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Full-Scale War Is Avoided And Trump Goes Right Back To Warmongering – Caitlin Johnstone

Posted by M. C. on January 10, 2020

https://caitlinjohnstone.com/2020/01/09/full-scale-war-is-avoided-and-trump-goes-right-back-to-warmongering/

author: Caitlin Johnstone

The United States and Iran entered into a direct military exchange for the first time ever with the drone assassination of General Qassem Soleimani last week and a retaliatory strike from Iran via surface-to-surface missiles upon two US military bases on Wednesday.

As usual it was the less powerful nation who exercised restraint, with Iran skillfully targeting the bases’ military capabilities but taking measures to successfully avoid any casualties. The two nations de-escalated back down to their previous high level of dangerous hostilities with an understanding between them that neither side wants a full-scale war. Both sides played “chicken” and both sides swerved, and they know that about each other now.

So that was a relief. We were all forced to hold our breath and hope against hope that cooler heads would prevail after the senseless assassination of a sovereign nation’s top military official, and they did. A full-scale war that would have dwarfed Iraq and Vietnam in terms of death, destruction and destabilization was averted.

And then Trump immediately went right back to warmongering.

“As we continue to evaluate options in response to Iranian aggression, the United States will immediately impose additional punishing economic sanctions on the Iranian regime,” Trump said in his speech the morning after the Iranian missile strike. “These powerful sanctions will remain until Iran changes its behavior.”

It is unclear at this time what form these sanctions will take. If they are of the sort being leveled at Iran currently, they will further target Iranian civilians with the goal of making them even more miserable so that they rise up and overthrow their government. This deliberate attempt to foment civil war against Tehran is not speculation; it is a fact, admitted to by the Trump administration itself.

A New York Times article from last year reports the following:

“Last week, Mr. Pompeo acknowledged to Michael J. Morrell, a former acting director of the C.I.A., that the administration’s strategy would not persuade Iranian leaders to change their behavior.

“’I think what can change is the people can change the government,’ he said on a podcast hosted by Mr. Morrell, in what appeared to be an endorsement of regime change.”

It is impossible for the US and Iran to de-escalate from the military powderkeg situation they are in as long as the US is deliberately attacking Iran’s economy with the goal of igniting a civil war in that country. The US government intends to not just continue to escalate this direct assault, but to continue its increasingly intrusive military presence in the region, including the unwelcome occupation of Iraq.

And yet, bizarrely, Trump also claims to want to reach a new nuclear deal with Iran.

“The very defective JCPOA expires shortly anyway and gives Iran a clear and quick path to nuclear breakout,” Trump said. “Iran must abandon its nuclear ambitions and end its support for terrorism. The time has come for the United Kingdom, Germany, France, Russia and China to recognize this reality. They must now break away from the remnants of the Iran deal, or JCPOA. And we must all work together toward making a deal with Iran that makes the world a safer and more peaceful place. We must also make a deal that allows Iran to thrive and prosper and take advantage of its enormous untapped potential.”

This is not going to happen. The US government has already burned Tehran on the JCPOA and it’s not going to enter into a new deal as long as the US continues to inflict aggressions upon it that the US itself wouldn’t tolerate from any other nation.  Iran is going to be much less willing to trust the US government in a new deal now and will require much more assurance and accommodation than it did in the previous one; such a negotiation (assuming the Trump administration even really wants it) would be harder, not easier. This will remain true even after Trump leaves office.

The Trump administration also further inflamed tensions by inviting NATO to become further involved in the Middle East, which NATO chief chief Jens Stoltenberg agreed to.

“The President asked the secretary general for NATO to become more involved in the Middle East,” a NATO statement said. “They agreed that NATO could contribute more to regional stability and the fight against international terrorism.”

So things are only continuing to heat up with Iran, and there is no reason to believe more eruptions like the direct military confrontation we just experienced won’t occur again, with the world perhaps getting a lot less lucky next time. Trump and his supporters are trying to claim the evasion of full-scale war as a victory for both peace and for America, but it is neither.

All of the defenses of Trump’s warmongering that you’ve been seeing are premised upon the unquestioned assumption that it is both reasonable and acceptable for the United States to maintain a military presence in the Middle East, even in nations whose governments don’t want them there like Iraq and Syria. If the US didn’t insist on maintaining an enormous military presence in this one area on the other side of the planet, there would be no debate about the need for America to “defend” itself by attacking the Iranian economy, assassinating government officials, and conducting airstrikes upon Iraqi militias. It would just be another country on the other side of the world, doing its own thing in its own way.

