Dr. Martin Kulldorf Was Fired For Cause From Both Mass General And Harvard

respectfulinsolence  |  So what was (and is) going on? Kulldorff now says he was fired as though the firing happened recently, but two and a half years ago he was already referring to his time as professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School in the past tense. Something odd is going on here but what could it be. One big hint is his profile on the Harvard website, which lists him as being “on leave,” which led me to immediately recognize that trying to figure out when Kulldorff went on leave was a job for the almighty Wayback Machine at Archive.org. There, I found that, as early as December 2021, Kulldorff’s status had already been listed as “on leave.” So where did Wikipedia get the idea that he had only been on leave since 2023? Whatever the case, it’s clear that before his “firing,” Kulldorff had not been working for Mass General Brigham or Harvard since at least November or December 2021, given that the last archive of his webpage showing him not on leave is dated October 20, 2021 and the next one on December 20, 2021 shows his status as “on leave.” This time period aligns very nicely with his move to the Brownstone Institute.

However, it also aligns with the Harvard vaccine mandate for the fall 2021 term. So maybe Harvard did fire him for refusing to be vaccinated and raising all sorts of nonsensical objections, such as his claim that it was against his religion because the vaccine mandate was more religious than science-based? If that was the case, though, then why was he listed as “on leave” on the website, rather than as suspended? Let’s look further.

Here’s yet another hint. If you look at Kulldorff’s Harvard listing, you’ll see that it includes his research support, specifically his grant support. This listing indicates that he has not had NIH grant support since 2019. To understand why this is important, you need to know that lots of universities, but in particular Harvard Medical School-associated positions, require faculty to maintain grant support sufficient to cover a specific percentage of their salary. This percentage can range from a relatively modest 30-50% to a rather draconian 100%. (If you have to get grants to cover 100% of your salary, I always wonder, what good is the university?) While it is true that there is some wiggle room in that if you lose grant funding for a while usually the university will support you until you reacquire funding, but the university won’t support you forever. Kulldorff’s leave started a bit more than two years after his NIH R01 grant support expired, which is a fairly reasonable period of time for Harvard to support whatever percentage of Kulldorff’s salary that had been grant-supported, in the hopes that he would reacquire NIH funding.

The overall narrative is that the reason that Kulldorff had to go on leave was because of Harvard’s vaccine mandate for its fall 2021 term, which somewhat fits with the timeline. However, what doesn’t make sense (at least to me, at least) about this potential explanation. Harvard got rid of its vaccine mandate a week ago. Would Harvard decide to fire Kulldorff now, given that it had progressively decreased its requirements for boosters and now has eliminated the COVID-19 vaccine mandate altogether? Possibly. I can’t rule it out entirely. Certainly, that’s what Kulldorff appears to be claiming, that he was fired because he refused to be vaccinated. However, it seems rather excessive that it took over two and a half years. I also believe, based on my experience observing him, that Kulldorff is not to be trusted, which is why I’m skeptical of his explanation.

Here’s my educated guess as to what really happened, and I freely acknowledge that it is nothing more than an educated guess. However, it is a guess that makes sense given the timeline and what we know. My guess is that in late 2021, having failed to garner any new NIH RO1 grants, Kulldorff saw the writing on the wall and decided to go on leave in order to accept Tucker’s offer to become senior scientific director of the new right wing think tank that Tucker was forming, the Brownstone Institute. (It is also possible that Harvard’s imposition of a vaccine mandate for fall 2021 might have played into his considerations.) My further guess is that Brigham has a limit to how long you can be on leave before you lose your position. Here we are, over two years since Kulldorff went on leave, and Kulldorff shows no signs of renewed academic activity that might allow him to score new NIH or other government grant funding. Assuming that Kulldorff was not tenured, which now seems likely, that meant that it was time for him to go.

Of course, I still can’t totally rule out the possibility that he was actually canned because he refused to be vaccinated against COVID-19 and that he was tenured, which somehow allowed him to drag out the process two and a half years. However, it still seems unlikely (to me, at least) that he would have been able to drag out the appeals process that long even as a tenured full professor, particularly given that in the intervening time Harvard has progressively decreased its vaccine mandate until it got rid of it altogether a week ago. Still, it seems rather implausible that it would take two and a half years from his refusal to his being fired, and it seems even less plausible that Harvard would go through with firing Kulldorff after that long given how much the political winds have shifted with respect to mandates and how much heat Harvard would face for doing so, in particular after its president Claudine Gay was forced to resign over her testimony regarding campus free speech plus plagiarism charges.

When The Iron Law Of Oligarchy Pinched Joe Biden's Little Narrow Peasant Ass

ZeroHedge  |  As the MSM turns on President Joe Biden heading into the 2024 election, the Washington Post had an interesting piece on Thursday exploring a little-known connection between the Bidens and the du Pont family, which revolves around a 2001 case in which then-Sen. Joe Biden (D-DE) was voted in as a prominent new member of a prestigious Golf Club in Wilmington, Delaware, founded by a du Pont heiress.

That year, Biden, known for his "Middle-Class Joe" image and modest financial status, joined the exclusive Fieldstone Golf Club, a symbol of prestige and power. This move painted a contrasting picture: a politician aligned with working-class values, yet rubbing shoulders with the state's most affluent family, renowned for their chemical company empire.

At the time, Biden walked a delicate line. On one hand, he campaigned as an Amtrak-riding “Middle-Class Joe” striving to make ends meet, and accurately described himself as “one of the poorest members of Congress” — reporting $221,000 in combined income with his wife that year and $360 in charitable contributions. -WaPo

Biden's connection to the du Ponts extended beyond social interactions. His staffing choices, political allies, and personal real estate investments all reflected a deep integration with this influential family. His acquisition of a mansion built by a du Pont member further underscores this relationship.

