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“We Are Human, We Are Free”: “The Great Reset” Must Be Defeated

Posted by M. C. on April 29, 2022

Their obsession with total control of all nature and life means they have no genuine awareness of what it means to be alive, and they see everything around them as something to be monetised, numbered and controlled to create a ‘perfect’ state of existence. Because they are so fundamentally insecure, and know that individuals do not willingly give up their existence to become slaves, their most powerful weapon to gain control is lying –  they try to con us into believing that giving them control is in our interests,

https://www.globalresearch.ca/analysis-great-reset-must-lead-practical-action-defeat-it-we-human-we-free-campaign/5778781

By Anita McKone

Global Research

Millions of people worldwide are aware that their lives, and their children’s lives, are being threatened by lockdowns. vaccine mandates and loss of free speech.

And there is a growing awareness that these immediate and obvious threats are merely parts of a complex overall plan to implement a technocratic system of world governance that can be described as a neo-feudal system that seeks to increase and consolidate the power and wealth of the world’s billionaire individuals and families by destroying any possibility of autonomous individual behaviour. The intention of these psychopathic elitists is that we ‘the people’ become literal extensions of their will, through technological invasion of all aspects of our lives which will lead to the total loss of our capacity to feel, think and act for ourselves.

Their obsession with total control of all nature and life means they have no genuine awareness of what it means to be alive, and they see everything around them as something to be monetised, numbered and controlled to create a ‘perfect’ state of existence. Because they are so fundamentally insecure, and know that individuals do not willingly give up their existence to become slaves, their most powerful weapon to gain control is lying –  they try to con us into believing that giving them control is in our interests, or indeed that we are in fact in control of our own lives when we make superficial, meaningless choices, such as voting for political parties that inevitably end up doing the bidding of the financial power elite.

These elitists have become masters at co-opting all movements of self-respect, self-care and solidarity – their use of double speak means they claim to be supportive of community, fair wealth distribution, truth in the media, ecological sustainability, diversity, racial equality, women’s equality, freedom and nonviolence (for example) while working to implement an agenda that supports none of these things. And their increasing use over the past 70 years of NGOs that sound ‘friendly’ and ‘independent’, but which in fact pursue corporate, imperialist and other elitist agendas, has led to enormous numbers of ordinary ‘concerned’ people putting their money and energy into organisations and movements that dissipate their capacity to genuinely act in their own interests and the interests of life on the planet as a whole.

To take just a few examples – the environment movement has become dominated by the demand for a massive ‘green’ tech revolution that requires further rape and pillage of the peoples and natural environment of Africa and anywhere else rare minerals are found, union movements around the world have become utterly neutered and no longer act in the interests of their working members, medical ‘science’ is most likely to be a profit-making anti-scientific enterprise rather than one designed to further people’s health through use of genuine scientific methodology, and (particularly close to my heart) campaigns using nonviolent tactics have been used to simply achieve ‘regime change’ in centralised states, furthering the interests of transnational corporations, even though this was never the intention of the majority of activists involved.

While it does feel demoralising at times to realise that it is necessary to question everyone and everything, and not take things at face value, ever (!), there are a number of  (genuinely) independent researchers (including those I have referenced above) who expose the goings on of the Global Elite, historically and currently, through detailed research, logical analysis and referencing, who make the work of deciding who definitely not to trust a little easier for the average person. Although they do not always agree on every angle, and bring different areas of research to the table, they put together a picture of the real world elitist actors, from all countries (Russia and China – herehere and here –  included), that have shaped and continue to shape the world through their particular philosophies (eg. technocracy, eugenics), plans (eg. the New World Order/Great Reset/UN Agenda 30) and organisations.

These researchers’ particular concern is looking beyond the ‘conflict and alliances between nation states’ narrative as an explanation for political and economic behaviour in the world, to expose the transnational and transcultural nature of global finance and elitist philosophies, and the fundamental war being continually waged by the Global Elite on ordinary people (people who are content with a relatively small scale, localised frame of reference for exercising control in their lives, and who value the autonomy of others, and therefore do not feel that they have to be in control in all situations). These researchers expose the megalomaniacs who crave to rule the world, who deem every bit of control exercised by others to be a threat to their security, and whose conflicts with each other pale in comparison to their disregard, disrespect and disgust for those not of their psychopathic, criminal ‘superclass’.

