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The domestic situation in America continues to spiral out of control, Robert Bridge writes.

In recent days, global attention has been focused on the explosive events in the Middle East and Ukraine, and that helps people to forget about the domestic situation in America that continues to spiral out of control.

Evidence that the American people are slowly starting to awaken from a deep stupor known as ‘the American Dream’ began in earnest on June 12 as Democratic Senator for California Alex Padilla stormed a speaking event by the Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and was quickly arrested by federal agents.

Padilla cut off Noem as she was delivering a statement in the Los Angeles FBI headquarters regarding the Trump administration’s response to the protests in that city against the DHS and its immigration-enforcement campaign.

Padilla was abruptly ejected from the room, forced to the ground by police officers and placed in handcuffs during the rapidly unfolding situation.

The incident came amid a particularly hostile atmosphere in Los Angeles, which had been hammered with protests against President Donald Trump’s highly divisive federal immigration ICE raids. While the senator was not arrested, his ejection from the hall by security guards follows the arrests of other public officials, who the administration has accused of interfering with its enforcement of immigration laws.

“I was there peacefully,” Padilla said in his first public comments shortly following the incident. “At one point I had a question, and so I began to ask a question. I was almost immediately forcibly removed from the room. I was forced to the ground, and I was handcuffed.”

He continued: “If this is how this administration responds to a senator with a question, if this is how the Department of Homeland Security responds to a senator with a question, you can only imagine, what they’re doing to farm workers, to cooks, to day laborers out in the Los Angeles community and throughout California and throughout the country.”

Noem said the U.S. Secret Service “thought he was an attacker and officers acted appropriately.”

The shocking display of brute force against the Democrat provoked California Governor Gavin Newsom to call the Trump Administration “tyrannical” and this remark came after the Governor shared an image of the “California Republic” state flag, a move many interpreted as a thinly veiled warning for Washington to back off.

It gets better. On the same day as Padilla’s ejection from the conference, the United States witnessed a series of late-night legal actions, when a federal judge first ruled that President Trump had unlawfully federalized the California National Guard. He was ordered its return back to state control, saying he had violated the U.S. Constitution. Just hours later, the ruling was overturned by another federal judge in defense of Trump’s actions.

Newsom had said he planned to return the 4,000-members of the Guard to their regular duties protecting the border, working on wildfire prevention or getting back to their day jobs. Instead, they continued to perform their duties under the command of the U.S. commander-in-chief, squaring off against protesters in downtown Los Angeles.

On the basis of the order, Trump then signaled a willingness to expand the use of federalization orders to additional National Guards, as well as the possible deployment of U.S. Marines to other beleaguered urban areas. This announcement was greeted with unsurprising anger by numerous Democratic Governors.

This unsettling set of circumstances was followed by the U.S. Marines being deployed to Los Angeles where they temporarily detained a civilian. It was the first known detention by active-duty troops deployed there by Trump. The Democrats continued to voice their heated objections against the use of active-duty U.S. military forces being used in a policing role.

Finally, on June 14th in Minnesota the majority leader of the State House was assassinated along with her husband by a former appointee of the governor. Earlier that morning, Senator John Hoffman and his wife, Yvette, were shot in their home in nearby Champlin and hospitalized without life-threatening injuries. Police responding to the attack on the Hoffmans checked on the Hortmans’ home, where 57-year-old Vance Luther Boelter opened fired at them. The shooter managed to escape the crime scene on foot, thus sparking the most extensive manhunt in Minnesota history.

In the suspect’s car was found a crudely drafted political manifesto, as well as an assortment of material pertaining to the “No Kings” protests that swept hundreds of cities across the nation, suggesting a political connection between the murders and the movement. Governor Tim Walz called the shooting “an act of targeted political violence”. Inside Boelter’s vehicle was a hit list of nearly 70 people, including abortion rights advocates, Democratic politicians, and abortion providers. Incidentally, the assassinated legislator had recently been the deciding vote in abolishing state funding for healthcare for illegal immigrants; this is notable given the anti-ICE element of the current protests.

However one may wish to interpret these events – as random, unfortunate scenarios that are par for course in any vibrant democracy, or something far more disturbing and dangerous – it is clear that the United States of America appears to be more on the political knife edge than at any time in its recent history. Whether the tensions will explode like a tinderbox with the least bit of disturbance remains to be seen. Until then, the Democrats and Republicans need to call a political time out and resolve their well-known differences in a calm and methodical manner before the street decides to take matters into its own dirty hands. It goes without saying that the last thing that any country needs – and perhaps least of all the United States, which has more firearms per capita than any other country in the world – is a full-blown civil war to sort out deeply entrenched problems.

The views of individual contributors do not necessarily represent those of the Strategic Culture Foundation.

The post Is America Sliding Inexorably Towards Its Breakup? appeared first on LewRockwell.

You want war? Bring it on.

This is it. The ruling classes of the Empire of Chaos, plus the current, clownish Circus Ringmaster have finally realized that BRICS is a serious strategic threat – and existential challenge – to their unilateral domination of the current system of international relations.

They didn’t come to this conclusion by carefully scrutinizing the BRICS annual summit in Rio – or last year’s ground-breaking summit in Kazan for that matter: they are lousy at doing basic homework.

It’s more like they were awakened from their torpor by feeling in their skins which way the – global – wind is blowing, in terms of all sorts of models being tested to bypass the U.S. dollar and the iron-clad control of the Bretton Woods institutions.

The conclusion was inescapable: BRICS have crossed the ultimate red line. No more Mr. Nice Guy talk shop. The 130-plus point Rio declaration, released at the first day of the summit, spells it out, politely but decisively: this is what we are, a systemic alternative; and we’re going to write the rules of the new system our way.

Building the Geopolitics of Sovereignty

BRICS 2025 in Rio was a stunning surprise. Expectations initially were low – when comparing the meek Brazilian presidency with the extraordinary amount of work put out by Russia in 2024 leading to Kazan.

Yet in the end Rio coalesced what Kazan had annonced: the new, rising system will be all about sovereignty, equality, and fairness – with emphasis on continental-wide economic integration; trade in national currencies; an expanded role for new global financial institutions such as the NDB (the BRICS bank); and myriad platforms for sustainable development.

A Geopolitics of Sovereignty has to be structurally constructed: the iron and cement for the new system will come from a new interconnection of trade in national currencies, independent payment/settlement systems, and new investment platforms.

Geo-economically, BRICS is already on a roll. A quick glance of a map of Eurasia, and Afro-Eurasia, will suffice to convey the existing and emerging interconnection of connectivity, logistics and supply chain corridors. Across BRICS lands, those tie up energy sources, rare earth deposits, and a wealth of agricultural commodities.

To quote the Godfather of Soul James Bown, Papa’s got a brand new (BRICS) bag.

Hence it’s no wonder that a tawdry incarnation of the White Man’s Burden, the Circus Ringmaster, has unleashed Full War on BRICS and its partners – from threats to tariffs, complete with a previous death certificate (at the time he was even more clueless on what BRICS is all about).

The serial Trump Tariff Temper Tantrum (TTT) is of course another manifestation of Divide and Rule, trying to blow up BRICS from the inside. And now we’re up several notches, with a trademark childish letter threatening 50% tariffs on all Made in Brazil products exported to the U.S. – plus extra “sectoral” tariffs.

And yet this has nothing to do with trade. Over the past 15 years, the U.S. trade surplus with Brazil is over a hefty $400 billion. Some Trump 2.0 underling should have whispered that number into his boss’s ear.

But even if they did, that’s irrelevant. Because the latest gimmick actually constitutes a crass foreign interference in another nation’s domestic politics and upcomig presidential race, illegal and predictably once again making a mockery of international law.

The Circus Ringmaster started by hollering in his posts that the Lula government – and the independent Brazilian judicial system – had been involved in a witch hunt against his buddy, former President Jair Bolsonaro, who is being legally prosecuted under charges of staging a coup to overturn the results of the 2022 presidential election and prevent Lula from taking power.

It was up to not so smooth operator Steve Bannon to give the whole tawdry game away: if you ditch the prosecution of Bolsonaro, we ditch the 50% tariffs.

President Lula’s response has been measured, but firm: “Brazil’s trade with the U.S. makes up just 1.7% of our GDP. You can’t call these figures vital (…) We will look for other partners“.

Of course it will be very tough. A 50% tariff is like a deadly hurricane. Example: Brazil is the largest global exporter of orange juice. 95% of indigenous production is exported, nearly half to the U.S. It will take some time and lot of hard work to find “other partners”. The solution may lie across BRICS lands. In time, there should be plenty of candidates for top Brazilian exports such as oil, steel, iron, planes and parts, coffee, timber, meat and soy.

Unionizing every exporter in the world against U.S. importers

In parallel, the top two BRICS actors, China and Russia – both already under zillions of sanctions (Russia) and trade tariffs (China) – see the Trump TTT as a spectacular opportuniy ahead for undermining even faster the unilateral U.S. grip on trade and currency systems.

The war on BRICS has gone up to the next level, now that Russia, China, Iran and Brazil are all confirmed – illegitimate – targets. It’s up to this Sri Lanka viewpoint to delightfully summarize the stakes:

“Trump has effectively unionized every exporter in the world against American importers.” It comes down to a quite simple equation: “If you tariff one person, more power to you. But it you tariff everyone, more power to us.”

“More power to us” translates into BRICS and the wider Global South perfectly aware there’s no way out except full steam ahead for the BRICS project, culminating in full de-dollarization. From Kazan to Rio and beyond, it’s now also clear that out of control TTT will target any nation or partner that aligns with “anti-American” BRICS.

You want war? Bring it on.

The views of individual contributors do not necessarily represent those of the Strategic Culture Foundation.

The post Trump Terrified by BRICS Strategic Threat appeared first on LewRockwell.

The moral rot of unlimited debt looks “free” but it’s unaffordable in the end.

We like to think we’re special and this moment in history is special, but alas, we’re still running Wetware 1.0 which was coded between 300,000 and 60,000 years ago, when the last “out of Africa” migration finally got traction. Since then, the code has been tweaked a bit here and there (adults can now digest dairy products, etc.), but we’re running the old code, and so we make the same mistakes and follow the same emotional pathways as individuals and as groups.

Which leads us to our current predicament, which is not unique: we’re living on debt, “money” borrowed from the future, a future we’re assuming will be so over-supplied with energy and other goodies that we’ll be able to pay all the interest we’re piling up with ease.

All the charts below are shouting “parabolic,” as in crazy-unsustainable increases. There’s the federal debt, $36 trillion, up 4X from the 2008 spot of bother, there’s TCMDO, total public and private debt (McMansions, university degrees and SUVs all paid for with debt), student loans from zero to $1.5 trillion, Medicare and Medicaid, now 1/3 of the federal budget, and so on.

How did we get here? Let’s start with what’s not taught in Econ 101: primary surplus. Every economy–from households to empires, meaning this is scale-invariant–generates a surplus from its production of goods and services, or it runs a deficit, meaning it has to get more money from somewhere to support its consumption.

The question then becomes, how is the primary surplus being spent? (Or put another way, how is it being distributed across the economy and society?) There are only three options: 1) consume it, 2) invest it and 3) save it / hoard it.

Without making a conscious choice, the US has chosen to “invest” most of its primary surplus in moral rot, unproductive frauds, skims, scams, monopolies, cartels, regulatory capture, grift and graft.

This is the problem with giving an irresponsible teenager a no-limit Platinum credit card with an easily ignored admonishment to “stick to a tight budget, pay the balance off every month.” Uh, right.

Since the US can borrow unlimited trillions on its credit card, we can “afford” to burn our surplus on grift, graft, inefficiency, cronyism, profiteering, etc. Since our surplus was squandered on moral rot, we have to borrow trillions to pay for what the citizenry wants and what politicians must promise to get re-elected.

Wetware 1.0: we like windfalls and free stuff, and so every program becomes a “third rail” politically: touch it and you don’t get re-elected. But if you borrow a few “free” trillions a year, you get re-elected.

We love windfalls and free stuff and hate hard choices, but that’s all we have now. We have three choices in how we deal with our dependence on parabolic debt to sustain our profligate lifestyle:

1. Run the debt up to the point that nobody is dumb enough to lend us more, and then default on the debt / go bankrupt. All our creditors are wiped out.

The problem here is all debt is an asset to the wealthy entity that owns it as an income stream. Since the wealthy run the status quo in a manner that serves their interests, they’re unlikely to be thrilled with debt jubilees that zero out their assets and income or messy defaults that end up doing the same thing.

So nix that option. The wealthy want to keep their wealth and income streams, and since they own US Treasuries, they’re not going to approve defaulting on that debt.

2. Inflate the debt away with sustained high inflation. So we borrowed $1 when $1 bought a lot of stuff, and now we’ve inflated everything so it takes $10 to buy what $1 bought back then. Now we can pay back the $1 with a fraction of the earnings it took back when we borrowed it.

We’ve already taken that step–what once cost $1 now costs $10. So the next step is to do another 10X reduction in the debt via inflation.

In previous eras, authorities reduced the silver content of coinage to near-zero, effectively devaluing the money, i.e. inflating away the debt. What cost one mostly-silver denarius in the good old days soon cost 100 devalued denarius.

This looks like some pretty easy hocus-pocus to pull off, but there’s a catch: Catch-19, which is devaluing the money devalues trust in the leadership, social contract and the future, all of which leaves the economy and society a hollowed-out shell awaiting a stiff breeze to push the whole system off the cliff.

The problem here is inflation is distributed asymmetrically, along with the primary surplus. The wealthy, powerful elites skim off the surplus, and they’re equally adept at distributing the “inflation tax” to the middle and working classes, which soon meld into a single class, the impoverished.

A funny thing about Wetware 1.0 is we’re hard-wired to take note of rampant unfairness and eventually we respond in a destabilizing fashion, for example, uprisings, revolts, revolutions, etc.

3. The third option is to root out all the moral rot that’s consuming the economy’s surplus and our future, scrap all the programs designed in the bygone eras of 50+ years ago (defense, Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, higher education, etc.) and start from scratch with new programs whose expenses are limited to what the economy generates as surplus.

In other words, go Cold Turkey on our addiction to living on debt.

Read the Whole Article

The post Three Choices, None Good appeared first on LewRockwell.

At the recent annual meeting of the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) in Dallas, the attendees failed to pass a motion to prohibit member churches from having women pastors. The motion, which needed a two-thirds majority to pass, received 3,421 votes in favor and 2,191 votes against. However, other resolutions did pass that go beyond an intra-denominational issue.

A collective resolution passed that urged Christians to “celebrate and embrace marriage and childbearing”; called for the overturning of Obergefell v. Hodges, which legalized same-sex marriage throughout the country; and called for “the complete and permanent defunding of Planned Parenthood,” a leading provider of abortion.

