Lew Rockwell Institute

International Man: As the US approaches its 250th anniversary, how would you compare the personal and economic freedoms Americans have today with those envisioned by the Founding Fathers in 1776?

Doug Casey: The US has had a good, long run as a beacon of freedom for the entire world, but nothing lasts forever. Things started changing radically with the War Between the States, and the ascendancy of progressives like Teddy Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson. Then came FDR with his New Deal, and Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society. And it’s accelerated downhill from there.

The trend in the US is critically important. However, Western civilization is in decline throughout the world. And it’s more than just a civilizational issue. There’s a rot in ethics, philosophy, and even the makeup of the population. People of European descent are declining all over the world, especially in Europe itself, where the native population is dropping rapidly. Even in the United States, figures show that the white population dropped by 250,000 in the last year, while the populations of all other ethnic groups rose substantially.

So, to answer the question: Apart from the huge and obvious changes in technology, I think the US founders would find the country culturally unrecognizable. This trend is underscored by the presumptive election of Zohran Mamdani as mayor of New York. He’s young, affable, charismatic. His appeal is understandable relative to the corrupt and constipated alternatives. But he’s also a Muslim communist who openly wants to overthrow what’s left of American traditions in the largest and most important city in the country.

I discussed this at some length in a conversation with Matt Smith on our podcast.

International Man: What do you see as the most dangerous erosions of civil liberties in the US today—and how did we get here?

Doug Casey: All things become corrupt and wind down over time. The Second Law of Thermodynamics affects political systems just as it does the physical world. Everything degrades and dissolves. Unfortunately, that includes the US Constitution. It’s been interpreted, amended, and disregarded into a dead letter.

That’s particularly true of the Bill of Rights, which is the most important part of the Constitution. And the most important part of the Bill of Rights is freedom of speech. All the other freedoms rest upon it. Because if you have a thought and you can’t express it, you’re as good as a slave. You can work and pay taxes, but if you say the wrong thing, you’ll be punished. Best to restrict what you think and say to the weather, sports, and the condition of the roads. And be careful what you say about the weather…

For what it’s worth, the situation is much worse in the UK, Germany, and Canada, among others. Simply making members of protected groups uncomfortable is cause for prosecution and jailing. Hundreds of people have been fined and/or jailed in those countries just for saying—or being perceived to have said—something considered politically incorrect by the powers that be.

International Man: Many Americans still believe they live in the ‘land of the free.’

In your view, is this a myth? What freedoms do they think they have that, in reality, they no longer do?

Doug Casey: Myth rules people’s beliefs and actions vastly more than does reality itself. For instance, soldiers are taught to think and say that they’re fighting for freedom. That’s accepted as a tautology. But in fact, US soldiers rarely fight for freedom. They fight for the government, which has sent them to some shithole, where they don’t speak the language or understand the culture. And where, typically, most of the locals view them as invaders.

People believe they have freedoms. But those freedoms mainly exist as holograms. They’re insubstantial phantoms. Our vaunted freedoms are so eroded they exist mostly as myth—but, as I said earlier, myth is much more powerful than reality. I outlined the 12 characteristics of Western Civilization here.

Americans think they have free thought, but that’s been overruled by political correctness and thought crimes. Free speech has been overruled by cancel culture. Free markets have been pretty much regulated out of existence. We think we have limited government, but the State is absolutely everywhere and in everything.

Individualism is deemed antisocial and is overruled by identity politics. Rationality, logic, and science are deemed “white” or impositions of “the patriarchy.”  Liberty is seen as a danger that needs to be excluded from safe spaces. The very concept of progress may lead to inequality, which makes progress a dangerous thing.

The list can go on, but freedoms that were self-evident facts 250 years ago have been completely watered down. A year ago, I discussed the 20 points Michael Moore put forward, which he said proved the average American is basically socialist and left-leaning. We analyzed them and found that he was absolutely right. He didn’t fabricate anything. Sad to say, “the land of the free” is a myth.

International Man: How is the US education system failing to instill the principles of liberty and critical thinking that underpinned the American Revolution?

Doug Casey: Not only is it failing to instill these things, but it’s doing exactly the opposite. It’s indoctrinating students with socialist principles. That’s no surprise. It’s to be expected because the public school system is run by government employees who naturally think like bureaucrats. They’re all members of teachers’ unions, which are among the most left-wing of labor organizations.

It’s a far cry from the one-room schoolhouse of the past, where kids—rather than being imprisoned and listening to mostly irrelevant lectures from a bureaucrat—were, in effect, taught by a mentor. The older kids would help the younger kids, breeding responsibility. Schools today exist, at great expense, for two reasons: 1) to indoctrinate the kids, 2) to keep them off the street while their parents are at work.

The school system in the US is dysfunctional and should be replaced with something else. Matt Smith and I are now completing a book that will explain exactly what that would be. It’s pointless to complain unless you can offer a positive solution.

International Man: What roles do central banking, taxation, and economic regulation play in the decline of freedom and liberty in the US?

Doug Casey: The three things you mentioned make economic prosperity much harder to achieve. Central banking causes inflation, which, along with taxation, makes it very hard for the average guy to build capital. It’s extremely hard for someone who produces more than he consumes to save the difference, because those savings are being inflated out of existence. Worse, he can only save what’s left after lots of direct and indirect taxation. If you do manage to put together some savings, economic regulation makes building a business extremely expensive and risky.

The net result of government is that the average guy is impoverished and in debt. It’s hard to experience freedom when you’re actually an indentured servant. And yet people think the State is their friend, and they can vote their way to liberty and prosperity.

Reprinted with permission from International Man.

The post Erosion of Freedom in America Ahead of Its 250th Anniversary appeared first on LewRockwell.

If Iran resumes enrichment while rejecting IAEA inspections, then Trump will target Iran’s underground facilities with a low-yield B61-11 nuclear weapon

You can usually tell which side won a war by simply observing ‘what happens’ after the hostilities end. Following the announcement of a ceasefire between Iran and Israel, millions of Iranians poured onto the streets of Tehran, chanting patriotic songs and waving flags in a spontaneous display of jubilation. In contrast, there were no festivities or celebrations in Tel Aviv or Jerusalem where the mood was noticeably more somber and gloomy. What this indicates is that most people believe that Iran won the war.

We are not ignoring the fact that Iran’s threshold for success in the conflict was much lower than Israel’s. As the aggressor, Israel needed to achieve its strategic goals to claim victory, while Iran only needed to withstand the assault, which it managed to accomplish with great ease. Regardless of whether this benchmark is equitable, the result is evident: for 12 days, Iran held its own, matching Israel’s aggression blow-for-blow, eventually forcing Israel to seek a ceasefire. In short, Iran won.

Israel made a number of miscalculations in its approach to Iran which severely undermined its chances of success. It’s two biggest mistakes, were its overconfidence in its own multilayered air defense systems (Note– Arrow 2, Arrow 3, David’s Sling, Iron Dome and THAAD) which proved to be woefully inadequate in defending the country’s strategic assets. Israeli war planners also grossly undervalued Iran’s impressive ballistic missile capability which exceeds Israel’s dated arsenal and ranks among the best in the world. In last week’s article, we provided a long list of the key military, intelligence, industrial and energy facilities that were obliterated by Iran’s precision guided ballistic missiles and which Israel’s ineffective air defense system failed to intercept. We now believe that Israel’s military experts must have realized –no more than a week into the fighting– that they were gravely over-matched and needed to find a diplomatic off-ramp pronto. But –for whatever reason– they stubbornly persisted with their anemic offensive for nearly a week hoping for a miracle. When the miracle failed to arrive, Netanyahu goaded Trump into bombing Iran’s nuclear sites in order to establish a pretext for ending the conflict. In short, Israel had been looking for a way to end the hostilities long before the fighting formally ended, which means they knew their strategic aims would not be achieved.

The outcome of the conflict has been particularly instructive for Israeli leaders who now realize that they are incapable of winning a conventional war with Iran. Unfortunately, that lesson has ominous implications for the rest of the world as no one seriously thinks that Netanyahu is going to ditch his life-long dream of a Greater Israel extending across the region. If a conventional war against Iran cannot be won, then Israel must escalate to the next level of military confrontation. That is the rationale behind Netanyahu’s unexpected trip to Washington next week. He wants Trump to lead the next round of fighting with a nuclear bomb.

In my opinion, people are so relieved that the conflict lasted just 12 days, that they are ignoring the signs that the world is be on the brink of something truly horrific. This is from Tuesday’s Times of Israel:

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will fly to Washington early next week to meet with US President Donald Trump, a White House official confirmed to The Times of Israel Monday night, amid intensifying efforts by Washington to end the war in Gaza and free hostages held there for nearly two years.

The July 7 visit will mark Netanyahu’s third trip to Washington to meet Trump since the US president returned to office in January 2025, and will come exactly two weeks after Israel and Iran agreed to a US-brokered halt to a 12-day air war that saw long simmering tensions between the arch foes explode into open conflict for the first time….

The second US official said Trump would also discuss Iran and Syria during the meeting with Netanyahu. According to the official, the president planned to use the meeting to tout military achievements during the war against Iran. Though primarily an Israeli-led offensive, the US briefly joined on June 22 by attacking three Iranian nuclear sites, dropping massive ground-penetrating bombs on the hardened subterranean Fordo facility and firing missiles at the Natanz and Isfahan plants….

Trump has claimed that the US strikes “obliterated” Iran’s nuclear capabilities, but other US officials have offered more measured assessments amid lingering questions over how badly the program was damaged and the effectiveness of the bombing campaign….