Most Americans haven’t thought very hard about this premise. They are fed some lines about the need to protect American “interests” and some unexplained need to defend Israel, and because those lines are spoken in an authoritative tone of voice most are content to leave it there. But if Americans actually laid out all the facts in front of them and thought deeply about what their government’s Middle Eastern military presence costs them and risks for them compared to what it actually gains them, it would be seen for the insane imperialist power agenda that it so clearly is.

_________________________

Thanks for reading! The best way to get around the internet censors and make sure you see the stuff I publish is to subscribe to the mailing list for my website, which will get you an email notification for everything I publish. My work is entirely reader-supported, so if you enjoyed this piece please consider sharing it around, liking me on Facebook, following my antics on Twitter, checking out my podcast on either Youtube, soundcloud, Apple podcasts or Spotify, following me on Steemit, throwing some money into my hat on Patreon or Paypal, purchasing some of my sweet merchandise, buying my new book Rogue Nation: Psychonautical Adventures With Caitlin Johnstone, or my previous book Woke: A Field Guide for Utopia Preppers. For more info on who I am, where I stand, and what I’m trying to do with this platform, click here. Everyone, racist platforms excluded, has my permission to republish or use any part of this work (or anything else I’ve written) in any way they like free of charge.

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Top 10 Warmongering Ideas of the Day

Posted by M. C. on January 10, 2020

https://moneymaven.io/mishtalk/economics/top-10-warmongering-ideas-of-the-day-HI4ORQ85N0WoKOxLWhTMwg

Mish

by

The list of warmongering excuses is nearly endless. Here’s 10 of them.

  1. It’s OK to kill someone today if there is reason to believe they may do something wrong in the future: Senator Lindsey Graham January 3, 2020. “This was not an act of revenge for what he had done in the past. This was a preemptive, defensive strike planned to take out the organizer of attacks yet to come.” Apparently only the US has this right.
  2. Assassinating foreign leaders is OK and does not constitute an act of war. Trump, Graham, Ben Shapiro, and too many neocons to count.
  3. Declared wars, who needs em? Bush, Obama, Hillary, Trump. Rand Paul Mocks the idea October 15, 2019. “Senator Graham and Hillary Clinton stood together to support Islamic extremists in the Syrian civil war. America should come first,” said Paul
  4. It will be a short war: Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld November 2002
  5. Keeping US troops in Iraq will only cost $3.9 billion: Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld 2003
  6. It’s OK for the US to fight everyone else’s war: Bush, Cheney, Obama, Hillary, Trump, and every neocon, too many to name. In contrast, “I’m tired of America always paying for everybody else’s war,” said Rand Paul, February 4, 2019.
  7. Crippling economic sanctions are not an act of war. Who cares how many starve to death? Too many neocons to count.
  8. “We Came, We Saw, He Died!”: Hillary Clinton joked in 2011 when told of news reports of Libyan leader Moammar Gaddafi death at US hands. Libya is now a Jihadist wonderland led by ISIS and Al Qaueda.
  9. Iran’s retaliation in response to Trump’s Assassination of a foreign leader was an “Act of War” but the assassination was not: Senator Lindsey Graham, January 7, 2020.
  10. “In order to get elected, Barrack Obama will start a war with Iran”: Donald Trump November 29, 2011.

Here’s a bonus 11th. “We have to get them over there so they don’t get us here.”

That goes back at least to the wonderful domino theory and false flag incident that kicked off the Vietnam War.

Iran History Lesson

Iran has every reason to mistrust if not hate the US for its role in the 1953 Iranian Coup D’état…

If you don’t support war, you get accused of being an Incomprehensible America Hating Sissy.

Let’s make that Warmongering Idea Number 12.

John Bolton’s Warmongering Notes

Image from John Bolton’s Warmongering Notes by Brian McFadden on The Nib.

 

…Could we not make better use of that money on US infrastructure than blowing up the world and making enemies in the process?

Nah. That kind of thinking is for sissies. Real men are willing to kill innocent men women and childrens with drones and blow up cultural sites in the name of peace.

Mike “Mish” Shedlock

Be seeing you

 

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Iraqi PM reveals Soleimani was on peace mission when assassinated, exploding Trump’s lie of ‘imminent attacks’ | The Grayzone

Posted by M. C. on January 10, 2020

According to Abdul-Mahdi, he had planned to meet Soleimani on the morning the general was killed to discuss a diplomatic rapproachment that Iraq was brokering between Iran and Saudi Arabia.

Abdul-Mahdi said that Trump personally thanked him for the efforts, even as he was planning the hit on Soleimani – thus creating the impression that the Iranian general was safe to travel to Baghdad.

https://thegrayzone.com/2020/01/06/soleimani-peace-mission-assassinated-trump-lie-imminent-attacks/

The Trump administration claimed Iranian general Qasem Soleimani was planning “imminent attacks” on US interests when it assassinated him. That lie was just destroyed, but not before countless corporate media outlets transmitted it to the public.