Other resolutions passed that called on the United States Congress and state legislatures to “pass laws banning the manufacture, sale, and distribution of chemical abortion drugs, to enforce the Comstock Act prohibiting the mailing of abortion pills, and to hold accountable pharmaceutical companies and medical providers complicit in these harms” and to “enact comprehensive laws that ban the creation, publication, hosting, and distribution of pornographic content in all media and to provide rigorous enforcement mechanisms—including age-verification and civil liability—in the ultimate effort to eradicate pornography nationwide.”

Still another resolution passed “On the Harmful and Predatory Nature of Sports Betting.” In addition to condemning “sports betting in all its forms,” the resolution calls upon “corporations involved in this industry to cease their exploitative practices” and urges “our leaders at all levels of government to curtail sports betting and to address its disastrous effects through policy and legislation.”

Writing for the Daily Signal, Jacob Ogan, a student at Boyce College and the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, titles his commentary “Southern Baptists Get Sports Betting Right.”

Ogan believes that the SBC gambling resolution “is timely—and necessary” because sports betting “preys disproportionately on young men,” “poses threats not only to churches but to society at large,” “breaks up marriages and families, harming churches, and communities,” and “helps to fuel a dangerous addiction, leading to riskier bets and even greater losses over time.”

I don’t necessarily disagree with these points raised by Mr. Ogan. However, when he says that “it is the government’s role to step in and put an end to this predatory market,” I vehemently disagree, and believe that Southern Baptists get sports betting wrong. (For the record, I am an Independent Baptist.)

As a theological and cultural conservative who rejects the hypocrisy and nanny statism of political conservatism, I would agree with those who say that gambling on sports or at a casino table is an immoral, sinful, wasteful vice with terrible odds that can be addictive and financially ruinous. “The house always wins,” says Ogan, and I certainly agree with him. However, I think that most gamblers realize this and gamble for the thrill and entertainment of it, not because they think that they are going to strike it rich.

The real issue here is not gambling, but whose job it is to warn people about the dangers of gambling and discourage them from gambling.

The Southern Baptist Convention and Ogan believe that it is the role of government to do these things. I believe that it is family, friends, co-workers, mental health professionals, acquaintances, social workers, anti-gambling organizations, religious groups, churches, ministers, and organizations like the Southern Baptist Convention to warn people about the dangers of gambling and discourage them from gambling.

From a libertarian perspective, the issue of sports betting is a simple one. Although sports betting — whether online, at a casino, or in an office pool — may be addictive, financially ruinous, a waste of money, a bad habit, or a vice, it is not the job of government at any level to discourage anyone from betting, prevent anyone from betting, or punish anyone from betting.

In a free society, people have the freedom to do what they will with their own money, even if that means waste it, squander it, or gamble it away.

From a Christian perspective, the issue of sports betting is also a simple one. Although sports betting may be bad, immoral, sinful, evil, wicked, or wasteful, there is no warrant in the Bible for religious people to use the force of government to hinder, restrict, or prohibit people from betting.

Those with moral objections to sports betting or any other form of gambling have the right to try to persuade others not to bet or gamble. What they do not have the right to do is use the force of government to stop people from engaging in activities that they don’t like that do not involve aggressing against the personal or property rights of others.

The post Southern Baptists Get Sports Betting Wrong appeared first on LewRockwell.

Over the past week, the Western media has frantically pushed the narrative that Russia is suffering massive losses. Marco Rubio’s remarks in Kuala Lumpur a couple of days ago is a typical example:

One hundred thousand since January? But it is not just Rubio… The Economist provides a more modest estimate, but the key word is estimate:

As of July 9th our tracker suggests there have been between 900,000 and 1.3m Russian casualties since the war began, including some 190,000–350,000 deaths. That updates assessments from other sources, which put total casualties above 1m at the end of June. Our numbers suggest roughly 31,000 Russians may have been killed in the summer offensive so far, which began in earnest on May 1st.

There is too little data to generate a comparable live estimate for Ukraine. However, a catalogue of the known dead and missing from UALosses, a website, implies that between 73,000 and 140,000 Ukrainian soldiers have died since the invasion began.

Talk about lazy reporters. There is plenty of data out there if you simply do basic analysis. For example, start with social media. In the age of ubiquitous smartphones and social media platforms, it is impossible to hide death notices — aka obituaries — and pictures of funerals and graveyards. There are hundreds of images of Ukrainian funerals and of graveyards with a literal sea of Ukrainian flags fluttering over a vast expanse of freshly dug graves. Not so in Russia. There are a few, but nothing to match the quantity displayed on Ukrainian channels. Here is one example from the cemetery in Khmelnitsky.

Again, there are a few videos of some cemeteries in Russia, but nothing to match the scale of what we can see in Ukraine.

Western intelligence analysts have access to satellite imagery and the capability to look at cemeteries in both Russia and Ukraine and compare where the most new graves are being dug. I swear I wrote an article on this with those images, but I can’t find it. But I did make an interesting discovery while searching for it… Western satellites and media companies are doing nothing to make that comparison.

The following graph helps explain why. [Note: This bears an erroneous title.] This graph shows the number of Russian bodies exchanges for Ukrainian bodies since the start of the Special Military Operation:

In my previous article, I discussed the reason for the disparity in combat deaths… It is the fact that Russia enjoys an overwhelming advantage in firepower. Let’s look at just two weapons systems:

Artillery shells: Russia enjoys a lopsided advantage thanks to ramped-up domestic production (3-4.5 million shells annually) and massive imports (e.g., 9+ million from North Korea since 2023), while Ukraine is dependent entirely on Western aid (1.3-2 million annually). NATO’s Secretary General has conceded in public that Russia produces more artillery shells in three months than the US and the rest of NATO can produce in a year. Production numbers are relevant because Russia’s firing rate (10,000-15,000 shells/day) outpaces Ukraine’s (2,000-7,000/day), leading to a 5-10:1 disparity in some sectors in 2024. In 2025, that disparity has grown to a 23:1 disadvantage for Ukraine. In other words, Ukrainians hit by Russian artillery shells will have more casualties than Russians hit by Ukrainian shells, simply because the Russians are firing more shells.

Drones: Russia holds several key advantages in the use of drones for combat in the ongoing conflict with Ukraine, primarily stemming from its larger industrial base, foreign partnerships (e.g., with Iran for Shahed-type drones and China for components), and focus on mass production and deployment.

Superior Production Volume and Stockpiles: Russia aims to produce 2-4 million drones in 2025 (including 2 million FPV models and 30,000 long-range/decoy types), outpacing Ukraine’s targets in certain categories despite Ukraine’s overall goal of 4.5 million. This includes ramping up to 300-500 long-range drones per day, bolstered by Chinese components, giving Russia a 3:1 edge in daily output for some types. Ukraine produced 2.2 million in 2024 (a 900% surge), but Russia’s cumulative stockpiles (estimated 1.5-2.5 million active) enable sustained operations.

Massive Barrage Capabilities: Russia routinely launches large-scale drone assaults (e.g., record 728 drones in one night in July 2025, up from 2,264 in H1 2024 to 22,495 in H1 2025), overwhelming Ukrainian air defenses and destroying key facilities.

Technological Adaptations for Resilience: Russia has gained an edge with fiber-optic cable-guided drones (e.g., Lancet variants), which are resistant to electronic jamming—a key Ukrainian countermeasure. These “low-tech” innovations have been called game-changers, allowing Russia to bypass EW systems where Ukraine previously dominated. Additionally, Russia’s integration of AI and machine vision in drones enhances targeting, though Ukraine leads in autonomous swarms.

Foreign Supply Chains and Sustainability: Partnerships with Iran (thousands of Shahed imports annually) and China (components for 70% of drones) provide Russia with a reliable influx, evading sanctions and sustaining high usage rates. This contrasts with Ukraine’s reliance on Western aid and domestic firms (200+ companies), which face funding volatility despite a 22-fold increase in long-range drone output from 2023 to 2024.

Battlefield Integration and Attrition Edge: Russia uses its drone superiority to support infantry advances, forcing Ukraine into defensive adaptations like motorcycle evasions. Russia’s drones enable a 10:1 attack ratio in some sectors, compounding its manpower advantage, and increasing the number of Ukrainian casualties.

There is not a single weapon system where Ukraine can claim to have the advantage. Russia is employing two additional weapons systems that Ukraine does not have… hypersonic missiles and combat aircraft. Before you holler, “Wait a minute… Ukraine has combat aircraft,” Russia enjoys air supremacy, while Ukrainian aircraft are shot down with regularity. Oh yeah, almost forgot… Russia’s fleet of bombers and submarines regularly launch missiles that Ukraine is incapable of destroying.

Whatever casualties Ukraine is inflicting on Russian forces, it pales in comparison to what Ukraine is losing because of the overwhelming advantage in fires that Russia has. I guess Marco Rubio did not get that briefing.

This article was originally published on Sonar21.

The post By the Numbers — Western Propaganda on Russian Losses appeared first on LewRockwell.

First published on Global Research on December 22, 2022

Introductory Note 

The doctrine of peaceful coexistence was first formulated by Moscow in the wake of the 1918-1920 war against Soviet Russia.

It was presented to the Genoa Conference in April 1922.

The “unspoken” 1918-20 war against Russia (barely acknowledged by historians) was launched two months after the November 7, 1917 Revolution on January 12 1918.

It was an outright “NATO style” invasion consisting of  the deployment of more than 200,000 troops of which 11,000 were from the US, 59,000 from the UK. 15,000 from France.  Japan which was an Ally of Britain and America during World War I  dispatched 70,000 troops. 

The article below entitled Genoa Revisted: Russia and Coexistence was written by my late father Evgeny Chossudovsky in April 1972 (in commemoration of the Genoa 1922 Conference). It was published by Foreign Affairs.

“Half a century ago, on April 10, 1922, Luigi Facta, Prime Minister of Italy, solemnly opened the International Economic Conference at Genoa.Lloyd George, the prime mover of the Conference, was among the first speakers. He called it “the greatest gathering of European nations which has ever assembled,” aimed at seeking in common “the best methods of restoring the shattered prosperity of this continent.” (See text below)

At the height of the Cold War, the Foreign Affairs article was the object of a “constructive debate” in the corridors of the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR).  According to the NYT:

“Mr. [Evgeny] Chossudovsky wants a United Nations Decade of Peaceful Coexistence, a new Treaty Organization for European Security and Cooperation which would embrace all Europe, and comprehensive bilateral and multilateral cooperation in everything from production and trade to protection of health and environment and “strengthening of common cultural values.” …

Skeptics, of course, can point out that Mr. Chossudovsky’s argument; has lots of holes in it, not least in his strained efforts to prove that peaceful coexistence has always been Soviet policy. Nevertheless, he has made such a refreshing and needed contribution to the East‐West dialogue that it would be neither gracious nor appropriate to answer him with traditional types of debating ploys.

Unquestionably, East‐West cooperation in all the fields he mentions is very desirable, and so is East‐West cooperation in other fields he doesn’t mention such as space. And he is pushing an open door when he laments the colossal burdens of the arms race. (Harry Schwarz, The Chossudovsky Plan,  New York Times, March 20, 1972, emphasis added)

Flash Forward to 2025

The world is at a dangerous crossroads. In the post Cold War Era, East-West Dialogue has been scrapped. Starting with the Obama adminstration, a one trillion dollar budget has been allocated to the development of nuclear weapons. (This massive allocation of tax revenues is slated to increase to two trillion in 2030).  

Is “Peaceful Coexistence” and Diplomacy between Russia and the U.S. an Option? 

Constructive Debate and Dialogue is crucial.

Can East-West Dialogue be Restored as a Means to Avoiding a Third World War?

There is a sense of urgency. Military escalation could potentially lead humanity into nuclear war.

The first priority is to restore dialogue and diplomatic channels. 

We call upon the U.S., the member states of the European Union and the Russian Federation to jointly endorse a policy of “Peaceful Coexistence”, with a view to reaching meaningful peace negotiations in regards to the war in Ukraine. 

My father’s family left Russia in 1921 for Berlin. He was seven years old. In 1934, he departed for Scotland, where he started his studies in economics at the University of Edinburgh, the alma mater of Adam Smith.

In 1947 he joined the United Nations secretariat in Geneva. In 1972 at the time of writing of his article he was a senior official at the United Nations Conference for Trade and Development (UNCTAD) and Secretary of the Trade and Development Board. 

The following article on “Peaceful Coexistence” is part of the legacy of my late father, Dr. Evgeny Chossudovsky

It is my sincere hope and commitment that the concept of “Peaceful Coexistence” between nations will ultimately prevail with a view to avoiding a Third World War.  

Michel Chossudovsky, Global Research, June 29, 2024, July 12, 2025

***

Genoa Revisited: Russia and Coexistence

by Evgeny Chossudovsky

Foreign  Affairs, April 1972

Half a century ago, on April 10, 1922, Luigi Facta, Prime Minister of Italy, solemnly opened the International Economic Conference at Genoa. Lloyd George, the prime mover of the Conference, was among the first speakers. He called it “the greatest gathering of European nations which has ever assembled,” aimed at seeking in common “the best methods of restoring the shattered prosperity of this continent.”

Though this rather remote event has by now been forgotten by many, the evocation of it is justified. For a study of Soviet attitudes at that Conference throws light on the origins and evolution of the notion of the peaceful coexistence between countries having different economic and social systems, a major concept of Soviet foreign policy which no serious student of international affairs can nowadays afford to ignore.

Therefore, to look at Genoa afresh from this particular angle may perhaps add to the understanding of Soviet foreign policy and economic diplomacy, including their more recent manifestations.[1]

The author was also anxious to assess the relevance of this first multilateral encounter between Soviet Russia and the Western world to current efforts, a half-century after Genoa, aimed at promoting cooperation across the dividing line. To undertake the task in these pages is not unfitting: the first issue of Foreign Affairs, published only a few months after the Conference, carried a then anonymous article by “K” entitled “Russian After Genoa and The Hague,” written in masterly fashion by the review’s first Editor, Professor Archibald Cary Coolidge. I am grateful for having the privilege, on the eve of the golden jubilee of Foreign Affairs, to revert to this early theme, even if from a different standpoint and at a more comfortable historic distance.[2] 

The Genoa Conference was convened as a result of a set of resolutions passed by the Supreme Council of the Allied Powers meeting at Cannes in January 1922. The principal among these was Mr. Lloyd George’s Resolution. 

In the form in which the draft was adopted on January 6, it provided for the summoning of an Economic and Financial Conference “as an urgent and essential step towards the economic reconstruction of Central and Eastern Europe.” All European states, including the former Central Powers, were asked to attend.