From Analysis to Action

Gaining a thorough analysis is extremely important, and a key part of activism involves research, self-education and information sharing, but if we want to change the situation, it is equally important that we come up with self-empowering actions that take this deeper analysis into account. So, when the historical, real world analysis shows that the Elite (because they are elitist!) do not have any interest in listening to those ‘below’ them, and when we know the extent to which they have corrupted (or even invented) mainstream politics and legal structures, we need to stop pretending 1) that political ‘leaders’ will listen if we complain a bit louder and longer and 2) that we must wait for our corporate oppressors and their political/legal enablers to give us permission to act in defence of our own lives and fundamental existence.

We have mostly been trained to be ‘polite’ or ‘law-abiding’ or ‘respectful of authority’ as children and unfortunately this psychological structuring makes us vulnerable to abusers who falsely claim to be authorities with our interests at heart. And our childhood fear of punishment for ‘disobedience’, including social abandonment when we think or feel differently to others,  gets in the way of us trusting our own capacity to feel, think, make decisions and act for ourselves. Often it helps to pay conscious attention to this fear, so that it can cease to rule us unconsciously. It is unfortunately the case that many freedom activists are still putting their faith in some leader, political party or system to save them, because they feel powerless as individuals, as they were trained to feel by the many forces for domination in the world.

We become powerful when we trust that we, ourselves, will do a pretty good job of getting things right, and even if we make mistakes, we can keep learning and successfully negotiating a path forward in life without being mindlessly obedient to someone who ‘knows better’. We become powerful when we take the initiative to act. We become powerful when we act on our own conscience, and face our fear of unjust punishment. We become powerful when we know that even an experience of pain is our experience to feel, and that we exist, fundamentally, no matter how hard someone tries to con us into believing that we are ‘nothing’. And when we experience solidarity and kindness from other activists as part of a resistance campaign it feels real and powerful, and worth so much more than any friendship that relies on pretending ‘everything is okay’ as we sleepwalk into slavery.

The We Are Human, We Are Free worldwide nonviolent campaign to resist ‘The Great Reset’ is based on both an analysis of the many different components of the Reset, and an analysis of the elitist power structures that further the Reset agenda by disempowering individuals so that they cease to believe they have the responsibility or capacity to take effective action for themselves.

There are so many things that people can do to practically defend themselves, and while it takes a bit of time and commitment to identify and change elements of our lives that contribute to Elite control, it is these ‘small’ things that add up to genuine change in one’s own life and in society as a whole.  Change and standing up for the truth as you see it sometimes takes courage, and there will be times when your resistance may be ‘dramatic’, but it is vital to remember that everyday sensible, practical actions are what grounds an effective resistance movement in reality.

Following is a poster available in 15 languages that presents grassroots noncooperation and constructive actions for people to take in 7 different areas: Pharma, Tech, Media, Banks, Business, Human Social Interactions and Non Payment of Fines (+ Surveillance is thrown in as an added bonus!). The campaign is explained more fully on the We Are Human, We Are Free website.

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Oops! Our Bad! IMF Director Admits “We Printed too Much Money”

Posted by M. C. on April 29, 2022

https://schiffgold.com/commentaries/oops-our-bad-imf-director-admits-we-printed-too-much-money/

 BY MICHAEL MAHARREY 

Mostly we get lies, spin and obfuscation from central bankers, politicians and bureaucrats. But every once in a while, one of these people accidentally wanders into the truth.

IMF Director Kristalina Georgieva did just that during a recent panel discussion hosted by CNBC. She conceded that central banks globally “printed too much money and didn’t think of unintended consequences.”