By Max Blumenthal

Desperate to justify the US drone assassination of Iranian Major General Qasem Soleimani, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo insisted that Washington had made an “intelligence-based assessment” that Soleimani was “actively planning in the region” to attack American interests before he was killed.

President Donald Trump justified his fateful decision to kill the Iranian general in even more explicit language, declaring that Soleimani was planning “imminent attacks” on US diplomatic facilities and personnel across the Middle East.

“We took action last night to stop a war,” Trump claimed. “We did not take action to start a war.”

Trump’s dubious rationale for an indisputably criminal assassination has been repeated widely across corporate media networks, and often without any skepticism or debate.

At a January 3 State Department briefing, where reporters finally got the chance to demand evidence for the claim of an “imminent” threat, one US official erupted in anger.

“Jesus, do we have to explain why we do these things?” he barked at the press.

Two days later, when Iraqi Prime Minister Adil Abdul-Mahdi addressed his country’s parliament, Trump’s justification for killing Soleimani was exposed as a cynical lie.

According to Abdul-Mahdi, he had planned to meet Soleimani on the morning the general was killed to discuss a diplomatic rapproachment that Iraq was brokering between Iran and Saudi Arabia.

Abdul-Mahdi said that Trump personally thanked him for the efforts, even as he was planning the hit on Soleimani – thus creating the impression that the Iranian general was safe to travel to Baghdad.

Soleimani had arrived in Baghdad not to plan attacks on American targets, but to coordinate de-escalation with Saudi Arabia. Indeed, he was killed while on an actual peace mission that could have created political distance between the Gulf monarchy and members of the US-led anti-Iran axis like Israel.

The catastrophic results of Soleimani’s killing recall the Obama administration’s 2016 assassination of Mullah Akhtar Muhammad Mansur, a Taliban leader who was eager to negotiate a peaceful end to the US occupation of Afghanistan. Mansur’s death wound up empowering hardline figures in the Taliban who favored a total military victory over the US and triggered an uptick in violence across the country, dooming hopes for a negotiated exit.

Since Soleimani’s assassination, Iraq’s parliament has voted to expel all US troops from the country and Iran’s Grand Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has sworn to exact a “severe revenge” on the “the criminals who have stained their hands with [Soleimani’s] and the other martyrs’ blood…”

Trump, for his part, tweeted a litany of gangster-like threats, promising to destroy Iranian cultural sites if it retaliated and pledging to sanction Iraq “like they’ve never been before” if it ousted US troops.

Trump’s treacherous assassination has brought the US closer to war than ever before against a country more militarily potent than any adversary it has faced since the Korean War. And as with the failed US invasion of Iraq, Washington’s casus belli for triggering this conflict was based on falsified intelligence sold to Americans by administration officials, and on a pliant Beltway media acting as their megaphone.

With its claim of “imminent attacks,” the Trump administration has essentially re-mixed Condoleeza Rice’s 2003 warning that “we don’t want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud.” Back then, the US attacked a sovereign state to rid it of WMD that did not exist. This time, it killed the second-most important Iranian official to prevent a killing spree that was not on the way. And Trump administration officials knew they were lying.

In fact, Pompeo pitched assassinating Soleimani to Trump several months ago, well before any attacks were “imminent.” And in the wake of the general’s killing, a US official revealed to the New York Times that the NSA had intercepted “communications the United States had between Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and General Suleimani showing that the ayatollah had not yet approved any plans by the general for an attack.”

But the preponderance of evidence exposing Trump’s basis for killing Soleimani as a titanic lie has not generated the same level of media interest as the lie itself.

On January 3, CNN assigned three reporters to disseminate the Trump administration’s disinformation about Soleimani, claiming without a hint of critical detachment that he was “planning specific attacks on US interests, including US personnel.”

After the story went live, CNN’s lead reporter, Jim Sciutto, reached out to another official US source to “confirm” his now-discredited piece of war propaganda. In Sciutto’s mind, if more than one US official says a thing, it must be true.

Sciutto is not just any run-of-the-mill national security reporter. During the Obama era, he accepted a job as chief of staff at the US Embassy in Beijing, placing himself at the center of Washington’s gathering Cold War with China. Now back behind CNN’s anchor desk, Sciutto poses as a ferocious critic of Trump while providing the Pentagon and State Department with reliable stenographic services.

No president in recent history has been despised more viscerally by the Beltway press corps than Trump. Nearly everything he says is met with disdain and suspicion, even when he is telling the truth.

But when Trump and his administration attempt to lie the public into war against a designated evildoer, a swath of the corporate media responds with reflexive trust, then shrugs when the lie is exposed in broad daylight.