Special decisions were adopted to invite Russia and the United States. Russia replied in the affirmative. Indeed, the young Soviet Republic accepted this call with eagerness and alacrity for reasons which will become apparent as we proceed. On the other hand, we are told that Secretary of State Charles E. Hughes informed the Italian Ambassador in Washington on March 8 that, since the Conference appeared to be mainly political rather than economic in character, the United States government would not be represented.[3] However, the U.S. Ambassador in Rome, R. W. Child, was appointed observer.

American oil and other business interests were represented by F. A. Vanderlip. In the opinion of Soviet historians, the U.S. refusal to take part was motivated mainly by hostility toward Soviet Russia and fear that Genoa might strengthen that country’s international position. The United States at the time was adhering firmly to the policy of economic blockade and nonrecognition of the new Bolshevik regime. On May 7, 1922, Ambassador Child wrote to the State Department that he considered his main function as observer at Genoa would be to “keep in closest possible touch with delegations so as to prevent Soviet Russia from entering any agreements by which our rights would be impaired.” 

Russia was to have been represented by Lenin himself in his capacity as Chairman of the Council of People’s Commissars. Lenin had closely supervised all the preparations and undoubtedly intended to go to Genoa. He stated publicly that he expected to discuss personally with Lloyd George the need for equitable trade relations between Russia and the capitalist countries.

But in naming Lenin as its chief delegate, the Soviet government entered a proviso that “should circumstances exclude the possibility of Comrade Lenin himself attending the Conference,” Georgy Vassilievich Chicherin, People’s Commissar for Foreign Affairs, the deputy head of the delegation, would be vested with all requisite powers.

In the end, public concern over Lenin’s personal safety, pressing affairs of state requiring his attention, and the deterioration of his health, made it undesirable for him to leave Moscow. However, he retained the chairmanship of the Russian delegation and directed its activity through almost daily contact. (The New York Times entitled its leader on the opening of the Conference “Lenin in Genoa!”) Chicherin serving as acting head of the delegation was aided by such outstanding Soviet diplomats and statesmen as Krassin, Litvinov, Yoffe, Vorovsky and Rudzutak, who together formed the “Bureau” of the delegation.

All eyes turned with curiosity on the People’s Commissar when he took the floor, after star performers such as Lloyd George and Barthou had made their inaugural speeches. In keeping with the diplomatic etiquette of those days, he wore tails. Issue of the Russian nobility and for some years archivist in the Tsarist Foreign Ministry, Chicherin as a young man had broken with his past and espoused the cause of revolution, ultimately siding with Lenin and the Bolsheviks. Un homme genial and a diplomat of consummate professional skill, he combined wide knowledge of world affairs, sophisticated erudition and artistic sensitivity with burning faith in communism and a single-minded dedication to the defense of the interests of the Soviet state. Having spoken in excellent French for some twenty minutes, he proceeded, to the surprise and spontaneous applause of the meeting, to interpret his speech into English.

Though Chicherin had hardly looked at his notes during delivery, his statement had been most carefully prepared. Lenin himself had approved the text, had weighed each word, formulation and nuance. Chicherin’s declaration was the first made by a Soviet representative at a major international conference on the agenda of which the “Russian question” loomed large and to which the Soviet Republic had been invited. It was truly a historic moment.

Chicherin told the Conference that “whilst themselves preserving the point of view of Communist principles, the Russian delegation recognizes that in the actual period of history which permits of the parallel existence of the ancient social order and of the new order now being born, economic collaboration between the States representing the two systems of property is imperatively necessary for the general economic reconstruction.” He added that

“the Russian delegation has come here … in order to engage in practical relations with Governments and commercial and industrial circles of all countries on the basis of reciprocity, equality of rights and full recognition. The problem of world-wide economic reconstruction is, under present conditions, so immense and colossal that it can only be solved if all countries, both European and non-European, have the sincere desire to coordinate their efforts… The economic reconstruction of Russia appears as an indispensable condition of world-wide economic reconstruction.” (emphasis added)

A number of concrete offers (combined with proposals for a general limitation of armaments) accompanied this enunciation of policy, such as the readiness of the Russian government “to open its frontier consciously and voluntarily” for the creation of international traffic routes; to release for cultivation millions of acres of the most fertile land in the world; and to grant forest and mining concessions, particularly in Siberia.

Chicherin urged that collaboration should be established between the industry of the West on the one hand and the agriculture and industry of Siberia on the other, so as to enlarge the raw materials, grain and fuel base of European industry. He declared, moreover, his government’s willingness to adopt as a point of departure the old agreements with the Powers which regulated international relations, subject to some necessary modifications. Chicherin also suggested that the world economic crises could be combated by the redistribution of the existing gold reserves among all the countries in the same proportions as before the war, by means of long-term loans. Such a redistribution “should be combined with a rational redistribution of the products of industry and commercial activity, and with a distribution of fuel (naphtha, coal, etc.) according to a settled plan.” 

Such was, in essence, the first considered presentation by Soviet Russia of what came to be termed the policy of peaceful coexistence between the capitalist and socialist systems, linked with a specific program of practical action, made in an intergovernmental forum. But the genesis of the concept goes back much further.

As long ago as 1915, Lenin, in the midst of the First World War, which to him was above all a clash of rival imperialist powers, in a celebrated article entitled “On the Slogan for a United States of Europe,” had foreseen the possibility of the victory of socialism in one country. In so doing he proceeded from an “absolute law” of the uneven economic and political development of capitalism, especially during its imperialist phase.

Lenin came to the related conclusion that the “imperialist chain” might first snap at its weakest link, e.g. in a relatively backward country like Tsarist Russia with a small but concentrated and rapidly expanding capitalist sector, a desperately poor peasantry and a compact and politically conscious working class pitted against a decaying ruling elite. Though the break in the chain would set in motion a process of revolution, that might take time, possibly decades to unfold, depending on the specific conditions obtaining in each country. The socialist state, meanwhile, would have to exist in a capitalist environment, to “cohabit” with it for a more or less prolonged period, peacefully or nonpeacefully. In another article dealing with the “Military Programme of the Proletarian Revolution,” published in the autumn of 1916, Lenin developed this theme further by concluding that socialism could not achieve victory simultaneously in all countries. It would most probably first be established in one country, or in a few countries, “whilst the others will for some time remain bourgeois or pre-bourgeois.”

The weakest link did break, as Lenin had foreseen, in Russia, though the tide of revolution was also mounting in other parts of Europe, impelled by the desperate desire of the peoples to end the war. Indeed, at one time it looked as if a socialist upheaval was about to triumph in Germany. It is hardly surprising that Lenin, the revolutionary leader, openly hailed this prospect, though he was resolutely opposed to the manipulating and artificial pushing or “driving forward” of any revolution from the outside, since for him this was essentially an inexorable social phenomenon ultimately shaped by internal forces. As E. H. Carr has observed, “it was the action of the western Powers toward the end of the year 1918 which contributed quite as much as of the Soviet government which had forced the international situation into a revolutionary setting.”[4]

Yet, being a realist, Lenin did not omit to stress from November 1917 onwards that it would be wrong and irresponsible for the young Soviet Republic to count on revolutions in other countries. They might or might not occur at the time one wished them to happen. There was no question either, as he said again and again, of trying to “export” the Russian Revolution.

While maintaining its belief in the ultimate victory of socialism in other countries, the young Soviet Republic had, meantime, to be prepared to stand on its own feet and to defend its own interests as a state. Not only had the forces of the White Guards and the interventionists to be defeated, but steps had to be taken to conclude peace with the capitalist countries and to prepare, under certain conditions and safeguards, for cooperation with them. Exploratory moves for the resumption of trade and economic relations with the Allied and Central Powers, as well as with neutral countries, had begun immediately after the conclusion of the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk. As early as May 1918, for instance, the Soviet government made, through the good offices of Colonel Raymond Robins (the representative of the American Red Cross in Petrograd) detailed and far-reaching offers to the United States of long-term economic relations, including the granting of concessions to private businessmen for the exploitation, subject to state control, of Russia’s vast and untapped raw material resources. These offers were reiterated a year later through William Bullitt. There was no response.

Military intrusion and economic harassment from the outside (the latter going to such lengths as “the gold blockade,” i.e. the refusal to accept gold for desperately needed imports) continued, forcing the Soviet government, as Lenin put it, to “go to greater lengths in our urgent Communist measures than would otherwise have been the case.” But the option of “peaceful cohabitation” with the capitalist world, based on normal economic, trade and diplomatic relations, was kept open nonetheless throughout this entire phase.

This emerges clearly from the writings and utterances of Lenin and the documents on Soviet foreign policy during the pre-NEP period. Indeed, one of the most incisive and farsighted definitions of the concept of peaceful coexistence dates back to the early summer of 1920 when, in a report on the foreign political situation of the Soviet Republic, the People’s Commissar for Foreign Affairs proclaimed that

“Our slogan was and remains the same: peaceful coexistence (mirnoye sosushchestvovaniye) with other Governments whoever they might be. Reality itself has led … to the need for establishing durable relations between the Government of the peasants and workers and capitalist Governments. . . . Economic reality calls for an exchange of goods, the entering into continuing and regulated relations with the whole world, and the same economic reality demands the same of the other Governments also.”[5]

Thus, the Soviet policy of peaceful coexistence has deep roots in the early history of the Russian Revolution and was most assuredly not something concocted on the spur of the moment for tactical use at Genoa.

[Our thanks to Foreign Affairs]

Click here to read the full article.

The original source of this article is Foreign Affairs

The post Russia’s Doctrine of ‘Peaceful Coexistence’. A Solution to Avoiding WWIII? appeared first on LewRockwell.

We are six months into Donald Trump’s presidency, really his first presidency as his previous four years he was staffed by the ruling establishment with his opponents.

Washington taught Trump a lesson, and this time he is staffed with  people who share the values he expressed in his campaign.  

Nevertheless, the Trump administration is now at odds within itself and with a significant percentage of its MAGA supporters, if news reports can be believed.  The issue splitting the Trump forces is the Epstein dossier.  I wrote yesterday about the Epstein Saga.  Clearly there are problems.

But the nature of the problem is being misrepresented.  Attorney General Bondi did not decide on her own that the Epstein file was empty.  She was not protecting Trump. The decision was imposed on the Trump administration by the American Establishment, the Ruling Elite, the Deep State, the Globalists–whatever you want to call those whose money and economic interests rule the governments in the Western World.

The issue our rulers put to President Trump was:  Are you prepared to discredit in the eyes of the American People the ruling establishment and the government of the United States?  If the people lose confidence in their government, how can you accomplish anything?  

Netanyahu was there with Trump to back them up. If you release the Epstein Files it will be revealed that he was a Mossad agent blackmailing your leaders. We, Israel, will release the names, and your country will be ruined.

But it is not only Bondi having difficulties.  It is also Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., Secretary of Health and Human services, and Trump himself.

Robert Kennedy has found that despite being a cabinet secretary in the US government, he cannot decide based on hard evidence that the Covid “vaccine” is harmful to everyone.  All RFK could do was to cease the government’s recommendation of the deadly Covid vax for healthy children and pregnant women.  The Secretary of Health and Human Services is powerless to stop the vaccination of the vast majority of the American population with a “vaccine” that kills and destroys the immune system.  Big Pharma is more powerful than the US Secretary for Health.

Kennedy despite his promise was also unable to ban the deadly glyphosate weed killer that has poisoned food, soil, and water. Kennedy announced that this toxic substance was too important to agri-business to be denied them.  Agri-business is more powerful than Secretary Kennedy, and its profits are more important than Americans’ health.

President Trump cannot even impose tariffs or deport immigrant-invaders.  Globalism makes countries dependent on imports.  Manufacturers are harmed by tariffs, and agri-business is harmed by deportations of illegals. These  powerful economic interests are opposed to tariffs and deportations.

Trump’s tariffs are used to lower foreign tariffs against the US or to force concessions from foreign governments.  But as it turned  out the tariffs raise the cost of the remaining American manufacturers and hurt their profits..  They confronted  Trump and were granted exemptions from tariffs for their input needs.  Essentially, the tariff list was naked.  Nothing on it that wasn’t exempted.

The same for deportations. According to news reports, there are to be no deportations of restaurant workers, farm workers, and workers in the chicken slaughter houses. The deportations seem mainly to be limited to criminal gangs.

It has only taken the Ruling Establishment six months to cancel the domestic agenda of the Trump administration.  The Reagan administration lasted longer before it was neutralized.

Trump’s peace agenda has also gone by the wayside.  He has bombed Iran for Netanyahu and continues to support Israeli aggression and Israel’s genocide of Palestine.  Trump is yet to meet with Putin, instead handing the “peace negotiations” over to Zelensky and Putin.  As the war is really between the US and Russia, Zelensky cannot settle it.  The military/security complex needs war or the threat of war for its profits and power. Peace does not serve their interests.

Americans have a false belief in the power of a president. As long as private money determines politics, money, not the people, rules.

The post Interest Groups Are Stronger Than President Trump appeared first on LewRockwell.

No one wants to think about a nuclear crisis – and hopefully it will never happen – but we all must accept the fact nuclear tensions are rising globally with Russia and China (and others are seeking nukes) so we should prepare ourselves and our loved ones in the event the unthinkable strikes our soil.

For decades, movies and some in the media have portrayed a nuclear attack as a “doomsday” event implying most people would be killed on impact … and survivors would want to die once they come out of their shelters.

In reality, unless you are actually at ground zero or within a several mile radius of the blast zone (depending on the size of the nuke, of course), there is a very high probability you’ll survive as long as you…

• limit your exposure to radiation and fallout,
• take shelter with proper shielding,
• wait for the most dangerous radioactive materials to decay.

In other words, you CAN survive a nuke attack … but you MUST make an effort to learn what to do! By learning about potential threats, we are all better prepared to know how to react if something happens.

Please realize this is being written with small nuke devices in mind (like a 1-kiloton to 1-megaton device). A larger device, ICBM or a nuclear war would cause more wide-spread damage but some of this data could still be helpful. These are some very basic tips on sheltering for any type of nuclear (or radiological) incident.

What happens when a nuke explodes?

A nuclear blast produces a blinding light, intense heat (called thermal radiation), initial nuclear radiation, 2 explosive shock waves (blasts), mass fires, and radioactive fallout (residual nuclear radiation).

The below graphic shows the destruction of a test home by an atomic blast on March 17, 1953 at the Nevada Proving Ground. The structure was located 3,500 feet from ground zero, and the time from the first to last picture was 2.3 seconds.  It shows the force of the blast wave then the radiating energy set it on fire.

Also, if a nuke is launched over our continent and explodes miles above the earth, it could create an electromagnetic pulse (EMP). An EMP is a split-second silent energy burst (like a stroke of lightning) that can fry electronics connected to wires or antennas like cell phones, cars, computers, TVs, etc. Unless electronics are grounded or hardened, an area or nation could experience anything from minor interference to crippled power, transportation, banking and communications systems.