Iran has consistently denied seeking to acquire nuclear weapons. However, it enriched uranium to levels that have no peaceful application, obstructed international inspectors from checking its nuclear facilities, and expanded its ballistic missile capabilities. Israel said it had recently taken steps toward weaponization. Times of Israel

The article is largely a diversion aimed at concealing Netanyahu’s real motive which is to draw Trump deeper into Israel’s war with Iran. I assure you, Bibi is not looking for Trump’s input on developments in Gaza nor will the US determine whether there’s going to be a ceasefire with Hamas or not. The only rational explanation for Netanyahu’s surprise visit is that he wants to persuade Trump on a matter of great urgency that requires man-to-man arm-twisting to ensure that Bibi ‘gets his way.‘ Once Netanyahu convinces Trump to ‘go nuclear’, he thinks Iran will be forced to capitulate allowing Israel to impose its imperial diktat across the region. Here’s former weapons inspector Scott Ritter discussing Iran with Judge Andrew Napolitano on Monday:

Note the following: 400 kilograms of uranium hexafluoride enriched to 60% is missing and no one seems to know where it is. The Iranians said the secured it and it wasn’t impacted by the strikes. We know that since January 2021, Iran has been producing centrifuges that are no longer accounted for by the IAEA because Donald Trump withdrew from the JCPOA in 2018 in which accounting for centrifuges was part of the inspection regime…. (Iran ended its partial cooperation after the EU countries refused to honor their part of the deal by lifting sanctions)

Iran said they were no longer bound to the terms of the nuclear treaty and prevented the IAEA account for the centrifuges. You can build a lot of centrifuges in four years, and Iran has over a dozen buried sites similar to Fordow that could be easily converted, in fact, they were in the process of declaring a third uranium conversion facility when the bombing took place. My point is, there is nothing stopping the Iranians from building advanced centrifuge cascades in other locations now undeclared, because they don’t trust the IAEA because the IAEA spied on Israel on behalf of Israel and the United States and provided critical information that was used to destroy facilities and assassinate scientists.

So, we don’t know where the centrifuges are, we don’t know where the already enriched uranium is …and let’s say the Iranians did enrich it to over 90%, the facility that converts it into metal that will be used in a weapon is 100 meters underground untouched. So, Donald Trump doesn’t know what he’s talking about or he’s simply lying to the American people, but there’s no professional in the world who would say that Iran’s nuclear program has been totally destroyed The evidence directly contradicts that assertion. Will Trump Nuke Iran; Interview with Scott Ritter, You Tube, 6 minute mark

Video Link

There it is in black and white. Iran has abandoned transparency because the IAEA used its access to nuclear sites to conduct espionage on Israel’s behalf. So, now, all the IAEA cameras have been removed, and the inspections have stopped. There is no longer any monitoring of Iran’s sites. If we couple that development with the fact that Trump is determined to prevent any additional enrichment, then we have the makings of a pretext that will be used to justify the upcoming attacks on Iran’s nuclear sites; only this time, conventional “bunker busters” will be replaced with some variation of the low-yield, earth-penetrating B61-11 nuclear bomb, which is designed to penetrate hardened underground targets before detonating. That is the logical upgrade from the GBU-57 Massive Ordnance Penetrators (MOPs) that were previously employed.

Keep in mind, there are a number of fanatics in the US foreign policy establishment who would like to see the threshold for the use of nuclear weapons lowered so these species-ending munitions could be used on the battlefield or –in this case– to eliminate the threat of WMDs falling into the “wrong hands”. This is no longer a far-fetched prospect but a highly likely probability as new alliances grow stronger challenging Washington’s ability to preserve the rapidly-collapsing “rules-based order.”. The temptation to use “tactical” nukes will eventually be too seductive to resist.

In any event, there is nothing a Zionist warlord like Netanyahu would prefer more than to have his good friend Trump spearhead the next aggression on Iran by lobbing a few nuclear bunker busters in the direction of Fordo, Natanz and Isfahan. In Bibi’s mind, that would pave the way to Iran’s capitulation followed by Israel’s de facto domination of the entire region. Game. Set. Match.

Bottom line: Israel lost Round 1 to Iran which means they must up-their-game. That is why Netanyahu has planned an emergency meeting with Trump, so Israel can activate Plan B. Regrettably, Iran has made Bibi’s job easy for him by terminating relations with the IAEA, which has turned Iran’s nuclear program into a black box. Netanyahu will use Iran’s action as proof that they have resumed enrichment and are just days from developing a nuclear weapon. Trump will feel compelled to act more aggressively than before by giving the green light to a more forceful attack. Here’s more from Ritter:

Bottom line: I believe Donald Trump is committed to a policy of regime change. He would like to have the nuclear program eliminated…but he’s boxed himself into a corner because what happens when it is discovered that the nuclear sites are intact (US bombs did not “obliterate” them), so now you have a nuclear enrichment program that Trump said he would never allow to exist. So what happens? Will Trump Nuke Iran; Interview with Scott Ritter, You Tube

Ritter’s analysis is hard to refute, after all, he’s merely connecting the dots while assuming that Trump will stick to his original pledge to totally eliminate Iran’s uranium enrichment program. If that can’t be achieved with conventional weapons, then Trump will move up the escalatory latter to nukes. It all seems pretty straightforward. Here’s Ritter again:

Judge Andrew Napolitano— So what’s he going to do? Do you think Trump will be tempted to use nuclear weapons on Iran?

Scott Ritter– Yes…… The fact of the matter is there’s only two ways to take out the Iranian nuclear program. One: The Iranians do it voluntarily. (Regime change followed by abandoning enrichment.) The other way is nuclear weapons, and there’s a war plan in place that is already designed to do this. (In his first term) Trump was told our conventional munitions can’t do this, that it would require nuclear weapons. So, a new nuclear deployment plan was developed making nuclear weapons available to target these facilities. So, I think Trump will probably go into a long-range regime change game now, but if that fails, Trump may have no choice but to either reverse course ….or use a nuclear weapon.

Look, DARPA, (Note– Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, is a research and development agency of the U.S. Department of Defense) took two years –according to Sec-Def Pete Hegseth– to come up with this ‘strike option’ against Fordow, so, if it didn’t work, what other options do you have? (implying that the use of nukes is inevitable)

I am fearful that the domestic opposition that could stop a war isn’t manifesting itself, so, unless something else happens, I’m afraid we are on a weeks or months-long path towards the potential of nuclear weapons being used against Iran. Will Trump Nuke Iran; Interview with Scott Ritter, You Tube

Of course, we could be wrong. It could be that Netanyahu actually wants to discuss a ceasefire in Gaza with his dear friend, Donald Trump. But we think that is highly unlikely. We think Bibi is laser-focused on Iran, the last significant obstacle blocking the Zionist dream of Greater Israel and regional hegemony. All he needs to do is convince our credulous president that Iran is building a bomb and can only be stopped with a nuclear bunker buster. It might take some coaxing, but Bibi is certainly ‘up to the task’.

After that, it’s just a matter of getting American pilots to drop the bombs.

Reprinted with permission from The Unz Review.

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“Healthcare” grift, graft, fraud and financialized skims / scams will bankrupt the nation.

I’ve been writing about America’s healthcare system for 18 years, emphasizing two enduring themes: 1) our lifestyle is unhealthy, with predictable consequences and 2) healthcare as it is currently configured will bankrupt the nation all by itself.

This recent article on how having a baby without complications now costs over $44,000 adds a third theme: the tragi-comic insanity and absurdity of the “healthcare” system that has been normalized, as if this is the only possible way to organize healthcare:

“And They Wonder Why The Birth Rate Is Declining”: A Mother Went Viral For Revealing The Costs Of Being Pregnant In America:

Lastly, Kayla reveals that her baby received a bill, too, which added up to $12,761.30 without insurance. For their family of five now, the cost of insurance per month is $2,500 — a nearly $400 increase from when they were just a family of four. “We’re still waiting for him to process on our insurance,” she explains, “so, for now, this is the cost without it.”

One user said, “America’s healthcare system is a joke… how does the newborn have a $12k bill?”

It’s more than a joke–it’s travesty of a mockery of a sham of a system that actually improves health. There’s an even darker side of the picture–the takeover of the system by financiers and fraudsters–which truth be told is a redundancy.

We can now add a fourth theme: stripped of purposeful opacity, America’s “healthcare” system is nothing more than a structured financial skim/scam. Before we dig into that, here are a few of the dozens of posts I’ve written on “healthcare” since 2008:

U.S. Lifestyle + “Healthcare” = Bankruptcy (June 19, 2008)

The “Impossible” Healthcare Solution: Go Back to Cash (July 29, 2009)

Why “Healthcare Reform” Is Not Reform, Part II (December 29, 2009)

Sickcare Will Bankrupt the Nation–And Soon (March 21, 2011)

How Healthcare Became Sickcare (March 18, 2022)

Let’s start with what childbirth cost back when healthcare was paid in cash. Here are the costs of childbirth in 1952 at one of the finest hospitals on the West Coast, The Santa Monica Hospital: $30:

According to the BLS Inflation Calculator, $1 in 1952 is $12.13 today, so adjusted for inflation, the $30 fee to deliver a baby would be $363 today. Here are maternity rates from 1952:

A private room was $19, or $230 in today’s currency. OK, so we have fancier equipment now, more staff, etc., but really–does that explain what once cost less than $1,000 in today’s money–paid in cash, no insurance–now costs $44,000? No. Here’s why: structured financial skims/scams.