Be seeing you

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The Islamic Republic of Restraint – Antiwar.com Original

Posted by M. C. on January 9, 2020

The administration lied about the Iranian general’s mission that day in Baghdad; he was actually likely there for secret talks to ease tensions with Saudi Arabia. Talk about a counterproductive killing.

https://original.antiwar.com/Danny_Sjursen/2020/01/08/the-islamic-republic-of-restraint/

by

What if it’s Iran that’s avoided war?

Don’t buy the hype 1.0: Look, the administration, Fox News, and a Twitter army of Trumpsters are about to unleash a wave of propaganda. The president was right to assassinate Soleimani all along, they’ll say. The Iranian missiles fired on Tuesday night missed all American targets – perhaps on purpose – resulting in zero U.S. military casualties. Trump must’ve known the Iranians would flinch, we’ll be told. His hard line, his provocative escalation, was all part of a grand strategy – the master dealmaker strikes again!

That’s all balderdash! Remember: according to the most loyal Trumpeteers, every time the president’s rash actions don’t result in nuclear Armageddon he’s clearly a “stable genius” (his words). Now, that’s a pretty low bar, folks. We should expect better. Seems to me that Trump’s foreign policy is more aptly characterized, as William Hartung – of the Center for International Policy – coined it, the “P.T. Barnum strategy:” more show than substance. It goes both ways, of course, what with Iran potentially “retaliating” against the US for their own domestic consumption, whilst carefully avoiding American casualties.

The main problem with the Trump-as-genius argument is that, at best, he’s left in place an unacceptable status quo. Tensions remain unnecessarily high between the US and Iran – mainly due to Trump’s original sin: pulling out of the multinational nuclear deal that even American intelligence agencies assessed that Iran had adhered to. In fact, the execution of Soleimani may have only made matters worse. The administration lied about the Iranian general’s mission that day in Baghdad; he was actually likely there for secret talks to ease tensions with Saudi Arabia. Talk about a counterproductive killing. War could still break out at any moment. Both sides have mobilized and repositioned troops. Heck, a brigade of paratroopers from the 82nd Airborne Division is already on its way to the region. The two inessential adversaries remain on hair-trigger alert.

Now, at worst, Trump has only weakened the US position in the area. After all, right on the heels of the Soleimani assassination, Iraqi’s Parliament and Prime Minister officially called for the withdrawal of all US troops from the very country upon which Iran and America have been waging war of late. Naturally, in a fun twist on the widespread global understanding of national sovereignty, Defense Secretary (Incorporated) Mark Esper has emphatically declared that US troops “are not leaving Iraq.” International law, international shmaw – we’re America, and Trump is president.

Finally, lost in the sure-to-come “Trump was right” talking points will be a few other inconvenient facts:

  1. The president provided zero evidence to the public that Soleimani himself posed an imminent threat to US forces. We’re just supposed to trust the government? Really? After the mountain of lies fed to the people reference the 2003 Iraq invasion, CIA torture program, and Afghanistan (as shown in the oh-so-quickly forgotten Afghan Papers)? Count me out! What’s more, after a closed session congressional briefing on Wednesday, even some Republicans complained that they were given “no specific information” on any “specific” alleged “attack.” Now that’s fishy.
  2. Furthermore, the very legality of the strikes – and targeted assassinations in general – under domestic and/or international law was highly dubious.
  3. The constitutionality of the killing was also questionable. Yes, the president possesses Article II commander-in-chief powers, however, those ought to be used sparingly and only as a last resort. By design, the Founders placed the preponderance of martial decision-making in the hands of Congress. Trump isn’t alone here, as one executive after another has gradually stripped war-making authority from an all-too-willing, and complacent, legislative branch. What was particularly dangerous in this case, however, is that President Trump unilaterally committed an egregious, risky escalation – an act of war – that set all the pieces in motion for a potential regional conflagration, essentially leaving Congress and the People to pick up the pieces. He presented America with a perilous fait accompli.

So let’s not fall for the administration talking points or its loyal social media trolls’ undoubtedly absurd musings. The Soleimani operation was far from prudent and hardly a slam dunk. Don’t take my word for it: Republican Senators Rand Paul and Mike Lee told CNN Wednesday that the “way the whole thing went down” was “un-American and unacceptable.” I couldn’t agree more; we can do better!

Don’t buy the hype 2.0, either: No matter what the US Government has long claimed, Iran is not the world’s most dangerous state; nor is it really the globe’s greatest “state-sponsor of terrorism” – whatever the “T-word” even means anymore. Nor, contra the Mikes (Pompeo and Pence) – who seem genuinely intent on pursuing policies designed to sow the de rigueur chaos to bring forth their own insane hopes for the Rapture – would regime change in Iran accomplish much of anything or serve US or regional interests. These mad eschatological millenarians are deeply mistaken in their belief that Iran represents something uniquely evil in this world. They should take a hard look at their own diplomatic Facebook friends for exhibit A: Saudi Arabia.