An EMP from a high-altitude nuke (where a nation or group succeeds in detonating a nuclear device carried miles into the atmosphere) could affect electronics within 1,000 miles or more as shown below. (Evidence suggests some countries and groups are working on enhanced and non-nuclear EMP weapons or e-bombs.)

What is the most dangerous part of a nuclear attack?

Both the initial nuclear radiation and residual nuclear radiation (also called radioactive fallout) are extremely dangerous.

Initial nuclear radiation is penetrating invisible rays that can be lethal in high levels.

Radioactive fallout (residual nuclear radiation) is created when the fireball vaporizes everything inside it (including dirt and water). Vaporized materials mix with radioactive materials in the updraft of air forming a mushroom cloud.

Fallout can be carried by winds for hundreds of miles and begin falling to the ground within minutes of the blast or take hours, days, weeks or even months to fall. The heaviest fallout would hit ground zero and areas downwind of that, and 80% of fallout would occur within 24 hours. Most fallout looks like grey sand or gritty ash and the radiation given off cannotbe seen, smelled, tasted or felt which is why it is so dangerous. But as the materials decay or spread out radiation levels will drop.

More about radiation

Types of radiation – Nuclear radiation has 3 main types of radiation…

• alpha – can be shielded by a sheet of paper or by human skin. If alpha particles are inhaled, ingested, or enter body through a cut, they can cause damage to tissues and cells.

• beta – can be stopped by skin or a thicker shield (like wood). Beta particles can cause serious damage to internal organs if ingested or inhaled, and could cause eye damage or possible skin burns.
• gamma – most dangerous since gamma rays can penetrate the entire body and cause cell damage throughout your organs, blood and bones. Since radiation does not stimulate nerve cells you may not feel anything while your body absorbs it. Exposure to high levels of gamma rays can lead to radiation sickness or death, which is why it is critical to seek shelter from fallout in a facility with thick shielding!

Radiation detection devices – You cannot see, smell, taste or feel radiation, but special instruments can detect even the smallest levels of radiation. Since it may take days or weeks before First Responders could get to you, consider having these devices handy during a crisis or attack since they could save your life.

Measuring radiation – Radiation was measured in units called roentgens (pronounced “rent-gens” and abbreviated as “R”) … or “rads” or “rem”. An EPA document called “Planning Guidance for Response to A Nuclear Detonation 2nd Edition June 2010” explains … 1 R (exposure in air) ≅ 1 rad (absorbed dose) ≅ 1 rem (whole-body dose). Although many measuring devices and older documentation use R and rem, officials and the media now use sievert (Sv) which is the System International or SI unit of measurement of radiation. The formula to convert sieverts to rems is quite simple … 1 Sv = 100 R (rem).

How many rads are bad? – High doses of radiation in a short span of time can cause radiation sickness or even death, but if that high dose is spread out over a long period of time, it’s not as bad.

According to FEMA, an adult could tolerate and recover from an exposure to 150R (1.5 Sv) over a week or 300R (3 Sv) over a 4-month period. But 300R (3 Sv) over a week could cause sickness or possibly death. Exposure to 30R (0.3 Sv) to 70R (0.7 Sv) over a week may cause minor sickness, but a full recovery would be expected. But radioactive fallout decays rapidly so staying in a shelter with proper shielding is critical!

The “seven-ten” rule – For every sevenfold increase in time after the initial blast, there is a tenfold decrease in the radiation rate. For example, a 500 rad level can drop to 50R in just 7 hours and down to 5R after 2 days (49 hours). In other words, if you have shelter with good shielding and stay put for even just 7 hours … you’ve really increased your chances of survival. Your detection devices, emergency radio or cell phone [if the last 2 are working, that is] can assist you in knowing when it’s safe to come out.

Coping with reality is the best way to beat it. Prepare. Most of us are. We are just waiting for the S to HTF, so to speak. Once it does, and it will again, we will be comfortable and unafraid while others won’t be able to function without submitting to their own enslavement in exchange for a can of corn.

So how do I protect myself and my family?

Basic shelter requirements – Whether you build a shelter in advance or throw together an expedient last-minute shelter during a crisis, the area should protect you from radiation and support you for at least 2 weeks. Some basic requirements for a fallout shelter include …

• shielding
• ventilation
• water and food
• sanitation and first aid products
• radiation monitoring devices, KI (potassium iodide), radio, weapons, tools, etc

Reduce exposure – Protect yourself from radioactive fallout with …

• distance – the more distance between you and fallout particles, the better
• shielding – heavy, dense materials (like thick walls, earth, concrete, bricks, water and books) between you and fallout is best. Stay indoors or below ground. (Taking shelter in a basement or a facility below ground reduces exposure by 90%. Less than 4 inches of soil or earth can reduce the penetration of dangerous gamma rays by half.)
• time – most fallout loses its strength quickly. The more time that passes after the attack, the lower the danger.

Read the Whole Article

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Over the weekend you may have seen quite a long post from Donald Trump on Truth Social that made its way onto other platforms, in which he once again expressed impatience, even bewilderment, with people who still want to discuss the Jeffrey Epstein matter.

It began:

What’s going on with my “boys” and, in some cases, “gals”? They’re all going after Attorney General Pam Bondi, who is doing a FANTASTIC JOB! We’re on one Team, MAGA, and I don’t like what’s happening. We have a PERFECT Administration, THE TALK OF THE WORLD, and “selfish people” are trying to hurt it, all over a guy who never dies, Jeffrey Epstein.

To use social media parlance, Trump got “ratioed” for this post on his own platform, Truth Social. Truth Social is not even marketed to people outside the Trump orbit. For that to happen is fairly serious.

Meanwhile, the FBI’s Kash Patel is receiving much the same treatment for this post, particularly his use of “conspiracy theories” in the same dismissive sense in which the left employs the term:

Matt Walsh, fresh from vacation, sums up the frustration:

[amazon template=*lrc ad (right)&asin=1781808368]The Attorney General said she had the client list on her desk. The White House made a big show of giving binders marked “Epstein Files: Phase 1” to a bunch of influencers. Now they tell us that there is no list and we should stop talking about it. Well then why did you say there was a list? Why did you pull that stunt with the influencers? Why did you call it Phase 1 (obviously implying that there were more phases to come)?

If you claim that all of this seems normal, above board, and honest, you’re being extremely obtuse. We’re Americans. We don’t accept obvious bullshit from our political leaders. And we don’t move on from a topic just because we’ve been instructed to do so….

Up until 10 seconds ago there was unanimous agreement that Epstein was a pedophile and child sex trafficker with high profile clientele who all must be exposed and brought to justice. Now, out of the blue, we’re being told that none of that is true and anyone who believes this thing that everyone believed is a whack job and a conspiracy theorist. This is the kind of shameless 180-degree unexplained pivot that leftists typically specialize in. Very weird to see it happening on the Right….

One MAGA person commented to Walsh, “Right-wing conspiracy theorists invented the files, and now you’re all mad it doesn’t exist.”

To which Walsh replied, “Pam Bondi invited influencers to the White House and handed them big binders that literally said ‘Epstein Files’ in huge bold letters on the front. If the files never existed then why did the White House do that?”

In the understatement of the century, something is obviously screwy here, and the Mark Levins of the world who want everyone to shut up already are not going to get their wish.

Never pay for a book again: TomsFreeBooks.com

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I governi nazionali europei si sono impegnati a chiudere le centrali nucleari, rendendole insostenibili con una tassazione predatoria; a penalizzare gli investimenti nella distribuzione con normative assurde; a imporre un mix energetico volatile e intermittente; a gravare il settore energetico con tasse elevate e ritardi amministrativi. Cosa poteva andare storto? Tutto. E così è stato. Le energie rinnovabili, pur essendo essenziali in un mix energetico equilibrato, non possono garantire sicurezza e stabilità a causa della loro volatilità e della loro natura intermittente. Ecco perché è essenziale disporre di un sistema bilanciato con energia di base in funzione ininterrottamente, come l'energia idroelettrica, nucleare e il gas naturale come riserva. Distruggere l'accesso all'energia nucleare con chiusure inutili e una tassazione predatoria è stata una delle cause principali del blackout spagnolo ad aprile di quest'anno. Spagna e Portogallo producono elettricità con oltre il 60% di energia solare ed eolica. Le centrali idroelettriche, nucleari e a gas a ciclo combinato devono coprire le carenze. Non è possibile avere un sistema stabile e sicuro con un'alimentazione continua se la rete elettrica non è bilanciata per evitare blackout totali. Secondo Euronews, la Francia a volte produce troppa elettricità, costringendo il gestore di rete RTE a disconnettere i siti solari ed eolici. Il consumatore paga le tasse per coprire le perdite del gestore. Questa procedura impedisce un blackout generale della rete, ma rappresenta una doppia spesa che non esisterebbe se l'Europa non avesse un pregiudizio nei confronti del mining di Bitcoin. Un sistema privo di inerzia fisica, fornito da fonti energetiche di base in costante funzionamento – nucleare e idroelettrico – rende impossibile stabilizzare la rete in caso di interruzioni dell'approvvigionamento. Quando si è verificato il blackout la rete elettrica spagnola era composta per quasi l'80% da fonti rinnovabili, per l'11% da fonti nucleari e solo per il 3% da gas naturale. Non c'era praticamente alcuna generazione di base, o inerzia fisica, in grado di assorbire lo shock. I blackout, che avrebbero dovuto essere qualcosa di obsoleto e dimenticato, sono diventati la norma da quando i politici hanno ideologizzato l'energia. Altri Paesi hanno sofferto di problemi simili: Australia (2016), Germania (2017) e Regno Unito (2019) hanno subito blackout a causa di riserve energetiche o di misure di stabilità della rete insufficienti. E per quanto riguarda quest'ultima, in particolar modo, le cose non sono cambiate da allora e ciò metterà ulteriore pressione nel futuro prossimo sulla rete energetica francese. Tuttavia, nessuno di questi incidenti è stato così drammatico o scandaloso come quello in Spagna. Ciò che è accaduto in Spagna è un sintomo, non un incidente. I governi spagnoli hanno deciso che la chiusura di tutte le centrali nucleari sarà effettiva nel 2035. Nonostante tutti i tecnici ci ricordino che funzionano perfettamente e che la loro durata potrebbe essere prolungata di almeno dieci anni, questa azione aumenterà la dipendenza dalle energie rinnovabili e dal gas naturale russo. In altre parole, la politica miope della Spagna renderà il Paese ancora più dipendente da Cina e Russia per l'energia, costringendolo a continui blackout e tagli alle forniture per l'industria. La propaganda ci ha fatto credere che le energie rinnovabili avrebbero portato competitività e stabilità alla rete, ma la realtà dimostra che un'eccessiva dipendenza dalle fonti rinnovabili e una carenza di fonti energetiche di base indicano che la rete elettrica dipenderà sempre più dalle poche centrali nucleari e a gas naturale rimaste per mantenere la stabilità dell'approvvigionamento.

____________________________________________________________________________________ 

di Joakim Book

(Versione audio della traduzione disponibile qui: https://open.substack.com/pub/fsimoncelli/p/il-blackout-spagnolo-dimostra-perche)

Quando la rete elettrica spagnola è crollata in un normale lunedì di fine aprile, sono morti con essa anche i sogni di energia rinnovabile e il team per la transizione verde.

Ryan McMaken si è affrettato a sottolineare che, secondo convinzioni politiche simili a quelle del Green Deal europeo, convenienza e affidabilità non sono virtù importanti della rete elettrica europea. Quando si mettono tutte le proprie risorse in un unico posto, una tale strategia è destinata a fallire... a maggior ragione, poi, se si tratta di rete elettrica.

Mentre le autorità spagnole hanno negato che le energie rinnovabili siano state la causa della perdita di frequenza che ha causato l'interruzione dell'elettricità per circa 60 milioni di persone in Spagna e Portogallo, diversi commentatori ed esperti si sono schierati pubblicamente e hanno confessato che la causa era l'eccessiva dipendenza dall'energia solare al momento del blackout.

La manipolazione da parte dei media generalisti, sempre più irrilevanti, è stata per lo più triste da guardare. Ironia della sorte l'autore dell'articolo di propaganda sulla Reuters ha cercato di allontanare la colpa dalle divinità verdi affermando che non erano loro da criticare bensì le “energie rinnovabili nella rete moderna”. Oh, ok.

Torniamo indietro. Avete sentito parlare di ESG (criteri ambientali, sociali e di governance) di recente? Neanch'io. Nel giro di pochi anni c'è stata una notevole inversione di tendenza nell'uso aziendale del termine “ESG”. Da concetto onnicomprensivo, pronunciato da ogni amministratore delegato e imposto a ogni dipendente da ogni ufficio risorse umane di ogni azienda sufficientemente grande, è semplicemente svanito.

Da un giorno all'altro, a nessuno importava più. Un recente sondaggio ha suggerito che solo il 7% di coloro che un paio d'anni fa erano stati assunti per lavorare sui criteri ESG a livello di aziende lo sono ancora oggi. Puff, spariti.

E tutto è avvenuto in silenzio. Matt Levine, famoso per “Money Stuff” su Bloomberg, ha ripetutamente ipotizzato che i criteri ESG – come tante altre cose – fossero un fenomeno legato ai tassi d'interesse bassi. Non appena tassi e inflazione hanno iniziato a farsi sentire, le persone hanno rapidamente abbandonato gli sforzi virtuosi per la giustizia ambientale e sociale.

Ecco una previsione alla luce del disastro spagnolo: la cosiddetta “onda verde” – o la minacciosa transizione energetica – che spinge pannelli solari su ogni tetto e ricopre il paesaggio di turbine eoliche, subirà un destino simile.

Perché? Oltre a rovinare le reti e a comparire nel dibattito politico e sociale, non sta facendo molto altro. La “transizione” verde non ha ottenuto praticamente nulla nei circa 30 anni in cui ha dominato le menti di intellettuali e politici. Non ci credete? Guardate un grafico del consumo globale di energia primaria per fonte e constatate voi stessi.

Nel 1991, l'anno in cui sono nato – per prendere un anno a caso dagli anni '90, quando il movimento per il cambiamento climatico si è davvero scatenato – il 77,5% del consumo energetico proveniva da petrolio, gas e carbone. Nel 2023, dopo migliaia di miliardi spesi per elettrificare le reti, costruire impianti solari e sovvenzionare questa o quella iniziativa ecologica, dopo folli sforzi sociali e politici per volare meno, mangiare in modo sostenibile e riciclare la plastica e così via, quella stessa percentuale si attesta al 76,55%. Tre decenni di energie, denaro e propaganda e l'ago della bilancia non si è minimamente spostato.

