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No Victory Lap For Governors Who Locked Down America – AIER

Posted by M. C. on July 15, 2021

The lockdowns that governors imposed also pointlessly ravaged many Americans’ mental health. The Centers for Disease Control last month reported a 51% increase in emergency room visits for suspected suicide attempts by teenage girls in early 2021. A Kaiser Family Foundation survey found a 300% increase in the percentage of adults reporting symptoms of anxiety disorder and/or depressive disorder (41% of adults in January 2021). The CDC also reported a record number of drug overdose deaths last year, due in part to the lockdowns and other government-imposed disruptions. 

https://www.aier.org/article/no-victory-lap-for-governors-who-locked-down-america/

James Bovard

James Bovard

There are no fact-checkers for victory laps. Last week, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo summarized his experience with the Covid-19 crisis: “Speaking for myself, it was a tremendous personal benefit.” Cuomo made that declaration in a speech concluding his one-year chairmanship of the National Governors Association. Because Cuomo’s spiel sought to rewrite history to exonerate politicians who ravaged Americans’ rights and liberties, it requires a rebuttal. 

Cuomo declared that “we maximized the moment as governors. Governors have a new credibility. Governors have a new status.” Cuomo epitomized the rush to “absolute power” that occurred in governor’s mansions across the nation. After he fueled pandemic fears, the New York Times proclaimed, “Andrew Cuomo Is the Control Freak We Need Right Now.” A New Yorker profile, titled “Andrew Cuomo, King of New York,” explained that Cuomo and his aides saw the battle over Covid policy as “between people who believe government can be a force for good and those who think otherwise.” Cuomo denounced anyone who disobeyed his edicts, including condemning sheriffs as “dictators” for refusing to enforce his mask mandate inside people’s homes. 

Cuomo justified placing almost 20 million people under house arrest: “If everything we do saves just one life, I’ll be happy.” Though his repressive policies failed to prevent New York from having among the nation’s highest Covid death rates, he became a superhero thanks largely to media scoring that ignored almost all of the harms he inflicted. Cuomo won an Emmy Award for his “masterful use of television” during the pandemic. Media valorization helped make Cuomo’s self-tribute book,American Crisis: Leadership Lessons from the COVID-19 Pandemic, a bestseller. 

Cuomo had plenty of power-mad accomplices in the governors’ association.  Oregon Governor Kate Brown banned residents from leaving their homes except for essential work, buying food, and other narrow exemptions and also banned all recreational travel. Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer imposed some of the most severe restrictions, prohibiting anyone from leaving their home to visit family or friends. Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti even banned people from walking or bicycling outside. The CDC eventually admitted that there was almost no risk of Covid contagion from outdoors activity not amidst a throng of people. But that did not stop politicians from claiming that “science and data” justified locking people in their homes. 

Some governors have acted as if their shutdown orders gave them unlimited sway to decree when normal life could resume. California Gov. Gavin Newsom decreed that Covid restrictions would be perpetuated in California counties based on voter turnout, alcohol availability, and other non-health factors. California assemblyman Kevin Kiley groused, “An entire county can be kept shut down because certain areas are judged to be lacking in ‘equity,’ even if the whole county has relatively few cases of Covid.” The end of Covid restrictions turned into hostage release negotiations with domineering rulers clinging to all their new prerogatives. 

Cuomo was proud that, when he visits a school, he is no longer asked “‘What does a governor do?” because “people know what governors do and how important governors are.” Governors can wreck kids’ futures by shutting down schools and placing children under indefinite home detention, costing millions of children almost an entire year of learning.

See then rest here

James Bovard is the author of ten books, including Public Policy Hooligan, Attention Deficit Democracy, The Bush Betrayal, and Lost Rights: The Destruction of American Liberty. He has written for the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Playboy, Washington Post, New Republic, Reader’s Digest, and many other publications. He is a member of the USA Today Board of Contributors, a frequent contributor to The Hill, and a contributing editor for American Conservative

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Will the Feds Try Price Controls to “Fix” Price Inflation? | Mises Wire

Posted by M. C. on July 15, 2021

Capping the amount of money a producer can charge for a product will not stimulate increased production or investment—why would it? This is why shortages inevitably follow: Who would enter into production or increase their production of a good at a time when doing so is a money-losing venture?

That being the case, price controls and the determined politicians who support them, are likely to push us even further down the road to serfdom than we already are.

https://mises.org/wire/will-feds-try-price-controls-fix-price-inflation

Joseph Solis-Mullen

As it began rapidly expanding the money supply early in 2020, the Fed confidently assured the public there would be no unanticipated or serious rise in inflation. Now that their projections have failed to materialize (in fact, their forecasts were off by almost 40 percent), they assure us that this will be but a temporary spike.

But for the sake of argument, let us imagine they are wrong—something that considering their track record is not difficult to do: What then?