Yet, Biden's entry into the Fieldstone Golf Club raised eyebrows and led to a brief FBI investigation in 2007. The inquiry centered on how Biden obtained his club membership, especially as it involved an "unused" ticket from a company owned by the club's founder, potentially bypassing a substantial partnership fee. The FBI's probe, which included photographing Biden's personal locker at the club, eventually closed without any allegations of wrongdoing. It's unknown whether Biden was ever informed about the FBI investigation.

In response to an inquiry, the White House told the Post: "These bizarre suggestions from more than 20 years ago are confusing given the fact that the Post is reporting that President Biden was fully responsible for membership dues at the golf club and all out-of-pocket costs associated with it. Frankly, the Post’s own reporting suggests this supposed matter was closed 15 years ago with no finding of wrongdoing. If you want to dig deep on who’s funding a president’s golf habits, we might have some suggestions."

Yet, this story reveals the delicate balance Biden navigated between his public identity as a relatable politician and his private interactions with Delaware's elite. While maintaining his image as a defender of middle-class interests, Biden also sought inclusion in the state's upper echelons, epitomized by his association with the du Ponts and his membership at Fieldstone.

For someone raised in Delaware with Biden’s blue-collar background, “it would be quite an accomplishment” to rise into the same social circles as the du Ponts, said Joseph Hurley, a Wilmington attorney who grew up with Biden and represented Moseley.

“It’s like, ‘I’ve really arrived,’ because the du Ponts were the family, the king’s-family type thing,” he said. -WaPo

Biden often cited the long role of the du Pont family in Delaware in his family story - writing in his memoir that his father moved the family from Scranton, PA to a suburb of Wilmington, which was made more economically stable thanks to so many well-paid DuPont employees.

"DuPont meant security for today and better times for the future," Biden wrote.

Years later, Biden recalled that his mother urged him to value his heritage with as much pride as the state’s best-known family. “Like I’m a du Pont or something,” Biden recalled. “You’re a Biden. Nobody is better than you, and everybody’s equal to you,” his mother told him.

Still, he envied the position and power of those who founded the DuPont company.

Elected to the Senate in 1972, he served in Congress alongside Rep. Pierre “Pete” du Pont IV, who later became Delaware’s governor and ran for president. Biden’s close adviser and Senate chief of staff, Ted Kaufman, had worked for DuPont as a plastics engineer.

 

 

 

When Russell Brand Was A Degenerate He Was "All Good", Now That He's All Good He's A "Degenerate"?

.@RobertKennedyJr talks to Russell Brand about how the NSA was in charge of Operation Warp Speed, the history of the United States bioweapons program, and why Anthony Fauci is the highest-paid government official in history:

"The weird thing about the pandemic was this constant… pic.twitter.com/qunw3Bn6pP

— KanekoaTheGreat (@KanekoaTheGreat) September 18, 2023

nydailynews  |  YouTube has demonetized Russell Brand’s channel, and the BBC pulled some of his shows from its online streaming service, after several women accused the comedian-turned-wellness guru of rape and sexual assault in an investigative report published over the weekend.

In a statement on Tuesday, YouTube said they took action against Brand’s account — which has 6.6 million subscribers — to “protect” users in light of “serious allegations against the creator.” It means 48-year-old Brand will no longer be able to profit from the ads that run within and alongside his videos, which have titles like “What REALLY Started the Hawaii Fires?” and “Covid Tsar Admits Lockdowns Were NEVER About Science.”

Other channels associated with the funnyman’s main YouTube page also include Awakening With Russell, which has 426,000 subscribers, Football Is Nice, which has some 20,000 subscribers, and Stay Free With Russell Brand, which has 22,200 subscribers.

“This decision applies to all channels that may be owned or operated by Russell Brand,” the Google-owned video service said.

While Brand has not been charged with any crimes, YouTube said he violated its “creator responsibility policy.”

“If a creator’s off-platform behavior harms our users, employees or ecosystem, we take action to protect the community,” the statement read.

BBC echoed the sentiment, saying Brand’s content “now falls below public expectations” of iPlayer and BBC Sounds.

Over the weekend, the Times of London, The Sunday Times and Channel 4 Dispatches published a joint investigation in which several women accused Brand of sexual assault and rape between 2006 and 2013 — a period during which Brand also became married to and subsequently divorced from pop star Katy Perry.

 

Political Elites Spying On And Censoring "Constituents"

public  |  Social media companies, including TikTok, Snap, and Twitter, caused people in France to riot and so the government should shut them down, say French President Emmanuel Macron and the European Union’s top censor, Thierry Breton.

Said Macron, “When things get out of hand, we may have to regulate them or cut [social networks] off.” The reason, Breton explained today, is that “Social media didn’t do enough” to remove "content that is hateful, that calls to revolt and to kill.” Warned Breton, "If they don’t do it, they will be sanctioned immediately.”

The comments made by Macron and Breton are shocking, and anybody who cares about freedom of speech should denounce them as a clear and present threat to the fundamental human right to freedom of expression as enshrined in the United Nations Declaration of Human Rights, the French Constitution, and the European Constitution.

It’s true that there are legal protections for removing "content that is hateful, that calls to revolt and to kill.” Such immediate incitement to violence is even illegal in the United States, which has much stronger free speech protections than France and Europe.

But neither Macron, Breton nor their defenders have presented any evidence showing that hate speech or incitement to violence rather than outrage over a police killing, combined with a large and restless immigrant population that France has failed to integrate and assimilate, caused the riots.

And their calls for greater censorship come at the same moment that the Macron government has passed a new law allowing police to spy on people by secretly taking control of their phones and laptop computers and activating the microphone, camera, and GPS. The government says a judge will have to approve all spying, but it is reasonable to worry about abuses of power. In 2013, military contractor Edward Snowden revealed mass US government spying without a warrant.

What’s more, the attack on privacy and the demand for censorship is worldwide. The British parliament is expected to pass legislation in the next few weeks that will allow the government to spy on private and encrypted text messages. The Irish Senate is expected to pass legislation in October that will allow the police to enter homes without a warrant and search phones and laptops for evidence of hate speech. And Australia is on the cusp of passing a new law that would require social media companies to remove any speech that causes “harm” to “health” or “the environment,” which would allow government censorship of criticisms of its climate and energy policies.