A quanto pare, le persone vogliono la loro energia, le loro auto, le loro cose, i loro viaggi e, in definitiva, sopravvivere. Qualsiasi cosa si faccia dall'alto per ostacolare tutto questo non ha altro che effetti marginali.

Ciò che è stato fatto è stato destabilizzare molte reti elettriche in tutto il mondo. Il solare e l'eolico hanno sostituito parte della biomassa e parte del nucleare con percentuali a una sola cifra, e le reti stanno già andando in pezzi – ad esempio, in Spagna. E non è che (“noi”) non lo sapessimo. Sepolte nei rapporti di ricerca e nei documenti informativi della Federal Energy Regulatory Commission all'Oxford Institute for Energy Studies, le conclusioni sono chiare: più inaffidabili, meno inerzia, più rischio di crolli di frequenza che innescano un blocco totale.

I grandi cambiamenti, storicamente parlando, che hanno portato alla sostituzione del biocarburante con il carbone e poi con il gas naturale erano già stati in gran parte completati alla fine degli anni '70. La lezione che possiamo trarre dalla storia dell'umanità e dal suo rapporto con il mondo naturale è che l'obiettivo è ottenere di più e meglio (più economico, più veloce, più sicuro, più stabile); non peggio, più costoso o meno affidabile. “Ogni transizione energetica che abbiamo avuto”, ho scritto l'anno scorso, “è stata additiva”. Come civiltà non “sostituiamo”, o “eliminiamo gradualmente”, le fonti energetiche; le facciamo evolvere con fonti migliori. E, come dimostra il disastro elettrico spagnolo, fonti inaffidabili come l'eolico e il solare non sono migliori.

Così come i criteri ESG stanno scomparendo silenziosamente dall'attenzione di quasi tutti, si spera che l'ossessione per tutto ciò che è green scomparirà da un momento all'altro.

La legge della politica climatica, alla quale Roger Pielke Jr. ha prestato il suo nome, afferma che “ogni volta che obiettivi ambientali ed economici vengono contrapposti, l'economia vince sempre”.

Questa è la lezione degli ultimi trent'anni di politiche e propaganda green, così come del più recente fenomeno ESG. Quando i fattori finanziari ed economici incidono, i sogni (in realtà gli incubi) di “crisi” climatiche e le relative urgenti proposte politiche svaniscono. Ora che la maggior parte delle reti elettriche occidentali è stata saturata da energia eolica e solare, con prezzi alle stelle e blackout sempre più frequenti, i sogni green sono destinati a finire.

Col tempo, l'intera portata della “transizione verde” diventerà oggetto di curiosità storica, di interesse esclusivo per sociologi e storici della politica. Che gran bella liberazione!

[*] traduzione di Francesco Simoncelli: https://www.francescosimoncelli.com/

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All government intervention is bad, but the income tax is a particularly insidious form of evil. As the great libertarian theorist Frank Chodorov wrote in 1954: “With this definition of ‘evil’ in mind, it is the purpose of this book [The Income Tax: Root of All Evil] to show that many laws and governmental practices are impregnated with it, and to trace this wholesale infringement of our rights to the power acquired by the federal government in 1913 to tax our incomes—the Sixteenth Amendment. That is the ‘root.’ Furthermore, proof will be offered to support the proposition that the ‘evil’ has reached the point where the doctrine of natural rights has been all but abrogated in fact, if not in theory. As a consequence, the kind of government we are acquiring is distinctly different from that envisaged by the Founding Fathers; it is fast becoming a government that conceives itself to be the source of rights, which it gives and can recall at its own pleasure. The transformation is not yet complete, but it will be seen as we go along that completion is not far off—if nothing is done to prevent it.”

Why did Chodorov maintain that the income tax is so evil? He explains in a devastating argument: “Income and inheritance taxes imply the denial of private property, and in that are different in principle from all other taxes. The government says to the citizen: ‘Your earnings are not exclusively your own; we have a claim on them, and our claim precedes yours; we will allow you to keep some of it, because we recognize your need, not your right; but whatever we grant you for yourself is for us to decide.’ This is no exaggeration. Take a look at the income-tax report that you are required by law to make out, and you will see that the government arbitrarily sets down the amount of your income you may have for your living, for your business requirements, for the maintenance of your family, for medical expenses, and so on. After granting these exemptions, with a flourish of generosity, the government decides what percentage of the remainder it will appropriate. The rest you may have. The percentage of the appropriation may be (and has been) raised from year to year, and the exemptions may be (and have been) lowered from year to year. The amount of your earnings that you may retain for yourself is determined by the needs of government, and you have nothing to say about it. The right of decision as to the disposition of your property rests in the government by virtue of the Sixteenth Amendment of the Constitution.”

The great Austrian economist Ludwig von Mises noted that the income tax rests on a false premise, namely, that money can be taken from people without having an adverse effect on production. “Interventionism is guided by the idea that interfering with property rights does not affect the size of production. The most naive manifestation of this fallacy is presented by confiscatory interventionism. The yield of production activities is considered a given magnitude independent of the merely accidental arrangements of society’s social order. The task of the government is seen as the ‘fair’ distribution of this national income among the various members of society.

The interventionists and the socialists contend that all commodities are turned out by a social process of production. When this process comes to an end and its fruits ripen, a second social process, that of distribution of the yield, follows and allots a share to each. The characteristic feature of the capitalist order is that the shares allotted are unequal. Some people–the entrepreneurs, the capitalists, and the landowners–appropriate to themselves more than they should. Accordingly, the portions of other people are curtailed. Government should by rights expropriate the surplus of the privileged and distribute it among the underprivileged.

Now in the market economy this alleged dualism of two independent processes, that of production and that of distribution, does not exist. There is only one process going on. Goods are not first produced and then distributed. There is no such thing as an appropriation of portions out of a stock of ownerless goods. The products come into existence as somebody’s property. If one wants to distribute them, one must first confiscate them. It is certainly very easy for the governmental apparatus of compulsion and coercion to embark upon confiscation and expropriation. But this does not prove that a durable system of economic affairs can be built upon such confiscation and expropriation.

When the Vikings turned their backs upon a community of autarkic peasants whom they had plundered, the surviving victims began to work, to till the soil, and to build again. When the pirates returned after some years, they again found things to seize. But capitalism cannot stand such reiterated predatory raids. Its capital accumulation and investments are founded upon the expectation that no such expropriation will occur. If this expectation is absent, people will prefer to consume their capital instead of safeguarding it for the expropriators. This is the inherent error of all plans that aim at combining private ownership and reiterated expropriation.”

Mises characterized progressive taxation as insane: “Progressive taxation of income and profits means that precisely those parts of the income which people would have saved and invested are taxed away. Take the example of the United States. A few years ago, there was an “excess-profit” tax, which meant that out of one dollar earned, a corporation retained only eighteen cents. When these eighteen cents were paid out to the shareholders, those who had a great number of shares had to pay another sixty or eighty or even greater percent of it in taxes. Out of the dollar of profit they retained about seven cents, and ninety-three cents went to the government. Of this ninety-three percent, the greater part would have been saved and invested. Instead, the government used it for current expenditure. This is the policy of the United States. I think I have made it clear that the policy of the United States is not an example to be imitated by other countries. This policy of the United States is worse than bad—it is insane.”

Further, as the great Murray Rothbard noted with his customary brilliance, taxation is theft: “For there is one crucially important power inherent in the nature of the State apparatus. All other persons and groups in society (except for acknowledged and sporadic criminals such as thieves and bank robbers) obtain their income voluntarily: either by selling goods and services to the consuming public, or by voluntary gift (e.g., membership in a club or association, bequest, or inheritance). Only the State obtains its revenue by coercion, by threatening dire penalties should the income not be forthcoming. That coercion is known as ‘taxation,’ although in less regularized epochs it was often known as tribute.’ Taxation is theft, purely and simply, even though it is theft on a grand and colossal scale which no acknowledged criminals could hope to match. It is a compulsory seizure of the property of the State’s inhabitants, or subjects. lt would be an instructive exercise for the skeptical reader to try to frame a definition of taxation which does not also include theft. Like the robber, the State demands money at the equivalent of gunpoint; if the taxpayer refuses to pay, his assets are seized by force, and if he should resist such depredation, he will be arrested or shot if he should continue to resist. lt is true that State apologists maintain that taxation is ‘really’’ voluntary; one simple but instructive refutation of this claim is to ponder what would happen if the government were to abolish taxation, and to confine itself to simple requests for voluntary contributions. Does anyone really believe that anything comparable to the current vast revenues of the State would continue to pour into its coffers? lt is likely that even those theorists who claim that punishment never deters action would balk at such a claim. The great economist Joseph Schumpeter was correct when he acidly wrote that ‘the theory which construes taxes on the analogy of club dues or of the purchase of the services of, say, a doctor only proves how far removed this part of the social sciences is from scientific habits of mind.’

Let’s do everything we can to get rid of the monstrously evil income tax.

The post Why the Income Tax Is Evil appeared first on LewRockwell.

Everywhere, power is exerted over people’s life, liberty, and property by governments.

Limiting Governments

In tribes, power was exerted by chiefs. In larger agricultural civilizations, power was exerted by kings. The person who used the most power reigned.

In Israel initially, laws were given by God and administered by judges, and collective self-defense was organized under military leaders. In Israel later, power was exerted by kings, and people soon fell away from God.

The Dutch Republic, then England, and then the American Colonies had printed Bibles in people’s native tongues, and had reformed churches. These innovations helped people individually grow close to God. People’s natural envy was better-controlled, so people were able to add more value. Naturally, people chose to make themselves freer. The American Colonies started out with the world’s lowest taxes and greatest freedom.

The Constitution’s ratifiers needed support from people who had lived in freedom, experienced abuses of power by government people, and fought for freedom. To earn acceptance, the ratifiers took the best-available theory and transformed it into rules and sanctions.

The Constitution’s foremost rule is that no person shall be unduly deprived of life, liberty, or property.

Rules are followed more fully when sanctions get used.

The Constitution’s sanctions are that government powers must be separated into national and state jurisdictions, and that within jurisdictions, government powers must be separated into legislative, executive, and judicial branches. In each separated power, each person is required to support the Constitution by using his powers against other powers to offset and therefore limit the other powers.

Separate and offset. Divide and limit.

But after ratification, the drafters and their distinguished colleagues slacked off.

They never spun off analogous constitutions that would limit other powerful groups. They began working within parties to disuse the Constitution’s sanctions.

The Constitution’s sanctions now get systematically disused by government people. These people collude using parties.

Limiting a Party

Parties control governments. Parties’ people therefore exert government power over people’s life, liberty, and property.

We need at least one major party to have enumerated, limited powers. Some rules must be in a party constitution:

The [republican Constitution party] congress shall have power to solicit and collect donations;

to arrange national party meetings;

to set schedules for, and national party controls on, state party selection of candidates for the national government;

— and

to make all party laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into execution the foregoing powers, and all other powers vested by this constitution in the republican Constitution party government, or in any department or officer thereof.

The republican Constitution party shall have no platform.

The Constitution Needs a Good Party, pp. 43–4 53 (discussions omitted)

Other rules must be in party laws:

A previously-elected candidate shall qualify to run as a member of the party only if his Conservative Review Liberty Score [or alternatively, his John Birch Society Freedom Index in his most-recent term] is a minimum of 80%.

Party-sanctioned debates shall have no moderators, no commentators from the start to the finish of the debate, and no questions other than the questions asked by the candidates during the debates.

Candidates for Congress shall be selected using closed caucuses with proportional voting.

The candidate for president shall be selected using closed caucuses with proportional voting, using a candidate electoral college the same in numbers and distribution as the electoral college, and counting only candidate electors from regions represented by the party in the House or Senate.

State caucuses to select candidates for Congress and president shall be scheduled one state at a time, approximately equally-spaced apart in time, in order of decreasing party strength. The party strength shall be the average of the party proportions of the vote in the most-recent elections for each House and Senate seat in the state, with each election counted as being of equal weight in the average.

The Constitution Needs a Good Party, pp. 48–53 (discussions omitted)

The party constitution must have sanctions that replicate the best-available model: the Constitution’s separated, offsetting powers.

A limited party can be built multiple ways, for instance by electing an independent to be president.

Limiting Other Groups

Other groups also exert power over people’s life, liberty, or property. Group constitutions are needed, for example, for state governments, legislative houses, and major businesses.

State governments need limited, enumerated powers: to tax, borrow, regulate intrastate commerce, establish intercity roads, define and punish criminal offenses, regulate domestic and family affairs, administer civil justice in intrastate cases, appoint officers and train the militia, and enact exclusive legislation over the government district and needful buildings.

State governments should not be empowered to regulate property that’s not in commerce, regulate businesses, operate and regulate schools, or operate and regulate social services. Excluding these powers will protect state residents’ liberty and property, for example so that residents can provide or choose schooling, or can provide or choose charity social services, without being boxed out by government-advantaged producers.

The state constitutions’ sanctions must replicate the Constitution’s separated, offsetting powers.

Legislative houses have limited, enumerated powers vested in them by their jurisdiction constitutions.

In each legislative house, the powers must be separated well. Working groups must each have limited, enumerated power over at most one individual clause in the jurisdiction constitution. Each house member must choose to belong to just one working group. Each member will be incentivized to offset and limit other working groups’ members.

Major businesses that wield security, surveillance, or other powers over people’s life, liberty, or property need rules and sanctions that internally limit these businesses’ powers. To succeed, these businesses must limit their own operations and develop better products that customers choose.

Like the ratifying generation’s people, we the people must accept no less than freedom—from all powerful groups; and most crucially right now, from at least one party.

Separate and offset. Divide and limit.

The post Limiting Governments by Limiting a Party appeared first on LewRockwell.

Like a child with his new favorite toy at Christmas, President Trump is using tariff taxes not only to attempt to centrally plan the pricing of thousands of goods and services in the economy, but also to engage in election interference in other countries.  The latter statement refers to how he recently put the government of Brazil on notice that 50 percent tariff taxes would be imposed on Brazilian imports to the U.S. unless it dropped the legal case against the former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro.  I bet you thought that Donald Trump was against one country interfering with the electoral politics of another country, didn’t you?

With this threat President Trump is essentially saying, “We will punish American consumers with higher prices on goods imported from Brazil unless you run your legal system the way I, Donald Trump, want you to run it.”  No skin off Donald Trump’s back, only hapless American consumers and tariff taxpayers.  Imagine if say, Japan or Canada made similar threats of quadrupling tariff taxes on American imports into their countries unless we changed our immigration laws, quit deporting illegal aliens, let illegal aliens who have committed additional crimes out of prison, etc.  Why, Donald Trump would be outraged!