As policymakers continue to mine the twentieth century for mistakes to repeat—from protectionism to higher taxes, to trying to start a second Cold War technology and arms race—it seems only logical to ask how long it will be before popular discontent over the rising consumer prices generated by their mismanagement of the money supply leads them to resurrect one of the most serious and notable policy failures of the last hundred years: price controls. After all, prices are rising rapidly, right?

Meant to arrest the rise in prices brought on by the increased amount of money pursuing the same basic amount of goods—since February 2020 M2 has expanded more than 25 percent—price controls have only ever brought shortages and poverty despite their typical initial popularity.

Should inflation persist or accelerate, price controls may be presented as a temporary necessity, as in 1971 under Nixon. Far more certain, however, is that price controls, whatever their guise, will do nothing to resolve the issue underlying the inflation: the amount of goods and services being produced are being outstripped by the growth in the money supply.

Capping the amount of money a producer can charge for a product will not stimulate increased production or investment—why would it? This is why shortages inevitably follow: Who would enter into production or increase their production of a good at a time when doing so is a money-losing venture?

That being the case, price controls and the determined politicians who support them, are likely to push us even further down the road to serfdom than we already are.

As Ludwig von Mises explained in a 1958 address at the University of Buenos Aires, attempting to control the price of a good or goods will ultimately require control over the prices of the inputs that go into creating them—and then further control over the inputs that go into the inputs that go into the creation of the good, and so on.

The reason is simple: the government’s desire to see continued production of a good maintained or expanded at prices less than the cost of the inputs necessitates, by their thinking, the capping of the prices of those inputs as well.

These are frankly dangerous times, and we should be earnestly unsettled by the fawning masses at the feet of an increasingly interventionist government comfortably ensconced in power despite manifold ineptitudes on virtually all sides—including in the handling of the present crisis. Indeed, under the auspices of preserving public health, in the last year the government, at various levels, has undertaken violations of property rights previously almost unimaginable in a liberal republic whose constitution explicitly provides for their protection.

Should the Fed’s forecast prove incorrect yet again—and by a similarly enormous margin—the pressure on the Biden administration from the Left will intensify. It supported rent freezes, direct payments, massive fiscal stimulus, and an almost doubling of the federal minimum wage—what next if not price controls?

And if, in an attempt to control prices, your business or labor are “needed” to produce something you don’t want to produce at a price you won’t agree to, attempted requisitions and appropriations may be only an executive order away. Author:

Joseph Solis-Mullen

A graduate of Spring Arbor University, J.S. Mullen is a current graduate student in the political science department at the University of Illinois. An author and blogger, his work can be found at http://www.jsmwritings.com.

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Canadian Healthcare: A Half Century of Broken Promises | Mises Wire

Posted by M. C. on July 15, 2021

At the beginning of each year, budgets for Canadian hospitals are dictated by the government, and if this predetermined tax revenue is depleted before the end of the year, as often happens, new patients are put on a waiting list for the next fiscal year. Thus, the government breaks its promise “to make sure that people [can] get care when it [is] needed without regard to other considerations.”

Moreover, the government breaks its promise every year, usually more so than the previous year, thereby establishing a trend of deteriorating performance over fifty-plus years, with deadly consequences:

https://mises.org/wire/canadian-healthcare-half-century-broken-promises

Lee Friday

“People primordially fear illness and death, and physicians, from shaman to modern scientists, have always been perceived as holding a near-talismanic power over both. With the rise of modern wealth came the potential for enormous tax harvesting, and politicians were quick to see that this power over life and death could generate deep feelings of gratitude and loyalty. Could they take this power unto themselves?” – William D. Gairdner, The Trouble with Canada . . . Still! A Citizen Speaks Out

Yes, they could, and in 1966, Canadian politicians took that power unto themselves, then promptly reneged on their promise to provide universally accessible healthcare for everyone.

The Deception

According to Tom Kent (the government’s senior policy wonk at the time), the Medical Care Act of 1966 was needed because “many poorer people just did not get care when it was needed.”

In an imperfect world, it is probably true that some people did not receive care when it was needed. However, as I have written before, it is doubtful that more people lacked access to care under the pre-1966 private system as compared to the government’s socialized system. Furthermore, in the private system, contrary to Kent’s assertion, healthcare was routinely provided to people who could not afford to pay for it.

Charitable impulses and the pursuit of profits are not mutually exclusive concepts, despite what Kent wanted us to believe, and despite what politicians and bureaucrats still want us to believe. That’s the deception.

Broken Promises

Kent said that the government’s objective with the Medical Care Act was “to make sure that people could get care when it was needed without regard to other considerations.” That sounds good, but as Milton Friedman warned, we should judge policies by their results, not their intentions.

At the beginning of each year, budgets for Canadian hospitals are dictated by the government, and if this predetermined tax revenue is depleted before the end of the year, as often happens, new patients are put on a waiting list for the next fiscal year. Thus, the government breaks its promise “to make sure that people [can] get care when it [is] needed without regard to other considerations.”

