowing that “this chaste, devout, and prudent woman…never ceased to pray at all hours and to offer you the tears she shed for me.” But while the dream had infused her with renewed hope for her son, “she gave no rest to her sighs and her tears. Her prayers reached your presence,” he adds, quoting from Psalm 87, “and yet you still left me to twist and turn in the dark.”

Nevertheless, more help is on the way, which comes in the form of a bishop whom Monica had been urging to sit down with her son and simply refute all his errors. But he tells her that Augustine is not yet “ripe” enough for instruction. “‘Leave him alone,’ he said. ‘Just pray to God for him. From his own reading he will discover his mistakes and the depth of his profanity.’” She persists, however, with still more tears and entreaties, until the poor man, finally exhausted by her importunities, bursts out: “’Leave me and go in peace. It cannot be that the son of these tears should be lost.”

“In later years,” writes Augustine at end of Book III, “as we walked together, she used to say that she accepted these words as a message from heaven.”

What a lesson in prayer we are given here! Revealing the gesture of the beggar, who, as Luigi Giussani never tired of telling us, becomes the chief, albeit hidden, protagonist of history. Because his arms remain forever outstretched, beseeching God for all that he does not have.  Entrusting his destiny to Another, knowing in faith that so heartfelt an appeal will not go unanswered. But especially when the cry for help comes from a broken and distraught mother, who knows herself powerless by human means to check the perversities of her wayward child.

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President Trump’s approach to peace and liberty, as a subset of MAGA objectives, seems to be a net positive for his supporters, so far.  He and his cabinet are working to defibrillate and jump start America’s broken and unhealthy body in hopes of strengthening and enriching the nation.  He wants to build back its working class, and re-acquire and even exceed its former level of excellence in economic productivity, science, technology and character.

Trump exercises two kind of power.  He heads the vast executive branch – de facto larger and more powerful than the other two federal branches, and all the states combined.  Sadly, this is not by constitutional design but through elite oligarchic evolution, and 112 years of Federal Reserve Bank subsidy of the state and its profit seeking interests, through currency debasement and fraud.

His other power is motivational.  Like a coach hoping to motivate his national team, he combines the idea that he cares about “we the people” as he inspires us crudely and creatively with pep talks at the end of a losing third quarter.

As observers and analysts attempt to get a handle on where Trump is actually taking the country, the Constitutionalists among us can’t shake a persistent tic of concern that for all the talk of peace, and putting the interests of Americans first, Trump has a blind spot that we do not share.

Leftists, elitists and TDS sufferers never united around hopes for peace, and they understand free trade exactly the same way Trump does.  Correctly, they see him as the disruptor of systems they adored and causes they championed.  They are enraged that leftist ideals and elitist objectives didn’t pay popular dividends.  Trump broke the Democrat Party through exposure, just as he broke the Republican Party through intimidation.

But both of these formerly powerful political parties share Trump’s blindness. Two of the three federal branches are stumbling backward – and calling it progress – because of the State of Israel’s subversion of the US Constitution.  A small example of this is Trump’s recent executive order, that violates the 1st Amendment but echoes a similar Congressional theme.

Many point to Trump’s largest supporter, billionaire Miriam Adelson, and her $100 million donation to the 2024 Trump campaign. A typical donor’s return on investment in a winning Presidential, Senatorial or Congressional campaign is 76,000%.   A donated dollar returns $760.  Adelson’s $100 million will return $760 million worth of taxpayer funded support for her agenda.  Her agenda starts with the Israeli takeover of the entire West Bank, and US sanctions lifted on Israeli companies and individuals engaged in clearing the West Bank of Palestinians.  As a bonus, a new mandated US phraseology of Judea and Samaria for Israel has been implemented, and no public Palestinian sympathy is outlawed.

Pro-Israel donations to US senators and representatives are even more impressive.  The top twenty recipients in 2023-2024 alone raked in nearly $40 million.  We can conservatively assume that the 90% of senators and representatives who accept pro-Israel donations are collecting at least $100 million a year from pro-Israeli donors, annually.  That buys another $760 million for Israel.