Then there is the chaotic global economic uncertainty caused by Trump’s ever-growing list of tariff tax threats, which seem to randomly range from around 15 percent to 50 percent or higher, involving dozens of countries.  Just last year the average American tariff tax on imports was 2.5 percent.  In doing this President Trump is posing as the Jolly Green Giant of negotiators, a one-man negotiating “team” taking on all the other countries in the planet under the apparent assumption that a balance of trade with all countries is the goal.  Who could argue that the residents of Liechtenstein should induced to buy as much from America as Americans buy from Liechtenstein?

Negotiating tariff rates with all the countries of the world just may be more difficult and time consuming than Trump thinks.  The most famous American tariff in American history, the Smoot-Hawley tariff of 1930 (with a 60 percent average tariff rate), spawned an international trade war that shrunk world trade by two thirds in three years and exacerbated the Great Depression. After the war the nations of the world went to work negotiating down tariff rates because the whole world understood the economic catastrophe that was created by such a shrinkage of the international division of labor, the lifeblood of economic prosperity.  The created the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) in 1947 when the average worldwide tariff tax rate was around 25 percent.

For the next fifty years round after round of negotiations whittled down the worldwide average tariff rate to 5 percent.  This was a tremendous boost to post-war worldwide economic growth and prosperity.  There were numerous rounds of negotiations that lasted from five months to seven years.  Each round, in the end, tended to reduce tariff rates and non-tariff trade barriers.

Every country has its own special interest politics that will affect how such country-to-country negotiations take place, and there are bound to have been some negotiations that impeded rather than encouraged more world trade, but certainly on balance tariff taxes were reduced severely over that half century.

President Trump’s increases in the average American tariff rate by at least a multiple of four, at a minimum, threatens to bring us back to where we were in 1947.  But not to worry, The Great Jolly Green Giant Negotiator is confident that he can do in five days or less what the entire world took fifty years to achieve just in case his hyper-protectionist policies blow up in his face (economically speaking).  This kind of thinking is what F.A. Hayek, in his critique of socialism, called “the pretense of [more than is humanly possible] knowledge” and “the fatal conceit.”

The post Trump’s Election Interference Tariff appeared first on LewRockwell.

Jack Callahan was frying rainbow trout on his camp stove along the Upper Sacramento when the news broke on his iPhone. California’s Caligula was at it again, crying about federal agents doing what they’re supposed to do—enforce the law.

This time, Gavin Newsom was throwing his slick-haired tantrum over immigration raids at marijuana farms where ten children were found working illegally.

“Trump calls me ‘Newscum’ — but he’s the real scum,” whined Slick on social media. Jack set down his spatula and shook his head. Here was the second-worst governor in America—barely edging out Oregon’s Tina Kotek for the title—defending child labor while posturing as the champion of righteousness.

On this issue, the Golden State Gasbag cannot see the forest for the trees of farmed cannabis. Federal agents discovered ten illegal alien minors at the Glass House Farms facility in Camarillo, eight of them unaccompanied. These were children—children—toiling in marijuana fields while families across America struggle to find honest work.

Yet Newscum focused his outrage not on the exploitation of these kids, but on the federal agents who rescued them.

“Why are there children working at a marijuana facility, Gavin?” asked the Department of Homeland Security. It’s a question that cuts to the heart of what Slick has done to California.

Under his watch, the Golden State has become a playground for illegal exploitation while he spends fifty million taxpayer dollars fighting the federal government instead of protecting vulnerable children.

Jack Callahan knows what real Americans are thinking as they watch this spectacle unfold. While the governor tweets about “kids running from tear gas,” he ignores the fact that these same kids were being exploited as cheap labor in his marijuana wonderland. The man who calls himself a progressive champion is defending a system that turns children into field hands.

The Oily Eel is giving the Sapphic Sphinx up north a run for her money as America’s worst governor, but at least she has the decency to keep her failures closer to home. Newsom broadcasts his moral bankruptcy to the world while spending taxpayer money on legal battles against the work of law enforcement.

Jack finished his trout dinner as the sun set over the Trinity Mountains, thinking about the ten children pulled from the weed fields. Do they not deserve better than Slick’s California, where exploitation masquerades as compassion and child labor hides behind progressive talking points?

Fogged by a lifetime of narcissism, the governor doesn’t recognize what the rest of America sees clearly: a sociopath who values political theater over protecting children.

This article was originally published on The O’Leary Review.

The post Mr. Callahan Has His Say: California’s Governor Defends Child Exploitation, Attacks Law Enforcement appeared first on LewRockwell.

Like a trailer park after a line of tornadoes, the landscape is littered with debris from awful presidencies. But few opportunities have been as wasted as the one Donald Trump is squandering. This shouldn’t be surprising.

Six months ago he re-entered office, bearing specific promises and broad support. The hope was that he’d learned lessons about the nature of the presidency, and about political enemies who use nefarious means to preserve their power.

What we’ve learned (again) is that Donald Trump isn’t capable of learning anything, and that many Americans aren’t either. Love him or loathe him, most insist on seeing Trump for what he isn’t.

In the minds of many, this shallow showman is either an unrivaled villain or unerring saint. Instead, he’s a fairly standard politician with boisterous style and overbearing flair.

The PT Barnum of the last half century, Trump is among the great marketers and most brash self-promoters this country has seen. Fortunately for him, plenty of suckers are born every minute. But not enough for what he tried this week.

“Someone Got to Her”

Doug Casey often quips that the economic collapse he foresees will be even worse than he thinks it will be. After watching Trump’s attempt to stifle the Epstein story, I can say the same about my expectation of government corruption.

The FBI that identified every 55 year-old grandma who was invited into the Capitol can’t find one elite client of a powerful pedophile ring.

Worse, after assuring us it had ample evidence they were primed to reveal, the “Justice” Department now disavows any knowledge of Jeffery Epstein’s Intelligence connections, insists there’s no reason to think he was murdered, and denies his child-rape racket even existed.

The latest from Attorney General Pam Bondi – who in February said she had a list of Epstein clients sitting on her desk – is that Epstein was a lone pervert who wallowed in kiddie porn… which may make Ghislaine Maxwell wonder why she’s sitting in jail.

Tom Woods recalled an interview Bondi did with Jesse Watters. Regarding the Epstein case, she asserted:

“What you’re going to see, hopefully tomorrow, is a lot of flight logs, a lot of names, a lot of information. But, um, it’s pretty sick what that man did.”

Waters adds, “And he had help.” Bondi answers, “He sure did.”

As Woods rightly wonders, “So what happened to all that? Where are the flight logs and the names?”

In another interview, Bondi said the FBI had a “truckload of evidence”. She reiterated that “we believe in transparency and America has the right to know.”

Until, suddenly, they don’t.

In the movie, All The President’s Men, Carl Bernstein (played by Dustin Hoffman) is stunned that a librarian he called about CIA agent Howard Hunt checking out books completely reversed her story after she placed him on hold.

“Someone got to her”, he told Robert Redford’s Bob Woodward. Since Bondi’s confident assertions a couple months ago, that appears to have happened to the Attorney General.

Someone seems to have gotten to the president too.

Trump’s latest spin is that released files could “destroy [innocent] people”. Of course they could… if the release is done carelessly. Even if done right, it’ll bring a wave of defamation suits. But this is why the information should be vetted and verified before its unveiled.

Yet this isn’t news. It’s always been the case. Was Trump previously unaware of possible retribution, or that powerful pedophiles might disapprove being publicized? Destroying them is the whole point!

Why didn’t these scruples prevent the Administration from trumpeting its earlier assurances that it possessed flight logs and client lists, and promising to publicize them because “the American people have a right to know”?

What changed between Bondi saying the lists were on her desk and pledging to release them, to now assuring us no lists exist and acting as if only kooks would assume they did?

Lame and Pathetic

No one with an IQ above room temperature (Celsius) buys what the Administration is selling. And the people peddling it must know it elicits eye-rolls and anger. But they obviously don’t care, which is also illuminating.

How disgusting must the details be, and how serious the threats against anyone who’d expose them, for high-ranking members of the Administration to willingly crater their credibility and ravage their reputations?

Were the ridiculous stories they put out this week less to convince us that they were true than to inform the people they’re protecting that their secrets are safe with the US government? Possibly.

It’s also possible they decided this information couldn’t be revealed once they saw how bad it was. That wouldn’t be surprising.

Maybe the Administration determined, as Scott Adams surmised, that the information could jeopardize “national security” (never-mind the disturbing implications of that) or that the American people couldn’t handle the truth.

Perhaps. But then they shouldn’t have boldly promised what they weren’t prepared to deliver, while repeatedly claiming they’d seen the evidence they now say wasn’t there.

A few days ago, the president embarrassed himself by chastising a reporter who dared ask about disclosures Trump’s own team previously promised. It was a reasonable question (indeed, an obligatory one) to ask on the first opportunity since Trump’s team told us there was nothing to reveal. Aside from being lame and pathetic, Trump’s dismissive response contradicted accusatory comments he’d frequently made.

Good Guesses

During his question, the reporter asked about Epstein’s Intelligence connections. But he understated the case. He said that Trump’s former Labor Secretary, Alex Acosta, who was the US Attorney in Miami who cut Epstein a plea in 2008, “allegedly” claimed Epstein worked for Intelligence agencies.

But this isn’t “alleged”.

Acosta stated in Court documents that the CIA approached Acosta and told him to back off Epstein because of his connections. Pam Bondi was a Florida prosecutor at the time and elected to Florida AG soon after so… despite her feigned ignorance this week… it’s unlikely she didn’t know this.

The question isn’t whether this one-time math teacher – who became an exclusive “hedge-fund manager” who turned down $500M accounts while living in the largest residence in Manhattan – worked with Intelligence agencies. It’s how many and which ones.

The CIA is a good guess. But Mossad is a better one. It was likely both, and maybe more.

Among Epstein’s mentors was media mogul Robert Maxwell, who had known connections to Mossad (among other intel agencies), and whose daughter now sits in prison for crimes apparently no one committed.

To borrow another famous quote from All the President’s Men, we should “follow the money”. Epstein invested in Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak’s defense intelligence start-up, and was funded by Zionist billionaire Les Wexner… who also has Mossad links.

Coincidentally, as Trump’s Epstein about-face was underway, the current Prime Minister of Israel paid his third visit to Washington since the president took office. For a tiny country halfway around the world, that seems like a lot.

During that time, at the behest of “our greatest ally”, the US has unleashed repeated attacks on Yemen, launched a reckless strikes on Iran, and keeps funding ethnic cleansing of Palestinians in Gaza. Aside from a few crony corporations and connected insiders, none of this benefits a single American.

So why does it happen? Do campaign contributions explain it? Or was there something more insidious, including “systematic blackmail” (which the Trump Administration also denies) of Epstein patrons who apparently never existed?

Maybe the “Justice” Department isn’t orchestrating a cover-up at at the behest of the Intelligence apparatus in the U.S. and Israel.

But if it were, it could hardly look any different.

This article was originally published on Premium Insights.

The post Nothing To See appeared first on LewRockwell.

Matt Smith: All right. Good morning, Doug. Lots happening these days. I’d love to get your take on—I think starting with the Epstein case. Case closed, apparently. What do you think? What’s going on?

Doug Casey: Well, where to start on this thing? It’s so ultra disappointing, so embarrassing, and so serious that it’s hard to figure out where to begin. But it’s been obvious to me, from watching these things, that this could only end very, very badly. And it’s shameful the way Bongino and Patel—who made a point of saying how honest they were and how they were going to reform things—have just backed off and said there’s nothing there.

And then this woman—Bondi. That was equally inexplicable. She says she’s got all this stuff on her desk, ready to go, and it turns out she doesn’t have it after all. There’s clearly corruption here. It’s very bad.

And it occurred to me how similar this might be to the famous Dreyfus case in France, around the turn of the 20th century. I became, to use a French phrase, a cause célèbre, and overturned the government. This has got the potential to do the same thing.

Matt Smith: One of the things I was thinking about with the whole thing is: what does it take to make these people, who have impeached themselves publicly recently by making claims about evidence that existed—and who have been champions for this cause, for transparency around this for so long—but again, some of these people have now publicly impeached themselves, like Pam Bondi and others, to make this kind of U-turn?

It is such a drastic U-turn, it implies something really scary to me. Because I don’t think you do this for self-gain. I don’t think you can be bribed into destroying yourself like this. I think fear is the only thing that could possibly motivate someone to do this.

So there is something they’ve been exposed to that is so scary to them that they are willing to destroy their whole sense of identity—their reputation—over it. Fear is the only thing I can even imagine that would do it. And it’s got to be fear that probably most of us have never experienced.

I try to put myself in that role, and I think maybe the fear of watching my children be brutalized in front of me might make me do this. But other than that, I just can’t imagine it. I really can’t imagine. So I think the implications are actually pretty frightening.

Doug Casey: Yeah. I don’t see how Bongino in particular can live with himself. It’s like overturning his whole persona. Everybody knows these people are lying. The question is: why are they lying?

Fear, of course—I think you’re right. Because no amount of money would do it. These guys have plenty of money. Bongino and Patel can’t be doing it to maintain their crappy government jobs. They don’t need that. They don’t need money.

By doing this and discrediting themselves, Patel and Bongino are going to be marked men for the rest of their lives. Public frauds.

What’s going on? What are the secrets that somebody is trying to hide? Could it be that Trump himself is implicated with what Epstein was doing? Or are there so many high government officials and billionaires that are so heavily involved in really disgusting things that it would overturn all credibility in the US government and the US power structure?

This is a big deal.

Matt Smith: Yeah, I think it’s a really big deal. And I think it shows what we’re really dealing with here. Because I don’t know what exactly would be revealed by revealing all the Epstein stuff, but the motivation of the people who are willing to destroy themselves in order to cover it up implies something insidious, something dangerous, something scary—probably something beyond our comprehension.

Doug Casey: It must be that. And haven’t these people thought this out a little bit? It’s really simple. Patel and Bongino—I don’t know anything about Bondi—but if you double back like this, it’s obvious that you’re being intimidated or lying. What did they think was going to happen?

So it must be that they’re being threatened on a really serious level. That’s the only thing I can figure.

Matt Smith: That’s the only thing I can figure too.

So, the other thing—I have basically just a whole list of random news items. I think maybe they’re connected, maybe they’re not connected, but I think they’re interesting. I want you to comment on them.

The second one is that the US Army Corps of Engineers is active today in essentially rebuilding a whole bunch of Israeli defense structures.

You know, it’s not just that we’re sending weapons. It’s that that we’re actively involved. The US Army Corps of Engineers is actually rebuilding infrastructure to accommodate the Israeli Air Force’s new refueling aircraft and helicopters, as well as constructing new headquarters for their 13th Naval Commando Unit, and numerous other projects. This is costing billions of shekels, and it’s all according to official documents from the US Army Corps of Engineers published online.