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1991: When America Tried to Keep Ukraine in the USSR

Posted by M. C. on April 29, 2022

Indeed, in the case of Ukraine, President George H.W. Bush even traveled to Kyiv in 1990 to lecture the Ukrainians about the dangers of seeking independence from Moscow, while decrying the supposed nationalist threat.

https://mises.org/wire/1991-when-america-tried-keep-ukraine-ussr

Ryan McMaken

The US government today likes to pretend that it is the perennial champion of political independence for countries that were once behind the Iron Curtain. What is often forgotten, however, is that in the days following the fall of the Berlin Wall, Washington opposed independence for Soviet republics like Ukraine and the Baltic states.

In fact, the Bush administration openly supported Mikhail Gorbachev’s efforts to hold the Soviet Union together rather than allow the USSR to decentralize into smaller states. The US regime and its supporters in the press took the position that nationalism—not Soviet despotism—was the real problem for the people of Eastern Europe and the Caucasus.

Indeed, in the case of Ukraine, President George H.W. Bush even traveled to Kyiv in 1990 to lecture the Ukrainians about the dangers of seeking independence from Moscow, while decrying the supposed nationalist threat.

Today, nationalism is still a favorite bogeyman among Washington establishment mouthpieces. These outlets routinely opine on the dangers of French nationalismHungarian nationalism, and Russian nationalism. One often sees the term nationalism applied in ways designed to make the term distasteful, as in “white nationalism.”

When nationalism is convenient for the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and its European freeloaders, on the other hand, we are told that nationalism is a force for good. Thus, the US regime and mainstream media generally pretend that Ukrainian nationalism—and even Ukrainian white nationalism—either don’t exist or are to be praised.

In 1991, however, the US had not yet decided that it paid to actively promote nationalism—so long as it is anti-Russian nationalism. Thus, in those days, we find the US regime siding with Moscow in efforts to stifle or discourage local nationalist efforts to break with the old Soviet state. The way it played out is an interesting case study in both Bush administration bumbling and in the US’s foreign policy before the advent of unipolar American liberal hegemony. 

The Antinationalist Context

In the late 1980s, it was already apparent that the Soviet Union was beginning to lose its grip on many parts of the enormous polity that was the USSR. Restive nationalists within the Soviet Union were beginning to assert local control. For example, by 1989, ethnic Armenians and Azeris were already embroiled in the conflict over Nagorno-Karabakh that continues to this day. Deadly ethnic violence flared, but Moscow, in its weakened state, put off taking action. Yet, in January 1990, Moscow did act in what is known in Azerbaijan today as “Black January.” Soviet tanks rolled into the Caspian Sea port city of Baku and killed as many as 150 Azeris—many of them civilians: “The ostensible aim of the intervention was to stop Azeri massacres of Armenians, but the real goal was to prevent the Azerbaijani Popular Front from taking power.”1 The Popular Front was the chief political arm of anti-Moscow nationalism in Azerbaijan, and its leader stated, ”The goal is to drive out the army, liquidate the [Moscow-controlled] Azerbaijani Communist Party, establish a democratic parliament.”

Yet instead of Washington pundits instructing Americans to announce “I stand with Azerbaijan,” we were told the real threat was nationalism. As Doyle McManus wrote at the Los Angeles Times in 1990: “An ancient specter is haunting Europe: untamed nationalism…. From Baku to Berlin, as the Soviet Bloc has disintegrated, ethnic conflicts that once seemed part of the past have suddenly returned to life.” These old nationalistic impulses, one official from the State Department averred, are “dangerous ghosts” from Europe’s past. Arch establishment foreign policy advisor Zbigniew Brzezinki was on hand to claim that ethnic tensions could lead to “geopolitical anarchy.” Bush administration officials were “worried” that smaller national groups might replace the Soviet Union. At the time, it was not uncommon to hear that nationalism in Europe would bring about a situation similar to that which supposedly caused World War I. As one “senior Bush advisor” said, “It’s 1914 all over again.”

So, when the Soviet tanks showed up to crush a potential coup that might free some Soviet subjects from Moscow’s yoke, the feeling in Washington was one of relief rather than dismay at Moscow’s aggression. Washington was clinging to the idea that the answer to nationalism was to ensure the continued existence of—as Murray Rothbard put it—”a single, overriding government agency with a monopoly force to settle disputes by coercion.” That agency was the USSR. 