Why is the attack on free speech and privacy happening in so many nations simultaneously? And what can be done about it?

The Garden Intends To Clamp Down On Thought Crimes Among You Ashy-Assed Jungle Bunnies

NC  |  So, who in the EU will get to define what actually constitutes mis- or disinformation?

Surely it will be the job of an independent regulator or a judicial authority with at least clear procedural parameters and no or few conflicts of interest. At least that is what one would hope.

But no.

The ultimate decider of what constitutes mis- or dis-information, possibly not just in the EU but across multiple jurisdictions around the world (more on that later), will be the European Commission. That’s right, the EU’s power-hungry, conflict-riddled, Von der Leyen-led executive branch. The same institution that is in the process of dynamiting the EU’s economic future through its endless backfiring sanctions on Russia and which is mired in Pfizergate, one of the biggest corruption scandals of its 64-year existence. Now the Commission wants to take mass censorship to levels not seen in Europe since at least the dying days of the Cold War.

In this task the Commission will have, in its own words, “enforcement powers similar to those it has under anti-trust proceedings,” adding that “an EU-wide cooperation mechanism will be established between national regulators and the Commission.”

The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) broadly supports many aspects of the DSA, including the protections it provides on user rights to privacy by prohibiting platforms from undertaking targeted advertising based on sensitive user information, such as sexual orientation or ethnicity. “More broadly, the DSA increases the transparency about the ads users see on their feeds as platforms must place a clear label on every ad, with information about the buyer of the ad and other details.” It also “reins in the powers of Big Tech” by forcing them to “comply with far-reaching obligations and responsibly tackle systemic risks and abuse on their platform.”

But even the EFF warns that the new law “provides a fast-track procedure for law enforcement authorities to take on the role of ‘trusted flaggers’ and uncover data about anonymous speakers and remove allegedly illegal content – which platforms become obligated to remove quickly.” The EFF also raises concerns about the dangers posed by the Commission’s starring role in all of this:

Issues with government involvement in content moderation are pervasive and whilst trusted flaggers are not new, the DSA’s system could have a significant negative impact on the rights of users, in particular that of privacy and free speech.

And free speech and a free press are the foundation stones of any genuine liberal democracy, as notes the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU):

The First Amendment protects our freedom to speak, assemble, and associate with others. These rights are essential to our democratic system of governance. The Supreme Court has written that freedom of expression is “the matrix, the indispensable condition of nearly every other form of freedom.” Without it, other fundamental rights, like the right to vote, would cease to exist. Since its founding, the ACLU has advocated for broad protection of our First Amendment rights in times of war and peace, to ensure that the marketplace of ideas remains vigorous and unrestricted.

A Transatlantic “Wish List”

The DSA and the Biden Administration’s proposed RESTRICT Act (which Yves dissected back in April) were among the topics discussed during Russell Brand’s recent interview of Matt Taibbi. Both bills, said Taibbi, are essentially a “wish list that has been passed around” by the transatlantic elite “for some time,” including at a 2021 gathering at the Aspen Institute:

The governments want absolute, full and complete access to all data that these platforms provide. And then they want a couple of other things that are really important. They want to have the authority to come in and moderate or at least be part of the process of moderation. And they also want people who are called trusted “flaggers” — that’s how they’re described in the European law — to have access to these platforms as well. What they mean by that are these outside quasi-governmental agencies who tell these platforms what they can and cannot print about things like vaccine safety.

In other words, the legal environment for free speech is set to become even more hostile in Europe. And possibly not just Europe. As Norman Lewis writes for the British online news website Spiked, the DSA will not only force the regulation of content on the Internet, but could also become a global standard, not just a European one:

This Jungle-esque Arab Spring In The Garden Must Not Be Tolerated...,

English translated pic.twitter.com/SMSPbR9whZ

— Top Notch Journal (@topnotchjournal) July 2, 2023

 

theconservativetreehouse |  Let me take you back to 2010 and 2011 when the U.S. State Department, Hillary Clinton, Samantha Power, Susan Rice, CIA Director Leon Panetta and French President Nicholas Sarkozy wanted to support the Islamist Spring uprisings in Tunis, Libya, Egypt and Yemen. 

What happened then is very much related to what we are seeing right now in Europe, specifically France; only this time we are seeing the inverse of the government interests regarding social media on display. 

The bad dictators were targeted for removal following the now famous Barack Obama Cairo, Egypt speech. President Barack Obama triggered the removal of the Zookeepers and released the big cats to become apex predators; the downstream consequences eventually showed up with ISIS burning people in cages. 

When the leaders of Tunis, Egypt, Libya, Yemen, Bahrain, Sudan and a multitude of other unapproved dictatorships, reacted to the collective effort of the CIA and U.S. state Dept by shutting down cell phone communication, the CIA and DoS responded by enlisting Twitter and Facebook as the messaging platforms for the rebels in each country.

Twitter became the main conduit through which the people on the ground could organize against their regimes. This was the initial merge of the U.S. government using social media to effect political change. [Side Note: this is the atom splitting moment which eventually led to the government’s ability to control, filter and ultimately censor U.S. social media content.]

Twitter, and to a lesser extent Facebook, served the interests of western government by helping the people on the ground to organize protests, violent uprisings, against the dictators in the Arab Spring. As we eventually saw in Libya and Egypt, the Muslim Brotherhood (Egypt, AQIM) and al-Qaeda (Libya, AQAP) were supported by the State Dept/CIA during that effort.

The key takeaway is: the uprisings were supported by the western governments, and the social media platforms served the interests of the western government leadership.

We have the inverse issue for the interests of western government, specifically France and broad parts of the EU as well as the United States.

General uprisings, riots and assorted mayhem created by mostly Islamic immigrants and the subsequent cultural clash, are against the interests of France and the EU. The ability of the cultural insurgents to organize on social media is now against the interests of western government. How are they reacting? They are shutting down the utility of the platforms and shutting down the internet.