AIPAC’s own numbers agree – it spent $100 million in the latest election season.  AIPAC is the largest Israeli lobby, but there are many others.   Beyond this, there is the Zionist Organization of America Coalition, whose lobbying and fundraising are aimed at shaping US foreign policy.

Clearly American tax dollars are important to these lobbyists, and it has been well worth the investment.  Speaking of investment, while Americans are aware and tend to embrace the $3.3 billion given to Israel annually, many don’t know how much their state and local governments invest in the Israeli government.  Through the Israel Bonds program, billions have been raised for the government of Israel, and significantly, $3.7 billion in the last sixteen months.  This is how that works.

None of this addresses individual donations.  Millions of dollars are donated to Israeli charities like this one, aimed at breaking Israel’s cycle of poverty, or these.

Don’t forget US business investment in Israel, like this example.

Overall, Israel’s fundraising in the United States encompasses political lobbying and condition-free  military aid, private lobbying, sale of government bonds to state and local governments, charitable donations, and business investment.  Much of the business investment is partially subsidized by the US taxpayer, either directly or indirectly, as seen in Amazon Web Service’s long connection with US government and intelligence services.  US government political support extends to international buttressing of Israel’s positions and actions, whenever they are questioned or criticized, to the extent of justifying genocide.

Pro-Israeli messaging also flows from mainstream and Hollywood media, but in a decentralized marketplace of ideas, this seems to be a less effective method for a small country, 7,000 miles from the American heartland, to exercise its agenda.   On the other hand, seemingly pro-American thinktanks like the Heritage Foundation and the Vandenburg Coalition produce agendas in support of an expansionist Zionist entity that can and are shaping our foreign policy.

Here’s what I don’t understand. Israel’s complex and integrated influence operations on the governments at all levels in the United States continue to post a fantastic return on investment.  Billions and billions of US dollars flow to Israel annually.  No objective analyst could state the case differently.

So why aren’t these billions and billions and even more billions bringing peace to Israel?  Why isn’t the cash flow bringing prosperity to Israel?  Why isn’t it improving tourism and quality of life in Israel?  Why does the IDF fail to win their spectacularly funded wars? Why does Israel need to pass laws to prevent its own citizens from questioning the events leading up to and including October 7, 2023?  Why isn’t Socialism Israeli-style making life better for anyone in the region, or for the Americans that support it?

Doubling down on something that is evidently not enhancing greater peace or liberty, and investing in continued constitutional abasement can’t be good for US security.  Embracing the kind of foreign entanglements that Jefferson warned against has hastened the very ruin of the United States that brought forth the election of Donald Trump twice in the past decade.  Perhaps the key to correcting this path can be found in Jefferson’s own words on the day he assumed the Presidency over two centuries ago. Jefferson said:

…it is proper that you should understand what I deem the essential principles of our government, and consequently those which ought to shape its administration. I will compress them within the narrowest compass they will bear, stating the general principle, but not all its limitations. Equal and exact justice to all men, of whatever state or persuasion, religious or political; peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations — entangling alliances with none;

The entangling alliance with Israel is expensive in terms of peace and commerce, not only for the US and Israel, but for the world.  Yet the real tragedy is the complete and willful lack of honesty that surrounds it.

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As most of my readers know, I am not a huge fan of President Donald Trump. This, of course, doesn’t mean that I prefer Joe Biden or Kamala Harris or any other Democrat to Trump. I, in fact, loathe Biden and Harris much more than the Reason staffers who voted for them in 2020 and 2024.

I have always praised Trump when he gets things right (most recently, see here and here). And on the subject of “birthright citizenship,” Trump gets things right. We don’t have to agree with all of Trump’s immigration policies (I don’t) to agree with him on birthright citizenship. Indeed, the most diehard libertarian advocate of “open borders” could and should still agree wholeheartedly with Trump on birthright citizenship.