Doug Casey: Well, perhaps this relates in some way to the Epstein scandal. Why is Israel, in effect, being turned into the 51st state—and treated even better than a state? The money that’s being directed there—couldn’t the Army Corps of Engineers be helpful to the Carolinas or Texas instead?

Israel is getting a lot more attention than actual states in the US. This is frankly criminal. Look, I’ve never been anti-Israel per se. It’s just another nation-state. I understand why the Jews started it, and all that. I get it, and I’ve always been sympathetic, especially since I’m not sympathetic to the Muslim world. But this? What’s the matter with Trump? He looks like he’s under Netanyahu’s thumb.

Maybe it ties into the whole Epstein thing. Because apologists for Israel—like Mark Levin and Ben Shapiro—are rabid. They’re frothing and drooling at the mouth when anything is said that might possibly be counter to Israel’s interests. Wait a minute—who are they working for? What’s going on here?

Matt Smith: And in addition to that, we have Trump’s announcement that we’ll be sending more weapons to Ukraine.

Doug Casey: Yeah. Got to continue the war. A pointless war. It should be completely obvious to everybody that Russia is going to win.

Instead of ending the war Trump is making it much worse. Everyone has forgotten the reason they invaded is because they were provoked.

Trump is continuing the war at great expense. Young men are getting killed and maimed pointlessly. It’s crazy. You can’t justify it. You can’t rationalize it. Just like you can’t rationalize attacking Iran—a country on the other side of the world that’s never done anything to the US—just because it helps the Israelis. This isn’t our problem, but we’ve made it a much bigger one by getting involved.

There are lots of other problems in Trump world. Like the fact that there have been no indictments handed down, and there should have been by now. There have apparently been no investigations on anything, although I’ve heard they’re supposed to be starting something on Comey.

It looks like DOGE is dead or dying. Musk has quit in disgust. That was supposed to be the centerpiece of the Trump regime.

Matt Smith: Well, maybe it goes back to our first point: that there’s something out there scaring the hell out of enough people that they’re willing to do things that shock us all, perhaps.

And incidentally, my friend from Ukraine—she lives in Kyiv—told me that a lot of the recent Russian attacks there have targeted recruitment centers. These are the conscription centers, and apparently, there was a lot of praise among some people in Kyiv over that. But some officials came out and denounced it as treasonous to be happy about the destruction of those recruitment facilities.

Just a side note, but it shows what happens to a country in a state of war. It becomes a very dangerous place to live.

Doug Casey: Yes. The rumors have been floating around for some time that it’s not just recruitment—they’re actually sending out press gangs to round up anyone who looks like good cannon fodder on the front lines.

And with the nature of warfare now, “cannon fodder” is the right term. With drones advancing in technology almost weekly, if you’re a soldier on the front lines you’re dead meat.

Matt Smith: Yeah, it’s awful.

The next thing that stood out to me—among everything else that’s happening—was this big press announcement today by the former governor of South Dakota Kristi Noem. And this is great news: apparently now, in TSA it’s no longer necessary to take off your shoes.

Doug Casey: That’s good. It means flying won’t be quite as degrading. But I suppose you’re still going to have to take off your belt and everything else.

Matt Smith: Yeah, and still go through screening. And if some alarm goes off, or you’re randomly selected, you still get the pat-down by some agent of the state. So yeah—it’s still not good. But this is what’s being trumpeted as progress, I guess, for the American people.

The other thing that seems totally unrelated—but I think it’s noteworthy—is that over the weekend, there was this incredible anti-gringo sentiment. Really, riots or protests in Mexico City. And I don’t know if these things are organized—it seems like most of these big groups are organized by someone, you know, Soros types to sow discontent—but it just shows that the world is becoming a lot less friendly and a lot more risky across the board.

And I don’t know if you saw any of those signs, but they were saying things like “Kill a gringo,” “Gringo go home,” all that kind of stuff. Pretty nasty environment.

Doug Casey: Apparently this was all in Mexico City. I’ve been to Mexico City a couple of times in recent years, and it never struck me that there were a lot of gringos there. If you want to find gringos in Mexico, you go to San Miguel de Allende—full of gringos—or better yet, down to Cabo, which is absolutely full of them. No protests there. Why in Mexico City, of all places? Who could care enough about a few gringos running around in a city of 15 million? It doesn’t make any sense.

Matt Smith: Yeah, it doesn’t. But I think it’s just another sign—like, I don’t think these big movements are organic. Just like BLM wasn’t organic. Just like Antifa seems inorganic. It seems to me there’s another effort to divide people, to create conflict.

And this is one that—at least for Americans living abroad—you have to be aware of. You have to be aware of it. You’d think, of all people, Mexicans could see the comedic irony in “Gringos go home” when the US is full of tens of millions of Mexicans.

Doug Casey: I know. Don’t these people have any self-awareness at all? Which, of course, leads me to believe that there’s some group that’s trying to create chaos. And I think you were getting into this. The fact that foreigners, Canadians and certainly Europeans, really don’t want to come to the US anymore.

It feels like an unfriendly place. Your electronic devices might be searched, you could be forced to unlock them and show what’s there. And if they don’t like it, maybe they’ll do something to you. Maybe they’ll throw you in a prison for a few days while they sort your papers out.

This has happened to several Canadians already, which seems really out of line. Everything considered, if I were a foreigner, I wouldn’t want to come back to the US.

In fact, as an American, I’m not sure I want to go back to the US. The summer’s still young, and things could still get wild and woolly.

Matt Smith: Yeah, I’m not going. And with the new requirement—if you’re applying for a particular type of visa, I think it’s just a visitor or educational visa—you now have to unlock all your social media accounts.

And in the statement, as I understand it, it didn’t just say list all your social media accounts—it said unlock them. Which makes me think that Palantir is already hard at work and has probably identified you and all your accounts, and they just want to make sure it’s all visible. And if you don’t fully disclose, they can drop you into a Kafka-esque nightmare, where they accuse you of not disclosing everything, and now you’re really in trouble.

And there’s this other thing going on—this hasn’t gotten national news, and I don’t know why, because it’s a huge deal—there are coordinated attacks on ICE agents by armed, masked, body-armored, well-armed, apparently leftist groups that are unhappy with the deportation agenda.

You can just see this escalating in wild ways as it continues. And the budget for ICE grew 800% in the “Big Beautiful Bill.” It’s now something like nearly $75 billion—up from around $8 billion.

Doug Casey: That’s a gigantic increase in budget. And even that is dwarfed by the $200 billion increase in the military budget. Further proof that the “Big Beautiful Bill” is just a tax-and-spend bill. That’s really what it is—and it’s not in any way improving the freedoms of the average American.

I wonder if Michael Yon could be right when he says that many thousands of the illegal migrants are actually surreptitious military agents who can be activated at the right time. It’d be shocking to imagine there wouldn’t be some of them in there. If you run an intel agency somewhere and you see an opportunity—“Hey, now’s our chance to slip some in”—you’d almost be abdicating your duty not to do it.

Matt Smith: If, for instance, I were running a foreign intel agency and I wanted to create chaos in the US, I might tell some of my guys already here to track down ICE agents—not hard to find—and assassinate them. At that point, the US government would have to strike back. And since they don’t know who did it for sure, it becomes a dragnet and a lockdown for everyone. That’s a good way to do it.

Doug Casey: Yes, agreed.

Matt Smith: Another thing, for years there’ve been these citizenship-by-investment programs. And I think you were really the instigator of a lot of that thinking. These programs let you essentially buy a passport as a backup option.

But now they’re under a lot of scrutiny. These passports are potentially losing their ability to travel visa-free to the EU and the US. They’re considering proposals like mandatory 30-day residency requirements and other changes to try to assuage the concerns of larger state blocs.

I think these programs are dead. I don’t think they’ll work anymore—if they ever really did. They just won’t work now.

Doug Casey: Yeah. I think the idea of, in effect, renting a citizenship so you can travel—is flawed. Every passport says right on it that it’s the property of the issuing government. It’s not actually yours. It can be taken away at any time.

These rental-country options were okay when there were only a few and it wasn’t a big deal. But now it is a big deal. There are a lot of them out there. And you’ve got to admit, many of these microstates, like all those tiny Caribbean countries… why are they recognized as real governments? Like, come on. They have the same votes in the UN General Assembly as the US or China or the EU? And I speak as someone who doesn’t believe in nation states.

Not that the UN serves any useful purpose. In fact, it’s a negative influence and should have been disbanded years ago—just like NATO.

Travel documents that you buy issued by these countries—they’re going away. I still think everyone ought to have a second or third passport or citizenship, but getting one from these little Caribbean microstates? That’s on its way out. You’re probably just wasting your money.

Matt Smith: Maybe with a country like Turkey, where they still have a program—it’s more expensive, but at least it’s a bigger state with some real heft. They can’t be bullied around the way a place like St. Kitts can.

Doug Casey: That’s right. Turkey is a real country. You’re right—they can’t be pushed around.

Matt Smith: So maybe that’s still a valid option. But if nothing else, getting a legitimate residency outside your home country—I think the imperative is growing. And if you don’t have one, I’d do some work to get it. Some of them are easy to get. Mexico, for example.

Although, I’m personally a little concerned about the spreading anti-gringo sentiment there.

Doug Casey: The US government is a problem everywhere.

I noticed you’re not at your usual station for our calls. So—where are you today?

Matt Smith: I’m in Brazil today. I’m in São Paulo. Just wanted a little warmer weather, a bigger city environment, better shopping. I can get my full blood panel done here—which I like to do regularly for preventative health—for about $150. It costs me over $2,000 to do the same thing in the US. And it’s easier to do here than in Uruguay.

It’s cheap, too—very affordable for that kind of stuff. And the cuisine in Brazil is different from the Spanish-speaking countries, which is a nice change as well. We had Peruvian last night and Thai for lunch yesterday. I mean, I love Uruguay—it has many redeeming qualities. A broad palate is not one of them. You know, they like certain things, and you don’t get much that survives beyond that very well. So that’s also kind of a—well, it’s a good opportunity. Not that it matters that much, but it’s nice to have when you can get it.

The other thing—this relates to the economy. I listened to you talk on another podcast about the economy and the state of things, and what could happen from here. One thing of note—it’s not hugely substantial—but the M2 money supply, which just means the money supply continues to be printed, although there are lots of ways to measure the money supply.

And, you know, these are US numbers, and you can’t trust any government numbers. But officially, the money supply continues to grow—19 months in a row now—still expanding. That means there’s still inflation. According to the official numbers, it’s expanding at 4.5% year-over-year, which isn’t terrible, but still, we grew the money supply by 30% during COVID. So yes, this is better—but I think it’s a sign that inflation is the only way they think they’re getting out of this game, economically.

One of the things they asked you was: Is there any way out? Is there any way out of the economic troubles the US faces? And I’d just like to ask you the same question.

Doug Casey: Well, if I were the president of the US—in other words, if I were Trump—what would I do to stop the country’s decline?

It would take radical action to reduce the size of the government. Trump is not doing that. The action he should take would be devastating to large parts of the economy—the parasitic parts.

Is it possible to pay off the national debt without destroying the value of the currency? Yes, but I think they want to pay it off with pocket change by making the dollar worthless. I think that would be the worst alternative. But it’s the one we’re following.

Matt Smith: Yeah. That seems to be the path.

Doug Casey: Listen, I’ve said in the past that I’d consider something as radical as defaulting on the national debt. And people say, “Well, how can you do that? The banks would fail. Insurance companies own a lot of bonds. It would be a daisy chain of problems. People couldn’t get their money out of the banks because the banks wouldn’t be there,” and so on.

Well, I suppose. But I always like to look at the bright side, as you know. And the bright side is, if you defaulted on the national debt your children and grandchildren can avoid becoming indentured servants to pay it off.

Default on the national debt—and yes, I know it sounds outrageous, ridiculous, un-American, all those things—is going to happen one way or the other. But if you defaulted on it, all the real wealth in the world would still exist. The factories, the farms, the businesses, the technologies—they’re not going to vanish just because the creditors are stiffed. Governments do it all the time because they’re essentially criminal enterprises. And it would punish the cronies who’ve been enabling the State, with its wars and gifts to the political class.

The currency at that point would shift to a commodity like gold, maybe supplemented by Bitcoin. All the real wealth would still be there. It would be a boon for the average guy..

Matt Smith: It would mostly punish—well, isn’t most of the debt now not even owned by foreigners? Maybe it’s 50/50? About half foreign-owned, half American entities—banks, insurance companies, pension funds?

Doug Casey: I think the breakdown is overwhelmingly domestic, not foreign.

The people who own US government debt have, in effect, been financing the terrible things the US government has been doing. They’re codependent with it.

One of the reasons to default on the debt: it would punish the groups that have enabled all the terrible things the US government has done. So yeah, we’d be freeing up the next generations. We’d be punishing the people who have been financing the US government.

It would also enable taxes to be radically decreased, because at the same time you’d have to abolish lots of government agencies.

As outrageous as it sounds, if you defaulted on the debt honestly— insofar as any default can be “honest”—as opposed to gradually and dishonestly through currency debasement, it’s the better option. I once had a collection of worthless currencies and defaulted government bonds. They make interesting decorations.

So that’s my solution. But this is all just academic speculation. They’re not going to default on it overtly.

Matt Smith: Yeah, I think the argument against defaulting honestly is that it would really hurt a lot of Americans too—pension funds, retirement accounts, insurance companies, and so on.

And so the argument for doing it dishonestly is that you avoid the pain for people here and now—by putting the burden on future generations.

But that’s a lie, because the truth is the standard of living has been destroyed in America. The middle class is shrinking dramatically. People are suffering. And the amount of inflation they need at this stage is way higher than this four and a half percent.

And we’re going to get much higher inflation than this in order to get out of it. I mean, my best guess is you’d have to devalue the dollar—effectively, compared to something like gold—by about 90% from here, just to have any chance of inflating your way out.

And in that case, everyone in the here and now gets destroyed anyway—including the retirees, the people with pensions, insurance companies, and everything else. Isn’t that true?

Doug Casey: Yes, it is. But worse things have happened.

Look at what happened to Germany during World War 2. Look at what happened to Japan during World War 2. Their real wealth was actually destroyed—obliterated and burned down. That wouldn’t be the case in the US.

It’s hard to do this gradually, on a gradient. This is a mistake I think Milei has made in Argentina. He should have defaulted on the Argentine national debt, because it’s not nearly as central to the standard of living of the average Argentine as the US national debt is to Americans and the world at large.

He should have done that. He didn’t. Now he’s stuck with an albatross around his neck. But I don’t want to nitpick with Milei, because he’s made tremendous improvements. Still, that would have been my suggestion.