Dutch Rojas (@DutchRojas) is a go-to source for explaining the opaque way “healthcare” skims / scams siphon off hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars. Consider these X posts:

Why is healthcare expensive?
You go to your doctor.
Same building, same service.
But now it’s 3x the price, because they sold to a health system.

The secret?
A “facility fee” was added.
Medicare and commercial payers just hand it over.

It’s not for better care.
It’s for ownership.

Every consolidation deal is a bet against the patient and you’re footing the bill.

And the politicians love every bit of it…

Provider Taxes: The Most Elegant Grift in American Healthcare
It’s not a tax.

It’s a laundering operation.

Here’s how it works:

North Carolina’s ‘nonprofit’ health systems are running a $40+ billion hedge fund operation disguised as healthcare.
They’re extracting hundreds of millions in tax exemptions while paying CEOs tens of millions.

This is the largest wealth transfer scheme in the American healthcare system.

This doesn’t even include outright Medicare/Medicaid fraud, overbilling, unnecessary tests, medications and procedures, and a nearly endless menu of other enrichment schemes passed off as “care.” These billions go to the “owners,” not the frontline healthcare providers / workers.

Read the Whole Article

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Yesterday, I wrote about the decades-long obsession that the U.S. national-security establishment — i.e., the Pentagon, the CIA, and the NSA — has had with Cuba. Long ago, as part of their Cold War against the Reds, U.S. national-security state officials convinced themselves that Cuba’s communist regime posed a grave threat to U.S. “national security,” whatever definition is placed on that ridiculous term. Of course, they’ve now got President Trump on the target-Cuba bandwagon.

Not surprisingly, there are tons of Republicans, conservatives, and, no doubt, even libertarian right-wingers who are ecstatic about Trump’s recent executive decree that strengthens and reinforces the brutal economic embargo that the U.S. government has had on Cuba for more than 60 years. Hope for regime change in Cuba springs eternal for these people notwithstanding more than six decades of deadly and destructive failure to achieve that goal.

What these people, many of whom call themselves “freedom advocates,” fail to realize — or maybe they do and just don’t care — is that the U.S. embargo against Cuba has destroyed the economic liberty of the American people. In fact, I’m willing to bet that most Americans don’t realize that. While the embargo, acting in tandem with Cuba’s socialist economic system, brings extreme impoverishment and maybe even death by starvation to Cubans, many Americans think that it is a neutral measure insofar as the American people are concerned.

Not so! Anyone who cheers for the embargo is, at the same time, cheering the destruction of his own liberty. That should hit home with everyone who celebrates the Fourth of July.

Many people believe that it is illegal under U.S. law to travel to Cuba. Actually, it’s not. The reason is that U.S. officials never wanted to portray themselves as destroying a right that has always been considered basic, natural, and fundamental — the right of freedom of travel.

Thus, to avoid doing that, U.S. officials instead made it illegal for Americans to spend money in Cuba. So, you’re free to travel there but as soon as you spend money there on anything, including food, hotel, transportation, or just a tip — you are in violation of U.S. law.

Let me qualify that. It’s only Americans who spend money in Cuba without the official permission of the U.S. government who are in violation of U.S. law. If you’re able to get official permission to spend money there, you’re okay. Thus, it’s not the actual spending of money that is considered to be a grave offense. It’s doing it without official permission that is the grave offense.

What happens to an American who travels to Cuba and spends money there without official permission? Upon his return to the U.S., he is fined. The fine can be hefty. For example, one company was fined $31,000 for doing photo shoots in Cuba. Another was fined $220,000 for doing hotel bookings there.

But while most of the actions taken involve fines, the U.S. government has the option of going after someone criminally under what has become a popularly used law from World War I — the Trading with the Enemy Act. Even though the two nations are not at war with each other, Cuba is considered to be an “official enemy” of the United States. Therefore, any economic activity on the part of an American could be said to be “trading with the enemy.” In that case, under the discretion of federal prosecutors, the violator is looking at the possibility of a felony indictment, prosecution, and punishment with fine and jail time.

A good example of this phenomenon was the U.S. criminal prosecution of two Americans who organized some sailboat races between Key West and Cuba in the late 1990s. U.S. officials went after them with a vengeance for daring to trade with “the enemy.” They were indicted and faced the possibility of 15 years in prison and $350,000 in fines. A judge later dismissed the charges, and the government ended up settling for $15,000 in fines.

What’s important to note about all this is that with its embargo, the U.S. government has destroyed the economic liberty and private-property rights of the American people. After all, as Thomas Jefferson implied in the Declaration of Independence, people have the natural, God-given right to do whatever they want with their own money. It’s their money after all. It doesn’t belong to the government. Thus, people have the natural, God-given right to travel to Cuba or wherever else they wish to travel and spend whatever amount of money they want — all without the official permission of U.S. officials.

A dark irony in all this is that in the effort to bring down Cuba’s communist regime, U.S. officials have adopted the same types of controls over the money and economic activities of the American people that the Cuban socialist regime exercises over the money and economic activities of the Cuban people. But hey, I’m sure U.S. officials would say: What better way to celebrate the Fourth of July than by cheering the destruction of our own liberty here at home through the targeting of innocent people with death abroad?

Reprinted with permission from Future of Freedom Foundation.

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The defense ministers of all 10 members of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) met last week in Qingdao, in China’s Shandong Province.

That, in itself, is the stuff drama is made of. Not only because it was a warm-up for the main SCO annual summit later this year in Tianjin with heads of state. But mostly because on the same table we had top BRICS members Russia, China, India and Iran, plus Pakistan; an Indian defense minister visiting China for the first time in five years and facing his Pakistani counterpart after their latest serious exchange of fire; and the Iranian minister closely consulting with Beijing immediately after the Israel–Iran ceasefire kabuki orchestrated by POTUS.

If that was not intriguing enough, the SCO meeting in Qingdao took place almost simultaneously with the NATO summit in The Hague.

Pakistani Defense Minister Khawaja Muhammad Asif cut to the chase, remarking how, unlike NATO, the SCO can “further peace in this region.” China’s Defense Minister Dong Jun stressed that the SCO plays the role of a “stabilizing anchor.”

The now-fragmented (thanks to US President Donald Trump) collective west has no idea what the SCO is all about. The SCO is a 25-year-old multilateral organization, founded a few months before 9/11, and consists of 10 full member states, two observer nations, and 14 dialogue partners: nearly half of the world’s population, from Eastern Europe (Hungary) all the way to the Indian Ocean and the Pacific Rim.

The SCO is not an Asian NATO – as in an offensive military alliance, and it doesn’t want to be; rather, in a quintessentially Chinese formulation, it prefers to affirm itself as a “giant ship of security.”

Initially conceptualized to fight against what the Chinese define as “three evils” – terrorism, separatism, and extremism – the SCO has seriously evolved into a mechanism of economic cooperation. Its latest round table at the St. Petersburg Economic Forum less than two weeks ago, for instance, was hosted by SCO Secretary-General Nurlan Yermekbayev, moderated by the ultra-experienced Sergey Katyrin, president of Russia’s Chamber of Commerce and Industry, and focused on the challenges of creating a common SCO logistics, financial and energy infrastructure.

This panel moderated by Alexey Gromyko, director of the Institute of Europe of the Russian Academy of Sciences and with the secretary of the Union State (Russia–Belarus) Sergey Glazyev as the main speaker, intertwined the SCO with the Eurasia Economic Union (EAEU), debating what is the role to be played by the post-Soviet space in the emerging multipolar economy.

So the SCO today promotes not only joint counterterrorism drills and intelligence sharing, but also economic cooperation fine-tuned to the cultural expectations of different civilizations. It’s a multipolar organism by definition.

Strategic partners Russia–China get on board 

The heart of the matter in Qingdao had to evolve around what can be called the Primakov triangle – a nod to former Russian prime minister Yevgeny Primakov who envisioned a post-Soviet, autonomous Russian powerhouse in a new multipolar order. Today, we see that prescience in a “RIC” composed of Russia, Iran, and China, and not India: These three independent civilizational states are, at the moment, the top three actors advancing the complex Eurasia integration process.

Russian Defense Minister Andrey Belousov met privately with Chinese Defense Minister Dong Jun, as well as with Iranian Defense Minister Aziz Nazirzadeh. At the SCO table, Belousov did not mince his words.

He said that US and Israeli attacks on Iran breach the UN Charter and international law; he confirmed that Moscow had proposed to broker a de-escalation; and he re-emphasized that “the role of international institutions designed to ensure global stability has fallen to an unacceptable level.”

Belousov also stressed all 10 Ministers’ top headache: that “terrorist ideologies” and “transit of militants” continue to spread from West Asia to Afghanistan.

On Ukraine, Belousov was quite predictable; Russia is steadily advancing, and Kiev resorts to “terror tactics” as it contemplates doom. None of the players at the SCO table would dream of contradicting him.

So, where was India amidst all this action? Well, refining its shopping list. Defense Minister Rajnath Singh personally asked Belousov for urgent upgrades to the Su-30MKI and much faster delivery of the remaining S-400 Triumf. These are part of a hefty $5.43 billion deal; three units have been delivered, and the next two will arrive by early 2026.

These S-400s were instrumental during Operation Sindoor – India’s mini-war against Pakistan.