One of Trump’s first acts as president was to issue an executive order “Protecting the Meaning and Value of American Citizenship.” The relevant part reads:

Sec. 2. Policy. (a) It is the policy of the United States that no department or agency of the United States government shall issue documents recognizing United States citizenship, or accept documents issued by State, local, or other governments or authorities purporting to recognize United States citizenship, to persons: (1) when that person’s mother was unlawfully present in the United States and the person’s father was not a United States citizen or lawful permanent resident at the time of said person’s birth, or (2) when that person’s mother’s presence in the United States was lawful but temporary, and the person’s father was not a United States citizen or lawful permanent resident at the time of said person’s birth.

Unfortunately, a federal judge declared the executive order “blatantly unconstitutional,” and issued a two-week injunction against it.

According to a report by the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS), there were, in 2024, 400,000 “anchor babies” born in the United States to mothers who were not U.S. citizens. They were either illegal immigrants or foreign nationals in the United States with temporary visas or as tourists. These babies are granted automatic U.S. citizenship by virtue of their being born on U.S. soil because that is how the Fourteenth Amendment has been interpreted. They are therefore entitled to education, healthcare, and welfare.

According to the first article of the Fourteenth Amendment: “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.”

The members of Congress who wrote the amendment in 1866—according to their own published comments on the amendment—never envisioned “birthright citizenship” as it is promoted today. It is only because of court rulings that purported to interpret the amendment that people have believed otherwise. The sole purpose of this section of the Fourteenth Amendment was to grant citizenship to formerly enslaved blacks. It was based on the Civil Rights Act of 1866, which stated that “all persons born in the United States and not subject to any foreign power, excluding Indians not taxed, are hereby declared to be citizens of the United States.”

That “subject to the jurisdiction thereof” meant that some persons born on U.S. soil were not citizens is evident by the fact that American Indians were not recognized as citizens until the passage of the Indian Citizenship Act of 1924 even though their presence on American soil long predated that of the framers of the Fourteenth Amendment.

Yet, Jeff Jacoby, a columnist for the Boston Globe, a writer that I often read and most often agree with, believes that birthright citizenship is a constitutional right:

Birthright citizenship isn’t a privilege that presidents can bestow or withdraw at will. It is a constitutional mandate, enshrined in the 14th Amendment, which was ratified in 1868.

Birthright citizenship is a constitutional entitlement that cannot be abrogated by executive order or even legislation.

Trump can deride birthright citizenship as “ridiculous,” but it is bedrock constitutional law.

According to Jacoby and other advocates of birthright citizenship, the phrase “subject to the jurisdiction thereof” excludes from U.S. citizenship only the children of foreign officials, ministers, ambassadors, consuls, diplomats, emissaries, and soldiers who serve in some official capacity for a foreign government.

But proponents of birthright citizenship can’t have it both ways. If the “subject to the jurisdiction thereof” clause of the Fourteenth Amendment excludes from citizenship the children of foreign officials, ministers, ambassadors, consuls, diplomats, emissaries, and soldiers though they be born on U.S. soil, then it likewise excludes from citizenship the children of illegal aliens and foreign visa holders and tourists though they be born in the United States. And if it does not exclude from citizenship the children of illegal aliens and foreign visa holders and tourists born on U.S. soil, then it likewise does not exclude from citizenship the children of foreign officials, ministers, ambassadors, consuls, diplomats, emissaries, and soldiers who are born on U.S. soil.

And how do we know this? Because the Fourteenth Amendment makes no distinction between the two groups. Foreigners who come here—for whatever reason—are “subject to the jurisdiction” of a foreign government, as are any of their children who are born here. If they or their children don’t want to be under such jurisdiction, then they can apply to become a naturalized U.S. citizen like Elon Musk did.

The phrase “subject to the jurisdiction thereof” cannot possibly mean just “subject to U.S. laws,” like former U.S. House member Justin Amash claims: “It should be obvious that even individuals who are unlawfully present in the United States are ‘subject to the jurisdiction thereof.’ ‘Jurisdiction’ is just the applicability of legal authority to them and the potential exercise of state power against them.”

Even foreign diplomats and officials subject to the jurisdiction of their government with “diplomatic immunity” in the United States are subject to U.S. laws otherwise they could murder, rape, and pillage with impunity. They can even be issued traffic citations.

