Wednesday, May 18, 2022

“Get Ready to Be Muzzled: The Coming War on So-Called Hate Speech”

“Get Ready to Be Muzzled:
 The Coming War on So-Called Hate Speech”
by John W. Whitehead & Nisha Whitehead

“Whoever would overthrow the liberty of a nation 
must begin by subduing the freedom of speech.”
- Benjamin Franklin

"Beware of those who want to monitor, muzzle, catalogue and censor speech. Especially be on your guard when the reasons given for limiting your freedoms end up expanding the government’s powers.

In the wake of a mass shooting in Buffalo, NY, carried out by an 18-year-old gunman in military gear allegedly motivated by fears that the white race is in danger of being replaced, there have been renewed calls for social media monitoring, censorship of flagged content that could be construed as dangerous or hateful, and limitations on free speech activities, particularly online.

As expected, those who want safety at all costs will clamor for more gun control measures (if not at an outright ban on weapons for non-military, non-police personnel), widespread mental health screening of the general population and greater scrutiny of military veterans, more threat assessments and behavioral sensing warnings, more surveillance cameras with facial recognition capabilities, more “See Something, Say Something” programs aimed at turning Americans into snitches and spies, more metal detectors and whole-body imaging devices at soft targets, more roaming squads of militarized police empowered to do random bag searches, more fusion centers to centralize and disseminate information to law enforcement agencies, and more surveillance of what Americans say and do, where they go, what they buy and how they spend their time.

All of these measures play into the government’s hands. As we have learned the hard way, the phantom promise of safety in exchange for restricted or regulated liberty is a false, misguided doctrine that serves only to give the government greater authority to crack down, lock down, and institute even more totalitarian policies for the so-called sake of national security without many objections from the citizenry.

Add the Department of Homeland Security’s “Disinformation Governance Board” to that mix, empower it to monitor online activity and police so-called “disinformation,” and you have the makings of a restructuring of reality straight out of Orwell’s 1984, where the Ministry of Truth polices speech and ensures that facts conform to whatever version of reality the government propagandists embrace. And this expletive deleted, expletive deleted, expletive deleted creature will decide what you see and hear:
After all, it’s a slippery slope from censoring so-called illegitimate ideas to silencing truth. Eventually, as George Orwell predicted, telling the truth will become a revolutionary act. If the government can control speech, it can control thought and, in turn, it can control the minds of the citizenry.

It’s been a long time since free speech was actually free. On paper - at least according to the U.S. Constitution - we are technically free to speak. In reality, however, we are only as free to speak as a government official - or corporate entities such as Facebook, Google or YouTube - may allow. That’s not a whole lot of freedom, especially if you’re inclined to voice opinions that may be construed as conspiratorial or dangerous. (As we learned personally on Sept. 10, 2020 when Google/Blogger suddenly and without warning simply disappeared "Running 'Cause I Can't Fly" blog 1. - CP)

This steady, pervasive censorship creep clothed in tyrannical self-righteousness and inflicted on us by technological behemoths (both corporate and governmental) is technofascism, and it does not tolerate dissent. These internet censors are not acting in our best interests to protect us from dangerous, disinformation campaigns. They’re laying the groundwork now to preempt any “dangerous” ideas that might challenge the power elite’s stranglehold over our lives.

The internet, hailed as a super-information highway, is increasingly becoming the police state’s secret weapon. This “policing of the mind” is exactly the danger author Jim Keith warned about when he predicted that “information and communication sources are gradually being linked together into a single computerized network, providing an opportunity for unheralded control of what will be broadcast, what will be said, and ultimately what will be thought.”

Yet what a lot of people fail to understand, however, is that it’s not just what you say or do that is being monitored, but how you think that is being tracked and targeted. We’ve already seen this play out on the state and federal level with hate crime legislation that cracks down on so-called “hateful” thoughts and expression, encourages self-censoring and reduces free debate on various subject matter.

With every passing day, we’re being moved further down the road towards a totalitarian society characterized by government censorship, violence, corruption, hypocrisy and intolerance, all packaged for our supposed benefit in the Orwellian doublespeak of national security, tolerance and so-called “government speech.” Little by little, Americans have been conditioned to accept routine incursions on their freedoms.

This is how oppression becomes systemic, what is referred to as creeping normality, or a death by a thousand cuts. It’s a concept invoked by Pulitzer Prize-winning scientist Jared Diamond to describe how major changes, if implemented slowly in small stages over time, can be accepted as normal without the shock and resistance that might greet a sudden upheaval. Diamond’s concerns related to Easter Island’s now-vanished civilization and the societal decline and environmental degradation that contributed to it, but it’s a powerful analogy for the steady erosion of our freedoms and decline of our country right under our noses.

We’ve already torn down the rich forest of liberties established by our founders. The erosion of our freedoms happened so incrementally, no one seemed to notice. Gradually, the freedoms enjoyed by the citizenry became fewer, smaller and less important. By the time the last freedom falls, no one will know the difference. This is how tyranny rises and freedom falls: with a thousand cuts, each one justified or ignored or shrugged over as inconsequential enough by itself to bother, but they add up.

Each cut, each attempt to undermine our freedoms, each loss of some critical right adds up to an immeasurable failure on the part of each and every one of us to stop the descent down that slippery slope. We are on that downward slope now.

America is approaching another reckoning right now, one that will pit our commitment to freedom principles against a level of fear-mongering that is being used to wreak havoc on everything in its path. Yet as I make clear in my book "Battlefield America: The War on the American People" and in its fictional counterpart "The Erik Blair Diaries," while we squabble over which side is winning this losing battle, a tsunami approaches."
Related:

"Sitrep Operation Z 5/18/22: NATO Surrenders in Azovstal"

"Sitrep Operation Z 5/18/22: 
NATO Surrenders in Azovstal"
Nazi Azovites - from rats in a hole to fish in a barrel -  
This is what denazification looks like!
by Pepe Escobar

"The New York Times prevaricates as follows: Ukraine ended its “combat mission” in Mariupol and said fighters were being evacuated, signaling that the battle at a steel plant was over. https://nyti.ms/3sIon9B

Zelensky adds some Ukrainian/Cocainian dreams to that: “The evacuation mission from Azovstal continues. It is led by our military and intelligence officers.” (OK, Mr PianoDick, they’re being led straight into war criminal prison! - thank your military and intelligence officers for doing the job for the world!) Dmitry Polyansky says it differently: “I didn’t know English has so many ways to express a single message: the #Azovnazis have unconditionally surrendered.”

Nightfall did not stop the surrender process. Ukrainians are still surrendering in crowds without stopping. Sufficient forces to deal with this are on the terrain and the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the DPR are kicking ass and taking prisoners. Illumination rockets are constantly launched into the sky, which at least somehow facilitates the crawling out of underground inhabitants :) These invincible heroes are emaciated, ragged, hungry and a pitiful sight.