The US Against Independence for Ukraine and the Baltics

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Going Full Orwell: Homeland Security To Launch ‘Disinformation Governance Board’

Posted by M. C. on April 29, 2022

The US Department of Homeland Security announced yesterday that it is creating a “Disinformation Governance Board” to fight “disinformation.” Heading up the new outfit is, not surprisingly, a highly political Democratic Party operative who is herself a spreader of disinformation. What could go wrong? Also today: Germany caves to EU on Russia oil embargo and…another day another aid package to Ukraine: Biden asked for $33 billion!!!

Who decides what is truth? AOC?

Thank you Tom Ridge

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Elon Musk’s Twitter Gambit and What It Means to the “Clique in Power”

Posted by M. C. on April 28, 2022

https://mises.org/wire/elon-musks-twitter-gambit-and-what-it-means-clique-power

Michael Rectenwald

Elon Musk’s bid to take over Twitter and turn it into a private company has apparently been successful. Now the real action begins. Musk’s buyout exposes the Big Digital media complex to unwanted and unwonted competition, while threatening to loosen its near-total control of information and opinion. Twitter has represented a vital component in an information configuration that has barred competitors and participants from the digital sphere by means of progressive criteria, including wokeness, political fealty, and obedience to official state dictates and narratives.

The response to the Twitter takeover by the arbiters of acceptable expression has been as hysterical as it has been swift. The New York Times, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), Media Matters for Americamembers of the establishment professoriate, and other “experts” have rushed to fortify the defensive forces against free speech.

Angelo Carusone, president of Media Matters, described the sale of Twitter to Mr. Musk as

a victory for disinformation and the people who peddle it. Musk could unleash a wave of toxicity and harassment and undo Twitter’s efforts to increase quality engagement and make its platform safer for users….

This potential deal is about much more than the future of Twitter. A sale to Elon Musk without any conditions will pollute the entire information ecosystem by opening the floodgate of hate and lies. Twitter’s board needs to take this into account now before the deal is done.

Despite the special pleading for safe spaces, Carusone is right about one thing. The deal is about more than the future of Twitter. As if it wasn’t already obvious, the Twitter board’s earlier attempt to foil Musk’s seizure of the company with a poison pill betrayed the true nature of the Big Tech cartel member. It has not operated as a for-profit, free-market competitor but rather as a vital component in a carefully curated monopolistic information bubble that it has helped to cultivate and maintain, and within which it has not needed to compete.

Musk’s commitment to free speech has raised the hackles of the establishment gatekeepers, who ironically figure free speech as a “threat to democracy.” Alluding to Twitter’s state functions, California State East Bay professor of communication and history Nolan Higdon said that Musk’s acquisition makes “democracy less and less likely to work as it’s designed.” Democracy here does not mean equal representation in the public sphere but rather the preordained domination of a particular “democratic” ideology. This ideology is defined by the imperatives of “diversity, equity, and inclusion,” which are expressed in terms of acceptable and protected identities and politics.

Human rights groups fret that Musk’s commitment to free speech will endanger supposedly beleaguered identity groups, who will be harmed by other people’s speech given the possibility that Twitter’s restrictive algorithms will be overwritten. “Regardless of who owns Twitter,” wrote digital rights researcher and advocate at Human Rights Watch Deborah Brown, “the company has human rights responsibilities to respect the rights of people around the world who rely on the platform. Changes to its policies, features, and algorithms, big and small, can have disproportionate and sometimes devastating impacts.”

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Pushback Against Wokeness at Stanford

Posted by M. C. on April 28, 2022

Will the Stanford Review get cancelled?

By Vasko Kohlmayer

A truly heartening piece of news comes out of Stanford: The Stanford Review, the school’s independent newspaper, is taking a bold stand against [the] unhinged progressivism that has taken over so many American universities.

This Monday they started a series called “Woke Watch.”

This is a laudable pushback against woke insanity at one of America’s premier institutions of higher learning.