The initial takeaway from this might be perceived as good. The rioters are creating social unrest, looting, arson and crisis; they must be stopped and controlled. It seems like the government action will be a good thing.

However, as with the example of private corporations joining in alignment with WEF government to target Russia, what do you think will happen when a populist revolt of yellow vests, or anti-vaxxers, or freedom rebels take to the streets? Precedents are being set.

You might cheer France using control over communication to target the violent brown people now; but what happens when those same EU entities decide to target the communication of a different type of uprising. This is me, sending warning flares to those who might not care about this ‘beta-test’.

Oh, and don’t forget the Senate Intelligence Committee recent effort with the “Restrict Act“, total internet and domestic social media control pushed under the auspices of controlling TikTok data collection.

 

 

Political Satirist CJ Hopkins Under Criminal Investigation For Thought Crimes In Germany

cjhopkins  |  The Berlin State Prosecutor has launched a criminal investigation of me for tweeting the image on the cover of my book, The Rise of the New Normal Reich. 

I am charged with “disseminating propaganda, the contents of which are intended to further the aims of a former National Socialist organization,” which is punishable by “imprisonment for not more than three years or a fine.”

The “propaganda” in question is the image on the cover of my book, which image will be familiar to the thousands of readers who have bought and read it. It was a Barnes & Noble and Amazon bestseller upon its release in 2022, and continues to sell quite well internationally. 

As you might recall, the book was banned by Amazon in Germany, Austria, and The Netherlands in August 2022 (i.e., the time of my alleged Twitter crimes).

The Prosecutor’s notice orders me to respond to the charge within two weeks, though it’s possible the deadline to respond was today, June 8, 2023 (i.e, the day I received the notice of the investigation, dated May 25, 2023, in the mail).

Along with my response to the charge, I am ordered to provide the Prosecutor with all my personal identification papers and documentation of my net monthly income.

Obviously, the cover of my book is not “propaganda intended to further the aims of a former National Socialist organization.” Anyone vaguely familiar with my work over the last 30 years is aware of my fierce opposition to fascism, totalitarianism, and all other forms of authoritarianism.

The charge is utterly ridiculous. Swastikas are banned in Germany if they are used to promote Nazism, fascism, neo-Nazi organizations, etc. However, they are allowed to be displayed for the purposes of “civic education, countering anti-constitutional activities, art and science, research and education, coverage of historic and current events,” and similar purposes, according to German law.

Given the circumstances, I have to assume the Berlin State Prosecutor has launched this absurd investigation in order to punish me for my aggressive opposition to the roll-out of the New Normal, or intimidate me into silence. There’s quite a lot of that going around these days … just ask Matt Taibbi, Roger Waters, Sucharit Bhakdi, and Kit Klarenberg, among others.

It is possible these trumped-up charges are also a result of my criticism of the official Russia/Ukraine narrative. I’ve been pretty tough on the NATO-backed neo-Nazis and the official propaganda the corporate media has been churning out.

Whatever the actual reason is, I am, needless to say, angry. I will be responding to this baseless and unsupportable charge in a robust fashion. I’ll keep you posted.

 

 

Think'em Bilderbergers Wuz Talm'bout Flushing These Epstein-Tainted Turds?

WaPo  | As government attorneys unravel Jeffrey Epstein’s complex finances and sex trafficking ring, officials are training their focus on other high-wealth individuals with whom the disgraced financier may have done business.

Epstein’s List: Bill Gates & Mila Antonova, a quick look back 2009–2023 pic.twitter.com/gpgSWAOh5S

— TexasLindsay™ (@TexasLindsay_) May 22, 2023

One of the most closely watched cases comes from the U.S. Virgin Islands, where Epstein maintained a residence, as it pursues a lawsuit against JPMorgan Chase, Epstein’s bank of 15 years. The suit alleges that the institution profited from keeping Epstein on as a client and was complicit in funding his long history of abuse and child sex trafficking.

Deutsche Bank, where Epstein took much of his wealth after leaving JPMorgan in 2013, has already settled a similar case for $75 million. But legal observers say the claims against JPMorgan are far more sweeping than those against Deutsche Bank, covering a period when his trafficking operation was more robust and sophisticated.

Here are the figures surrounding the JPMorgan-Epstein case, and what you need to know about them.

The United States Has Been Destroyed By Its Ruling Elites

PCR  |  Against the backdrop of the United States’ recognition of the investigation against Donald Trump as politically motivated, structural and ideological controversies, and concerns that the American economy will enter a recession, the GEOFOR editorial board asked Paul Craig Roberts, Chairman of the Institute for Political Economy (USA), a PhD in Economics and US Undersecretary of Treasury in the Reagan administration, to share his views on America’s future.

GEOFOR: Special Counsel John Durham “acquitted” Donald Trump on the so-called “Russiagate”, writing in his report that the FBI investigation was politically motivated. How will this news affect the Democrats’ fight against Trump?

Dr. Paul Craig Roberts: The Special Counsel’s vindication of Donald Trump and denunciation of the FBI for conducting a politically motivated investigation devoid of any evidence should collapse the equally fraudulent Biden regime investigation of Trump on fake documents charges and the New York state prosecution of Trump on alleged expense misreporting charges. It has been clear for a long time that the list of fake charges against Trump, supported by the media, are propaganda to prevent Trump again running for President and to teach all future potential presidential candidates that they will be destroyed if they attempt to represent the people instead of the unelected ruling oligarchy.

However, the Democrat Party and the presstitutes that service them have no respect whatsoever for truth. Facts simply do not matter to them. This is true also of American Universities, law associations, medical associations, the CIA, FBI, NSA, the State Department, the regulatory agencies such as NIH, CDC, FDA, the large corporations, and many establishment Republican members of the House and Senate who serve the economic interests that pay them, not truth. It is also the case with a high percentage of Democrat voters who have been conditioned by propaganda to hate Trump. To Democrats what matters is not facts, but getting Trump. Truth is not permitted to prevent the destruction of Trump.