In reality, from this historian’s “hatch,” it is demonstrable that time and again, since at least 1979, it was Iran – not the US – which showed greater restraint and helped avoid war. Consider just a few examples. After the CIA and MI6 overthrew a democratically elected Iranian prime minister in 1953 and installed the vicious dictatorial shah – whose security forces killed thousands – it took 25 years for the Islamic Revolution to kick off. When that rebellion overthrew the U.S.-armed and -backed shah, how did the young revolutionaries respond? Well, famously they snatched and long held 52 American embassy personnel hostage. Sure, this was an unacceptable violation of diplomatic sovereignty, but, as compared to the deaths of thousands of Iranian innocents, it was a relatively muted response. No hostages were killed, and, though it took far too long, all were eventually released.

Then, in 1980, when Iraq invaded and threatened to destroy Iran, the US openly backed Saddam Hussein’s aggressive regime. The US provided key intelligence in the form of satellite photos to the Iraqi Army, and granted Baghdad over $1 billion in economic aid. In all, after eight years of existential war, perhaps 500,000 Iranians died. To this flagrant US provocation, Iran did retaliate substantially: in 1983, the Iranian-backed Amal militia killed 241 US Marines in Beirut (where they shouldn’t have been in the first place), throughout the 1980s Hezbollah took several American journalists and Intel officials hostage in Lebanon, and its Saudi offshoot (allegedly) killed 19 US Airmen in the 1996 Khobar Towers bombing. None of this is defensible; still, comparable scale remains relevant. Iran never directly attacked United States military personnel or the American homeland, even though Washington had clearly enabled the devastation of the Persian nation.

Then, when after a US ship struck an underwater mine (no fatalities resulted) the American Navy – in Operation Praying Mantis – overtly sank the majority of the Iranian Navy in a one-sided sea battle. Then, during the same undeclared Persian Gulf maritime conflict, a US naval vessel even shot down a civilian Iranian airliner, killing 290 people. The commander, Captain Rogers, claimed his crew mistook the jet for an Iranian fighter, but even so the plane was fully in Iranian airspace.

Then, Vice President George H.W. Bush even refused to apologize for the shoot-down. He callously announced “I will never apologize for the United States – I don’t care what the facts are. … I’m not an apologize-for-America kind of guy.” Oh, and as for Captain Rogers – he was awarded the Legion of Merit. For all these immense, and deadly, provocations, Iran didn’t responded in any measurable way. So it was, in Tuesday night’s case of deja vu, that Tehran again showed remarkable restraint by appearing to retaliate without harming the hair on a single American’s head.

None of this is to say that Mr. Trump, if he shows relative restraint – and it appears he plans to, for now – doesn’t deserve some credit. He’s done it before. Months ago, after Iran shot down an unmanned American drone, Trump apparently shocked his own aides and backed away from military strikes. Whatever shred remains of the optimist inside of me likes to believe that – for all his PT Barnum posturing and absurd risky behavior – The Donald, unlike the John Boltons’ of the world, doesn’t actually want an outright war with Iran.

Still, overall, it must be Tehran that earns the gold star for restraint in this – and many past – instances. I mean, come on, an American drone blew away one of their national heroes, perhaps the third most powerful man in their sovereign government. The move was tantamount to war by any and all reasonable definitions. And how did they respond? With a sham, maybe symbolic, American-casualty-free missile strike. Now that’s self control.

All of which raises a profound opportunity for President Trump. Iran’s leadership has shown, once again, and quite profoundly, that they’ll eschew open war with the US and may even be open to détente, for reentry into the global community from which they’ve long been excluded (by America, it must be said). Trump, it seems, in spite of his bluster, fumbling, mad carelessness, and escalation, could still salvage a new “deal” with the Islamic Republic.

No doubt, mainstream liberals will hammer this author for even suggesting that all could work out in Trump’s favor – but it could! So, if our dear leader seizes this opening to pivot to diplomacy, to some degree of relational normalization, he’d come slightly closer to earning his self-styled sobriquet of “stable genius.” And, for my sins, I might even crack open The Art of the Deal…

Be seeing you

Rise Of A Dictator | The Wall Street Journal, August 19, 1953

 

 

 

 

 

 

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VA Wants to CLOSE Non-Govt. Gun Ranges, Create AMMO-FREE Zones

Posted by M. C. on January 9, 2020

What is going on in Virginia? The whole state is out of it’s mind.

https://www.theorganicprepper.com/virginia-close-gun-ranges-ammo-free-zones/

by Daisy Luther

If you thought the law that would effectively ban semi-automatic weapons in Virginia was draconian, just wait. The General Assembly isn’t done trampling the Second Amendment yet. They have lots more potential felonies in store for gun owners.