This is what the Review staff wrote in the editorial in which they announced the launch of their admirable initiative:

“No idea should be off-limits at a university. But when an ideology becomes so prevalent that it is nearly impossible to challenge, it becomes a serious problem—and a threat to academic freedom. Over the last few years, Stanford has been taken over by a collection of theories that view society as consisting only of the oppressors and the oppressed, see words as violent and disagreement as danger, and deny the existence of objective truth. Whether these theories are called anti-racism; social justice; Critical Theory; Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion; or simply being “on the right side of history;” their effect is the same. They chill free speech, encourage conformity, and demonize disagreement. We at the Review are deeply concerned about the stranglehold these ideas place on rational discourse. In this spirit, we are launching “Woke Watch,” a new series that gives readers an inside look into how wokeness is rotting the intellectual foundations of one of America’s leading universities.”

It is worth reading this excellent short editorial in full which you can do here.

God’s speed to the very brave writers and editors at The Stanford Review. They are taking their good fight straight to the lions’ den.

There is every indication that they have their work cut out for them, since Stanford – like most American universities – has its share of noxious progressive educators. Earlier this month, the Review ran a story on a Stanford mathematics professor by the name of Jo Boaler. Boaler uses her prestigious position to influence public education policy in California as well as in the United States. Boaler happens to be one of the co-authors of the California Math Framework (CMF), which sets out guidelines for math education for millions of California’s pupils. The document asserts – among other things – that the notion of gifted children is a “myth.” The project is largely an attack on high standards in learning and teaching, which is something that a number of sane professors and educators have objected to.

One of those who has criticized Boaler is a Berkeley professor Jelani Nelson, who is black. Nelson argued that the guidelines co-authored by Boaler will harm minorities in particular, because they promote low quality of work. When Nelson also pointed out that Boaler was charging the government $5,000 per hour for her “consulting” work, Boaler did what most good, white progressive leftists do in such situations: she called the police and lawyers to silence her opponent.

This shows that the staff of The Stanford Review will have no shortage of good material for their “Woke Watch.”

May their work shed light of truth on the progressives’ hypocrisy, greed, immorality, lies and totalitarian mindset.

The woke progressive left represents a great threat to civilization as it aims to subsume and destroy everything that is good, beautiful, holy, decent, and wholesome.

May sanity, openness, tolerance and decency prevail at Stanford and all throughout our world.

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$4 Billion and Counting: the D.C. War Machine Feasts on Ukraine

Posted by M. C. on April 28, 2022

Step aside, COVID Mania. The military industrial machine is back in the saddle.

By Jordan Schachtel
The Dossier

After going a full administration without a new war to fill their coffers, the D.C. defense industry has finally found their next big prize. After dismissing the prospect of diplomacy between Ukraine and Russia, the Biden Administration continues to flood Ukraine with an endless supply of military hardware, while using extraconstitutional means to perpetually lengthen the size and scope of America’s involvement in the Russia-Ukraine war.

Pfizer, Moderna, and Johnson & Johnson had their time to shine, but now it’s the defense contractors’ time to hoover up all it can from the taxpayer-funded Beltway regime. Welcome back to your place in the spotlight, and hop on back aboard the U.S. taxpayer gravy train, Boeing, Raytheon, Lockheed, and friends. There’s an ongoing inter slavic conflict 5,000 miles away from our shores, and the war machine is ready to eat.

.

On Tuesday, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin (who served on the board of Raytheon prior to his appointment) kicked off what he deemed a “historic meeting” of more than 40 allied countries, with the purported goal to “help Ukraine win the fight against Russia’s unjust invasion.”

And how exactly will Lloyd Austin accomplish such a task?

Read the Whole Article

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Diplomacy, not more arms is needed to avoid WWIII with Russia

Posted by M. C. on April 28, 2022

https://matthewehret.substack.com/p/diplomacy-not-more-arms-is-needed?s=r

Matthew Ehret

[The following article was co-written with my colleague Dr. Edward Lozansky and published in today’s print and digital edition of the Washington Times in order to call attention to the anniversary of Elbe Day and the forgotten spirit of US-Russian friendship that ended the threat of a fascist New World Order in 1945′]

With each passing day, it is becoming more evident that the lunatics have taken over the asylum, and words that would have been considered the height of self-destructive folly just a few years ago, are becoming normalized in today’s political discourse.