Donetsk Defense HQ – 962 Azovites surrendered and the process continues. In the meantime, 11 servicemen of the 25th airborne brigade and seventeen of the 54th mechanized brigade of the Armed Forces of Ukraine voluntarily laid down their arms and went over to the side of the DPR. We hope this is the start of a mass surrender. This is denazification and movies will be made and books will be written. After this major loss of prestige, expect a doozy of a false flag."
"Starting point today is the MoD report, 
and somewhat reformatted for ease of use."
Please view this complete, lengthy and highly informative article here:
Related:
Hey! Yes, YOU, Good Taxpayer Citizen! YOU'RE paying for this! $53 billion while our country falls apart! Don't you want to really know what's happening? Or are you truly so stupid and willfully ignorant that you believe all the lies and propaganda about this situation, while idiotically waving your oh-so-cutesy Ukranian flags? I don't think you are, or you wouldn't be here reading this... - CP
"Most of one's life is one prolonged effort to prevent oneself from thinking. 
People intoxicate themselves with work so they won't see how they really are."
 - Aldous Huxley

"How It Really Is"

"Massive Price Increases At Aldi! What Now?"

Full screen recommended.
Adventures with Danno, 5/18/22:
"Massive Price Increases At Aldi! What Now?"
"In today's vlog we are at Aldi and are noticing massive price increases! We are here to check out rising prices, and a lot of empty shelves! It's getting rough out here as stores seem to be struggling with getting products!"

Gregory Mannarino, "Middle Class People Are Being Deliberately Eliminated- FASTER!"

Gregory Mannarino, AM 5/18/22:
"Middle Class People Are Being Deliberately Eliminated- FASTER!"

Tuesday, May 17, 2022

"Should You Buy A Home Today? Don't Be A Sucker! Home Builders Begin To Worry; Historic Crash Coming"

Full screen recommended.
Jeremiah Babe, 5/17/22:
"Should You Buy A Home Today? Don't Be A Sucker!
 Home Builders Begin To Worry; Historic Crash Coming"

"Get Ready for Battle... Its Gonna Get Ugly"

Full screen recommended.
Canadian Prepper, 5/17/22:
"Get Ready for Battle... Its Gonna Get Ugly"
"The world is going to hell! Gas prices projected to rise 37%!
 "Apocalyptic" food prices..."

Musical Interlude: Liquid Mind, "Moment of Grace Part 1"

Full screen recommended.
Liquid Mind, "Moment of Grace Part 1"

"A Look to the Heavens"

"From our vantage point in the Milky Way Galaxy, we see NGC 6946 face-on. The big, beautiful spiral galaxy is located just 20 million light-years away, behind a veil of foreground dust and stars in the high and far-off constellation of Cepheus. From the core outward, the galaxy's colors change from the yellowish light of old stars in the center to young blue star clusters and reddish star forming regions along the loose, fragmented spiral arms.
NGC 6946 is also bright in infrared light and rich in gas and dust, exhibiting a high star birth and death rate. In fact, since the early 20th century at least nine supernovae, the death explosions of massive stars, were discovered in NGC 6946. Nearly 40,000 light-years across, NGC 6946 is also known as the Fireworks Galaxy. This remarkable portrait of NGC 6946 is a composite that includes image data from the 8.2 meter Subaru Telescope on Mauna Kea.”

"Your Standard Of Living Is Being Systematically Destroyed"

Full screen recommended.
"Your Standard Of Living Is Being Systematically Destroyed"
by Epic Economist

"Our standard of living is being destroyed right before our eyes. Many Americans still don’t realize that the damages caused to the U.S. economy won’t be reversed anytime soon. Soaring food prices, lower buying power, and rising living expenses are only a few of the distortions caused by the exceedingly foolish decisions made by our leaders over the past few years. Now, our quality of life is decaying, and our standard of living is steadily being eviscerated. And we’re being told that a lot more financial pain is on the horizon. 

Each week it passes by, Americans face some unpleasant new surprises at the pump. In May 2020, we used to pay $1.96 for a gallon of gasoline in most stations across the U.S. In May 2021, that price jumped to $3.08, marking an over 50% increase in just 12 months. But, of course, that wasn’t the end of the story. Last Sunday, Americans were paying on average $4.47 for a gallon of gas. On Monday, gas prices hit another all-time high of $4.48 per gallon. And today, that figure surged to $4.52. 

Needless to say, our paychecks aren’t rising at the same rate gas prices are. That means that the price of gasoline has jumped by almost another 50 percent since May 2021. Has your paycheck gone up by 50 percent during each of the last two years? If it did, you’re certainly very lucky, because the vast majority of Americans cannot answer that question affirmatively.

At the same time, food prices in America are going through the roof. Over the past 24 months, they’ve been rising at a pace that is unlike anything most of us have ever seen before. Last week, a new report showed yet another broad-based rise in the cost of food at the wholesale level, with grains up 41.3 percent from a year. On top of that, the price of eggs skyrocketed 161.3 percent, as a result of a bird flu outbreak that led to the depopulation of 10 percent of chickens in the U.S. By the way, chicken prices went up 24.1 percent from a year ago. Fresh vegetables also soared, up 45.7 percent while fresh fruit rose 17.3 percent.

Eating fresh vegetables is essential to maintaining good health. But to do so, now you have to pay 45% more. Has your paycheck gone up by 45 percent over the past year? Meanwhile, homes are becoming significantly less affordable too. The combination of extremely inflated home prices and higher interest rates — driven by the Federal Reserve’s more aggressive efforts to fight inflation — has pushed monthly mortgage payments on the typical U.S. home up by 19.5 percent in the first three months of the year, according to real estate listing service Zillow. Compared to a year ago, payments are 38 percent higher. Has anyone’s paycheck gone up by 38 percent over the past year? We keep asking these questions to highlight the fact that our standard of living is being systematically destroyed.

This is a real crisis, that will not only affect us here and now but impact our future generations. We’re headed to a horrific inflationary meltdown that will shake this country to the core. Now it is time to reap what we have sown, and it will not be fun at all."
- https://www.epiceconomist.com/

Gerald Celente, "Trends Journal", "Good Violence, Bad Violence"

Full screen recommended.
Strong language alert!
Gerald Celente, "Trends Journal",
"Good Violence, Bad Violence"
"The Trends Journal is a weekly magazine analyzing global current events forming future trends. Our mission is to present Facts and Truth over fear and propaganda to help subscribers prepare for What’s Next in these increasingly turbulent times."

“We Are on the Precipice”

“We Are on the Precipice”
by Jim Rickards

"I don’t believe many people grasp the enormity of the global food crisis we’ll be facing in the months ahead. But the world could be on the verge of a massive humanitarian crisis. Let’s dive in…

The supply chain collapse preceded the war in Ukraine, but the war has only intensified the problems. You can see it with your own eyes when you walk into a supermarket and find long stretches of empty shelves in stores that used to be chock-full of food and other merchandise. Even goods that are available such as gasoline are being sold at much higher prices. Prices for gasoline (and diesel, which is critical for goods transportation) have more than doubled in the past nine months. All of this is clear. The question is will it get worse from here? Unfortunately, the answer is yes.