Let’s take a look at HB567 and HB318.

HB567 wants to ensure gun ranges are government-owned.

In a blow not only to gun owners but also to small business owners, HB567 would outlaw many indoor gun ranges that are not owned by the state government. What’s more, the private ranges allowed would have to cater to law enforcement as their primary clientele. And they’re not done yet – the gun ranges would serve as data-collection points.

Here’s the text of the summary. (Emphasis mine)

As used in this section, “indoor shooting range” means any fully enclosed or indoor area or facility designed for the use of rifles, shotguns, pistols, silhouettes, skeet, trap, or black powder or any other similar sport shooting.

B. It is unlawful to operate an indoor shooting range in any building not owned or leased by the Commonwealth or the federal government unless (i) fewer than 50 employees work in the building or (ii) (a) at least 90 percent of the users of the indoor shooting range are law-enforcement officers, as defined in § 9.1-101, or federal law-enforcement officers, (b) the indoor shooting range maintains a log of each user’s name, phone number, address, and the law-enforcement agency where such user is employed, and (c) the indoor shooting range verifies each user’s identity and address by requiring all users to present a government-issued photo-identification card. (source)

So very small indoor gun ranges might be able to continue to operate (for now) but the large, high-quality ranges that also serve as instruction facilities or have attached gun stores could have too many employees to continue to operate if the new bill becomes a law.

It’s interesting that the state government claims to want to make the state safer, but at the same time, they want to close facilities where gun-owners hone their skills, accuracy, education, and safe usage of firearms.

The penalties for breaking this law would be civil, with a fine of up to $100,000 on the first infraction and an additional $5000 per day if the defiance continues.

HB318 would create ammunition-free zones.

Making about as much sense as the law that caused the original hullaballoo – the one that would ban weapons that “could” possess extended magazines, even if the owner has no such magazines – HB318 would send anyone in the possession of ammunition to prison for a currently-undetermined amount of time.

I suppose they’re concerned that someone might have ammo in a gun-free zone and throw it really hard, causing a mass casualty incident? This would-be law encompasses more than ammunition. It also includes the possession of stun weapons and knives with metal blades.

Here’s the text of the bill, again, emphasis mine.

A. If any person knowingly possesses any (i) stun weapon as defined in this section; (ii) knife, except a pocket knife having a folding metal blade of less than three inches; or (iii) weapon, including a weapon of like kind, designated in subsection A of § 18.2-308, other than a firearm; or (iv) ammunition for a firearm, as defined in § 18.2-308.2, upon (a) the property of any public, private, or religious elementary, middle, or high school, including buildings and grounds; (b) that portion of any property open to the public and then exclusively used for school-sponsored functions or extracurricular activities while such functions or activities are taking place; or (c) any school bus owned or operated by any such school, he is guilty of a Class 1 misdemeanor.

B. If any person knowingly possesses any firearm designed or intended to expel a projectile by action of an explosion of a combustible material while such person is upon (i) any public, private or religious elementary, middle or high school, including buildings and grounds; (ii) that portion of any property open to the public and then exclusively used for school-sponsored functions or extracurricular activities while such functions or activities are taking place; or (iii) any school bus owned or operated by any such school, he is guilty of a Class 6 felony. (source)

There are a few exemptions that would allow law enforcement officers, former law enforcement officers, and concealed carry permit holders or those who use knives with metal blades in their trades, to have their unloaded weapons locked securely in their trunk while they are in traffic circles and parking lots. However, a regular person who happens to have an extra cartridge floating around the bottom of her purse (who doesn’t?) could potentially become a felon if tried by some over-zealous, anti-2A prosecutor.

Those exceptions would exist initially but at the rate new laws are being proposed, I wouldn’t count on the exceptions on a long-term basis.

Coincidentally, Governor Northam has increased his detention budget…

Be seeing you

 

 

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Armies Of Unidentified Drones Are Appearing Over The Western U.S. At Night, And It Is Really Freaking People Out – End Of The American Dream

Posted by M. C. on January 9, 2020

Because if these drones do not have a U.S. origin, then that opens up a completely different can of worms.

This sounds like a good sci-fi movie.

If this is a “true fact” it would take an organization. Civilian maybe, more likely a lying government doing it’s black op thing.

http://endoftheamericandream.com/archives/armies-of-unidentified-drones-are-appearing-over-the-western-u-s-at-night-and-it-is-really-freaking-people-out

by

Since just before Christmas, armies of unidentified drones have been appearing each night in the skies above Colorado, Nebraska and Kansas.  The drones are approximately 6 feet wide and they have red and white lights, but nobody knows where they are from or who owns them.  This is a story that is now receiving national attention, and the FBI, the FAA and the U.S. Air Force are all investigating this mystery.  According to eyewitnesses, these drones can move “much faster than a regular aircraft”, and that would seem to indicate that they are highly sophisticated.  So far, the U.S. military, every government agency that has been asked, and many of the major companies in the area have all denied operating the drones.  Federal, state and local law enforcement officials have been doing all that they can to solve this mystery, but so far they have come up completely empty.