The most radical elements, including certain members of congress, are calling for sending U.S. troops to Ukraine where they would join U.K. troops who are already on the ground “training” combatants. This of course means NATO forces are being put directly into harm’s way despite the risk of activating the “Collective Security Pact” at a moment’s notice pulling the entire 29 nation alliance into an active conflict with nuclear Russia.

Instead of using diplomacy in search of a way out, NATO and even some non-NATO countries are sending huge amounts of weapons to Ukraine which only amplifies the needless killing. Actually, the flow of Western weapons and military advisers to Ukraine started many years before the current crisis.

As each day edges us closer to the unthinkable, meaning WWIII with the use of nuclear weapons, it is important, at least for the benefit of survivors and future historians, to correctly describe why our civilization has decided to commit suicide. Perhaps this exercise may also contribute in some way to helping to avoid such a tragic fate.

If only the famous “not one inch eastward” assurance about NATO expansion pledged by the U.S. Secretary of State James Baker to Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev on Feb. 9, 1990, was honored, this entire catastrophe would have easily been avoided. Mr. Baker’s pledge was followed by an avalanche of other security assurances given by western leaders to Mr. Gorbachev and other Soviet officials throughout the process of German unification between 1990 and 1991, according to declassified U.S., Soviet, German, British and French documents posted by the National Security Archive at George Washington University. Under this paradigm, it was celebrated across Washington and Europe that “a new security architecture from Vancouver to Vladivostok” was upon us.

Sadly, that promise was short-lived, and within a short time, the process of NATO expansion was set into motion with the alliance gobbling up 13 more Eastern European states with targets on the Ukraine and Georgia. A younger and more lucid Joe Biden was then a senator who took an active part in this new conquest. He had a chance to fix this problem during the Obama years when Mr. Biden, as his VP, had a Ukrainian portfolio. Had this administration honestly proceeded with the announced reset, there is no doubt that friendship and harmony of common interests could easily have been maintained. Instead, it facilitated a Maidan coup in February 2014 when Victoria “F—- the EU” Nuland found herself working alongside VP Biden overseeing a color revolution that ousted a democratically elected Ukrainian president, putting Ukraine back onto the fast track for NATO membership. Those who followed these events remember well how Ms. Nuland was discussing the composition of the new Ukrainian cabinet with the U.S. Ambassador Geoffrey Pyatt almost three weeks before the coup had actually taken place.

Another chance for peace was lost when Mr. Biden failed to pronounce the word “neutrality” on any day prior to Feb. 24 of this year. This simply meant agreeing to neutrality for Ukraine. Keeping this country sovereign and whole without joining NATO or any military block was the easiest request for the Western alliance to meet. Had this been done, there would be no Russian invasion, U.S.-Russia security talks would have proceeded with good chances for success similar to the Reagan-Gorbachev scenario that ended the first Cold War.

And, of course, who would have benefited more than Ukraine, to whom the creator gave the richest fertile land, favorable climate, no deserts, no volcanoes, access to the sea, more than sufficient drinking water supplies, over 40 million population and strong industrial base left over from the Soviet days. Having Russia as a neighbor was not a disadvantage but a huge benefit due to their deeply-rooted historical, family, religious, economic and cultural ties.

Unfortunately, there were other forces, both inside and outside Ukraine that had other plans for this country that lit the fuse of the current disaster which might spill over onto the rest of the world. The plan was to turn Ukraine into an anti-Russian zone of conflict and so far, it looks like so far these forces are prevailing.

One of the few voices of sanity speaking to this growing crisis in recent days has come from the offices of former President Donald Trump, who still enjoys a large base of popular support within the American people, as well as better members of the political and business class who must play a role in putting out the fires of war before they go nuclear in the short-term.