Immediately after Trump’s Israel–Iran “ceasefire” kabuki, Tehran approached Beijing to examine buying options for a substantial batch (at least 40) of Chinese J-10CE fighters (the export version of the J-10C). These negotiations, by the way, have been going on for at least 10 years.

From an Iranian point of view, in terms of low cost and availability, the J-10C might be a better option than the Russian MiG-35s and Su-35Es (the export version of the Su-35S). But it’s important to remember that the Su-35 and the J-10C represent two different classes of jet fighters. Nothing prevents Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) from buying both – a case of interacting strategic partnerships.

Diplomatic sources confirm that Iran already has Su-35s. It is unclear how many, but certainly more than two. Russia is more than ready to sell up to two squadrons. Each squadron would have 12, so a total of 24 jets.

The consensus in Moscow is that Iran will step up simultaneous purchases of top-of-the-line Russian and Chinese fighter jets. And certainly air defense, as in Russian S-400s. The drama that unfolded in the past two weeks goes way beyond the artificial and superficial debate on whether Tehran lacked help from its close, strategic Russian–Chinese allies.

While the IRGC wants those fighter jets after the painful lessons of Israel’s 12-day war, it needs most of all to fine-tune its internal counter-intelligence and insurgency apparatus. A substantial amount of punishment suffered by Iran came from domestic saboteurs who launched drones, planted bombs, and surveyed high-value targets to be murdered.

We want war against Russia and China 

Now compare all these Eurasian interactions in Qingdao with what happened in The Hague. Essentially, after being blackmailed by the appalling NATO Secretary-General Mark “Hello Daddy” Rutte, the European Union (EU) decided to allocate a whopping €650 billion (approximately $695.5 billion) of funds it doesn’t have to buy US weapons to declare war on Russia – and later China.

That brings us to the five percent kabuki. For every NATO member to spend five percent on offense, with their combined debt already exceeding 80 percent of GDP, they would need to nearly triple the €325 billion (approximately $381.2 billion) they spent on weapons in 2024, thus reaching nearly one trillion euros.

EU citizens with a brain can easily do the math: There will be a non-stop orgy of “cost-cutting,” tax hikes, and disappearing social benefits to finance the weaponizing. And stealing €300 billion (approximately $351.75) of Russian assets won’t help, because that won’t cover even a one-year increase.

All ministers at the SCO table in Qingdao knew that NATO was at war with Russia, and then China does not even qualify as a lousy Monty Python sketch. Russia already has 13,000 missiles and counting, and will soon be able to produce up to 300 hypersonic Oreshniks a year – more than enough to paralyze every single port and airport in Europe.

It was quite intriguing to observe Russian President Vladimir Putin’s immediate follow-up to what was discussed at the SCO in Qingdao. Cue to the Eurasia Economic Union (EAEU) forum in Minsk, at which Putin said, “thankfully, the situation in the Middle East is stabilizing. The longstanding conflict between Israel and Iran is, thanks to God’s grace, now behind us.”

Or, maybe not, if statements of Israeli officials are anything to go by. Still, for the Russian president, what always matters most is geoeconomics. At the forum, Putin highlighted the EAEU’s preferential agreements with Vietnam, Singapore, and Serbia, plus an imminent agreement with the UAE, saying: “Mutually beneficial relationships with countries across Eurasia, Africa, and Latin America are actively advancing.” Not to mention further cooperation with the BRICS, the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), ASEAN, the African Union, and, of course, the SCO.

And just as the ministers were leaving Qingdao, it was officially confirmed: Iran ditched the American GPS system for China’s Beidou. Talk about a sharp, bold move in the tech war chessboard. Next step: to snatch all those Su-35s and JC-10CEs.

The views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of The Cradle.

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Okay, you sport fans out there, The Gilded Age is back on our idiot boxes, and it’s a welcome respite from the garbage that untalented directors and writers of today have been shoving down our throats. At least garbage had its uses before it turned to waste, but this recent stuff…words fail me. When was the last time we watched a black man speaking normal English, smiling, and not using the f-word nonstop while threatening to kill somebody white? On our screens, that is. Back in the good old days, screenwriters were terribly good writers with names such as Tennessee Williams, Irwin Shaw, Scott Fitzgerald, Gore Vidal, Tom Stoppard, and Billy Wilder among many other exceptional scribes, and they produced such classics as The Best Years of Our Lives, All About Eve, and Gone With the Wind, the latter with a little help from one Margaret Mitchell.

But I don’t want to dwell on the lack of talent among moviemakers today. (An exception is my friend Michael Mailer’s Hearts of Champions and Cutman, the latter an outstanding film.) It’s obvious that talent and Hollywood have parted ways, hence when a costume drama like The Gilded Age comes along, it’s welcome. Mind you, like Henry James and Edith Wharton before him, The Gilded Age auteur Julian Fellowes—a pretty good social climber himself—does overcook things. In other words, yes, one had to conform back then in order to be invited to Mrs. Astor’s balls, but definitely not as much as the abovementioned writers would have us assume. The Astor family began as German butchers, after all, so her snobbery was predictable. Here in America, social standing was based on only one thing—money—yet tradition played almost as big a role. If your ancestors had come over early, and especially if they had fought for the creation of what is now known as the US of A, you were special in the social ladder.

“Like Henry James and Edith Wharton before him, The Gilded Age auteur Julian Fellowes does overcook things.”

No longer. The WASP hierarchy has gone the way of the Titanic, while the Jewish ascendancy is at present in full bloom and rising. The WASPs had a good run, but unlike their aristocratic European counterparts, they blew it by drinking too much, spending too much on polo ponies, and paying too much alimony and tax. In other words, they didn’t make sure of their strong position both in society and in government. It is too early to tell, but their Jewish replacements will not make the same mistakes.

But back to The Gilded Age. The actor playing the Duke of Buckingham portrays him on the straight and narrow, the real-life Buckingham having earned his title by being King James’ bum boy back in the 1600s. (He had a grisly end.) Everyone seems to be on the make on the series, a gross exaggeration, I am sure, but nevertheless with some truth to it. The difference with European society is amazing. And I’ll tell you why: In the old continent, the Bible aside, the most important book that decreed who was who was the Almanach de Gotha—if you were in it, you were in; if you were not, you were out. Mind you, there were poets and writers and musicians and actors who would never be in the Gotha book but were ever present in the great salons of the aristocracy. The Gotha listed all titles, and Le Petit Gotha listed royal, princely, and ducal titles. (If you’re confused, don’t worry.)

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Titles were handed out by ruling kings, and the highest were princely ones. I once tried to explain them to a sweet Texas lady, but I was unsuccessful. “If you’re a princess, why aren’t you royal?” she asked. “Because you’re a Serene Highness, not a Royal Highness,” said I. No go. Ironically, yours truly is in the Gotha book, but I came in through the back door. My wife was born a Serene Highness, so her hubby and children and their descendants are in for good. (The Schoenburgs have been nobles since the 11th century—a pretty good run, I’d say.)

So, while in the good old USA money got Mister Moneybags a good seat at the table, in Parisian, London, Roman, Madrid, and other European drawing rooms it was titles that came first. Landed gentry managed to keep their assets for hundreds of years because land is more stable than hard cash. And the nobility partook in politics and protected itself from the demands of the great unwashed. The latter are now scrubbed clean but still screaming their heads off when someone like Bezos makes a Venetian splash. I went to two grand Venetian balls when very young, back when Italians were really struggling, and I remember the crowds cheering as we disembarked from our gondolas into the palaces. Now they boo. Envy is the 21st century’s disease.

What watching The Gilded Age brought to mind was the following: What would those uptight Edith Wharton characters have thought of such “society” figures of today as the Kardashians, the Hiltons, the Kushners, and the Dillers, all attendees to the Bezos nuptials? American high society died some thirty years ago—Winston and C.Z. Guest were the last—and was replaced by celebrities like those just mentioned. God help us.

This article was originally published on Taki’s Magazine.

The post Act Your ‘Age’ appeared first on LewRockwell.

Honestly at this point they should just get Netanyahu his own room in the White House and a desk in the Oval Office.

The prime minister of Israel is taking his third trip to the White House in the five months since Trump has been back in office. I have immediate blood family members who I love with all my heart and visit less often than this.

This comes as the Trump administration revokes the US visas of British punk rap duo Bob Vylan ahead of a US tour for chanting “Death, death to the IDF” at a concert in the UK. Trump’s sycophantic supporters who spent years complaining that their free speech rights were under assault appear fine with their government deciding what words Americans are allowed to hear in their own country.

This also comes as Trump actively intervenes in the Israeli judicial system to prevent Netanyahu’s corruption trial from moving forward.

The president has repeatedly taken to social media to demand that Israel abandon its corruption case against the prime minister, at one point even implying that the US could cut off arms supplies if his trial isn’t canceled.

“The United States of America spends Billions of Dollar a year, far more than on any other Nation, protecting and supporting Israel,” Trump said. “We are not going to stand for this. We just had a Great Victory with Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu at the helm — And this greatly tarnishes our Victory. LET BIBI GO, HE’S GOT A BIG JOB TO DO!”

It’s so revealing what the US government is and is not willing to threaten conditioning military supplies on, and what it’s willing to interfere in Israel’s affairs to accomplish.

Ever since the Gaza holocaust began we’ve been hearing lines like “Israel is a sovereign country” and “Israel is a sovereign state that makes its own decisions” when reporters ask why the White House doesn’t leverage arms shipments to demand more humanitarian treatment for civilians in the Gaza Strip. But the president of the United States is willing to leverage those same arms shipments to directly interfere in Israeli legal proceedings which have nothing to do with the US government in order to get Netanyahu out of trouble.