Bob Unanue is the CEO of Goya Foods, which is one of the largest food distributors in the world. Few people are better positioned to assess the global food situation than Unanue, who deals with raw food deliveries on the one hand and retail customers on the other. Unanue is now warning, “We are on the precipice of a global food crisis.” Other experts are quoted making a similar point. That’s not hyperbole or fearmongering, but a serious analysis. Here’s why…

29% of All Wheat Exports in Jeopardy: In the Northern Hemisphere, the planting season for 2022 is well underway. Crops were planted (or not) in March and April. Based on that, you can already form estimates of output next September and October during the harvest season (subject to some variability based on weather and other factors).

Plantings have been far below normal in 2022, either due to a lack of fertilizer or to much higher costs for fertilizer where farmers simply chose to plant less. This predictable shortage is in addition to the much greater shortages due to the fact that Russian output is sanctioned and Ukrainian output is nonexistent because it’s at war.

Russia and Ukraine together account for 29% of global wheat and 19% of global corn exports. Russia and Ukraine together produce 29% of all the wheat exports in the world. That doesn’t mean they grow 29% of the wheat in the world. It means they grow 29% of the wheat exports.

The U.S., Australia, Canada and others grow a lot of wheat but consume most of it themselves. They export relatively little. Importantly, they don’t simply eat it. They feed it to their farm animals. People don’t often make the connection between grain and animal products, but it’s critical.

Many countries get 70–100% of their grains from either Russia or Ukraine or both. Lebanon gets 100%. Egypt is over 70%. Kenya, Sudan, Somalia, many central African countries and Jordan and other Middle Eastern countries receive much of their grain from Russia or Ukraine.


No Planting, No Crops: But it’s worse than that because not only are many Ukrainian exports shut down now, but the planting season is nearly over. And you’re not going to get any grain in October if you didn’t plant it in April or May. And they didn’t for obvious reasons. What that means is you project ahead to October, November, December of this year, those countries I mentioned are not going to be able to get their grain supplies. There simply aren’t going to be any, or they’ll be greatly reduced. The combined population of countries that get between 70% and 100% of their imports from Russia or Ukraine is 700 million people.

That’s 10% of the global population. So you’re looking at mass starvation. You’re looking at a humanitarian crisis of unprecedented proportions, probably the worst since the Black Death of the 14th century. That’s coming down the road, even if most people can’t see it coming or fully fathom the depths of the coming crisis. In short, we know enough now to predict much higher prices, empty shelves and, in some cases, mass starvation in the fourth quarter of this year and beyond.

Beyond the humanitarian aspect of the coming food shortages, there are also potentially serious social and geopolitical ramifications.

Another Arab Spring? You remember the “Arab Spring” starting in 2010. It started in Tunisia and spread from there. Well, it was triggered by a food crisis. There was a shortage of wheat, which triggered the protests. There were underlying problems in these societies, but a food crisis was the catalyst for the protests.

Now, many poorer countries in the Middle East and Africa are facing a much greater crisis as the impact of shortages manifests itself later this year and into next year. Will we see even more social unrest than in 2011? It’s very possible, and it could be even more destabilizing than the Arab Spring. We could also see waves of mass migration from Africa and the Middle East as desperate and hungry people flee their homelands.

Europe endured a wave of mass immigration in 2015. Many migrants were attempting to flee the war in Syria, but there were great amounts of people who weren’t affected by the war. They were just seeking better lives in the welfare states of Europe. Mass starvation could trigger an even greater migration, which would present Europe with enormous challenges.

The United States could also witness another wave of migration at the southern border, which is currently being inundated by migrants. A global food crisis could send the numbers spiraling to uncontrollable limits.

What if the War Drags On? And what if the war in Ukraine drags on well into next year? Next year’s growing season would also be disrupted and the shortages could extend into late 2023 and beyond. Well, maybe some would argue that other nations could pick up the slack and grow additional grain. That’s nice in theory, but it’s not that simple.

Russia is the largest exporter of fertilizer, and sanctions are cutting off supplies. Many farmers cannot get fertilizer at all, and those who can are paying between twice and three times last year’s price. That means that crops actually produced will have much higher prices because of the higher price of inputs such as fertilizer, and the higher transportation costs due to higher prices for diesel and gasoline.

Like I said earlier, we’re looking at a humanitarian crisis of unprecedented proportions, probably the worst since the black death of the 14th century. And we’re not prepared to handle it."

Gregory Mannarino, "Is The Market About To Melt Up Or Melt Down? What's Next? Here We Go..."

Gregory Mannarino, PM 5/17/22:
"Is The Market About To Melt Up Or Melt Down? 
What's Next? Here We Go..."

Bill Bonner, "The Fed's Asylum"

"The Fed's Asylum"
$40 billion for the Ukraine, Powell's reappointment 
and more from the Incompetents Hall of Fame...
by Bill Bonner

Youghal, Ireland - "Congress did two amazingly idiotic things last week. First, the House passed a $40 billion aid package for the Ukraine. (The Senate is on the case today.) Second, the Senate approved Jerome Powell for another stint at the Fed. How the two are related… and what it means for the Fed’s promise to stop inflation… are the dots we’re trying to connect.

It was only a few months ago that Americans didn’t give two figs about the Ukrainians. But now, every red-blooded heart beats with them… every sturdy pair of legs stands with them… and every dollar of federal spending includes a few centimes for the Zelensky government. And why not? Ukrainians are minted in the likeness of Washington and Jefferson… defenders of democracy and freedom, one and all. But wait… all Great Causes, like sewer systems, look good in diagrams; they get messy and malodorous when you get into the details.

After all, the people of the Donbass and Lubansk regions – Russian speakers – voted to leave the Ukraine. Shouldn’t democracy lovers support them, rather than the strong-arm centralizers of Kyev? And if Zelensky is such a democracy and freedom lover, how come opposition parties have been banned? Who’s right? Who’s wrong? We don’t know. Neither does the Biden Administration.

But as to $40 billion, we know this: it is money the feds don’t have… and, if they had it, they shouldn’t give it away. The US is most likely on the threshold of a huge crash and a recession; this is no time to be squandering money on foreign policy malarkey. Of course, $40 billion won’t bankrupt the nation and the Russians won’t sink it. Which is why the second thing Congress did is even more important… and more foolish.

Another Stab: We’re ready to forgive almost anything. Lincoln forgave the rebels for trying to assert their independence, after killing a quarter of them. And Isaac forgave Abraham, after the latter nearly carved him up. But forgiving is one thing… asking him to take another stab at it is another.