Moreover, the government breaks its promise every year, usually more so than the previous year, thereby establishing a trend of deteriorating performance over fifty-plus years, with deadly consequences:

In the 2005 Chaoulli decision, Justices of the Supreme Court of Canada noted that patients in Canada die as a result of waiting lists for universally accessible health care.

Our analysis estimates that between 25,456 and 63,090 (with a middle value of 44,273) Canadian women may have died as a result of increased wait times between 1993 and 2009. (emphasis added)

Year after year, “wait times” in Canada tend to increase, not decrease. It seems that politicians and bureaucrats do not embrace the concept of “practice makes perfect,” no matter how much time we give them.

Private Healthcare? How Dare You!

More than a million Canadians are waiting for the healthcare that the government promised to deliver. And, as we have seen, in 2005, the government, through its supreme court, acknowledged the deadly consequences of its broken promises. The logical solution is to return healthcare to the private sector. However, heartless politicians and bureaucrats ignore this solution, and they cruelly forbid patients on their waiting list from accessing private healthcare options in Canada, thereby condemning many of them to death.

Despite the government’s growing incompetence, a more recent court ruling affirmed the government’s position that people must be denied the freedom to pursue private healthcare options in Canada.

Last year, the British Columbia Supreme Court “dismissed a court challenge by Dr. Brian Day, former head of the Canadian Medical Association, whose surgical clinic in Vancouver provided medical services to patients failed by the public system, in violation of BC law. Dr. Day argued that the province’s ostensible ban on this type of privately funded healthcare violates the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. While the court ruling acknowledged the plight of thousands of patients on waiting lists, it simultaneously denied them the right to do anything about it.”

Shockingly, as Justice John Steeves affirmed the illegality of voluntary exchanges between patients and doctors unimpeded by government conditions, he irreverently declared that this does not violate these individuals’ right to liberty under the Charter.

The Charter is part of Canada’s Constitution. Section 7 of the Charter reads:

Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of the person and the right not to be deprived thereof except in accordance with the principles of fundamental justice.

In his ruling, Steeves wrote: “[L]iberty interests under s. 7 are engaged only where the law or state action interferes with a person’s ability to make fundamental personal choices” (para. 1764, emphasis added).

That sounds good, but then Steeves wrote:

[P]atients are free to spend their money on healthcare services as they deem appropriate (admittedly within the constraints of the MPA[Medicare Protection Act]). Therefore it cannot be said that there is a sufficient causal connection between the impugned provisions and the alleged deprivation…. I conclude that the plaintiffs have not established a deprivation of their right to liberty under s. 7. (paras. 1767, 1768, emphasis added)

To say that this is a deception seems blatantly obvious. Steeves ignores the fact that “the law or state action” necessarily includes the MPA with its acknowledged constraints. Among other things, these constraints include rules about which medical practitioners may offer their services, which services they may offer, and at what prices they may offer these services. This clearly interferes with people’s (patients and doctors) “ability to make fundamental personal choices.” Yet while this deprivation of liberty is beyond dispute, Steeves denies it.

There you have it. Free = Unfree, according to the BC Supreme Court.

The courts will continue to support politicians and bureaucrats. The duplicity of these charlatans is painfully clear. For decades, their bureaucracies have feasted on billions of tax dollars while thousands of dead Canadians wait for the healthcare they were promised. They are dead because the government denied them the right to use their own money to save their own lives by purchasing private healthcare from willing providers in the Canadian marketplace.

The trail of broken promises will grow longer. The inhumane treatment of Canadian patients will become more widespread, and many more will die. Nothing will change until the masses realize that their health and well-being can be greatly enhanced only through the restoration of their freedoms. Author:

Lee Friday

Following a 23-year career in the Canadian financial industry, Lee Friday has spent many years studying economics, politics, and social issues. He operates a news site at www.LondonNews1.com

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Biden Unhinged: Voter ID Requirements Worst Threat ‘Since The Civil War!’

Posted by M. C. on July 14, 2021

But the Real ID is OK! January 6 is now small potatoes?

President Biden once again dredged up his “not since the Civil War” hyperbole, this time to describe efforts in Texas and elsewhere to require people to show IDs before casting a vote. Civil War? Really? Also today, Biden allies plan to “fact check” private text messages? And…why is the Post Office spying on you?

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Now Big Pharma is pushing for a MONTHLY covid shot, obliterating the false narrative that once claimed a vaccine would earn back your “freedom” – NaturalNews.com

Posted by M. C. on July 14, 2021

https://www.naturalnews.com/2021-07-13-now-big-pharma-is-pushing-for-a-monthly-covid-shot-obliterating-the-false-narrative-that-once-claimed-a-vaccine-would-earn-back-your-freedom.html

by: Lance D Johnson

(Natural News) Millions of people have already been convinced they need an experimental covid-19 vaccine in order to survive and be free in society. Now Big Pharma is getting ready to unveil MONTHLY covid shots for people with chronic health conditions.