Consequently, the US is moving toward a fatal split in the society from which recovery is impossible. Trump represents ordinary Americans who prefer peace to the neoconservatives’ wars, who want their jobs back that the greed-driven capitalist global corporations sent to China and Asia, who want their children properly educated instead of indoctrinated with sexual perversion, Satanism, and told that they are racists. In contrast, the Democrats are increasingly Woke–people who believe that truth is an oppressive tool of white supremacy, that Christian morality is tyrannical and discriminatory against pedophiles and other sexual perverts, and that, as “President” Biden himself has said, white people are the greatest threat to America. See: https://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2023/05/15/us-navy-enlists-drag-queen-for-digital-ambassador-role-to-attract-more-recruits-2/

Now that official investigations by the House Republicans have brought the utter corruption of Biden and his son to light (see: https://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2023/05/16/bank-records-show-biden-family-received-10-million-in-payments-from-china-foreign-interests-house-oversight/ ), the Democrats, the dangerous and corrupt military/security complex, and the complicit whore American media, are desperate. They all stand as being exposed. So, rather than apologize for their mistreatment of Trump and his supporters–1,000 of whom the Democrats have illegally imprisoned–they will likely strike out while they still control the Executive Branch, the US Senate, the CIA, FBI, NSA, and federal agencies such as the IRS that have been armed and militarized.

Alternatively, the corrupt and threatened Democrats might cause war between the US and Russia, or Iran, or China in the hopes that a war will unify even Trump supporters, especially the super-patriots among them, around the “President” against “foreign enemies.”

Rupricht DID NOT LIKE All Of Tucker's Good/Evil/God/Prayer Talk....,

vanityfair  | A new theory has emerged. According to the source, Fox Corp. chair Rupert Murdoch removed Carlson over remarks Carlson made during a speech at the Heritage Foundation’s 50th Anniversary gala on Friday night. Carlson laced his speech with religious overtones that even Murdoch found too extreme, the source, who was briefed on Murdoch’s decision-making, said. Carlson told the Heritage audience that national politics has become a manichean battle between “good” and “evil.” Carlson said that people advocating for transgender rights and DEI programs want to destroy America and they could not be persuaded with facts. “We should say that and stop engaging in these totally fraudulent debates…I’ve tried. That doesn’t work,” he said. The answer, Carlson suggested, was prayer. “I have concluded it might be worth taking just 10 minutes out of your busy schedule to say a prayer for the future, and I hope you will,” he said. “That stuff freaks Rupert out. He doesn’t like all the spiritual talk,” the source said. 

Carlson declined to comment. A spokesperson for Fox Corp. declined to comment. 

It’s been reported that Fox Corp. CEO Lachlan Murdoch and Fox News CEO Suzanne Scott made the decision to fire Carlson on Friday night. Another source, a person close to Murdoch, has said something similar to me. Scott informed Carlson of the decision on Monday morning. 

Rupert Murdoch was perhaps unnerved by Carlson’s messianism because it echoed the end-times worldview of Murdoch’s ex-fiancée Ann Lesley Smith, the source said. In my May cover story, I reported that Murdoch and Smith called off their two-week engagement because Smith had told people Carlson was “a messenger from God.” Murdoch had seen Carlson and Smith discuss religion firsthand. In late March, Carlson had dinner at Murdoch’s Bel Air vineyard with Murdoch and Smith, according to the source. During dinner, Smith pulled out a bible and started reading passages from the Book of Exodus, the source said. “Rupert just sat there and stared,” the source said. A few days after the dinner, Murdoch and Smith called off the wedding. By taking Carlson off the air, Murdoch was also taking away his ex’s favorite show. 

Smith did not respond to a request for comment. 

The 92-year-old mogul’s broken engagement is part of a string of erratic decisions he has made of late that raises questions about Murdoch’s leadership of his media empire. According to sources, executives at Fox are worried about Murdoch’s unsteady hand at the wheel of the company. “It’s like the King is senile but no one wants to say anything,” the source said. According to two sources, Fox settled with Dominion moments before the trial was set to begin because Fox’s lawyers didn’t want Murdoch to testify in public. “They were hoping and praying to settle for months, but they didn’t want to pay up,” the second source said. Once the trial began, the lawyers told Fox execs that Murdoch would be “disgraced on the stand, run out of the boardroom, and his testimony will expose him as a lunatic sliding into senility.” (The person close to Murdoch disputed this. “Rupert was very well prepared to testify.”)

If You Don't Like The Status Quo You Have No One To Vote For - Just People To Vote Against

neuburger  |  To answer that question seriously, consider the following premises. I think the first four accurately describe the thinking of mainstream Democratic leaders since the humiliating presidential loss of 2016:

1. Modern Republicans (leaders, media, and crucially, their voters as well) represent the worst threat to the American Republic since the Civil War.

   1. Or possibly since the Founding. Southern Confederates didn’t wish to institute Hitlerian reforms that would eliminate democracy from the governance of the state.

2. Any act by any individual or organization that advances the overall Republican Project, inadvertently or not, is as dangerous as the Project itself.

3. Because the Republican Project is evil, its supporters are evil — or in the most generous cases, deeply stupid.

4. Stopping the Republican Project means stopping all supporters and adherents, be they willing or not.

5. (Taibbi addendum 1) Matt Taibbi is a supporter, willingly or not, and therefore must be stopped.

6. (Taibbi addendum 2) Because his support is probably not inadvertent — Seder’s hosts and the Democratic committee members are certain his motive is money, a sell-out to advance Elon Musk — destruction of his entire career is a reasonable response. After all, the whole of American democracy is at risk; literally all.

I don’t think any of those statements, stark as they are, misrepresent the Democratic Party position. Everything I’ve observed since November 2016 confirms them all.

The Problem in a Nutshell

Statement 1 could well be true. I believe it myself, though about the leadership only. (I have other thoughts about Republican voters.)

But does the rest follow from that? Does it justify the destruction of free speech, to take one example, in order to preserve it? (If you doubt that’s what’s on offer, click the link.)