In the news recently was the story of a member of Congress who was caught watching porn during a House session. Our sympathies were with the politician. Anyone who has spent any time in Washington knows that Congress is one of the dullest, emptiest, most puerile places on the planet. Everything said is either a lie or a buffoonery. No honest man lasts very long – unless he can find something to distract himself. Maybe dirty pictures are just a way to keep things in perspective. The man denied the charge, but was condemned nevertheless and would have been taken behind the toolshed if there were one.

There are some things you can do in public office. And some things you can’t. Use the ‘n’ word… and your career is over. Pinch your secretary’s derriere and you will be handed a loaded pistol. But fumble, rob, cheat, lie… cause millions of deaths – and you get reappointed!

The make-believe battle between the two wings of the ruling class – ‘conservative’ and ‘liberal’… Republican and Democrat – occupies the press and satisfies the public. But when push comes to shove, both wings of the Deep, Deep State flap together. They carry the elite aloft… and leave ‘the people’ behind.

In both acts of Congress last week, Republicans and Democrats acted in unison… and solemnly voted to rip off the public. In the first instance, the American public has no real interest in the country where Hunter Biden earned $50,000 per month. Surely it is a coincidence that this very same country is now getting more in US aid than any other country in the world. Indeed, the Ukraine is now getting twice as much as the next biggest rathole – Israel. But much of the money ends up in good hands – the US ‘defense’ industry. And keeping the war going is also a priority because it helps distract the public from inflation, which was caused by Congress and the Fed.

The Fed’s Asylum: Which brings us to the second and more destructive of last week’s blunders – the confirmation of Jerome Powell’s reappointment as capo di tutti capi at the Fed. We now suffer the highest inflation rate in 40 years. And the public despises it. It is a ‘tax,’ but a particularly painful and insidious one. It falls like an unmoored window unit on the heads of the poorest among us. As we showed yesterday, higher food prices will likely condemn millions of the poorest people on the planet to starvation.

So, why leave the man most responsible for causing it at his post? You could set up a roadblock outside a Kentucky Fried Chicken joint and find dozens of people who would make better Fed chiefs. That is no salute to the genius of those ensnared, but to the fact that their minds are unpolluted by the Fed’s economic claptrap. No greasy talk of ideal 2% inflation… no hallucinations about the ‘wealth effect.’ And no orgasmic thrill at the thought of providing more ‘stimulus.’

Which is to say, most people have not spent their whole careers in the luxury wards of the Fed’s asylum; instead, they’ve had a chance to see the real world in action. Markets correct mistakes. Politics, rarely. In the Incompetents Hall of Fame are the generals who led America’s 20-year losing war in Afghanistan; they are treated with the respect normally reserved for successful people. There are the retired presidents, too – Bush, Obama, Trump. Despite their failures, they are rarely threatened by lynch mobs. Former Fed chiefs are there too. Greenspan, Bernanke, Yellen, Powell – together they helped cut the US growth rate in half… and multiplied US debt 5 times. And yet, they are still invited to give speeches; some – such as Janet Yellen – get to do even more damage as Secretary of the Treasury.

And Powell? In Washington, he has street cred. With a $30 trillion debt, the feds are going to need a lot more inflation in the years ahead; Powell may be a cretinous counterfeit, but he’s proven he can do the job. More to come…"

The Daily "Near You?"

Wichita Falls, Texas, USA. Thanks for stopping by!

"A Big Picture Of Russian War Doctrine"

"A Big Picture Of Russian War Doctrine"
Death by a thousand cuts: where is the West’s Ukraine strategy?
by Pepe Escobar

"Wars are not won with tactics and narratives – they require a Grand Strategy. Russia has a master plan behind its Ukraine military operations, but does the West have one? While we are all familiar with Sun Tzu, the Chinese general, military strategist and philosopher who penned the incomparable Art of War, less known is the Strategikon, the Byzantium equivalent on warfare.

Sixth century Byzantium really needed a manual, threatened as it was from the east, successively by Sassanid Persia, Arabs and Turks, and from the north, by waves of steppe invaders, Huns, Avars, Bulgars, semi-nomadic Turkic Pechenegs and Magyars. Byzantium could not prevail just by following the classic pattern of Roman Empire raw power – they simply didn’t have the means for it. So military force needed to be subordinate to diplomacy, a less costly means of avoiding or resolving conflict. And here we can make a fascinating connection with today’s Russia, led by President Vladimir Putin and his diplomacy chief Sergei Lavrov.

But when military means became necessary for Byzantium – as in Russia’s Operation Z – it was preferable to use weaponry to contain or punish adversaries, instead of attacking with full force. Strategic primacy, for Byzantium, more than diplomatic or military, was a psychological affair. The word Strategia itself is derived from the Greek strategos – which does not mean “General” in military terms, as the West believes, but historically corresponds to a managerial politico-military function.

It all starts with si vis pacem para bellum: “If you want peace prepare for war.” Confrontation must develop simultaneously on multiple levels: grand strategy, military strategy, operative, tactical. But brilliant tactics, excellent operative intel and even massive victories in a larger war theater cannot compensate for a lethal mistake in terms of grand strategy. Just look at the Nazis in WWII. Those who built up an empire such as the Romans, or maintained one for centuries like the Byzantines, never succeeded without following this logic.

Those clueless Pentagon and CIA ‘experts’: On Operation Z, the Russians revel in total strategic ambiguity, which has the collective west completely discombobulated. The Pentagon does not have the necessary intellectual firepower to out-smart the Russian General Staff. Only a few outliers understand that this is not a war – since the Ukraine Armed Forces have been irretrievably routed – but actually what Russian military and naval expert Andrei Martyanov calls a “combined arms police operation,” a work-in-progress on demilitarization and denazification.

The US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) is even more abysmal in terms of getting everything wrong, as recently demonstrated by its chief Avril Haines during her questioning on Capitol Hill. History shows that the CIA strategically blew it all the way from Vietnam to Afghanistan and Iraq. Ukraine is no different.

Ukraine was never about a military win. What is being accomplished is the slow, painful destruction of the European Union (EU) economy, coupled with extraordinary weapons profits for the western military-industrial complex and creeping security rule by those nations’ political elites. The latter, in turn, have been totally baffled by Russia’s C4ISR (Command, Control, Communications, Computers, Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance) capabilities, coupled with the stunning inefficiency of their own constellation of Javelins, NLAWs, Stingers and Turkish Bayraktar drones.

This ignorance reaches way beyond tactics and the operational and strategic realm. As Martyanov delightfully points out, they “wouldn’t know what hit them on the modern battlefield with near-peer, forget about peer.”

The caliber of ‘strategic’ advice from the NATO realm was self-evident in the Serpent Island fiasco – a direct order issued by British ‘consultants’ to Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky. The Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, Valery Zaluzhny, thought the whole thing was suicidal. He was proven right.