British scientists are now pushing for people with lingering health problems to take monthly covid-19 vaccines to “boost” their immune system and help clear out any remaining SARS-CoV-2 reservoirs lingering in their bodies. These “ideal candidates” for routine vaccination already have immunity to the natural infection and even took the initial vaccine protocol, going against all common sense. But these “ideal candidates” for routine vaccination still suffer from chronic health conditions and are now being pushed to take a monthly vaccine to make their “COVID long hauler” symptoms magically go away.

Big Pharma invents new term to cover up underlying causes of disease

The Big Pharma vaccine cartel is looking for new ways to prey on people who already suffer from various chronic health issues. During the covid-19 scandal, millions were convinced that their underlying health issues are the result of covid itself. Big Pharma invented the term “COVID long hauler” to consolidate these various health issues under one umbrella term and to make an infectious disease more than what it really is.

Under the Big Pharma dictatorship, it doesn’t matter anymore what the root cause of the health issue is. People who struggle with fatigue, lethargy, brain fog, loss of drive, shortness of breath, lack of endurance, arthritis, and other health issues can now claim they are a “COVID long-hauler.” Even though these issues are common side effects of pharmaceutical drugs that these people take, the proper diagnosis can be covered up and ignored, allowing the patient to get attention and call themselves a “COVID long hauler.” An infection that is properly treated with nutraceuticals and anti-virals will not typically cause chronic health issues or exacerbate underlying health issues. However, succumbing to stress, isolation, fear, terror, lung damage via ventilators, and immune-compromising pharmaceutical drugs will most definitely have long-lasting negative effects on the mind, the cardiovascular system, the endocrine system, the microbiome, and the immune system.

Underlying causes ignored, as millions of people are coerced to live in ignorance and suffering

The British study reports more than a million Britons are struggling with lingering health problems after recovering from covid-19. There is no indication if these health problems existed prior to the infection, or were undiagnosed prior to hospital admission. Allopathic practitioners often miss the underlying causes of people’s health problems. There is also no indication if these lingering health issues were exacerbated by the stress, isolation, and terror of the lockdowns, bodily controls, and pandemic messaging, or if the health problems are the result of damaging treatments, opportunistic infections, or substandard medical care. No matter what the origin of the health problems are – the British scientists want to line these “COVID long haulers” up for monthly vaccines. Out of the first forty candidates who anticipated relief from the vaccines, some felt their symptoms dissipate in the days following the booster shots, but their condition worsened over time.

By developing and taking advantage of this new term (COVID long hauler), Big Pharma continues to mislead people about the causes of their chronic health issues. This demographic of people is taught to rely on the pharmaceutical industry to address their symptoms, as more side effects manifest. Nevertheless, these people make great candidates for testing out monthly vaccines and other pharmaceutical dependency programs. This demographic rarely addresses the underlying cause of their chronic health problems and are more likely to take the experimental vaccine protocol for covid-19 – even if they already gained immunity through natural infection. These people have not addressed underlying inflammation, cellular oxidation, acidosis, heavy metal poisoning, hormonal imbalance, gut dysbiosis, nutrient and mineral deficiency, among other holistic concerns. Once these issues are addressed, millions of people will break free from their “COVID-long hauler” status and exit the mentality of fear and germaphobia that they have been conditioned to accept.

Sources include:

DailyMail.co.uk

NaturalNews.com

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Uncle Sam Must Cease Intervention in Haiti | The Libertarian Institute

Posted by M. C. on July 14, 2021

In April, 2009, the [U.S.] State Department, under the leadership of Hillary Clinton, decided to completely change the nature of the U.S. cooperation with Haiti.

Apparently tired with the lack of concrete results of U.S. aid, Hillary decided to align the policies of the State Department with the “smart power” doctrine proposed by the Clinton Foundation. From that moment on, following trends in philanthropy, the solutions of U.S. assistance would be based solely on “evidence.” The idea, according to Cheryl Mills, Clinton’s chief of staff, “was that if we’re putting in the assistance, we need to know what the outcomes are going to be.”

The January 2010 earthquake was the long awaited opportunity to test this new policy.

The idea was to transform Haiti into a Taiwan of the Caribbean, with maquiladoras, an apparel industry, tourism, and call centers. These would be the niche sectors that would guide the new cooperation framework.

In this plan, the particularities of Haiti itself didn’t matter much.

https://libertarianinstitute.org/articles/uncle-sam-must-cease-intervention-in-haiti/

by Patrick Macfarlane

The Assassination of President Jovenel Moïse

During the early morning hours of Wednesday, July 7, 2021, Haitian President Jovenel Moïse was assassinated in his home by a team of gunmen. His first lady, Martin Moïse, was critically injured. She was airlifted to Florida for treatment where she remains in critical condition.

Moïse was elected president of Haiti on February 7, 2017. According to Moïse’s opposition, his four-year term was to end on February 7, 2021. Moïse refused to step down on that date, arguing the Haitian constitution entitled him a five-year term. He has since remained in office, spurring months of opposition protests and rising crime rates that some outlets blame on Moïse himself.