And according to the State Department publication Diplomatic and Consular Immunity: Guidance for Law Enforcement and Judicial Authorities,

There is a common misunderstanding that consular personnel have diplomatic status and are entitled to diplomatic immunity.

Consular officers are those members of consular posts who are recognized by both the sending and the host country as fully authorized to perform the broad array of formal consular functions. They have only official acts or functional immunity in respect of both criminal and civil matters, and their personal inviolability is quite limited. Consular officers may be arrested or detained pending trial only if the offense is a felony and that the arrest is made pursuant to a decision by a competent judicial authority (e.g., a warrant issued by an appropriate court).

They can also be prosecuted for misdemeanors. Yet, children born on U.S. soil to these foreigners serving in official capacity for their governments are not granted birthright citizenship.

And there is more: “Persons sent to the United States on short-term official duty with diplomatic missions ordinarily do not enjoy any privileges and immunities.” Yet, even the children born on U.S. soil to these individuals who are fully subject to U.S. laws are not granted birthright citizenship.

The conclusion is inescapable. Since the phrase “subject to the jurisdiction thereof” does not just mean “subject to U.S. laws,” even the children of foreigners fleeing persecution by their governments, who consider themselves to be stateless and not owing allegiance to any government, and who want to pledge full allegiance to and be fully under the jurisdiction of the United States, are not automatically citizens just because they are born on U.S. soil.

The post Proponents of Birthright Citizenship Can’t Have It Both Ways appeared first on LewRockwell.

As of this writing, when you attempt to access the US Agency for International Development (USAID) website or social media pages you are informed that, “This site can’t be reached.” The media reports that the new Trump Administration has not only frozen USAID activities but may be planning on bringing it back under control of the US State Department.  Other reports, including statements by Elon Musk, suggest that it will be closed completely.

If true, the closing of USAID may be one of the most significant changes President Trump has made among many dramatic actions in his first couple of weeks in office. Many Americans may still have the idea that USAID is a government agency delivering relief at disaster sites overseas. They may still remember the bags of rice or grain with the USAID logo on them. But that is not USAID.

USAID is a key component of the US government’s “regime change” operations worldwide. USAID spends billions of dollars every year propping up “NGOs” overseas that function as shadow governments, eating away at elected governments that the US interventionists want to overthrow. Behind most US foreign policy disasters overseas you will see the fingerprints of USAID. From Ukraine to Georgia and far beyond, USAID is meddling in the internal affairs of foreign countries – something that would infuriate Americans if it was happening to us.

When President Trump ordered a 90 day pause in USAID activities, we quickly learned just how pernicious the agency really is. The US media reported that Ukrainian press outlets were scrambling to keep their doors open when the US dollars stopped flowing. It is reported that 90 percent of the media outlets are funded by the US government!

This means that there is virtually no independent media in Ukraine, only fake news outlets willing to toe the US Administration’s propaganda line. Does anyone think these wholly US-funded “news” outlets would ever publish a story that the US government did not want published?

This is plainly immoral, but it is also dangerous. Most US mainstream media stories about Ukraine have their origins in the “reporting” of the local media. From battlefield news to casualties to the state of the Ukrainian military, the “news” from Ukraine is being written by US government-backed media outlets and then picked up by US and other western media. It is a closed propaganda loop that not only propagandizes the US citizen but also feeds false information into US government outlets – such as Congress – that rely on mainstream US media reporting for their news on Ukraine.

No wonder so many in Washington continue to support this hopeless war!

But USAID is not just in the business of disinformation. Elon Musk recently re-posted a New York Post article on X reporting that USAID funneled $53 million to EcoHealth Alliance to support gain-of-function research on coronaviruses at the Wuhan lab! Did USAID help fund COVID? Americans have a right to know.

In natural catastrophes overseas Americans have shown themselves to be extremely generous. Private volunteer assistance organizations can more effectively assist victims of disasters worldwide.

USAID needs a full and transparent audit. Americans deserve to know exactly what is being done in their name overseas. Then the agency needs to be shuttered completely, and its employees sent home. That would go a long way toward making America great again.