Read the Whole Article

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There Is No Federal Solution

Posted by M. C. on April 28, 2022

If there is to be a war on drugs, government funding of education and health care, government welfare programs, government grants and subsidies, discrimination laws, gambling laws, and a minimum wage, then these things must be instituted at the state level. This, of course, does not mean that they are desirable, and, in fact, all of them are antithetical to the principles of liberty, even at the state level.

by Laurence M. Vance

The twentieth century in the United States can certainly be characterized by the massive increase in federal solutions to right every wrong, correct every injustice, and fix every problem, real or imaginary. This mentality is what gave us things like the New Deal, Social Security, Prohibition, the Fair Labor Standards Act, the Civil Rights Act, the Fair Deal, the Great Society, the War on Poverty, the War on Drugs, Medicare, and Medicaid. Unfortunately, much of this is still with us.There are a number of issues where the federal government has so clearly and plainly violated the Constitution by its solutions that it boggles the mind that anyone would defend its actions.
[Click to Tweet]

With the coming of the COVID- 19 pandemic in 2020, the 50 states reasserted themselves as problem solvers, but not in a good way. Governors, mayors, county commissioners, and city councilmen enacted draconian lockdowns, quarantines, face mask requirements, the closure of “unessential” businesses, bans on indoor dining, the closing of schools, stay-at-home orders, contract tracing, curfews, capacity limits on stores and restaurants, the canceling of concerts and sporting events, social distancing requirements, prohibitions on weddings and funerals, vaccine mandates, and the closure of bars, churches, theaters, amusement parks, and casinos.

Compared to the actions of the states, the federal government’s role at the beginning of the pandemic almost seems benign. The federal government initially did what it does best: hand out money. The Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act gave $1,200 to each adult, plus an additional rebate of $500 per qualifying child. The Tax Relief Act gave every adult $600, plus another $600 per qualifying child. The third COVID-19 stimulus package passed by the U.S. Congress was the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA). It provided adults with a maximum “recovery rebate” of $1,400 per eligible individual, plus an additional $1,400 per qualifying child.

But, of course, the federal government did not stop there. President Biden repeatedly promised on the campaign trail that he was going to “shut down the virus.” Soon after Biden took office, on January 29, 2021, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) instituted a face mask mandate for all people while on public transportation (airplanes, trains, subways, buses, taxis, ride-shares, maritime transportation, trolleys, cable cars) or at transportation hubs (commercial airports, bus terminals, commercial vessel terminals, train and subway stations, seaports, U.S. ports of entry, dedicated ride-share pick-up locations).

Throughout 2021, the federal government did everything it could to promote and mandate the COVID-19 vaccine. Biden’s “Path out of the Pandemic,” issued on September 9, maintained that his administration would “continue to use every tool necessary to protect the American people from COVID-19.” Additional actions were announced in December “to combat COVID- 19 as the United States headed into the winter months.

Biden’s statements

But then Biden made two brief statements that seemed to negate everything that the federal government was doing. In late December, Biden spoke with state governors on a call regarding potential strategies to manage the continued impact of COVID-19. After White House COVID coordinator Jeff Zients cleared the press from the room, Biden took questions from several governors. Arkansas governor Asa Hutchinson, a Republican, chairman of the National Governors Association, spoke about challenges his state was experiencing in responding to the pandemic: “And so one word of concern or encouragement for your team is that as you look towards federal solutions that will help alleviate the challenge, make sure that we do not let federal solutions stand in the way of state solutions.” Biden then surprisingly said that “there is no federal solution” to the COVID-19 pandemic and declared that it “gets solved at the state level,” before he boarded a helicopter and departed for his home state of Delaware.

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Empire Strikes Back! EU Threatens Musk Over ‘Free Speech’ On Twitter

Posted by M. C. on April 27, 2022

EU officials have warned Elon Musk that he faces steep fines or an outright ban if he follows a “free speech” model once his purchase of Twitter is complete. How far will authorities go to restrict freedom of expression? Also: Twitter’s top censor breaks down in tears at the thought of her reign coming to an end. And finally: Wimbledon’s racism.

Me thinks thou protesteth too much!

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