Wow, watch exchange with StateSpox@SMArikat: US-tax payers have given [] almost $23 billion in the last year, you have no leverage?

Miller: They’re a sovereign country

Said: That received $22 billion

Miller: That number isn’t correct

Lee: What is correct number

Miller:… pic.twitter.com/4a4w7TMJAD

— Assal Rad (@AssalRad) October 8, 2024

And it would appear that the president’s intervention has been successful; Netanyahu’s corruption trial has since been postponed.

When it comes to committing genocide using American weapons funded by American taxpayers, Israel is a sovereign state upon which the US can exert zero leverage or control. When it comes to meddling in the corruption trial of a man who is wanted for war crimes by the International Criminal Court, the White House pulls no punches in protecting its favorite genocide monster.

There is no meaningful separation between the US and Israeli governments. They’re two member states in the undeclared empire that sprawls across the entire western world, and Trump and Netanyahu are two of the most depraved and most consequential managers of this empire today.

They are thick as thieves. They are partners in crime.

Call it the Trumpanyahu administration.

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Today, July 4, America celebrates the 249th anniversary of the adoption of our Declaration of Independence.

On July 4, 1837, John Quincy Adams said these words about Independence Day:

Why is it that, next to the birthday of the Savior of the world, your most joyous and most venerated festival returns on this day [Independence Day]? . . . Is it not that, in the chain of human events, the birthday of the nation is indissolubly linked with the birthday of the Savior? That it forms a leading event in the progress of the Gospel dispensation? Is it not that the Declaration of Independence first organized the social compact on the foundation of the Redeemer’s mission upon earth? That it laid the cornerstone of human government upon the first precepts of Christianity, and gave to the world the first irrevocable pledge of the fulfillment of the prophecies, announced directly from Heaven at the birth of the Savior and predicted by the greatest of the Hebrew prophets six hundred years before?

Adams was exactly right. The United States of America is the only nation in human history established by (mostly) Christian people upon 2,000 years of Christian thought and God’s Natural Laws and dedicated to the purpose of religious and personal liberty and equal justice under the law.

When I was being interviewed for a documentary movie (I’m featured in 19 full-length documentary films and TV specials), the producer asked me to iterate the basic principles upon which America was founded. Based on my study of the Declaration, Constitution, Bill of Rights and the copious supplemental writings of the Founding Fathers, here, I believe, are the principles upon which America was founded:

1. That man is created equal under God, and, as such, human life is a sacred gift of God.

2. That the Natural rights of the individual are unalienable and superior to the will of the state.

3. That government exists to protect the Natural rights and liberties of man, not to provide man with public benefits and favors.

4. That a man is innocent until proven guilty, that he has the Natural right to a trial by jury and the right to a defense attorney.

5. That people have a Natural right to choose their own form of government.

6. That individuals have a Natural right and duty to bear arms for their own protection and the protection of their communities.

7. That the power and reach of the central government needs to be limited, being held in check by independent sovereign states, free, independent juries and state citizen militias.

8. That religious liberty is the core of America’s freedoms.

9. That the people have a Natural right and duty to alter or abolish any government that has become tyrannical.

10. That America was created as a constitutional republic.

11. That only sound money would be used as legal tender so as to keep the federal government from amassing excessive debt.

12. That America would always promote and protect a free market economy with limited governmental interference.

13. That a man’s home is his castle and his personal property can never be seized except by arduous due process.

14. That a free society depends upon the acceptance and application of God’s Natural Laws relating to the pursuit of happiness and peace, upon governmental adherence to the Law of Nations and upon the promotion of our Creator’s foundational moral code of human conduct.

15. That liberty depends upon the unfettered exercise of the Christian faith, including strong, uninhibited preaching from America’s pulpits.

The Declaration begins:

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. — Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world. 

The Declaration ends:

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States, that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. — And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.

Here are a few statements from America’s founders after the Declaration was approved by Congress:

John Hancock said,

There! His Majesty can now read my name without spectacles. And he can double the reward on my head. (The Crown had put a reward of 500 pounds sterling on Hancock’s head. That amounts to over $140,000 in today’s money.)

And never forget that John Hancock’s famous signature would not have even been on the Declaration of Independence had not Pastor Jonas Clark of the Church of Lexington and several of his brave congregants risked their lives to save Hancock from the British troops who had marched on Lexington and Concord on April 19, 1775, for the purpose of arresting (and killing) Hancock and Sam Adams (who was also protected by the men of the Church at Lexington) and seizing the arms of the colonists.

George Washington said,

The preservation of the sacred fire of liberty, and the destiny of the republican model of Government, are justly considered as deeply, perhaps as finally staked, on the experiment entrusted to the hands of the American people.

Thomas Paine said,

Those who expect to reap the blessings of freedom, must, like men, undergo the fatigue of supporting it.

Stephen Hopkins, a signer of the Declaration from Rhode Island, said as he signed the document,

My hand trembles, but my heart does not.

Indeed, Hopkins (and the rest of the signers) had reason to tremble. Of the 56 men who signed the Declaration of Independence, nine died of wounds or hardships during the war. Five were captured, imprisoned and tortured. Several lost wives, children or entire families. Two wives were brutalized and tortured. All were, at one time or another, the victims of manhunts and driven from their homes by British soldiers. Twelve signers had their homes completely burned. Seventeen lost everything they owned.

Carter Braxton, a wealthy planter and merchant, saw his ships swept from the seas by the British Navy. He sold his home and properties to pay his debts and died in rags.

Thomas McKean was so hounded by the British that he was forced to move his family constantly. He served in Congress without pay, and his family was kept in hiding. His possessions were seized by the British, and he died in poverty.

At the Battle of Yorktown, Thomas Nelson Jr. noted that British General Cornwallis was using his home for his headquarters. Out of respect to Nelson, General Washington refused to fire on the dwelling. Nelson privately urged Washington to open fire on his home, saying it was no longer his home but was now the headquarters of the enemy. The home was subsequently destroyed. Nelson died bankrupt.

Francis Lewis had his home and properties destroyed by the British. They jailed his wife, and she died within a few months.

John Hart was driven from his wife’s bedside as she was dying. Their 13 children fled for their lives. His fields and his gristmill were laid to waste. For more than a year, he lived in forests and caves, returning home to find his wife dead and all of his 13 children vanished. He never saw them again.

The two patriots most responsible for the Declaration of Independence, John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, both died on the same day: July 4, 1826—the 50th anniversary of the adoption of the Declaration. Daniel Webster gave the eulogy for both men on August 2 of that year. He concluded his remarks with these words:

It [the Declaration of Independence] is my living sentiment, and by the blessing of God, it shall be my dying sentiment. Independence now and independence forever.

Amen! This should be the living and dying sentiment of every American.

Reprinted with permission from Chuck Baldwin Live.

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There were three independence movements in America prior to the War to Prevent Southern Independence (1861-1865).  The American Revolution was a war of secession to gain independence from the British empire.  The New England Federalists plotted to secede from the union beginning with the Jefferson presidency (1801) and culminating with their Hartford Secession Convention of 1814 where in the end they decided to remain in the union, confident that New Englanders could control and dominate it (and they of course were right).

A mostly forgotten independence movement is the 1850s secession movements in “the middle states” – New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, and Maryland – where there was a widespread desire to secede from the Washington, D.C. empire.  (See William C. Wright, The Secession Movement in the Middle Atlantic States).  These states contained secessionists who wanted to join a Southern confederacy, form their own confederacy of states, and to just allow the South to secede in peace.  New Jersey had the largest secession movement, followed by New York City and New York state’s Hudson Valley.

The most popular position was to allow the Southern states to secede in peace, giving the lie to the refrain by “mainstream” historians that there was “unity” in the North regarding the invasion of the South in 1861.  Edward Everett, the vice presidential candidate of the Constitutional Union Party in 1860, said that “To expect to hold fifteen States in the Union by force is preposterous . . . too monstrous to be entertained for a moment.”

The majority of Maryland’s state assembly favored peaceful secession but in1861 the Lincoln regime imprisoned all of them, thereby prohibiting them from meeting to discuss the issue of peaceful secession.  At the time most Marylanders believed that forcing a state at gunpoint to remain in the union and governed by Washington, D.C. would destroy the founders’ concept of a voluntary union.

Fernando Wood, the mayor of New York City at the time, wanted the city to secede from the state and the U.S. and become a free trade zone.  (The Republican party, on the other hand, wanted to increase the average tariff rate from 15% to the 50% range).  The New York state legislature issued a resolution on January 31, 1861 condemning the use of force to force the Southern states to remain in the union.  Horatio Seymour, a former governor of New York, supported the creation of an independent “Central Confederacy” that would also secede from the Washington, D.C. empire.  New York Times editor Henry J. Raymond favored peaceful secession as did New York Tribune editor Horace Greeley.

Pennsylvania being a steel industry state, the Republican party there was strongly protectionist and pro-Lincoln, but the state Democratic party supported peaceful secession.  William C. Wright wrote that “The leadership of the [Pennsylvania] Democratic Party as well as most of its rank and file favored a policy of no coercion.”

New Jersey, “more than any of the other five Middle Atlantic states, said William C. Wright, supported the creation of a Central Confederacy” and its congressional delegation supported peaceful secession of the Southern states, as did a large majority of the state’s newspapers.