And even if it does, even if the means are justified by the end, the problem is that this Democratic Party response — this hate-Republicans-at-all-costs messaging (while party leaders themselves cut deals with them) — is not going to work. It won't blast them past their electoral opponents at near the speed it ought to, given their opponent's obvious and fatal flaws.

Mainstream Democrats run roughly even with Republicans except in protected districts. They certainly ran roughly even with Donald Trump in the only venue that counts, the Electoral College. And Democratic leaders are the reason that this is so. Will all this vitriol make them more attractive, or less?

If you don’t like the status quo, you have no one to vote for, just people to vote against.

What do you think would happen if Democrats ran a candidate of Real Rebellion, a Bernie Sanders, say, à la 2016, against the candidate of Pretending to Care what happens to suffering voters? Would real rebellion against predatory rule by the rich “trump” fake rebellion financed by the rich?

Of course it would. Sanders would have beaten Trump soundly, had he had the chance, in the 2016 race. All the momentum was his, and he won almost every head-to-head primary contest in states with open, same-day primary voting.

But Democrats, the other party of the rich, won’t take that course. Which leaves them only one pitch. In Taibbi’s language from the start of this piece:

It’s always “Vote for us or you’re a right-wing insurrectionist Putin-lover,” which is the opposite of persuasive.

This is the Democrats’ constant closing argument, and the worst they could advance. It makes them, not just wrong, but ugly as well, the “opposite of persuasive.” Yet this is all they have, if they can’t themselves attack the people’s real enemy, and this time actually mean it. Sad for us. Sad for them as well.

 

Corporate Overlords Steady Creeping To Throttle Last Vestiges Of Peasant Dissent

zerohedge  |  A Senate bill is raising fears among some for its potential to enable Big Tech and mainstream media outlets to collude against smaller and independent media outlets.

The bill, dubbed the Journalism Competition and Protection Act (JCPA), would supersede some existing antitrust laws and allow media companies to band together to negotiate with Big Tech platforms like Facebook, Google, and Twitter.

Specifically, the JCPA says:

“A news content creator may not be held liable under the antitrust laws for engaging in negotiations with any other news content creator during the 4-year period beginning on the date of enactment of this Act to collectively withhold content from, or negotiate with, an online content distributor regarding the terms on which the news content of the news content creator may be distributed by the online content distributor.”

In brief, this means that online and print media outlets, including some of the largest and longest-established names in the industry, could band together in a kind of media union to demand concessions from tech companies in order for the coalition to continue to allow their content on the platform. Under existing antitrust laws, such cartels—which describe a collusion of firms in an industry to join together for a common financial or industry outcome—are decidedly illegal.

Proponents of the JCPA have presented it as a much-needed panacea to address dwindling numbers of dedicated local media companies who, proponents say, are often left behind in the umbrella of Big Tech algorithms and advertising capacity.

In a change.org petition that has garnered over 23,000 signatures, the News Media Alliance, one of the most outspoken supporters of the bill, explained this position, presenting it as a hardline position against the reach of big tech power and influence.

“Today, many local newspapers are struggling to stay in business. Big Tech platforms, such as Facebook and Google, control how we access trustworthy news online and how journalism is displayed, prioritized, and monetized. They capture the vast majority of all digital advertising dollars because of their outsized ability to collect consumer data.

“Local newspaper revenues have gone down and as a result, thousands of journalists have been laid off, ‘news deserts’ are emerging across the country, and dangerous misinformation that threatens the fabric of our democracy continues to flourish.”

But opponents of the bill have raised alarm bells, warning that in practice the policy will only serve to benefit established legacy and mainstream outlets, to the exclusion of anti-establishment, independent publications.

Specifically, opponents point to a section of an updated draft of the JCPA that could effectively permit legacy media cartels to demand that tech platforms censor or outright refuse to permit newer, less-established media outlets from publishing on the platform.

 

World's Largest Purveyor Of State Sponsored Terrorism And Political Assassination

warontherocks |  today’s growing wave of assassination attempts has crossed ideologies. Certain adherents of the far left have been responsible for attempts on the Republican baseball practice and more recently Justice Kavanaugh. But the far-right is also active in this space and was responsible for the most recent successful high-level political assassination in the country: the killing of Reverend Clementa Pinckney, state senator of South Carolina, at the Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston in 2015. Jihadists often place prominent figures in their crosshairs, as demonstrated by a recently disrupted plot against George W. Bush. Even the more nascent male supremacist movement has its targets: A so-called “men’s rights activist” attacked the home of U.S. District Court Judge Esther Salas in July 2020, killing her son.

The emerging trend is due in no small part to the reemergence of so-called “accelerationism” as a distinct violent extremist strategy. For extremists seeking to sow chaos and speed up some cataclysmic societal collapse, high-profile politicians provide an attractive target, as symbols of the mainstream liberal political order. “We need to kill the HVT’s,” one poster wrote on Telegram in August 2019, using a military acronym for high-value target. “When a popular HVT is gunned down, it inspires hope and dreams.” The COVID pandemic then added fuel to the fire as public officials were blamed and then threatened for the lockdowns and enforced quarantines. Targets ranged from prominent health officials like cerebral National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Director Dr. Anthony Fauci to Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer, as well as many other lower-level state officials responsible for the imposition of these extraordinary public health measures. Fauci was forced into constant law enforcement protection because of threats against his life — which was only a prelude to the death threats and serial harassment that now routinely are directed against local and state election officials.