All the Russians had to do was launch a few choice anti-ship and surface Onyx missiles from bastions stationed in Crimea on airports south of Odessa. In no time, Serpent Island was back under Russian control – even as high-ranking British and American marine officers ‘disappeared’ during the Ukrainian landing on the island. They were the ‘strategic’ NATO actors on the spot, doling out the lousy advice.

Extra evidence that the Ukraine debacle is predominantly about money laundering – not competent military strategy – is Capitol Hill approving a hefty extra $40 billion in ‘aid’ to Kiev. It’s just another western military-industrial complex bonanza, duly noted by Deputy Chairman of the Security Council of Russia Dmitry Medvedev.

Russian forces, meanwhile, have brought diplomacy to the battlefield, handing over 10 tons of humanitarian assistance to the people of liberated Kherson – with the deputy head of the military-civil administration of the region, Kirill Stremousov, announcing that Kherson wants to become part of the Russian Federation.

In parallel, Georgy Muradov, deputy prime minister of the government of Crimea, has “no doubts that the liberated territories of the south of the former Ukraine will become another region of Russia. This, as we assess from our communication with the inhabitants of the region, is the will of the people themselves, most of whom lived for eight years under conditions of repression and bullying by the Ukronazis.”

Denis Pushilin, the head of the Donetsk People’s Republic, is adamant that the DPR is on the verge of liberating “its territories within constitutional borders,” and then a referendum on joining Russia will take place. When it comes to the Luhansk People’s Republic, the integration process may even come earlier: the only area left to be liberated is the urban region of Lysychansk-Severodonetsk.

The ‘Stalingrad of Donbass’: As much as there’s an energetic debate among the best Russian analysts about the pace of Operation Z, Russian military planning proceeds methodically, as if taking all the time it needs to solidify facts on the ground. Arguably the best example is the fate of Azov neo-Nazis at Azovstal in Mariupol – the best-equipped unit of the Ukrainians, hands down. In the end they were totally outmatched by a numerically inferior Russian/Chechen Spetsnaz contingent, and in record time for such a big city.

Another example is the advance on Izyum, in the Kharkov region – a key bridgehead in the frontline. The Russian Ministry of Defense follows the pattern of grinding the enemy while slowly advancing; if they face serious resistance, they stop and smash the Ukrainian defensive lines with non-stop missile and artillery strikes.

Popasnaya in Luhansk, dubbed by many Russian analysts as “Mariupol on steroids”, or “the Stalingrad of Donbass,” is now under total control of the Luhansk People’s Republic, after they managed to breach a de facto fortress with linked underground trenches between most civilian houses. Popasnaya is extremely important strategically, as its capture breaks the first, most powerful line of defense of the Ukrainians in Donbass. That will probably lead to the next stage, with an offensive on Bakhmut along the H-32 highway. The frontline will be aligned, north to south. Bakhmut will be the key to taking control of the M-03 highway, the main route to Slavyansk from the south.

This is just an illustration of the Russian General Staff applying its trademark, methodical, painstaking strategy, where the main imperative could be defined as a personnel-preserving forward drive. With the added benefit of committing just a fraction of overall Russian firepower.

Russian strategy on the battlefield stands in stark contrast with the EU’s obstinacy in being reduced to the status of an American dog’s lunch, with Brussels leading entire national economies to varying degrees of certified collapse and chaos. Once again it was up to Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov – a diplomatic master – to encapsulate it:

Question: “What do you think of Josep Borrell’s (Lavrov’s EU counterpart) initiative to give Ukraine frozen Russian assets as ‘reparations?’ Can we say that the masks have come off and the West is moving on to open robbery?”
Lavrov: “You could say it is theft, which they are not trying to hide… This is becoming a habit for the West. We may soon see the post of the EU chief diplomat abolished because the EU has virtually no foreign policy of its own and acts entirely in solidarity with the approaches imposed by the United States.”

The EU cannot even come up with a strategy to defend its own economic battlefield – just watching as its energy supply is de facto, incrementally turned off by the US. Here we are at the realm where the US tactically excels: economic/financial blackmail. We can’t call these ‘strategic’ moves because they almost always backfire against US hegemonic interests. Compare it with Russia reaching its biggest surplus in history, with the rise and rise of commodity prices and the upcoming role of the stronger and stronger ruble as a resource-based currency also backed by gold.

Moscow is spending way less than the NATO contingent in the Ukrainian theater. NATO has already wasted $50 billion – and counting – while the Russians spent $4 billion, give or take, and already conquered Mariupol, Berdyansk, Kherson and Melitopol, created a land corridor to Crimea (and secured its water supply), controls the Sea of Azov and its major port city, and liberated strategically vital Volnovakha and Popasnaya in Donbass, as well as Izyum near Kharkov. That doesn’t even include Russia hurling the entire, collective West into a level of recession not seen since the 1970s.

The Russian strategic victory, as it stands, is military, economic, and may even coalesce geopolitically. Centuries after the Byzantine Strategikon was penned, the Global South would be very much interested in getting acquainted with the 21st century Russian version of the 'Art of War'."
Hat tip to "The Burning Platform" for this material.

"Empire of Bioweapon Lies"

"Empire of Bioweapon Lies"
by Pepe Escobar

"What are the roots that clutch, what branches grow
Out of this stony rubbish? Son of man,
You cannot say, or guess, for you know only
A heap of broken images, where the sun beats,
And the dead tree gives no shelter, the cricket no relief,
And the dry stone no sound of water. Only
There is shadow under this red rock,
(Come in under the shadow of this red rock),
And I will show you something different from either
Your shadow at morning striding behind you
Or your shadow at evening rising to meet you;
I will show you fear in a handful of dust."

T.S. Eliot, "The Waste Land: I. The Burial of the Dead," 1922
Complete poem here:

"This glimpse of “fear in a handful of dust” already ranks as one of the prime breakthroughs of the young 21st century, presented this week by Chief of Russian Radiation, Chemical, and Biological Protection Force Igor Kirillov. The provisional results of evidence being collected about the work of U.S. bioweapons in Ukraine are simply astonishing. These are the main takeaways.

U.S. bioweapon ideologues comprise the leadership of the Democratic Party. By linking with non-governmental biotechnology organizations, using the investment funds of the Clintons, Rockefellers, Soros and Biden, they profited from additional campaign financing – all duly concealed. In parallel, they assembled the legislative basis for financing the bioweapons program directly from the federal budget.

COVID-19 vaccine manufacturers Pfizer and Moderna, as well as Merck and Gilead – of Donald “known unknowns” fame, and affiliated with the Pentagon – were directly involved.

U.S. specialists tested new drugs in the Ukraine biolabs in circumvention of international safety standards. According to Kirillov, acting this way “Western companies seriously reduce the costs of research programs and gain significant competitive advantages.”

According to Kirillov, “along with U.S. pharmaceutical companies and Pentagon contractors, Ukrainian government agencies are involved in military biotechnology activities, whose main tasks are to conceal illegal activities, conduct field and clinical trials and provide the necessary biomaterial.”