Delaware had strong support for a Central Confederacy as well, but Lincoln ordered the Federal army to occupy the state and, as with Maryland, prevent the state legislature from discussing the issue.  The “First State” was prevented from declaring the union to be voluntary under threat of bombardment by its own federal government.

What all of this shows is that: Secession was the very principle of the American Revolution; the New England Federalists, led by George Washington’s Secretary of State Timothy Pickering of Massachusetts,  understood this when they strategized over and plotted peaceful secession for thirteen years; at the outset of the War to Prevent Southern Independence everyone understood the union to be voluntary and not coerced, as with the twentieth century Soviet union.

Lincoln dreamed up a new and ahistorical view of the American constitution and forced his view on the country at gunpoint.  His theory, as summarized by legal scholar James Ostrowski, is as follows:

1. No state may ever secede from the Union for any reason.
2. If any state attempts to secede, the federal government shall invade such a state with sufficient military force to suppress the secession.
3. The federal government may require all states to raise militias to be used to suppress the seceding state (or states).
4. After suppressing the secession, the federal government may rule by martial law until such time as the state accepts permanent federal supremacy.
5. After the secession is suppressed, the federal government may force the states to adopt new state constitutions imposed upon them by federal military authorities.
6. The president may, on his own authority and without consulting any other branch of government, suspend the Bill of Rights and the writ of Habeas Corpus.

If conservative self-proclaimed constitutionalists believe that all of this is constitutional, then they obviously possess a different constitutional document than you and I do.  Moreover, the reason why all of the above is essentially a forgotten part of American history is that it flatly contradicts the Official History concocted by the victors after the War to Prevent Southern Independence.

The post America’s Forgotten Independence Movement appeared first on LewRockwell.

Two hundred forty-nine years ago, a series of events culminated in America’s Declaration of Independence from Great Britain.  On June 7, Richard Henry Lee of Virginia put forth a resolution for independence before the Second Continental Congress.  On June 10, Congress postponed consideration of Lee’s resolution for three weeks as members struggled to build a consensus.  Despite this uncertainty, more vocal proponents for independence persuaded Congress on June 11 to appoint a committee to draft a formal declaration.

That committee — consisting of John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, Roger Sherman, and Robert R. Livingston — worked from June 12 to June 27.  Or, more accurately, Jefferson worked on the Declaration, while Franklin and Adams provided several meaningful edits.  On June 28, a draft of the committee’s work was read in Congress.  After much debate and cajoling among representatives, the colonies officially severed ties with Great Britain on July 2.  (This is the date that John Adams believed would be celebrated as an American holiday.)

With additional revisions to Jefferson’s work, Congress unanimously approved the final wording of the Declaration of Independence on July 4 and ordered it printed.  After the printing of about two hundred broadsides from John Dunlap’s Philadelphia print shop, The Pennsylvania Evening Post became the first newspaper to publish the Declaration on July 6.  Finally, Colonel John Nixon is credited as having given the first public reading of the Declaration to a crowd on July 8 in the Pennsylvania State House Yard (now Independence Square).

In honor of that last event, park rangers from the National Park Service hold a re-enactment of the Declaration’s first public reading outside Independence Hall (formerly the State House) on July 8 each year.  It is a grand spectacle and well worth attending.  It is also most likely an incorrect commemoration of history.  The July 8 reading definitely occurred, but there was an earlier reading on July 4 that was lost to history for two hundred years.

In a 1992 academic paper entitled “From the Here of Jefferson’s Handwritten Rough Draft of the Declaration of Independence to the There of the Printed Dunlap Broadside,” historian Wilfred J. Ritz provides evidence of a public reading on July 4, 1776 — the day Americans actually celebrate as their country’s birthday.  Ritz highlights the eyewitness testimony of Charles Biddle, who wrote in his autobiography, “On the memorable Fourth of July, 1776, I was at the Old State-House yard when the Declaration of Independence was read.  There were very few respectable citizens present.”

Ritz also notes the personal diary entries of Quaker historian Deborah Norris Logan.  Logan describes the Declaration’s reading on July 4 thusly:

It took place a little after twelve at noon and they then proceeded down the street, (I understood) to read it at the Court House.  It was a time of fearful doubt and great anxiety with the people, many of whom were appalled at the boldness of the measure, and the first audience was neither very numerous, nor composed of the most respectable class of citizens.

The accounts of Biddle and Logan are significant because they both describe the gathering as filled with less than “respectable” citizens.  In other words, those Americans who first heard the Declaration of Independence were most likely common laborers and artisans — and not the wealthier Philadelphians who attended the festive official ceremony on July 8.

In a research paper published four years ago, scholar Chris Coelho provides additional testimonial evidence that the July 4, 1776 reading took place and argues persuasively that the likely orator was either the secretary of Congress, Charles Thomson, or his senior clerk, Timothy Matlack.  Coelho produces enough circumstantial evidence for a reasonable person to conclude that the revolutionary firebrand Matlack was the man who first publicly declared America’s independence from Great Britain.

Matlack was a delegate to Pennsylvania’s constitutional convention, a colonel in Philadelphia’s fifth militia battalion, and a well known public orator.  As Congress’s established penman, Matlack penned several petitions to King George III; George Washington’s formal commission as commander-in-chief of the Continental Army; and the signed, engrossed parchment now recognized as the official Declaration of Independence.  In other words, Matlack likely created and delivered a clean copy of the Declaration to the print shop of John Dunlap.  And Matlack was likely the speaker who addressed local Philadelphians on July 4, 1776 and read the Declaration of Independence publicly for the first time.

Why is it important to get this little bit of history right?  As Coelho argues, “the people who gathered outside Independence Hall” on July 4, 1776 “were the ones who drove the revolution in Pennsylvania.  Led by radicals including Timothy Matlack, the ‘lower sort’ forced Pennsylvania’s elite to accept independence.  Thanks to the pressure they applied in their colony, Congress was able to adopt the Declaration of Independence unanimously.”  What happened outside the Pennsylvania State House around noon on July 4, 1776 is much more than an esoteric footnote to a forgotten moment in history.  It rightly realigns that moment in history back to the common Americans, whose uncommon achievements birthed the United States.

Read the Whole Article

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Today we will be treated to fireworks and speeches celebrating our liberation from the British in the latter part of the 18th century.  It is a false celebration, because many of our cherished freedoms described in the Constitution have been taken away, and in place of the British we have a new master–Israel–a master whose grip tightens on us by the year.

In the 21st century we have destroyed a number of countries for Israel, financed and provided the weapons and diplomatic over for Israel’s genocide of Palestine, and celebrated Israel’s indicted mass murderer leader with standing ovations in the US Congress.  President Trump speaks of the mass murderer as if he is the greatest person on earth. The US might yet be forced by Israel into war with Iran.

Red states such as Florida and Texas have passed laws against US citizens speaking or acting disapprovingly of Israel.  No such laws exist protecting US gentiles from politically incorrect words and protests.  US universities have lost to the Israel Lobby the ability to govern themselves.  The Israel Lobby was able to reach inside a Catholic university and block the tenure of Norman Finkelstein, himself a Jew, and to reach inside the University of Illinois to cancel the tenure granted to Steven Salaita.

Presidents of Ivy League universities were hauled before the US Congress and upbraided for not preventing students from protesting Israel’s genocide of the Palestinians.  Some were forced to resign.  A rule was imposed on the universities that students who protest Israel must be suspended or expelled.  If they are foreign students, they are picked up and deported.

Christian Zionists worship Israel, not Christ, and are indoctrinated with the conviction that God’s purpose for America is to serve as Israel’s protector.

The British never had such control over their American colony.  Far from being a free and independent people, Americans are the two-bit punk puppet of their Israeli master.  Who will liberate us from Israel?

The post July 4, 2025, Finds Americans More Enslaved than Ever and Not Only to Their Government appeared first on LewRockwell.

… by watching Tucker Carlson’s interview with Scott Horton.

The real backstory of the American Empire, its phony wars and war cronyism.  What every American needs to know before Washington sells us more neocon carnage!

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1) The Patriot

2) 1776

3) It’s a Big Country: An American Anthology

4) Deadline – U.S.A.

The post Here Are Four Superb Movies Enthusiastically Exemplifying the Patriotic Spirit of ’76 for the 4th of July Weekend appeared first on LewRockwell.

Heroic Republicans: there are only three of them in the Senate and two of them in the House who voted against Trump’s big, beautiful bill that raises the debt ceiling by $5 trillion. Rand Paul, Susan Collins, and Thom Tillis in the Senate (never in my life have I ever found a reason to praise Susan Collins) and Thomas Massie and Brian Fitzpatrick in the House all voted against this monstrosity. 

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David Krall wrote:

I feel like going out and invading Poland.  (To secure a strategic supply of Polish Vodka. 

The post When I listen to this… appeared first on LewRockwell.

Click Here:

Global Research

The post Donald Trump’s Autocratic One-Man Government Regime: Doomed to Failure? appeared first on LewRockwell.

The post Big Beautiful Charade – Republicans Cave; Democrats Rave appeared first on LewRockwell.

Oscar Grau explains why “Javier Milei is a Neocon.”

The post A “Warmongering Zionist Neocon” Masquerading as a Libertarian appeared first on LewRockwell.