Political assassinations are uniquely suited to tear at the country’s social fabric. For starters, they force opposing politicians and voters into an apparently awkward dilemma between condemning hatred and violence and seeming to renege on their own political positions — a situation Democrats did not handle particularly well after the attempt on Kavanaugh’s life. As Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco stated in June in response to that attempted attack, “We can’t come together on this topic without acknowledging and condemning the appalling rise in violence that we have seen from a range of ideologies directed at public officials.” But they also risk dissuading good people, across the political spectrum, from running for public office and participating in a vibrant American democracy. Indeed, perhaps the most damning element of the January 6 commission hearings has been the broadcasting of the threats issued against everyday public servants, such as Georgia’s election workers. The Department of Justice recently announced it has opened around 110 federal criminal investigations into “contacts reported as hostile or harassing by the election community.” “A common refrain I hear from my members is that nobody is going to take this seriously until something bad happens, and we are all braced for the worst,” the National Association of State Election Directors executive director warned in recent written testimony to the Senate Judiciary Committee. “Until recently, this was not a field you went into thinking it could cost you your life.”

Heightening the threat yet further is a growing tendency for assailants to use untraceable or even homemade weaponry as part of violent plots — as seen in the assassination of Abe, in which the assassin used a fully homemade shotgun to evade Japan’s stringent gun laws. The crude attack was reminiscent of failed drone attacks against political leaders in Venezuela and Iraq and may be indicative of an emerging era in which more widely accessible tools are weaponized in these strikes against individuals — again, regardless of the motivating ideology. Cruder technology lowers the barriers to entry for attackers, allowing even untrained or unprepared extremists — such as Zeldin’s assailant, who, despite being an Army veteran, used a personal protection device disguised as a cat-shaped keychain in his assault — to attempt serious plots. As Colin Clarke and Joseph Shelzi write, “The proliferation of emerging personal technologies like drones, 3-D-printed weapons, and other innovations will likely open the door for more attacks against high-profile figures in the future.”

We live in an age of heightened political tensions, when political decisions are often seen as existential crises, and where elections, therefore, carry perceived life-or-death stakes. With a midterm around the corner, a former president under investigation, and major upheavals occurring on hot-button issues such as abortion and gun control, extremists inclined to violence will be increasingly likely to lash out. The situation is only made more serious by the seeming consent a faction of the political right has offered to would-be assassins, including a Florida State House candidate who was recently expelled from Twitter for writing, “Under my plan, all Floridians will have permission to shoot FBI, IRS, ATF and all other feds on sight! Let freedom ring!” The conceit that fuels these would-be assassins’ fanaticism and feeds their egos poses a considerable and growing danger to civil servants and political figures across the political spectrum — at a time when mass shootings at schools, shopping malls, cinemas, and other public venues have already become an increasingly frequent occurrence. “The system was blinking red,” Director of Central Intelligence George Tenet famously told the 9/11 Commission describing the months before September 2001 — a sentiment which feels pertinent again now.

Carol Crawford Is The CDC's Censorship And Disinformation Czar

stevekirsch  |  Carol Crawford is the person at the CDC responsible for censoring misinformation spreaders.

In this video, I make a call to her to propose a way to end misinformation.

At the end of the call, I remind her that she is engaging in illegal acts by telling social media companies what content to censor. See page 7 for her message to Twitter showing them what to censor.

Twitter follows orders, even though Carol is breaking the law. They aren’t going to turn her in. On the contrary, they are in on it. This is collusion to censor free speech.

If you’d like to tell her you support my suggestion, you can reach her at ccrawford@cdc.gov.

I’m sure she’d be delighted to hear from you.

You Tube censored my video within minutes of posting

I also uploaded the video on YouTube, but it was censored after just 6 views! YouTube will censor anything that makes the government look bad. So if you document government corruption, YouTube is not the place to post it.

Truth Is Treason In An Empire Of Lies

caitlinjohnstone |  The empire has had mixed feelings about the internet since its creation. On one hand it allows for unprecedented surveillance and information gathering and the rapid distribution of propaganda, which it likes, but on the other it allows for the unprecedented democratization of information, which it doesn’t like.

Its answer to this quandary has been to come up with “fact checking” services and Silicon Valley censorship protocols for restricting “misinformation” (with “facts” and “information” defined as “whatever advances imperial interests”). That’s all we’re seeing with continually expanding online censorship policies, and with government-tied oligarchic narrative management operations like NewsGuard.

Twitter has imposed a weeklong suspension on the account of writer and political activist Danny Haiphong for a thread he made on the platform disputing the mainstream Tiananmen Square massacre narrative.

The notification Haiphong received informed him that Twitter had locked his account for “Violating our rules against abuse and harassment,” presumably in reference to a rule the platform put in place a year ago which prohibits “content that denies that mass murder or other mass casualty events took place, where we can verify that the event occured, and when the content is shared with abusive intent.”

“This may include references to such an event as a ‘hoax’ or claims that victims or survivors are fake or ‘actors,’” Twitter said of the new rule. “It includes, but is not limited to, events like the Holocaust, school shootings, terrorist attacks, and natural disasters.”

That we are now seeing this rule applied to protect narratives which support the geostrategic interests of the US-centralized empire is not in the least bit surprising.

Haiphong is far from the first to dispute the mainstream western narrative about exactly what happened around Tiananmen Square in June of 1989 as the Soviet Union was crumbling and Washington’s temporary Cold War alignment with Beijing was losing its strategic usefulness. But we can expect more acts of online censorship like this as Silicon Valley continues to expand into its role as guardian of imperial historic records.

This idea that government-tied Silicon Valley institutions should act as arbiters of history on behalf of the public consumer is gaining steadily increasing acceptance in the artificially manufactured echo chamber of mainstream public opinion. We saw another example of this recently in Joe Lauria’s excellent refutation of accusations against Consortium News of historic inaccuracy by the imperial narrative management firm NewsGuard.

As journalists like Whitney Webb and Mnar Adley noted years ago, NewsGuard markets itself as a “news rating agency” designed to help people sort out good from bad sources of information online, but in reality functions as an empire-backed weapon against media who question imperial narratives about what’s happening in the world. The Grayzone’s Max Blumenthal outlined the company’s many partnerships with imperial swamp monsters like former NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen and “chief propagandist” Richard Stengel as well as “imperialist cutouts like the German Marshall Fund” when its operatives contacted his outlet for comment on their accusations.