And even though these drones are now receiving so much attention, they just keep coming back night after night.  According to one northern Colorado resident, when the drones come out it looks like “something from a movie”…

For the last week, Michelle Eckert has spotted a high-flying, night-time mystery above her rural northern Colorado home. She has seen drones, sometimes a dozen or more with wingspans 6 feet wide.

“The sky is lit up with Christmas lights basically,” she told CBS News. “There’s lights and things flying all over. It reminded me of something from a movie.”

Sometimes eyewitnesses just see one drone.  In other cases, the drones are working in pairs.  And in other instances, there are large groups of up to 30 drones working in very close coordination.

On Thursday night, a Denver Post reporter went out in search of these drones, and it wasn’t long before some of them were spotted…

As light turned to dark Thursday, stars appeared in the night sky. And soon after, so did drones. Around 6:10 p.m., a Denver Post reporter and photographer spotted two unmanned aircraft whizzing west above I-70, 8 miles outside Limon.

More drones could be seen outside Last Chance, a slight whir audible as they passed overhead. The aircraft flashed one red light and one white. Two other yellowish lights remained on throughout the flight. In 20 minutes, a half-dozen flying objects could be seen traversing over the barren wind farms.

The fact that there are so many of them and that they are operating over such a large area would seem to indicate that this is not the work of some rogue individual.

But at this point we don’t have any answers.

Lincoln County Sheriff Tom Nestor has been working on this case for quite a few days, and his county map is now “dotted with blue and yellow thumbtacks” because so many people have been reporting sightings…

Inside the Lincoln County Sheriff’s Office in Hugo on Thursday afternoon, Sheriff Tom Nestor and Capt. Yowell stared at a county map hanging in a narrow hallway.

It’s dotted with blue and yellow thumbtacks, depicting sightings from across the county of just under 5,500 people. There’s a series of tacks clustered around Interstate 70 in Limon, with a few scattered north and south of the interstate. Some people reported the drones flying in packs. Others saw solo flights.

Nestor immediately suspected that a local company may be doing some mapping, but that theory didn’t turn up anything.  And other law enforcement officials in the region have come up empty as well…

Nestor said he has spoken to local oil companies and drone experts, learning information but getting no answers. Neighboring sheriffs have spoken to the military, which has denied involvement, he said. The Air Force, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, the Department of Defense, the Environmental Protection Agency, the North American Aerospace Defense Command and the University of Colorado Boulder have told The Denver Post that they’re not flying the drones.

The FAA has gotten involved, and you would think that they should be able to get to the bottom of this, but they are just as puzzled as everyone else…

Already, the FAA has contacted test sites, drone companies and companies that have received authorization to operate drones in the affected areas. But the agency has not been able to determine who is flying the aircraft, spokesman Ian Gregor said in a statement Monday.

The FAA also asked area airports and pilots to report sightings or people they see operating the drones from the ground.

So far there is no evidence that these drones are malicious, but just a few days ago we received a reminder of how deadly they can potentially be.  Iranian military commander Qassem Soleimani was killed by a drone, and he probably never even knew that the attack was coming.

On Monday, dozens of federal, state and local law enforcement officials gathered in the town of Brush to talk about these drones.  At the conclusion of the meeting, reporters were told that there is still “no explanation” for this mystery…

Mysterious drone sightings remains a mystery on Colorado’s Eastern Plains. Monday, more than 70 local, state and federal officials met in Brush to talk about findings and reports from the last couple of weeks.

Multiple law enforcement agencies, the FBI, United States Air Force and the FAA ended the meeting with no explanation of what the objects hovering over vast properties really are.

People living in Colorado, Nebraska and Kansas desperately want some answers, and now a similar sighting has been reported in Minnesota…

Drones were reported flying over Juniata and Hastings Sunday night. An operator has not been identified at this time.

Minneapolis Air Traffic Control contacted the Hastings Police Department with a report from an airplane pilot about the drones.

Air traffic control reported the drones were flying in a grid pattern around 9-10 p.m. Sunday, Police Capt. Mike Doremus said.

This sounds very similar to many of the other sightings, but nobody has been able to examine one of these drones up close yet, and so we still don’t know precisely what we are dealing with.

But what we do know is that our world is a very strange place, and it is getting stranger by the day.