The Declaration of Independence – Dramatic Reading by Celebrities — Kathy Bates, Benicio Del Toro, Michael Douglas, Morgan Freeman, Mel Gibson, Whoopi Goldberg, Graham Greene, Ming-Na, Edward Norton, Winona Ryder, Kevin Spacey, and Renee Zellweger

Modern Historians Confront The American Revolution, by economist/historian Murray N. Rothbard

The American Revolution and Classical Liberalism, by Murray N. Rothbard

America’s Libertarian Revolution, by Murray N. Rothbard

America’s Radical Revolution, by Murray N. Rothbard

Economic Determinism, Ideology, and the American Revolution, by Murray N. Rothbard

American Revolution as a People’s War: A Bibliographical Essay by William Marina

Conceived in Liberty (Combined)  Volumes 1-4 Edition, Books by Murray N. Rothbard

Conceived in Liberty: The New Republic: 1784–1791 Volume 5, Book by Murray N. Rothbard

The post In Honor of Friday, July 4 –The American Revolution appeared first on LewRockwell.

Millions of people worldwide are concerned about climate change and believe there is a climate emergency. For decades we have been told by the United Nations that Carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from human activity are causing disastrous climate change. In 2018, a UN IPCC report even warned that ‘we have 12 years to save the Earth’, thus sending millions of people worldwide into a frenzy.

Thirty-five years ago, the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and the (World Meteorological Organization) WMO established the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) to provide scientific advice on the complex topic of climate change. The panel was asked to prepare, based on available scientific information, a report on all aspects relevant to climate change and its impacts and to formulate realistic response strategies. The first assessment report of the IPCC served as the basis for negotiating the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). Governments worldwide have signed this convention, thereby, significantly impacting the lives of the people of the world.

However, many scientists dispute with the UN-promoted man-made climate change theory, and many people worldwide are confused by the subject, or are unaware of the full facts. Please allow me to provide some information you may not be aware of.

1. Very few people actually dig into the data, they simply accept the UN IPPC reports. Yet many highly respectable and distinguished scientists have done exactly that and found that the UN-promoted manmade climate change theory is seriously flawed. Are you aware that almost 2,000 of the world’s leading climate scientists and professionals in over 30 countries have signed a declaration that there is no CO2-induced climate emergency? These signatories have refuted the United Nations claims in relation to man-made C02-induced climate change. See https://clintel.org/world-climate-declaration/

2. I have also signed this declaration. How can I make such an assertion? I have experience in the field as a former scientist at the Department of Energy and Climate Change, UK Government; and as former staff member at United Nations Environment, where I was responsible for servicing the Pollution Release and Transfer Register Protocol, a Multinational Environmental Agreement, involving the monitoring of pollutants to land, air, and water worldwide. Real pollution exists, but the problem is not CO2. Industrial globalisation has produced many substances that are registered as pollutants, including thousands of new man-made chemical compounds, toxins, nano-particles and genetically modified organisms (GMOs) that are in violation of the scientific pre-cautionary principle.

A book I published also provides ample evidence and testimony from renowned scientists that there is no ‘CO2-induced’ Climate emergency. The book titled ‘Climate CO2 Hoax – How Bankers Hijacked the Environment Movement’ is available on Amazon here.

3. Next, I will mention the Irish Climate Science Forum (ICSF) website, a valuable resource founded by Jim O’Brien. I am grateful to the ICSF for their excellent work in highlighting the scientific flaws in the UN climate narrative. The ICSF provides a comprehensive lecture series from renowned international scientists providing much evidence, analysis, and data that contradicts the UN assertions. The lectures are available at: https://www.icsf.ie/lecture-series

The ICSF scientific view coincides with those of the Climate Intelligence (CLINTEL) foundation that operates in the fields of climate change and climate policy. CLINTEL was founded in 2019 by emeritus professor of geophysics Guus Berkhout and science journalist Marcel Crok. Based on this common conviction, 20 Irish scientists and several ICSF members have co-signed the CLINTEL World Climate Declaration “There is No Climate Emergency” (see https://clintel.org/ireland/).

4. The reality is that the climate has always been changing, the climate changes naturally and slowly in its own cycle, and CO2 emissions (and methane from livestock, such as cows) are not dominant factors in climate change. In essence, therefore, the incessant UN, government, and corporate-media-produced climate hysteria in relation to CO2 emissions (and also methane from cows) has no scientific basis. It appears to me the UN narrative is yet another example of fake science being used to drive an ulterior agenda, see also the book Godless Fake Science.

In truth I am against ‘real’ pollution, and the reality is that the CO2 component is not a pollutant. Unfortunately, many misinformed environmentalists are driving around in electric cars, the battery production for which has caused vast amounts of ‘real’ pollution via the industrial mining and processing of rare earth metals, and the consequent pollution to land, air and water systems. See also this article. Note that the UN does not focus on the thousands of real pollutants that corporate industrial globalisation creates.

5. The conclusions of the Climate Intelligence foundation include the following

There is no [CO2-induced] climate emergency… The geological archive reveals that Earth’s climate has varied as long as the planet has existed, with natural cold and warm phases. The Little Ice Age ended as recently as 1850. Therefore, it is no surprise that we now are experiencing a period of warming.

The world has warmed significantly less than predicted by IPCC on the basis of modeled anthropogenic forcing. The gap between the real world and the modeled world tells us that we are far from understanding climate change.

Climate policy relies on inadequate models: Climate models have many shortcomings and are not remotely plausible as global policy tools. They blow up the effect of greenhouse gases such as CO2. In addition, they ignore the fact that enriching the atmosphere with CO2 is beneficial.

CO2 is plant food, the basis of all life on Earth: CO2 is not a pollutant. It is essential to all life on Earth. Photosynthesis is a blessing. More CO2 is beneficial for nature, greening the Earth: additional CO2 in the air has promoted growth in global plant biomass. It is also good for agriculture, increasing the yields of crops worldwide.

Global warming has not increased natural disasters: There is no statistical evidence that global warming is intensifying hurricanes, floods, droughts and suchlike natural disasters, or making them more frequent.

6. In the above book I reference the relevant work and scientific presentations of some of the world’s leading climate scientists. Let us examine some of the work and testimonies of these scientists:

“deeply flawed logic, obscured by shrewd and unrelenting propaganda, actually enabled a coalition of powerful special interests to convince nearly everyone in the world that Co2 from human industry was a dangerous plant destroying toxin. It will be remembered as the greatest mass delusion in the history of the world – that Co2 the life of plants was considered for a time to be a deadly poison.” – Professor Richard Lindzen, Professor Emeritus of Atmospheric Sciences at MIT.

Dr Nils-Axel Mörner was a former Committee Chairman at the UN International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). He was an expert involved in reviewing the first IPPC documents. He says the UN IPPC is misleading humanity about climate change.  He tried to warn that the IPPC were publishing lies and false information that would inevitably be discredited. In an interview, he stated: “This is the most dangerous and frightening part of it. How a lobbyist group, such as the IPPC, has been able to fool the whole world. These organised and deceitful forces are dangerous” and expressed shock “that the UN and governments would parade children around the place at UN Climate summits as propaganda props”. He states:

“solar activity is the dominant factor in climate and not Co2… something is basically sick in the blame Co2 hypothesis…  It was launched more than 100 years ago and almost immediately excellent physicists demonstrated that the hypothesis did not work.

I was the chairman of the only international committee on sea levels changes and as such a person I was elected to be the expert reviewer on the (UN IPPC) sea levels chapter. It was written by 38 persons and not a single one was a sea level specialist… I was shocked by the low quality it was like a student paper… I went through it and showed them that it was wrong and wrong and wrong…The scientific truth is on the side of the sceptics… I have thousands of high ranked scientists all over the world who agree that NO, CO2 is not the driving mechanism and that everything is exaggerated.

In the field of physics 80 to 90% of physicists know that the Co2 hypothesis is wrong… Of course, metrologists they believe in this because that is their own profession – they live on it.… I suspect that behind-the-scenes promoters… have an ulterior motive… It’s a wonderful way of controlling taxation controlling people” – Dr Nils-Axel Mörner, a former Committee Chairman at the UN IPPC, and former head of the Paleo Geo-physics and Geo-dynamics department in Stockholm

Another climate scientist with impeccable credentials that has broken rank is Dr Mototaka Nakamura. He asserts:  “Our models are mickey-mouse mockeries of the real world”. Dr Nakamura received a Doctorate of Science from MIT, and for nearly 25 years specialized in abnormal weather and climate change at prestigious institutions that included MIT, Georgia Institute of Technology, NASA, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, JAMSTEC and Duke University. Dr Nakamura explains why the data foundation underpinning global warming science is “untrustworthy” and cannot be relied on and that: “Global mean temperatures before 1980 are based on untrustworthy data”.

Professor John R. Christy, Director of Atmospheric and Earth Sciences, University of Alabama, has provided detailed analysis of climate data, see Endnote [i]. I summarise the main points from his analysis below:

“The established global warming theory significantly misrepresents the impact of extra greenhouse gases; the weather that affects people the most is not becoming more extreme or more dangerous; temperatures were higher in the 1930s than today; between 1895 and 2015, 14 of the top 15 years with the highest heat records occurred before 1960; the temperatures we are experiencing now in 2021 were the same as 120 years ago…

the number of major tornadoes between 1954 and 1986 averaged 56/year, but between 1987 and 2020 the average was only 34/year… Between 1950 and 2019 the percentage of land area experiencing droughts has not increased globally – the trend is flat… Sea levels rose 12.5 cm per decade for 8,000 years and then it levelled off, now it rising only 2.5 cm per decade… worrying about 30 cm rise in sea level in a decade is ridiculous, in a hurricane the east coast of the U.S. gets a 20 foot rise in 6 hours, so a 30 cm rise will be easily handled!”