The aftermath of the assassination was filmed by the late president’s neighbors. According to the Maimi Herald, a man can be heard in one of the videos yelling in English over a megaphone: “DEA operation. Everybody stand down. DEA operation. Everybody back up, stand down.”

Bocchit Edmond, the Haitian ambassador to the U.S., stated the attack “was carried out by foreign mercenaries and professional killers,” that it was “well-orchestrated,” and that the attackers were “masquerading as agents of the DEA.” He asked the U.S. government for assistance with the investigation.

Haitian officials claim at least twenty-eight people were involved in the assassination plot including twenty-six Colombian citizens and two Haitian-Americans. On July 8, Haitian national police chief Leon Charles confirmed that fifteen Colombians and the two Haitian Americans had been taken into custody. Three others were killed in a firefight with authorities. The two Haitian-Americans were identified as thirty-five-year-old James Solages and fifty-five-year-old Joseph Vincent.

Solages has been circumstantially linked to Haitian oligarchs Reginald Boulos and Dimitri Vorbe. Although Boulos and Vorbe were initially friendly to Moïse, they later became his outspoken critics, leading many Haitians to believe they are involved with the killing.

The day before the assassination, president Moïse nominated Ariel Henry, a neurosurgeon, to replace Joseph as prime minister. Henry was slated to be sworn in to the position on the afternoon of the killing, Wednesday, July 7. Following the assassination, Moïse’s interim prime minister, Claude Joseph, assumed a tenuous control of the Haitian government over Ariel Henry. As of the writing of this article, Joseph remains in power, though questions persist regarding the proper succession of presidential authority.

Joseph declared a state of martial law immediately following news of the assassination. Fearing unrest, the Dominican Republic closed its border with Haiti and the Port-au-Prince-Toussaint Louverture International Airport was shuttered, with all arriving planes being rerouted.

Despite Joseph’s declaration of martial law, the political situation appears relatively stable, at least for the moment. Nonetheless, the assassination has the potential to exacerbate an already turbulent political state of affairs—one to which the U.S. and other international influences not innocent third parties.

The U.S. and the O.A.S. Have Controlled the Haitian Presidency Since at Least 2011

If the current Haitian political arrangement appears chaotic, the U.S. and the U.S.-led Organization of American States (“O.A.S.”) own a lion’s share of the blame:

In April, 2009, the [U.S.] State Department, under the leadership of Hillary Clinton, decided to completely change the nature of the U.S. cooperation with Haiti.

Apparently tired with the lack of concrete results of U.S. aid, Hillary decided to align the policies of the State Department with the “smart power” doctrine proposed by the Clinton Foundation. From that moment on, following trends in philanthropy, the solutions of U.S. assistance would be based solely on “evidence.” The idea, according to Cheryl Mills, Clinton’s chief of staff, “was that if we’re putting in the assistance, we need to know what the outcomes are going to be.”

The January 2010 earthquake was the long awaited opportunity to test this new policy.

The idea was to transform Haiti into a Taiwan of the Caribbean, with maquiladoras, an apparel industry, tourism, and call centers. These would be the niche sectors that would guide the new cooperation framework.

In this plan, the particularities of Haiti itself didn’t matter much.

To set this plan in motion, Clinton selected Cheryl Mills to head the U.S. State Department’s Haiti Task force despite the fact that Mills had neither training nor experience in international development.

In order for the Haitian People to accept Clinton and Mills’ technocratic agenda, it had to be window dressed as democratic consensus. This first required the breaking of the country’s deadlocked presidential race, which had been pushed from April 28, 2010 to November 28, 2010 in the aftermath of the 2010 earthquake. After the November vote, the election became deadlocked when none of the candidates received the required 50 percent of the vote.

According to the Haitian election commission, the candidates who received the two highest November vote totals were Mirlande Manigat, a former first lady, and Jude Célestin, the candidate backed by the then-outgoing president, René Préval. The two candidates were scheduled to compete in a final run-off election March 28, 2011.

Despite the Haitian election commission’s findings, Clinton and the O.A.S. conducted their own audit of the November vote totals. This audit found popular Haitian singer Michael “Sweet Micky” Martelly had actually placed second and not Célestin. Incidentally, Martelly was the preferred candidate of the O.A.S.

To assure the Haitian people did not make the wrong choice, Hillary Clinton met with then-outgoing president René Préval on January 30, 2011. In this meeting, Clinton muscled Préval into breaking the electoral stalemate between the front running candidates:

Towards the end of the meeting, she asked Préval to make a last gesture in favor of harmony and understanding. It was to be a gesture that would lead him, once and for all, to a special place in the pantheon of Haiti’s history and the struggle for democracy in the continent. Préval replied with an emotive, albeit enigmatic smile. It was only him who knew that the crisis had reached its epilogue at that moment.

As she was leaving the house, Hillary invited Bellerive to accompany her. The [then-]prime minister asked Préval for authorization to do so and placed himself between the two women inside the armored truck that left in a convoy to the airport. Confident that she had obtained what she wanted, Hillary was concerned now with the result of the second round. Bellerive removed all traces of apprehension when he informed her that Michel Martelly was going to win easily. And so he did.