 

 

Leadership Comparison: Russian vs. NATO Leadership In Ukraine

stratpol  |  Response to Mr. Myard, on the United States / Russia confrontation in Ukraine.

If a good part of your analysis on the risks of the Ukrainian conflict getting out of hand seems correct to me, I come back to the sentence: “The information provided by the Americans was decisive in countering the Russian advance, of which the army proved incapable. to adapt, due to outdated military concepts.”

Former "Situation-Intelligence-Electronic Warfare" Chief of the Joint Operational Planning Staff, I do not at all share this part of the analysis which is based on an inaccurate "situation assessment" which is, in fact, the conclusion from a biased Atlanticist position, aimed at making the Ukrainians believe that Russia is weak, in order to push Ukraine to resist until the end and let it envisage, with Western help, a victory. Here is my argument:

Until proven otherwise, Russia has not declared a partial and even less general mobilization of its forces to carry out this “special operation”. As part of Operation Z, it has so far used only 12% of its soldiers (professionals or volunteers), 10% of its fighter planes, 7% of its tanks, 5% of its missiles and 4% of its artillery. Everyone will observe that the behavior of the Western ruling elites is, until now, much more feverish and hysterical, than the behavior of the Russian governance, calmer, more placid, more determined, more sure and master of itself, of his action and his speech. These are facts.

Russia has therefore not made use of its immense reserves (reserves which hardly exist any more in the EU). She has more than a week's worth of ammunition as she demonstrates every day in the field. We are not so lucky in the West where the shortage of ammunition, the obsolescence of major equipment, their insufficient maintenance, their low DTO (Technical Operational Availability), the absence of reserves, the lack of training of personnel , the sample nature of modern equipment and many other elements do not allow us to seriously consider, today, a military victory for NATO against Russia. This is the reason why we are content with an “economic” war, hoping to weaken the Russian bear.

Let's come to the quality of the military leadership of the Russian side and compare it to that of the “Western coalition”.

On February 24, the Russians urgently embarked on a pre-emptive “special operation”, preceding by a few days an assault by kyiv forces against the Donbass.

This operation was special because most of the ground operations were going to take place in a sister country and in areas where a large part of the population was not hostile to Russia (Donbass). It was therefore not a classic high-intensity operation against an irreducible enemy, it was an operation in which the technique of the Russian steamroller, crushing the opposing forces, infrastructures and populations by the artillery (as in Germany during the ^2nd World War) was impossible to envisage. This operation was special because it was more, in the Donbass, an operation to liberate a friendly population, hostage of the Ukro-Nazi reprisal battalions, and martyred for 8 years ., an operation in which civilian populations and infrastructure were to be spared as much as possible.

This operation was therefore truly special and particularly difficult to conduct, always bearing in mind the contradictory requirements of obtaining victory by advancing and occupying the ground, while sparing the population and the civilian infrastructure and the lives of its own soldiers.

In addition, this operation has been carried out, so far, in numerical inferiority (nearly one against two), while the ratio of forces on the ground required in offensive is 3 against 1, and even 5 against 1 in zone urbanized. The Kievan forces have also perfectly understood the interest of entrenching themselves in the cities and of using the Russian-speaking and Russophile civilian populations as a human shield...

I observe that, on the ground, the Russian forces continue to advance, day after day, slowly but surely against a Ukrainian army which has achieved its general mobilization, which is aided by the West, and which is supposed to fight for his land...

Question the quality of Russian leadership, engaged in a very complex military operation, conducted in numerical inferiority, in which everything must be done to avoid excessive collateral damage. seems to me to be a huge error of assessment. We also all too often lend to the Russians, in the West, war intentions or aims that they never had, just to be able to say that these objectives have not been achieved.

It is true that NATO has never bothered with scruples to crush under the bombs the civilian populations of the countries it attacked (often under false pretexts), to force these countries to ask for mercy. (Serbia, Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, etc.). More than a million NATO bombs have been dropped since 1990 on the planet, causing the direct or indirect death of several million individuals in the most total indifference of Western public opinion.

Before coming to the examination of the Western leadership, for comparison with the Russian leadership, let us note that NATO took 78 days of bombardment and 38,000 aerial sorties to force little Serbia to ask for an armistice. Remember that Serbia is 8 times smaller than Ukraine and 6 times less populated, and that it was attacked by NATO, without a UN mandate, in a balance of power of more than ten to one. Has anyone in the West wondered then about the quality of NATO's leadership, which took 78 days to defeat its Serbian adversary with such a balance of power? Has anyone questioned the legality of this action launched under a false pretext (false Racak massacre) and without a UN mandate?

Ukrainian Azovstal Human Shield Spills The Tea On Azov Nazi Captors...,

reuters  |   Cowering in the labyrinth of Soviet-era bunkers far beneath the vast Azovstal steel works, Natalia Usmanova felt her heart would stop she was so terrified as Russian bombs rained down on Mariupol, sprinkling her with concrete dust.

Usmanova, 37, spoke to Reuters on Sunday after being evacuated from the plant, a sprawling complex founded under Josef Stalin and designed with a subterranean network of bunkers and tunnels to withstand attack. read more

"I feared that the bunker would not withstand it - I had terrible fear," Usmanova said, describing the time sheltering underground.

"When the bunker started to shake, I was hysterical, my husband can vouch for that: I was so worried the bunker would cave in."

"We didn't see the sun for so long," she said, speaking in the village of Bezimenne in an area of Donetsk under the control of Russia-backed separatists around 30 km (20 miles) east of Mariupol.

She recalled the lack of oxygen in the shelters and the fear that had gripped the lives of people hunkered down there.

Usmanova was among dozens of civilians evacuated from the plant in Mariupol, a southern port city that has been besieged by Russian forces for weeks and left a wasteland.

Usmanova said she joked with her husband on the bus ride out, in a convoy agreed by the United Nations and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), that they would no longer have to go to the lavatory with a torch.

"You just can't imagine what we have been through - the terror," Usmanova said. "I lived there, worked there all my life, but what we saw there was just terrible."