The post Audit USAID…Then Shut It Down! appeared first on LewRockwell.

“Canadian doctors, having accepted the country’s assisted-suicide regime, are now considering whether to harvest organs from euthanasia patients before they have died.” Yes, Trump, we want Canada as the 51st state.

The post Canada to Take Organs from the Living? appeared first on LewRockwell.

Click Here:

The Guardian

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Thanks, Brian Dunaway. 

ZeroHedge

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Arnaud Bertrand on the recent moves by Trump:

• This is the US effectively saying “our attempt at running the world is over, to each his own, we’re now just another great power, not the ‘indispensable nation’.”
• Hegemony was going to end sooner or later, and now the U.S. is basically choosing to end it on its own terms.
• It is the post-American world order – brought to you by America itself.
• You can either view it as decline – because it does unquestionably look like the end of the American empire –
• or as avoiding further decline: controlled withdrawal from imperial commitments in order to focus resources on core national interests rather than being forced into an even messier retreat at a later stage.
• All in all this transformation may mark one of the most significant shifts in international relations since the fall of the Soviet Union.
• And those most unprepared for it, as is already painfully obvious, are America’s vassals caught completely flat-footed by the realization that the patron they’ve relied on for decades is now treating them as just another set of countries to negotiate with.

Highly recommend following @RnaudBertrand on X.

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Click Here:

Ben Bartee

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Rick Rozoff writes:

A 1993 USAID document shows the agency signed an agreement with the Soros Foundations’ Management Training Program to train 30 “professionals” from Bulgaria, Estonia, Poland, Romania and Slovakia.

In the late 1990s and early 2000s, a series of color revolutions shook Eastern Europe, with George Soros’ network of NGOs playing a central role in the unrest.

In 2003–2004, Soros’ International Renaissance Foundation partnered with USAID to support Ukraine’s ‘Orange Revolution’. Prior to that, the US spent $54.7 million in 2003 and $34.11 million in 2004 on “democracy programs” in Ukraine through various agencies, including USAID.

The US legal watchdog Judicial Watch revealed in April 2018 that USAID sponsored Soros’ globalist agenda in Guatemala. In total, OSF reportedly spent around $100 million fomenting unrest in Latin America between 2015 and 2018.

In October 2018, the watchdog obtained documents indicating that USAID partnered with Soros to fund radical left-wing activists in Albania. In 2016, USAID reportedly allocated $9 million to a campaign overseen by Soros’ East West Management Institute.

 To illustrate the scale of funds managed by Soros-linked initiatives, in 2024, then-President Joe Biden requested nearly $30 billion for USAID in 2025.

The post USAID: Soros’ Secret Cash Cow appeared first on LewRockwell.

President Trump made it clear during his presidential campaign that tariffs will be a part of his policy-making. He has followed through on that. Tariffs are risky. Yes, they can be used as a political tool, and can get results. But tariffs can also turn very bad, especially when egos are revved up. American history is littered with the use of tariffs going very bad. President Trump, and the American people, should always keep this in mind.

The post Can Trump’s Tariffs Lead To Trouble? appeared first on LewRockwell.

“USAID is a ball of worms. There is no apple. And when there is no apple you just need to get rid of the whole thing. That’s why it’s got to go. It’s beyond repair.”

“USAID is a key component of the US government’s ‘regime change’ operations worldwide. USAID spends billions of dollars every year propping up ‘NGOs’ overseas that function as shadow governments, eating away at elected governments that the US interventionists want to overthrow. Behind most US foreign policy disasters overseas you will see the fingerprints of USAID. From Ukraine to Georgia and far beyond, USAID is meddling in the internal affairs of foreign countries – something that would infuriate Americans if it was happening to us.”

The first quote is from Elon Musk. The second quote is from Daniel McAdams. It is an amazing time!

USAID was created by JFK by Executive Order. Speculation is that Trump will issue an EO folding USAID into the State Department and keep all disbursements for USAID frozen until Musk’s minions can complete forensic audits on where all the billions of dollars have gone. This is a very shrewd way to highlight spending that will “infuriate Americans” and force Congress to get rid of USAID spending.