As she was heading toward the plane, Hillary made a comment to Bellerive about his family relationship with Martelly. He confirmed that they were distant cousins. Since they were both educated individuals and the game was already over, the secretary of state allowed herself to make a joke and asked: “You are relatives, but you don’t sing?” Bellerive replied, humorously: “Neither does he.”

Hillary confessed having heard Martelly sing some songs and could not agree more with Bellerive. Then, smiling, she left Haiti.

Martelly proved to be a heavy-handed leader who was subservient to international interests.

See the rest here

About Patrick Macfarlane

Patrick MacFarlane is a Wisconsin attorney in private practice. He is the host of the Liberty Weekly Podcast at www.libertyweekly.net, where he covers libertarian legal theory, Austrian economics, history, and other libertarian topics. He may be reached at patrick.macfarlane@libertyweekly.net

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The End of Dodge? – EPautos – Libertarian Car Talk

Posted by M. C. on July 14, 2021

The source of all this force being these pathological people – “the government” – who think they know best and are determined to make us do what they think is best. This to include no more driving the kinds of cars Dodge makes, that no one else makes – in favor of electric cars that everyone else makes.

Or rather, that everyone else is being forced to make.

If Dodge is forced to make them, too, it will be the end of Dodge.

https://www.ericpetersautos.com/2021/07/13/the-end-of-dodge/

By eric

Something tragic may be about to happen. To Dodge. Which is the last American car company, even if it is owned by a foreign conglomerate (Stellantis).

It sells cars, first of all – which is a thing almost no one else does anymore – in favor of these Universal Transportation Appliance crossover SUVs, which overlap each other so closely it is difficult to divine why there needs to be more than one brand selling various sizes and colors of them.

Dodge sells cars. American cars. Big, ballsy cars – with big V8s that drive the rear wheels that average Americans can afford to buy.

No one else sells cars like that anymore. It is probably why Dodge sells a lot of them, even though all of them are pushing 15 years old, in terms of the last time they received a significant redesign. Which they haven’t because they don’t need it – as evidenced by the fact that people continue to buy them, eagerly.

For precisely that reason.

You don’t fix what ain’t broke.

Until, of course, the government breaks it.

As by this force-feeding of electric cars down the throats of unwilling Americans – the automotive equivalent of the attempt to force-needle every American, most especially the so-called “hesitant” (to be forced to submit to an injection that may harm or even kill them for the sake of protecting them – allegedly – from a sickness that doesn’t meaningfully threaten them).

The source of all this force being these pathological people – “the government” – who think they know best and are determined to make us do what they think is best. This to include no more driving the kinds of cars Dodge makes, that no one else makes – in favor of electric cars that everyone else makes.

Or rather, that everyone else is being forced to make.

If Dodge is forced to make them, too, it will be the end of Dodge.

Tesla already makes electric muscle cars – which they aren’t, either. They are very quick cars, certainly. But that is not what defines a muscle car and surely Dodge CEO Tim Kuniskis, who said earlier this week – with a proverbial gun to his head – “If a charger can make a Charger faster, then we’re all for it” – knows better.

No! You know it ain’t so, Tim!

My 1976 Pontiac Trans-Am would not stand a chance in a stoplight heads-up with a Tesla S, which can get to 60 in less than 3 seconds. But no matter how quickly the Tesla gets to 60 or runs a quarter mile it will never be a muscle car.

Speed is not everything.

Muscle cars are about many other things, too. Things electric cars will never have, except perhaps in ersatz form, such as a sound track that makes its electric motor sound like a big V8 with a hot cam – which is as pathetic to people who appreciate the real thing as alcohol-free beer.

What is there to see under the hood of an electric car? A bigger or smaller electric motor. If you can even see it. There is no intangible difference, one motor vs. another. They are all fundamentally the same, which obviates any reason to get emotionally attached to one vs. another. 

Muscle cars are defined by their beating (almost literally) hearts. The Charger and Challenger are powered by iterations of Dodge’s storied and iconic Hemi V8, an engine that is uniquely Dodge – just as the 455 V8 under the hood of my ’76 Trans-Am is uniquely Pontiac and not a Chevy engine.

Not that there is anything wrong with Chevy engines. The Z28 is a magnificent car, too. And it is defined by its uniquely Chevy V8s, from the original high-RPM 302 in the ’67-69 Z28 through the various iterations of the 350 that came afterward. But they were not the same, any of them, as the Pontiac engines found under the hood of cars like my Trans-Am, which gave people a reason to prefer – and buy – one or the other.

A new Challenger or Charger has the same difference. People love and buy these cars because they want that raucous, rumbling Hemi. Quiet is a defect when it comes to muscle cars.

They also love burnouts – which the all-wheel-drive “performance” of the electric car eliminates.

If they didn’t want the sound and the fury – if they wanted something quieter and even quicker – they’d have bought a Tesla or something like the Tesla, which is like everything else that has the same damned thing under its hood (and floorpans).