The Pentagon, Kirillov pointed out, expanded its research potential not only in terms of producing biological weapons, but also gathering information on antibiotic resistance and the presence of antibodies to certain diseases among the population in specific regions. The testing ground in Ukraine was practically outside the control of the so-called “international community”.

These findings, amply documented, suggest a vast “legitimized” bioweapon racket reaching the highest levels of the American body politic. There’s no doubt the Russians plan to thoroughly unmask it for the benefit of world public opinion, starting with a War Crimes Tribunal to be set up this summer, most probably in Donetsk.

An ongoing U.S. bioweapons program in Ukraine was one of the Top Three reasons that led to the launch of Operation Z, side by side with preventing an imminent NATO-managed blitzkrieg against Donbass and Kiev’s desire to re-start a nuclear weapons program. These are Top Three red lines for Russia.

The strength of the collected evidence may directly correlate with what was largely interpreted as a carefully measured Victory Day speech by President Putin. The Kremlin does not bluff. It will certainly privilege the meticulous presentation of – bioweapon – facts on the ground over grandstanding rhetoric.

The return of Nord Stream 2: Deputy Permanent Representative to the UN Dmitry Polyaniskiy announced Russia’s demand for an open meeting of the UN Security Council to present further evidence related to U.S. biolabs in Ukraine. Even if the meeting would be vetoed by the U.S., the evidence will be entered by Russia on the UN records.

These developments provide an extra indication there’s absolutely no space left for diplomacy between Russia and the U.S./collective West, as Polyaniskiy himself suggested when commenting the possible accession of Ukraine to the EU: “The situation has changed after Mr. Borrell’s statement that ‘this war should be won on the battleground’ and after the fact that the European Union is the leader in deliveries of arms [to Ukraine].”

It gets worse. The next chapter is Finland’s drive to join NATO. The Americans gamble that Finland – and Sweden – joining NATO will totally discredit Putin’s Operation Z as having accomplished next to nothing strategically: after all, in the near future, potential U.S. hypersonic missiles stationed in Finland and Sweden will be very close to Saint Petersburg and Moscow.

Meanwhile, Russian unmasking of the bioweapon racket will drive a toxic section of American political elites to turbo-charge their warmongering. It’s all following a carefully calculated script.

First, these bioweapon-supervising “elites” ordered the massive Kiev shelling of Donbas in early February. That forced the Kremlin’s hand, pushing it to launch Operation Z. We should always remember that the ultimate goal in the U.S. plan of training Ukrainians for war since 2014 was to alienate Germany from Russia – as Germany de facto controls Euroland economically.

Imperial control of the oceans allows the Empire to strangle Germany at will into subservience by cutting them off from Russian energy – as the British did to Germany in WWII when Britannia ruled the waves. The Wehrmacht could not supply their mechanized army with fuel. Now, in theory, Germany and the EU will have to look to the seas – and total U.S. dependency – for their natural resources.

The remote-controlled Kiev regime dominated by SBU fanatics and Azov neo-Nazis is making it even harder – by shutting off all natural gas from Russia through Ukraine into Europe, reducing the flow by more than one third.

That translates as U.S.-enforced blackmail to force the EU to increase the Ukro-weaponizing against Russia. The practical consequences for Germany and the EU will be dire – in terms of shut down industries and cost of home heating and electrical power. Russia, meanwhile, will rely on a bolstered Pipelineistan maze to China and East Asia as well as high-speed rail to transport all its natural resources.

Blowback against the Americans though is not off limits. Stranger things have happened. If gas transit to Europe via Ukraine is totally cut off, there are no alternatives. And that – assuming there are working IQs in Berlin – would open the way for a renegotiation on the future of Nord Stream 2. As the head of the Energy Development Center Kirill Melnikov notes, “the Yamal-Europe gas pipeline is practically idle and one of the Nord Stream 2 lines is also ready for operation though the German regulator has not issued permission for its launch yet.”

That prompted Melnikov to a priceless comment: “If purchases remain the same, Germany will probably need to urgently allow the launch of one of the Nord Stream 2 lines in order to replace the Ukrainian transit route.”

No one ever lost money betting on the astonishing stupidity permeating EUrocrat decision levels. Even facing economic suicide, the EU is desperate to “abandon” Russian oil. Yet a full ban is impossible, because of energy-deprived Eastern Europe. Every impartial energy analyst knows replacing Russian oil is D.O.A., for a number of reasons: the OPEC+ deal; the ghastly divide between Washington and Riyadh; the never-ending JCPOA renegotiation, where the Americans behave like headless chickens; and the crucial fact – beyond the understanding of EUrocrats – that European oil refineries are designed to use oil from the Urals.

So just when we thought we could enjoy the summer by watching Europe commit hara-kiri, it’s time to stock up on those Aperol Spritz. Get ready for a new hit series, season 1: 'Inside the American Bioweapon Racket.'"

"The Future..."

 

"Are They Really Out to Get Me?"

"Are They Really Out to Get Me?"
by Jeff Thomas

"Libertarians and others who seek to be left alone to run their own lives habitually ask themselves the above question regarding their government. So, what’s the answer? Are they out to get you? Well, unfortunately, the answer isn’t a simple "yes" or "no." In fact, it’s "yes" and "no."

The secret to understanding a government’s intentions is that there’s no unified overall objective, sentiment, or approach to dealing with the private sector. Quite the opposite. With any government, it couldn’t be more fragmented or dysfunctional.

At the very lowest level of any government is the civil service, which is, in any country, a catch-all for all those people who are so lacking in ability and imagination that they’d be unlikely to hold down a job in the private sector. Moreover, their level of motivation is likely to be so low that their dysfunction tends to coincide with extreme inefficiency.

To test this out, one only has to visit the local Department of Motor Vehicles, or a similar agency that does little except charge fees and waste time in order to provide you with a permit, which, were it not required, you could happily do without. Most anyone, in observing the individual behind the counter, would observe the glassy stare and recognize that, even though this person spends each working day behind this counter and may have been doing so for years, he or she takes virtually no interest in your personal concerns and, if you have questions, tends to find them a nuisance and an interruption in the endless drudgery of issuing paperwork.

Hence the image above. Here we have a pilot in Canada who, when being presented with a computer-driven list of tail letters that were authorized for him to choose from, immediately laughed when he saw the above letters on the list. He then went up to the counter, having circled the ones he chose, and the clerk processed the application brainlessly, without it even registering in his head what the letters suggested.

Later, when the pilot had had the letters emblazoned on his fuselage, it might not have been unlikely that an airport supervisor, seeing them 10 inches high on the side of the plane, raised an objection, at which time the pilot proudly produced his paperwork. As most anyone in the private sector can attest, as soon as paperwork is presented, the civil servant in question simply says, "Oh," then nods and lets you go on your way.