Let’s hope that the USAID budget is set to zero, all employees are fired, and many ex-employees start appearing before grand juries.

The post Musk and McAdams on USAID appeared first on LewRockwell.

Writes Dom Armentano:

Is there anyone on the planet who really thinks that  the recent Trump Administration’s  “reveal” concerning the alleged drone activity over New Jersey is either truthful or transparent?

According to Trump  spokesperson Karoline Leavitt,  the drones were actually  “authorized to be flown by the FAA for research and other activities…”  Oh really? That explanation, of course, flies in the face of repeated denials (to local and state officials in N.J.) by Homeland Security, the FBI and even the FAA itself, that authorities had no explanation for the massive drone activity.  Were the N.J. mayors simply lied to? Why?

The Trump Administration drone explanation begs several important questions. Whose drones are they? The FBI stated unequivocally two months ago that they were “not military.”  (Makes sense. Secret military drones would be flight tested in some secure location like the New Mexico desert and not over Trenton, N.J.)  But if they are civilian–private and commercial–where do they originate, what “research and other activities” are they conducting and why were they allowed to fly  over sensitive and  restricted air space at Langley AFB for 17 straight nights last October and Wright-Patterson AFB last December?  The FAA authorized that? Hardly. Makes no sense.

Further, mystery drone sightings are not at all unique to New Jersey or even to the U.S. (In November 2024, the U.S. Air Force admitted that unidentified “drones” were spotted over several of its leased military bases in England.)  Clusters of large drones have been spotted in many states including Nebraska and California; some sightings go back as far as 2014 and UFO sightings generally, of course, go back many decades.

Actually the most infamous (and all but forgotten) mystery drone activity occurred in Colorado in December 2019 and January 2020. Clusters of very large drones (at least 20) flew a nightly “grid pattern” over a 25 mile area for weeks. Authorities, including the FAA, were baffled. (I guess they didn’t “authorize” those!) What made the flights especially mysterious is that the “drone” activity continued “during severe storm conditions not conducive to drone flight…”

So what were these objects  and what were they doing? Like the New Jersey sightings (that are still on-going),  if anyone knows they aren’t really telling the public. And so far, that includes DJT.

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After three months of intense propaganda the CIA decided to bury an Ukrainian disinformation scheme and announced to ‘pull North Korean troops off the front line’.

Well. How did North Koreans get to the front line in the first place?

On October 14 the former president of Ukraine Vladimir Zelinski initiated an information-operation designed to increase support for Ukraine. He alleged, without evidence, that Russia planned to involve North Korea into the war.

U.S. financed media outlets in Ukraine soon propped up these rumors by citing ‘sources in Ukraine’s special services’. More anonymous ‘sources’ chimed in and soon there was talk of 3,000 soldiers from North Korea joining the fight. There was however zero evidence that anything like was ever planned or happened.

I thus remarked:

I regard the whole claim of North Korean troops in Russia as a fake news story and I am sure that most experts will follow me in that judgment.

However, today U.S. media manage to play up the nonsense:

Why North Korea is sending soldiers to the Russian front lines – Washington Post
Sending solders to help Russia’s war effort against Ukraine could earn valuable foreign currency for Kim Jong Un’s regime and bolster their strengthening ties.
…

I do not believe that any politician or military in the west will believe that nonsense which is again solely sourced to Ukrainian military intelligence claims. But there is clear campaign by the Ukrainian government to make the issue stick. What is its hope? To induce South Korea to send its forces to fight North Koreans on the Ukrainian border with Russia?

A few days later it emerged that the whole Ukrainian ‘North Korea’ information-operation was based on a U.S. plan:

At the time of writing the above I did not know that the idea for this campaign came from RAND, the Pentagon’s think tank which often proposes strategic ideas. In a commentary about Russian/North Korean and Chinese cooperation published on October 11, three days before the start of Zelenski’s campaign, a RAND analyst wrote:

What Should the United States Do?