Something that’s more of a ride than a drive.

Any stubble-chinned soy boy can push the button for “ludicrous speed.” It takes a man (and a woman) to handle an R/T Challenger Scat Pack’s 6.4 liter Hemi, connected to a six-speed manual transmission – which you can say bye-bye to in Our Electrified Future. Electric cars have no transmissions; they are direct drive. Nothing to do but push the gas and let the car drive you.

No matter how fast, something critically important is being lost. If you still care about the Drive. And Kuniskis knows this. He’s just got a gun to his head, as is true of everyone else trying to build cars people want as opposed to the cars the government – those people, god damn them – are trying to force everyone to buy. By making it illegal or impossibly expensive to keep on building them, via the regs.

Speaking of which . . .

Dodge also sells something else which electrification will almost certainly put a stop to:

Affordable muscle cars.

You can buy a new V8 Challenger R/T, right now, for $35,570 – which is about the same as you’d spend to buy a loaded Toyota Camry and about half the price of a base model Tesla S ($79,990). Average Americans can afford a V8 Challenger. Most average Americans cannot afford a Tesla S, even if they wanted one – and every American who bought a Challenger doesn’t want one.

A Charger with a charger and a motor and batteries will cost a great deal more than a Charger with an engine – and not just in terms of money.

Kuniskis knows the deal. But he is being made an offer he can’t refuse.

God damn these people, who are “the government.”

. . .

Got a question about cars, Libertarian politics – or anything else? Click on the “ask Eric” link and send ’em in!

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Fake terror plots, paid informants: the tactics of FBI ‘entrapment’ questioned | FBI | The Guardian

Posted by M. C. on July 14, 2021

Even more shocking was that the organisation, money, weapons and motivation for this plot did not come from real Islamic terrorists. It came from the FBI, and an informant paid to pose as a terrorist mastermind paying big bucks for help in carrying out an attack. For McWilliams, her own government had actually cajoled and paid her beloved nephew into being a terrorist, created a fake plot and then jailed him for it. “I feel like I am in the Twilight Zone,” she told the Guardian.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/nov/16/fbi-entrapment-fake-terror-plots

Critics say bureau is running a sting operation across America, targeting vulnerable people by luring them into fake terror plots

David Williams did not have an easy life. He moved to Newburgh, a gritty, impoverished town on the banks of the Hudson an hour or so north of New York, at just 10 years old. For a young, black American boy with a father in jail, trouble was everywhere.

Williams also made bad choices. He ended up going to jail for dealing drugs. When he came out in 2007 he tried to go straight, but money was tight and his brother, Lord, needed cash for a liver transplant. Life is hard in Newburgh if you are poor, have a drug rap and need cash quickly.

His aunt, Alicia McWilliams, was honest about the tough streets her nephew was dealing with. “Newburgh is a hard place,” she said. So it was perhaps no surprise that in May, 2009, David Williams was arrested again and hit with a 25-year jail sentence. But it was not for drugs offences. Or any other common crime. Instead Williams and three other struggling local men beset by drug, criminal and mental health issues were convicted of an Islamic terrorist plot to blow up Jewish synagogues and shoot down military jets with missiles.

Even more shocking was that the organisation, money, weapons and motivation for this plot did not come from real Islamic terrorists. It came from the FBI, and an informant paid to pose as a terrorist mastermind paying big bucks for help in carrying out an attack. For McWilliams, her own government had actually cajoled and paid her beloved nephew into being a terrorist, created a fake plot and then jailed him for it. “I feel like I am in the Twilight Zone,” she told the Guardian.

Lawyers for the so-called Newburgh Four have now launched an appeal that will be held early next year. Advocates hope the case offers the best chance of exposing the issue of FBI “entrapment” in terror cases. “We have as close to a legal entrapment case as I have ever seen,” said Susanne Brody, who represents another Newburgh defendant, Onta Williams.

Some experts agree. “The target, the motive, the ideology and the plot were all led by the FBI,” said Karen Greenberg, a law professor at Fordham University in New York, who specialises in studying the new FBI tactics.

See the rest here

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Joel Salatin: The Ron Paul of Family Farmers – LewRockwell

Posted by M. C. on July 14, 2021

What role should the government have had in response to Covid-19?

None. Health is not a government responsibility; it’s a personal responsibility. As soon as you make it a government responsibility, you begin taking sides as to which procedures are good and which are bad. Obviously, expert opinion is often wrong: think DDT, hydrogenated vegetable oil, and antimicrobial soap.

How has Covid-19 changed local farming?