But, looking at this more deeply, what we’re witnessing is that that percentage of the population who are (once again) lacking in ability and imagination are easy to program by the government to become automatons - that even if something strikes them as being somehow incorrect, as long as it has the State stamp of approval, it’s just fine.

And, so, at the lower level of government, we have those who are not "out to get us"; they are merely borderline useless and have ended up with jobs in which that deficiency will not get them fired. They are, therefore, merely "in the way."

As we go up the chain, however, where those in government are somewhat more ambitious, we find a greater desire to control. The closer we get to the higher echelons, the more they truly are "out to get you." Why should this be? And why should it be that those the higher-ups tend to hate the most are those who are self-motivated, responsible, self-reliant, and imaginative?

Well, unfortunately, the answer is simple. It’s because those are the character traits that they lack. I’m sorry to have to say that in my many years of working directly with politicians and heads of governments, virtually all of them were highly evolved civil-servant types. They had more drive, more guile, and larger egos than the lower-level bureaucrats but were just as parasitical and just as lacking in character traits that would make them productive people.

With these individuals, yes, they are out to get you. First, if they recognize that you possess the traits that would make you productive, they will be highly jealous and suspicious of you. Second, they will understand that since you are productive and they are not, they must find a means by which they can use you as a cash cow, to be milked as much as possible and as often as possible.

Their purpose, therefore, is to regulate, control, and tax you in every way possible, and in this they are, quite simply, predators. They may be Tory or Labor, Republican or Democrat, but they are predators nonetheless and, as such, are a genuine threat to both your freedom and your well-being.

Of course, all politicians play the game of party politics, doing all in their power to convince the electorate that they and their party are dramatically different from the opposing party, presenting their own party as "the good guys," and the opposing party as "the bad guys." However, they are, as Judge Andrew Napolitano has repeatedly stated, merely "two wings of the same bird of prey."

Significantly, as both the bottom level and top level are separated by many other layers of bureaucracy, and as their common character traits are inability, dysfunction, etc., there is no cohesive set of principles upon which a government operates. Its purposes are control and usurpation, and they’re backed by an imbroglio of confused and self-contradictory legislation and an increasingly large body of enforcement agencies.

Although the individuals within these agencies tend to be incompetent and dysfunctional, they do tend to remain loyal to the whole. They may not get along with each other, or work toward a unified set of goals, or even have the same beliefs. They do, however, tend to do as they’re told and blindly support the State, above all else.

Once all the above is understood, the individual may do as this pilot has done. He has grasped the dysfunction and parasitical nature of his government and has used their own computer-generated registration code to express his reaction to "authority." More to the point, he has used their laws, their bureaucracy to express it legally.

This is an important point. Each individual, essentially, has three choices. He can either go along with those lesser beings who seek to control his life, or he can rebel and possibly be incarcerated for his efforts, or he can become creative and recognize that the laws and regulations of his country are a confused mess, written by incompetent people, and do all he can to assert his independence, legally. He can and should do everything in his power to operate his life as though he’s not owned by the government of his home country, or any other government, for that matter.

Wherever a government tries to control the ownership of his real estate through taxation, he might seek out a jurisdiction that has no property tax. If they try to tax his income, he might seek out a country that has no income tax. If they try to restrict his migration, he might seek a second citizenship that does not restrict him.

Freedom is not merely a vague historical idea, or an excuse to celebrate with firecrackers once a year; it’s a lifetime pursuit and should be taken on as such. The pilot in question has made an initial stab at it. Hopefully he, along with you, the reader, will make it a central facet of his life’s work."

"Half Price Houses Coming Soon - Entire Housing Tracks Will Not Be Finished"

Full screen recommended.
Dan, iAllegedly 5/17/22:
"Half Price Houses Coming Soon -
 Entire Housing Tracks Will Not Be Finished"
"With interest rates rising you’re going to see major problems in the real estate market between now and the end of summer. Entire housing tracks will not be completed. You will see houses go as low as $.50 on the dollar."

"How It Really Is"

 

"Empty Shelves At Meijer! This Is Getting Crazy! What's Next?"


Full screen recommended.
Adventures with Danno, 5/17/22:
"Empty Shelves At Meijer! 
This Is Getting Crazy! What's Next?"
"In today's vlog we are at Meijer with empty shelves everywhere! We are here to check out skyrocketing prices, and some food shortages! It's getting rough out here as stores seem to be struggling with getting products!"

Gregory Mannarino, "Fear Remains High In The Market; Inflation Continues To Surge"

Your guide:
Gregory Mannarino, AM 5/17/22:
"Fear Remains High In The Market;
 Inflation Continues To Surge"

Monday, May 16, 2022

"Don't Trust Your Bank, Get Your Money Out Now; Credit Card Limits To Be Cut"

Jeremiah Babe, 5/16/22:
"Don't Trust Your Bank, Get Your Money Out Now;
 Credit Card Limits To Be Cut"

"Stock Market Meltdown: We Are In The Middle Of The Second Dot-Com Bubble"

Full screen recommended.
"Stock Market Meltdown: We Are In The 
Middle Of The Second Dot-Com Bubble"
by Epic Economist

"The stock market crash has only just begun, and several indicators are signaling that the downfall is about to get a whole lot worse. After years of inflating, it’s getting clear now that the “everything bubble” has finally burst. Over the past few weeks, the stock market went from free and easy to a chaotic mess. Bubbly stocks haven’t experienced such acute levels of destruction since the turn of the century, but the truth is that this stunning meltdown shouldn’t come as a surprise for anyone. Wall Street always knew the day of reckoning would come. Market veterans, financial experts, and economists have warned about it incessantly for years. And even though no one could tell for sure when the crash would arrive, everybody could feel that the correction would be brutal. What we’ve seen so far is just the tip of the iceberg. A massive sell-off is underway, and in today’s video, we’re going to break down the factors that have been adding to investors’ panic, resulting in breathtaking losses, and marking the end of a historic bullish run.

Over the last few weeks, following the financial markets has felt like watching a horror movie. Fear is the predominant feeling, blood is everywhere, flames are eating up everything on their way, and crowds are running and screaming for the exits. The bull run of the past two years has given us quite non-sensical bubbly assets, such as meme stocks, celebrity cryptos, $2 million monkey pictures, some out-of-reality tech valuations, and a lot more as retail investing became mainstream. Despite the Friday flash rally, everybody’s portfolio is getting massacred. Now, the broader stock market bubble has popped while Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies are facing a devastating free-fall. As the era of meme stocks ends, the era of crash memes begins.

Last week, the S&P 500 went down 18% from its January 3 peak, while the Nasdaq tech index has dropped by almost 30% for the year, and the Dow Jones has recorded consecutive losses for seven weeks, the longest losing streak since 1980, according to Reuters data. Many individual stocks have cratered too, with Netflix and Peloton both down about 70%.