Is there any way out of this thing gradually? Well, I guess it’s possible—but you’d have to radically cut back US government spending and abolish a lot of agencies. That would allow you to cut taxes, which would generate more money to pay off the debt. But like I said, I’m against paying off that debt at this point.

Matt Smith: And you’d have to radically increase the growth rate of the US, too, at the same time.

Doug Casey: Right. Well, you would—by getting rid of regulations and by eliminating the debt service. Of course, the economy would grow and expand.

But at this point, it’s funny—foreigners are still investing in the US, as risky as it is. That’s because it’s the best place they can think of. Other places have even more problems than the US. Europe, for example, is a genuinely sinking ship. I still think the European Union is going to break up—catastrophically.

I wouldn’t put a nickel into Europe right now as a long-term investment.

Matt Smith: I can’t recall the exact statistics, but there’s some measure of the amount of assets owned by foreigners in the US, and that number has been going down substantially over the last few months. They’ve been pulling capital out of the US—maybe out of concerns about what Trump might do, or other things.

So they are finding other places to put it. Maybe it’s in gold. Maybe it’s in their local markets. I don’t know.

I mean, European stocks have gone up recently. So it seems like that shift is happening. The US is no longer the go-to destination for travel, for investing your money. Those things are degrading over time, aren’t they?

Doug Casey: Yes. And it’s no longer the beacon of freedom that it once was. People are very suspicious of it now. Foreign governments and institutions don’t want to hold the hot potato of US government debt denominated in dollars.

On top of that, citizens don’t want to keep their capital in their own countries either, where they’re subject to the depredations of their governments.

So, if you’re a productive person or a productive company—where do you go in the world?

I think the options are becoming more and more limited.

Matt Smith: Yeah. I don’t know where they’re putting that capital, but the foreign outflows are definitely happening.

We’ve been putting it in gold. And gold, as we speak, is around $3,350 per ounce—very close to its all-time high. But as you’ve pointed out, if the dollar were to be redeemable at a fixed rate with gold, it would need to be priced at $20,000, $30,000, $40,000, even $50,000 an ounce.

Who knows what the number is?

Doug Casey: Wouldn’t you say that in order for us to inflate our way out of the debt, whether or not we eventually fix the dollar to gold, we’ll end up in the same place?

Matt Smith: Exactly. If we were to inflate our way out of the debt, that would necessarily mean gold would have to rise compared to the dollar—to that kind of level.

Doug Casey: I think so.

Even though gold is reasonably priced right now relative to everything else—you’re right. The one thing I think is certain is that the average guy—the people in the lower classes, the middle class, even part of the upper middle class—they’re the ones who are going to be hurt.

It’s not the guys really at the top who are going to get hurt. They have the political connections. They get the money first. They’re wired in. They’re going to do fine. As the dollar is inflated out of existence, it’s going to hurt the average American. There’s no way around it.

Which is why default would be better. It would cause real losses. It would cause some bank failures, and who knows what the knock-on effects would be—but the piper must be paid at some point.

Matt Smith: And another bright side of defaulting on the debt is that people would say, “God, I’ve got to cut back on living on credit. I’ve got to cut back on consumption. I’ve got to start producing things and building assets.” That’s what causes a boom—when people say, “Enough of this lying around. I’ve got to start doing something.”

Doug Casey: I’m all for that. But it’s unlikely to happen that way, because of the way the government is going—but that’s what should happen. It would be better after, admittedly, a period of chaos. The markets have to be cleansed of ingrained distortions.

Matt Smith: What do you think of Trump’s tariff ideas? He said something yesterday about putting a huge tariff on copper. Did you hear that?

Doug Casey: Yes, and copper went up about 10% or 15% overnight. I haven’t checked the copper stocks I own to see if they’ve responded yet. The problem is that Trump is acting like a schizophrenic. He’s completely unpredictable. Many of the things he does are just totally irrational—almost psychotic.

It makes it impossible for businessmen to plan. He can change things overnight—this or that—and your whole plan goes out the window.

Matt Smith: Yeah, it’s impossible. The guy’s turning into a disaster, I’m afraid. It’s not just that he’s an egomaniac. It’s not just that he can never admit he made a mistake. He’s turning into a megalomaniac.

Doug Casey: I’m a bit afraid of the guy—and I say that as someone who was glad he won instead of Kamala.

Matt Smith: Yeah. My gladness in that regard is definitely fading, because now we’re looking at what Trump did versus our fears of what Kamala might have done. She’s inept—maybe she wouldn’t have done much at all. I don’t know.

Still, if I voted—which I don’t—I probably still would have voted for Trump. But at this point, we’re comparing fears of Kamala with the actual realities of what Trump is doing, and it’s not great.

He talks about wanting to bring back manufacturing to the US, especially under this BBB bill—not “Build Back Better” but “Big Beautiful Bill.” They’re both triple-Bs, ironically.

Doug Casey: Funny coincidence.

Matt Smith: Yeah. The bill is mostly focused on military-related things. But it becomes impossible to plan any kind of new manufacturing when the price of copper might go up 500%. How does that work?

You can’t rebuild America if you can’t even build a cost structure to plan around.

Doug Casey: Of course, Trump would say, “Well, we can mine copper in the US.”

Yes, we can—if we can find a big enough copper deposit, then raise billions to develop it, and understand that it’ll take 10 years before cash flow starts—if it ever starts.

Matt Smith: Well, I heard our buddy Frank Giustra is looking for great projects in the US to help support this. Frank is smart, and it’s good that he’s focused on it.

But even then, it takes a long time to turn anything around.

Doug Casey: Exactly. And who wants to make a multi-billion dollar investment when chaos could overturn everything tomorrow morning?

One of the key components to real progress is the rule of law—stability. Without stability, you can’t plan or build anything meaningful.

Matt Smith: Yeah, I agree entirely.

It’s a wild time. And when you look at all these seemingly unrelated factors together—what’s your overall impression?

Doug Casey: We’re in for tough times. I really think so.

I still believe there’s a possibility of a genuine civil war in the US—not like the “unpleasantness” from 1861 to 1865. It’s not going to look like that. It’s going to be more like an informal guerrilla war.

Matt Smith: And we might be seeing early signs of that already, with these targeted attacks on ICE agents.

Doug Casey: Entirely possible. Like I said, if I were a malefactor running a foreign intelligence agency—one of the many countries that don’t like the US and want to weaken it—that’s exactly the path I’d take.

Matt Smith: Yeah, I agree.

Okay—so with that, just a reminder: we have our Plan B Uruguay conference coming up in October. If you don’t have your residency yet, or you don’t have a backup plan in case things go south—like certain historical periods we’ve referenced in the past—you might want to check out that conference.

You can learn more at crisisinvesting.com. There’s a link at the top called “Plan B Uruguay”—check it out and see if it’s right for you and your family.

Doug Casey: And I’ll add—since the seasons are opposite here in the southern hemisphere—when it’s cold and snowy in the US, you can escape to South America, where it’s warm and balmy.

Matt Smith: That’s right. October is actually a very pleasant month in Uruguay. A great time to be there.

Doug Casey: Absolutely.

Matt Smith: All right, we’ll leave it there for today, Doug.

Reprinted with permission from International Man.

The post Fear, Corruption, and the Coming Collapse of the American System appeared first on LewRockwell.

If one thinks that arming Ukraine against Russia or having Israeli soldiers and also American contractors slaughter Gazan civilians are not supportive of any United States actual interests, last week could easily be written off as yet another descent into Hell on the part of the United States. Americans and others should have the right to criticize how the Israelis wage war without being denounced and criminalized by governments that have been corrupted from the inside, most often by money, but that is exactly what is going on in the US and in select countries in Europe. Watching children being targeted for killing and complaining about it does not make one an anti-Semite even though the Israeli government exploits that issue precisely as a tool to avoid any consequences for its horrific behavior. Here in America, it’s past time for the White House and Congress to rid themselves of their obscene and unseemly obsession with judging overseas developments using the optics of Israel loyalty tests. There is a appreciable difference between hating Israel reflexively based on its religion and acting like a member of a cheering gallery on steroids every time Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu comes to town.

There were three major developments during the week. The first was the passage through Congress and the signing by President Donald Trump of the “big, beautiful budget bill” which establishes by law the national government’s spending projections for 2026. The fiscal year begins on October 1st. The government has long exploited alleged foreign threats to national security to boost spending to enhance America’s military power. This tendency has been largely unchallenged since 9/11, when President George W Bush announced that he and the US now represented “a new sheriff in town” and would be waging war against terrorists worldwide. In 2025 Pentagon costs were budgeted at the $895 billion level. Now, however, President Donald Trump has topped even that with his bill, adding $150 billion to the military budget for 2026, which will exceed in theory for the first time more than $1 trillion.

Interestingly, however, the reality is that the US has for some time exceeded $1 trillion due to the way the government handles its war costs through unfunded material transfers and extra expenses that are approved outside the budget process itself, combined with the fact that the Pentagon’s several components and poor money management make it impossible to be successfully audited. Based on the $895 billion National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), US national security spending for 2025 is, for example, expected to actually reach about $1.77 trillion. The difference partly derives from military-related spending from other government agencies not funded by the NDAA, such as the Department of Veterans Affairs and Homeland Security as well as from the national security share of the interest accrued on the US debt.

In September 2024 the Government Accounting Office reported that the Defense Department “remains the only major federal agency that has never been able to achieve a clean audit opinion.” And the numbers are astonishing. In fiscal year 2024, which ran from October 1st, 2023 to September 30th, 2024, the Pentagon could not account for at least 44% of its assets, nor for at least 68% of the money allocated by Congress.

The biggest addition to actual defense spending is the wars in Ukraine and Gaza, with a new front recently opened in Iran, that the US is supporting off-budget, meaning that they are being paid for “out of pocket” and the money is printed up by the Federal Reserve and is added to the government debt, where it increases through the accumulation of interest to bill and bond holders. The Federal debt is now $37 trillion and Trump’s bill is expected to add at least $3 trillion more to it. Foreign nations that have invested in the debt by buying Treasury Bills might soon figure out that it is a bad investment and will stop doing so and the dollar will plummet.

And then there is the visit to Washington, the third by Benjamin Netanyahu since Trump became president six months ago, which was memorable in its own way. Netanyahu was in America again due to the fact that he wanted something. The larger issue is to get US direct support to renew an attack on Iran and the second objective being to speed up the resupply of weapons as Israel had de facto lost the conflict with the Iranians having run through its defensive weapons. What arrangements have been made vis-à-vis Iran have not yet been completely revealed, but it has been reported that multiple transport plane loads have been making their way filled with weapons drawn from US reserve stocks that are on their way to Tel Aviv as a gift from the US to Israel. And then there was the comedy routine provided by Netanyahu proposing Trump as recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize, possibly the first time when a head of a state that is openly carrying out a genocide plus mass deportations and is about to create concentration camps endorses the country leader who enables the mass murder taking place. While in Washington Netanyahu also carried out the usual sucking up to Congress and vice versa as well as the closed-door meeting with the Jewish billionaires that have so effectively corrupted the US government.

The third performance of comic opera took place over Ukraine. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth apparently halted the shipment of new weapons to Kiev as a means of disengaging from the conflict with Russia. While it is clear that the US has no interest to be fighting a proxy war with Moscow, Trump had proven unable to end the fighting on his first day in office, which he had promised pre-election. To everyone’s actual surprise, Trump did not appear to know about the decision and reversed it, exhibiting some actual confusion during a press conference over what had happened. It was reminiscent of last week’s bizarre development over the disappearance of Israeli spy Jeffrey Epstein’s “client list” possibly to avoid embarrassing Israel and also, it has been suggested, to eliminate any speculation regarding Donald Trump’s relationship with Epstein in Florida back prior to 2019. It might be reasonable to assume that the whole episode amounts to one more big lie and cover-up coming out of the clownish ensemble that constitutes the Trump cabinet.

Finally, there is one other story that I consider a pure product of the ignorance and downright stupidity that characterizes the Trump regime. The United Nations Human Rights Council has what they refer to as a Special Rapporteur and investigator over developments in Israel and Palestine, to include the Israeli occupied territories on the West Bank. Francesca Albanese, an Italian, is an experienced bureaucrat of demonstrated integrity who has focused on human rights issues. She has been under intense pressure from both the United States and Israel to forego on reporting Israel’s atrocities, particularly in Gaza, but those who have actually interacted with her claim that she has recorded developments honestly and accurately. This past week, coinciding with the Netanyahu visit, Washington decided to move against her with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio announcing sanctions against her.

This is how Rubio described the case to be made to justify the sanctions: “Today I am imposing sanctions on UN Human Rights Council Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese for her illegitimate and shameful efforts to prompt [International Criminal Court] action against US and Israeli officials, companies, and executives… Albanese’s campaign of political and economic warfare against the United States and Israel will no longer be tolerated. We will always stand by our partners in their right to self-defense.”

One begins to wonder if Rubio is as totally ignorant and stupid as his boss. The US has previously called on the UN to replace Albanese and a week before the sanctions were issued a warning from Washington suggested that something was coming. “The United States once again expressed its grave concerns to UN Secretary-General António Guterres about the continued activities of Francesca Albanese … and again called upon the Secretary-General to condemn her activities and call for her removal,” the US UN mission said in a statement on July 1. The US has characteristically accused Albanese of “virulent antisemitism” for her criticism of Israel, a smear on Albanese also made by President Joe Biden’s administration after she last year produced a report accusing Israel of genocide. One might observe that in February the US also used the sanctions tool against the justices of the International Criminal Court (and their families) after the court issued arrest warrants for Netanyahu and the Israel’s former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant on charges of genocide.

Wish that were all, but there is one more story about what a fine place “America’s best friend and closest ally” Israel actually is. A twenty-year old Palestinian American from Tampa Florida, Seif al-Din Muslat, was visiting family in the town of Sinjil, north of Ramallah, on Friday. In town, he was confronted and beaten to death by rampaging Israeli settlers. Another Palestinian teen Mohammad Shalabi was shot dead in the same incident. The US Embassy apparently was informed of the killing by the boy’s family but as usual it will take no action and will defer to the so-called Israeli justice system to investigate. That means that the scum Settlers, largely expat Americans from places like Brooklyn, will in no way be punished and will walk free to kill more Palestinian children. There have been an increasing number of instances where Israeli settlers in the West Bank ransack Palestinian neighborhoods and towns, burning homes and vehicles and destroying crops and businesses in attacks. And they feel free to kill any Palestinian who crosses their paths or who tries to intervene. Thank you Prime Minister Netanyahu and President Trump for your loyalty to murderous Jews. It does you proud, or at least it demonstrates what you are made of!

Reprinted with permission from The Unz Review.

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