Given the differences in the objectives of Russia, China, and North Korea, the United States should be mounting major information operations against these three countries to highlight their differences and fuel distrust among them.
…
[T]he United States should recognize that North Korean military advisors are supporting Russian use of North Korean military supplies in occupied areas of Ukraine.
…
This new cooperation between Russia and North Korea is hardly a signal of a budding long-term alliance and U.S. information campaigns could help speed its demise.

Just three days later the Military Intelligence of the Ukrainian army, headed by General Budanov, started to ‘leak’ claims to the Ukrainian press about North Korean troops in Russia.

Since launching the first rumors of 1,500, then 3,000 North Korean soldiers in Russia the CIA trained head of the Ukrainian military special service General Budanov increased the number from hot air to 11,000 North Korean soldiers.

But even NATO denied to have any knowledge of such a force.

As I summarized at that time:

Shortly after RAND proposed a U.S. information operation campaign around the theme of North Korean soldiers in Russia the Ukrainian military intelligence service under CIA trainee Budanov started to spread rumors of North Korean soldiers soon to fight on the Russian side. The numbers claimed by Budanov have since steadily increased. South Korean intelligence, also associated with the CIA, and U.S. media have joined the campaign. The chair of the House Intelligence Committee is milking the campaign to make political points.

Evidence that was supposed to support the claims has been exposed as being fake. The whole story is thus based on nothing but ‘intelligence’ rumors which are following a RAND proposed script. Don’t fall for it.

The story continued to grow through repetition. Media quoted each other with each adding bits of bullshit from their usual ‘security sources’. What failed to turn up though was evidence.

After being repeatedly questioned about the lack of evidence for their claims, Ukrainian politicians presented their solution:

Today the Ukrainian Minister of Defense, Rustem Umerov, has given a hint how Ukraine will handle this issue (machine translation):

Ukrainian Defense Minister Rustem Umerov confirmed the words of the head of the National Security and Defense Council’s Center for Combating Disinformation, Andriy Kovalenko , that the first “small-scale fighting” had already taken place between the Ukrainian Armed Forces and North Korean soldiers, and the Koreans had suffered losses.
…
Umerov also said that the Russian Federation disguises Koreans as Buryats, so the dead and prisoners must be identified before Ukraine calls the number of enemy losses.

Buryats are a Mongolic people in Siberia who are part of the Russian Federation. Many of them have joined the well paid ranks of Russian forces. Umerov’s plan was thus obvious:

As soon as some Buryat soldier of Russia will turn up dead, the Ukrainian military will present him as a disguised North Korean soldier. Some black and white photos will be found of a similar looking person in North Korean uniform …

“There is your prove. Now send soldiers and weapons.” will Umerov say.

There have since been several attempts by Ukrainian special services to reinforce their media campaign. Russian passports from dead Russian soldiers were presented as ‘fake documents’ carried by ‘North Koreans’. They even captured a Buryat:

On Oct. 28 (local time), Jonas Ohman, head of the Lithuanian NGO Blue/Yellow, which provides aid to Ukraine and its military, informed local media outlet LRT, stating, “The first encounter between a Ukrainian unit we support and North Korean soldiers occurred on the 25th in Kursk. To my knowledge, all of the North Korean soldiers, except for one, were killed. The surviving soldier was found carrying identification as a Buryat.”

Other ‘evidence’ included hand written letters, allegedly by North Korean soldiers, written in South Korean type and style.

Even Wikipedia had to admit:

As of January 2025, there has been no independent confirmation of the Buryat Battalion’s existence [,allegedly consisting of soldiers from North Korea,] outside of Ukrainian sources.

The nonsense of this scheme has become too obvious.

Now the CIA, with the help of the New York Times, is shutting it down.

The ‘North Korean soldiers’ are leaving the battlefield the same way they came – ever unseen.

North Korean Troops No Longer Seen on Front Lines Fighting Ukraine (archived) – New York Times, Jan 31 2024
North Korea sent its best troops to aid Russia in its war against Ukraine. But after months of suffering severe losses, they have been taken off the front line.