2020 will go down as a time of accelerating interest in questioning scientific orthodoxy and individuals taking responsibility for their own health realizing they can’t depend on government yo-yos to do it. Catastrophes don’t make trends, they clarify trends.

https://www.lewrockwell.com/2021/07/ginny-garner/joel-salatin-the-ron-paul-of-family-farmers/

By Ginny Garner

Sitting on a picnic bench across from Joel Salatin on a beautiful day on Polyface Farm in Virginia’s Shenandoah Valley, I am struck with how much the farmer, author and lecturer reminds me of Ron Paul: Mission-driven, a leader who has inspired millions around the world, a Christian, family man, libertarian, self-sufficient, charismatic, energetic, enterprising, optimistic, hard-working, a teacher, a communicator, a brilliant unorthodox thinker, confident yet humble, good-humored, athletic, frugal, and possessing a strong bearing and commanding presence. A great and good man.

If you type the question “Who is the most famous farmer in the world?” into Google, the result is Joel Salatin. He has appeared in many documentaries on factory farming and/or the rogue food movement including Polyfaces, Food Inc., Fresh, Revolution Food, Sustenance, Freedom From Choice, What’s With Wheat?, American Meat, and At the Fork. Ron Paul also appears in Farmageddon which shows government agents swat teaming family farmers for selling raw milk, destroying their animals and their livelihoods. Salatin has written 12 books, lectured all over the world, edits the Stockman Grass Farmer, and the self-described “lunatic farmer” shares his musings online.

Four generations of Salatins live and work at Polyface: Joel’s mother Lucille who originally owned the 550-acre farm with her husband Bill who passed away in 1988; Joel, Teresa, his wife of 40+ years, their daughter Rachel who does marketing for the farm, and son Daniel who has been managing the farm since he was 18, his wife Sheri and their three children. The farm provides food for 3,000 in the community and local restaurants.

At Polyface Farm simple farming methods are modified by new technologies. The farm is regenerative, sustainable and organic: no pesticides, chemical fertilizers or antibiotics have ever been used and seeds have never been planted. The carbon-based ecosystem is teaming with life. The movement of the animals and their meeting with grass on the farm is carefully and lovingly managed. High-tech fencing keeps the animals in and the predators out. The cows, chickens, hens, baby chicks, and rabbits look healthy and content and so does the team who work on the farm. People travel from all over the world to visit Polyface, take a tour, participate in summits, and learn how to start or develop their own farms.

A palpable spirituality permeates this space: the cycle of life is fully expressed, with every living plant, animal and person doing their part and working together in perfect synergy. Life is biological and therefore fundamentally sacred and the sacrifice of life to feed or serve others is understood. This philosophy is most certainly in stark contrast with the transhumanist agenda of the global technocrats to transform humans into machines.

Over the past 50 years factory farming dominated by industrial giants took control of agriculture in America, with government regulations favoring the monopolists and governments subsidizing many farmers. For decades growing consumer awareness and concern about industrialized farm products and the globalized industrial food system vastly increased the market and demand for organics, but agribusiness has incrementally hijacked the label organic. While organic family farms constitute only 2% of agriculture in the US and the average age of a family farmer is 60, the local rogue food movement is growing, especially since the Covid coup. Salatin says if the farming methods used at Polyface were globally implemented, all the carbon depleted from the soil since the industrial age would be sequestered within 10 years.

Q & A with Joel:

How did you get started in farming?

See the rest here

Ginny Garner is a writer, editor, researcher, and music lover. She took the red pill many years ago and has been an avid reader of Lew’s website for the last 22-23 years. Write her at ginnygarner@protonmail.com .

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Erie Times E-Edition Article-Study: Vaccines saved 279K lives in US

Posted by M. C. on July 14, 2021

The study methodology would certainly be enlightening.

Take for example…you…how do you or the government know if your being asymptomatic, mildly symptomatic, symptomatic enough to visit a doctor and not dying as a result of the virus was due to the vaccine or gene therapy you accepted, a healthy lifestyle or, most importantly and never mentioned, due to your own natural immunity?

Do gene therapies inhibit your natural immune system?

https://erietimes-pa-app.newsmemory.com/?publink=08e072fd3_1345e3e

Theresa Braine

New York Daily News TRIBUNE NEWS SERVICE

The coronavirus vaccine blitz unleashed late last year saved 279,000 lives and prevented 1.25 million hospitalizations, according to a new study.

“The vaccines have been strikingly successful in reducing the spread of the virus and saving hundreds of thousands of lives in the United States alone,” said lead author Alison Galvani, the Burnett and Stender Families Professor of Epidemiology and the director of the Center for Infectious Disease Modeling and Analysis at the Yale School of Public Health, which led the study.

However, the delta variant could change those gains, if more people don’t step up for a jab, Galvani said, given that the pandemic is still raging.

“Yet until a greater majority of Americans are vaccinated, many more people could still die from this virus,” she said in a statement. “The danger is not over. Now is not the time to let down our guard.”

Besides the additional deaths and hospitalizations that would have occurred without a vaccination program, the researchers found that if vaccines had been rolled out at half the pace, there would have been nearly 121,000 additional deaths and more than 450,000 additional hospitalizations, they said in the study, which was published by the Commonwealth Fund, a health-equity think tank and advocacy organization.

The U.S. has seen nearly 34 million coronavirus infections and more than 607,000 deaths.

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