In a lecture titled The imaginary climate crisis – how can we change the message? Available on the Irish Climate Science Forum website, see Endnote [ii]. Richard L Lindzen, Professor Emeritus of Atmospheric Sciences at MIT summarises the battle against the climate hysteria as follows:

“in the long history of the earth there has been almost no correlation between climate and co2… the narrative is absurd…  it gives governments the power to control the energy sector… for about 33 years, many of us have been battling against the climate hysteria… Elites are always searching for ways to advertise their virtue and assert their authority. They believe they are entitled to view science as a source of authority rather than a process, and they try to appropriate science, suitably and incorrectly simplified, as the basis for their movement.”

“CO2…  it’s not a pollutant… it’s the product of all plant respiration, it is essential for plant life and photosynthesis…  if you ever wanted a leverage point to control everything from exhalation to driving, this would be a dream. So it has a kind of fundamental attractiveness to bureaucratic mentality.” – Prof. Richard Lindzen, Professor Emeritus of Atmospheric Sciences at MIT

Patrick Moore, co-founder of Greenpeace, and President of Greenpeace in Canada for seven years, states:

“the whole climate crisis is not only fake news its fake science… of course climate change is real it’s been happening since the beginning of time, but it’s not dangerous and it’s not caused by people… climate change is a perfectly natural phenomenon and this modern warming period actually began about 300 years ago when the little ice age began to come to an end. There is nothing to be afraid of and all they are doing is instilling fear. Most of the scientists who are saying it’s a crisis are on perpetual government grants.

I was one of the (Greenpeace) founders… by the mid-80s… we were hijacked by the extreme left who basically took Greenpeace from a science-based organisation to an organisation based on sensationalism, misinformation and fear… you don’t have a plan to feed 8 billion people without fossils fuels or get the food into the cities…” – Patrick Moore, co-founder of Greenpeace

Professor William Happer, Princeton University, Former Director of Science at the US Department of Energy, is also a strong voice against the myth of man-made global warming. He states: “More CO2 benefits the Earth”.

7. The UN IPCC cherry picks data, uses flawed modelling and scenarios not remotely related to the real world

The UN climate crisis predictions are not based on physical evidence, rather they are based on complex computer modelling. One has to decode and analyse the modelling process to ascertain whether or not the models are valid and accurate or whether they have obvious flaws. The vast majority of scientists, economists, politicians and the general public have simply assumed that the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) models are accurate. Very few people have the time or skills to analyse these models, not to mention actually dispute them. Nonetheless, there were many senior and highly distinguished scientists that did exactly that – they claimed the UN narrative was incorrect and that there was no climate emergency. Their voices have been drowned out by a vast money-driven political and media establishment of the globalised ‘system’. The vitally important work of some of these renowned scientists is referenced in the above book.

“The computer models are making systematic dramatic errors… they are all parametrised… fudged…  the models really don’t work” – Patrick J. Michaels, Director, Cato Institute Center for the Study of Science

Dr Roger Pielke Jr, University of Colorado, has conducted a detailed scientific review and analysis of the UN IPCC AR6 report, see Endnote [i].  He describes that in relation to climate modelling, the IPCC detached the models from socio-economic plausibility. In creating the models, instead of first completing integrative assessment models (IAMs), the IPCC skipped this essential step and jumped straight to radiative forcing scenarios and thus these scenarios are not based on competed IAMs. This led much of climate modelling down the wrong track. I quote points from Dr Pielke’s analysis as follows:

“The four IPCC scenarios came from a large family of models so instead of splitting modelling from socio-economic assumptions the models already had the assumptions faked and baked in to them, because they had to have those assumptions to produce the required radiative forcing (to produce a desired climate ‘crisis scenario’ outcome)… There are thousands of climate assumptions, but only 8 to 12 of them are available currently for climate research. The IPCC report even states that “no likelihood is attached to the scenarios in this report”. The likelihood is considered low they admit – This is an incredible admission by the IPCC.

These extreme unlikely scenarios dominate the literature and the IPCC report; therefore, the IPCC report is biased. Bottom line is that there is massive confusion. The IPCCs’ Richard Moss warned that RCP 8.5 was not to be used as a reference for the other RCPs, but 5,800 scientific papers worldwide misuse it like that… The whole process is seriously flawed… Nothing close to the real world is represented by the IPCC scenarios. Climate science has a huge problem! The IPCC currently uses RCP 8.5 as the ‘business as usual’ scenario, but RCP 8.5 is wild fantasy land and not remotely related to current reality at all… climate science has a scientific integrity crisis.” – Dr Roger Pielke Jr, University of Colorado

8. Financialization of the entire world economy is now based on a life-killing ‘net-zero’ greenhouse gas emissions strategy.

The UN Agenda 2030 plan and the Paris Agreement goal to reduce CO2 emissions by 7% per annum until 2030 is in effect a plan that would seemingly disable the current fossil-fuel-based mechanisms of the industrial economy for the food, energy and goods that enable human life and survival. Yet the narrative is quite hypocritical as the production of green energy infrastructure, and mining of rare earth metals for batteries for electric vehicles, is, and will most likely continue to be, very fossil-fuel intensive. Globalisation resulted in much of humanity becoming largely dependent on the trans-national industrial economy rather than on traditional more self-sufficient local/regional economies. Therefore, one has to ask where is this all going to lead if the plug is truly pulled on fossil fuels? Almost all of us are seemingly locked into, and have become dependent upon, the current economic paradigm of globalisation. A system rigged by debt-money created from nothing; created and controlled by private mega-banks and behind the scenes money-masters; and which can induce boom, bust, bailout scenarios that detrimentally effect the populace.

It should be noted that for decades, these same political, government, and corporate powers have rampantly promoted corporate economic globalization and fossil fuel dependency. Whilst, at the same time actively hindering the funding, creation, or government support of, more self-sufficient local communities/regions, and local co-operatives. Most of the world population thus became reliant on the globalized fossil-fuel driven system. I explore this topic in the books Demonic Economics and the Tricks of the Bankers and Transcending the Climate Change Deception Toward Real Sustainability

Purchase here

Zero carbon emissions, in essence, means pulling the plug on current systems of industrial agriculture, transport, goods production, electricity production, etc. This could have terrible consequences, particularly in locations and countries, that are currently unable to produce much food. In Ireland, the deluded greens in government had planned to close the coal-fired power station Moneypoint, in the name of reducing CO2 emissions. However, as the price of electricity increased and the dawn of so-called ‘green energy’ began to evaporate like the Irish morning mist, the government scrapped this plan in 2022, instead deciding to convert the station to an oil-burning facility. The Irish Times newspaper reported:

“With growing concerns over security of the energy supply in the State, the Government is not in a position to decommission Moneypoint as a fuel-burning station in the near future. It was confirmed by the Irish Government in 2022 that Moneypoint will convert to oil generation from 2023.” See Endnote [ii]

The so-called ‘green economy’ (for it is not environmentally friendly in reality) and UN Agenda 2030 are resulting in increased energy poverty and decreased energy independence for the masses, while also developing trillions of dollars for the behind-the-scenes mega-banks. “Stop burning coal and wood logs that causes climate change don’t ya know” my deluded neighbour informed me last year, having threw out her wood burning stove and installed solar panels. Then a typical winter storm in Ireland last month left many thousands of people without electricity or heating for almost a week, shivering and wishing for a wood burning stove, while their solar panels produced little electricity in winter.

9. Furthermore, the current green energy/renewable technologies being promoted by the UN and WEF, are not a viable solution for the world’s energy supply. Although these technologies have some limited viability in certain locations and scenarios, the fact remains that the Energy Returned on Energy Invested is much too low – in essence the entire process is mathematically flawed. This is evidenced by the work of scientists, including Professor David MacKay (1967 – 2016), former Regius Professor of Engineering at Cambridge University, and former Chief Scientific Advisor at the UK Department of Energy and Climate Change.

Summary

In summary, CO2 reduction is the main focus of the UN-promoted climate-change-hysteria that has been rampant among the world’s population. However, the proclaimed climate crisis exists in computer models only.  The cult of ‘manmade climate change’ is a media and UN politically-promoted ‘ideology’, that is used for a wider political and corporate agenda. Manmade climate change is not based in fact, and has hijacked real environmental concerns.

Due to incessant UN, government, and corporate-promoted climate change propaganda, many people are, thus, in a media-induced state of confusion, and, thus, blindly assume their pre-determined role in society under this ‘dictatorship of words’ without even being aware of it. The unpalatable reality is that people’s access to energy and resources is being intentionally reduced via bogus climate change policies, inflation, ongoing geo-political theatre and intentionally instigated war.

We cannot understand how to create a truly resilient society unless we correctly perceive the current society we live in and how it came to exist. Unless we recognize the untruths of the current paradigm, even if it is not ‘politically correct’ to do so, then we will not be able to make the correct adjustments to our communities and local/regional networks, or create a truly resilient thriving society. In this spirit of truth, new networks are emerging worldwide.

—

[1] Source: Irish Climate Science Forum lecture titled Testing Climate Claims 2021 Update available at www.icsf.ie

[1] The Irish Climate Science Forum website URL is www.icsf.ie

[1] Source: Irish Climate Science Forum lecture titled What does IPCC AR6 say on scenarios and extreme weather? available at www/icsf.ie

[1] Source:  https://www.irishtimes.com/environment/2022/11/27/plans-to-decommission-moneypoint-by-2025-delayed-by-government-over-fears-of-power-outages/

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