North Korean soldiers who joined their Russian allies in battle against Ukrainian forces have been pulled off the front lines after suffering heavy casualties, according to Ukrainian and U.S. officials.

The North Korean troops, sent to bolster Russian forces trying to push back a Ukrainian offensive inside Russia’s borders, have not been seen at the front for about two weeks, the officials said after requesting anonymity to discuss sensitive military and intelligence matters.

Well – that sentences is formally correct. But it would be even more precise to say that ‘North Korean troops have not been seen at the front – since ever.’

The CIA/NYT can’t go there (yet). They still add to the stupid claims:

Many of the soldiers are among North Korea’s best-trained special operations troops, but the Russians appear to have used them as foot soldiers, sending them forth in waves across fields studded with land mines to be mowed down by heavy Ukrainian fire.

Well, where are the pictures and videos of North Korean troops ‘sent forth in waves’ and ‘mowed down by heavy Ukrainian fire’?

In a war where every ground move is surveilled by dozens of drones how come there is not even one video that shows evidence of such a scene?

For now the RAND/Ukraine (dis-)information campaign of ‘North Korean’ soldiers fighting Ukraine has been shut down. U.S. ‘officials’ however keep the door open to relaunch it at a convenient time:

The American officials said the decision to pull the North Korean troops off the front line may not be a permanent one. It is possible, they said, that the North Koreans could return after receiving additional training or after the Russians come up with new ways of deploying them to avoid such heavy casualties.

Maybe a month, a year, or ten from now we will be again told about these imagined ‘enemies’ from North Korea which unite with Russians to ‘fight us’.

Reprinted with permission from Moon of Alabama.

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The Great White Father in Washington has spoken. Let mere mortals hark and obey.

Gaza is a ‘mess’ said President Trump and must be ‘cleaned up.’ 2.1 million human refuse are befouling this potentially prime beachside property. `We just clean out that whole thing’ quoth the Great Developer.

Trump said the answer to this thorny problem is to move all these Palestinian refugees to neighboring Egypt and Jordan. Voila! Problem solved!

Why didn’t the world think of this earlier? Small problem: Egypt, has 107.5 million people crammed into a fertile area the size of the small US state of Maryland. Overpopulated Egypt is so crowded that its people have taken up camping in cemeteries.

Egypt can’t feed its people without millions in US aid delivered through a network of corrupt suppliers. Trump had nothing to say about the corrupt former chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Robert Menendez, who took large bribes for decades from the Egyptian government – and possibly from others such as Ukraine and Israel.

Egypt is one of this world’s most rigid dictatorships. But you never hear about this in the tame western media. Cairo worked hand in glove with Israel in keeping Palestinians caged up in the Gaza open air prison. Egypt’s military regime rightly feared that Palestinians would infect Egypt with ideas of democracy or Islamic government. Egypt is the Arab world’s most populous country. Cairo’s military rulers don’t want any revolutionary, trouble-making Palestinians.

The same applies to Jordan’s royal regime. Its former prince, Hassan, was elbowed out of the succession to the Hashemite throne because the US and Israel considered him too pro-Palestinian. The more amenable and charming Abdullah II was made king.

Tiny Jordan, carved out of the Arabian desert by the British Imperialists after World War I, is already at least 60% Palestinians, ruled over by the crack Jordanian Army. Jordan is a decent, well-run nation but it too cannot absorb any more Palestinians. Neighboring Lebanon faces a similar problem.

All these irksome Palestinians did not come from the moon. They were created when Israel ethnically cleansed what’s now Northern Israel and bulldozed flat its former Arab villages. Gaza was created as a giant open-air prison camp for Palestinian refugees, whose very existence was denied by Israel.

Here’s an idea! Dear President Trump. Why not move the 2.1 million homeless Palestinian refugees to your Mar-a-Lago estate and its surroundings. Throw in Tampa and Lauderdale. Then you can green light your son-in-law Jared Kushner to turn the lovely Gaza coast – now unpopulated – into a new Miami. It’s so simple.

Reprinted with permission from EricMargolis.com.

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