Then, there’s the crypto market. Since last fall, Bitcoin’s price has dropped by more than 50%. Last week’s losses have continued to feed a remarkable sell-off cycle that has already wiped out billions in market value. After almost a year of threatening to raise interest rates, the central bank finally did it. Top market veterans are now warning that Wall Street is heading into a summer from hell, and this period of extreme volatility and uncertainty will bring a near-biblical reckoning to the market.

"I think the bear market is just beginning, and I think it gets much worse through the second and third quarters of this year," Michael Pento said. According to his estimates, indexes could drop an additional 30 to 50% by the end of the year. Pento's views illustrate the growing bearish sentiment on Wall Street, and some strategists at major banks are also sounding the alarm about stocks.

Bank of America analysts led by Michael Hartnett said in a note to investors obtained by Bloomberg on Friday that the worst may still be yet to come for stocks. Those dire figures have led Morgan Stanley's Chief US Equity Strategist Mike Wilson to release a note last Monday warning that the bear market in stocks is "far from completed," citing the impact of inflation on corporate earnings and slowing growth ahead. At the beginning of the month, Deutsche Bank economists made a similar call. A punishing combination of still hot inflation, hiked interest rates, a conflict between Russia and Ukraine, lockdowns in China, unprofitable companies facing reality, and recession fears are making it more than clear that this isn't just a short-term correction - it's a pivotal shift for markets. Billions of dollars have just evaporated, and billions more are probably about to disappear as the chaos intensifies."

"Breaking: Russia Moves NUCLEAR Missiles to Finlands Border"

Full screen recommended.
Canadian Prepper, 5/16/22:
"Breaking: Russia Moves NUCLEAR Missiles to Finlands Border"
"Russia has moved Iskander missiles towards the border, NATO is preparing 15000 troops under the guise of "exercises" in Estonia. Wheat hits an all time high. High ranking NATO military possibly captured in Ukraine."

Musical Interlude: Peder B. Helland, "Dance of Life"

Full screen a must for this beautiful video!
Peder B. Helland, "Dance of Life"
Relaxing Fantasy Music for Relaxation & Meditation

"A Look to the Heavens"

"NGC 3199 lies about 12,000 light-years away, a glowing cosmic cloud in the nautical southern constellation of Carina. The nebula is about 75 light-years across in this narrowband, false-color view. Though the deep image reveals a more or less complete bubble shape, it does look very lopsided with a much brighter edge along the top.
Near the center is a Wolf-Rayet star, a massive, hot, short-lived star that generates an intense stellar wind. In fact, Wolf-Rayet stars are known to create nebulae with interesting shapes as their powerful winds sweep up surrounding interstellar material. In this case, the bright edge was thought to indicate a bow shock produced as the star plowed through a uniform medium, like a boat through water. But measurements have shown the star is not really moving directly toward the bright edge. So a more likely explanation is that the material surrounding the star is not uniform, but clumped and denser near the bright edge of windblown NGC 3199."

"Remember..."

""Remember, we all stumble, every one of us.
That's why it's a comfort to go hand in hand."
- Emily Kimbrough

"201 Mass Shootings In The U.S. This Year"

"201 Mass Shootings In The U.S. This Year"
5/16/22: "So far this year, there have been 201 mass shootings in the United States, and it's only May. CNN and the Gun Violence Archive define a mass shooting as one that injures or kills four or more people. As a reminder that gun violence spares no state, city or town, these are the places where they've happened in 2022."
So what happens when things get really bad, and they will... soon.
Constitution of the United States, Second Amendment:
"A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State,
 the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed."
Related:

Bill Bonner, "Death at the Margin"

"Death at the Margin"
As food and energy prices soar, it's time to count 
the real cost of the fed's heavy handed covid response...
by Bill Bonner

Youghal, Ireland - "Today, let’s turn to the question we left you with on Friday: How many people will die because of the feds’ efforts to ‘save lives’ during the Covid Panic? Trigger warning: we are coming dangerously close to earnest indignation.

In 2020, much of the economy was shut down and trillions in fake money (newly created by the Fed… neither earned nor saved) was distributed to offset the lost output. We are paying part of the tab now. GDP is going backward. Real wages are falling. And consumer prices are rising. On that front we got news last week that inflation was slowing down and speeding up at the same time. Last month, the official inflation rate (CPI) declined by 0.35%... from 8.54% to 8.26%. The very next day came the PPI, producer price index, telling us that coming our way is a 15.6% increase. This is the second highest reading since we were born (1948).

Counting The (Real) Cost: It gets worse. On MSNBC Friday morning was an economist (whose name we missed) arguing that the core prices for families are up 19%. Food, shelter, transportation – those are the ones that drain the family checking account. As for food, actual price increases are far above the BLS’s index. Beef is up 14%, chicken 15%, wheat flour 33%, orange juice 17%, coffee 70%.

Shelter, too, is much more pricey than the BLS says. Zillow computes the average rent people actually pay. It’s up 17% over a year ago, it says. The average price paid to buy a house is also 16% higher than a year ago. And fuel? A gallon a gas averaged $3.11 last May. Now, it’s up 40%. Inquirer/Business:

"WASHINGTON - US gas prices reached a record high Tuesday, as President Joe Biden said fighting inflation is his top domestic priority. The average price at the pump hit $4.37 per gallon, according to the American Automobile Association (AAA), surpassing the last record of $4.33 set on March 11."

But wait… there’s more! A lot more. Inflation is not just a matter of money. “Everything happens at the margin,” say economists. And at the margin, people die. Most of us have a substantial margin of error. If beef is too expensive, we can switch to chicken. If fuel goes up in price, we can stop making unnecessary drives… ride a bicycle… and turn the thermostat down.

Millions Doomed? But what about people who live on $10,000… or $1,000? The World Health Organization says that 6.2 million people died from the Covid over the last two years. (Probably overcounted in some areas and undercounted in others). But there are said to be some 9 million who die each year from hunger-related problems. And now, thanks largely to the money printing, phony interest rates, stimulus programs, shutdowns, and social distancing… the price of food is rising all over the world. WSWS.org:

"The FAO Food Price Index (FFPI), which measures change in international prices of a basket of food commodities, reported in September that prices were 32.8 percent higher than they had been a year prior. The prices of the most basic staples rose even more sharply; wheat was up 41 percent and maize 38 percent from September 2020."

The numbers are all over the place. But the UN reports that the number of people facing a “critical” lack of food has grown by 60 million over the last two years… and now nearly 200 million are thought to be in danger.

WSWS.org continues: "Every day more than seven hundred million people, 8.8 percent of the world’s population, go to bed on an empty stomach, according to the UN World Food Programme (WFP). Hunger and malnutrition mean shortened life expectancies, stunted mental development, the premature death of loved ones; it means widows and orphans and childless parents."

What is the real cost… the final tab… for the feds’ ‘heavy touch’ failures? Did the feds save a few old, plump people by sacrificing young, skinny ones? Did they save no one… and doom millions? More tomorrow…. including another visit to the Incompetents Hall of Fame. Stay tuned..."