Hopefully this is just some relatively harmless top secret U.S. military program that the Pentagon doesn’t want to talk about.

Because if these drones do not have a U.S. origin, then that opens up a completely different can of worms.

About the Author: I am a voice crying out for change in a society that generally seems content to stay asleep. My name is Michael Snyder and I am the publisher of The Economic Collapse Blog, End Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and the articles that I publish on those sites are republished on dozens of other prominent websites all over the globe. I have written four books that are available on Amazon.com including The Beginning Of The End, Get Prepared Now, and Living A Life That Really Matters. (#CommissionsEarned) By purchasing those books you help to support my work. I always freely and happily allow others to republish my articles on their own websites, but due to government regulations I need those that republish my articles to include this “About the Author” section with each article. In order to comply with those government regulations, I need to tell you that the controversial opinions in this article are mine alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of the websites where my work is republished. This article may contain opinions on political matters, but it is not intended to promote the candidacy of any particular political candidate. The material contained in this article is for general information purposes only, and readers should consult licensed professionals before making any legal, business, financial or health decisions. Those responding to this article by making comments are solely responsible for their viewpoints, and those viewpoints do not necessarily represent the viewpoints of Michael Snyder or the operators of the websites where my work is republished. I encourage you to follow me on social media on Facebook and Twitter, and any way that you can share these articles with others is a great help.

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The Justice Department Is Devoid of Justice – PaulCraigRoberts.org

Posted by M. C. on January 9, 2020

The Horowitz report of the Justice (sic) Department’s lies to the FISA court did not recommend a six-month prision sentence for those Justice (sic) Deplartment officials who lied to the government.  Horowitz covered up the crimes by converting them into “mistakes.”

Trials take time and provide a test of often unreliable police and prosecutorial evidence.

https://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2020/01/08/the-justice-department-is-devoid-of-justice/

Paul Craig Roberts

In the United States the criminal justice (sic) system is itself not subject to law.  We see immunity to law continually as police commit felonies against citizens and even murder children and walk away free.  We see it all the time when prosecutors conduct political prosecutions and when they prosecute the innocent in order to build their conviction record.  We see it when judges fail to prevent prosecutors from withholding exculpatory evidence and bribing witnesses and when judges accept coerced plea deals that deprive the defendant of a jury trial.

We just saw it again when federal prosecutors recommended a six month prison sentence for Lt. Gen. Flynn, the former head of the Defense Intelligence Agency accused of lying to the FBI about nothing of any importance, for being uncooperative in the Justice (sic) Department’s effort to frame President Trump with false “Russiagate” charges.  The Justice (sic) Department prosecutor said: “The sentence should adequately deter the defendant from violating the law, and to promote respect for the law. It is clear that the defendant has not learned his lesson. He has behaved as though the law does not apply to him, and as if there are no consequences for his actions.”

That is precisely what the Justice (sic) Department itself did for years in their orchestration of the fake Russiagate charges against Trump.

The prosecutor’s hypocrisy is overwhelming.

The Justice (sic) Department is a criminal organization.  It has no sense of justice.  Convicting the innocent builds the conviction rate of the prosecutor as effectively as convicting the guilty. The Horowitz report of the Justice (sic) Department’s lies to the FISA court did not recommend a six-month prision sentence for those Justice (sic) Deplartment officials who lied to the government.  Horowitz covered up the crimes by converting them into “mistakes.”  Yes, they are embarrassing “mistakes,” but mistakes don’t bring prison sentences.

Gen. Flynn, who was President Trump’s National Security Advisor for a couple of weeks before Mueller and Flynn’s attorneys manuevered him into a plea bargain, allegedly lied to the FBI about whether he met with a Russian.  Flynn and his attorneys should never have accepted the proposition that a National Security Advisor shouldn’t meet with Russians.  Henry Kissinger and Zbigniew Brzezinski met with Russians all the the time.  It was part of their job.  Trump originally intended to normalize the strained relations with Russia.  Flynn should have been meeting with Russians. It was his job.

Ninety-seven percent of felony cases are resolved with plea bargains.  In other words, there is no trial.  The defendant admits to guilt for a lighter sentence, and if he throws in “cooperation,” which generally means giving false evidence against someone else in the prosecutor’s net, no sentence at all.  Flynn was expected to help frame Trump and Flynn’s former business partner, Bijan Rafiekian, on an unrelated matter.  He didn’t, which means he is “uncooperative” and deserving of a prison sentence.

Plea bargains have replaced trials for three main reasons.  One is that the defense attorney doesn’t want the hard work of defending his client.  One is that the majority of defendants cannot afford to pay the cost of defense.  One is that refusing to plea guilty and demanding a trial angers both the prosecutor and judge.  Trials take time and provide a test of often unreliable police and prosecutorial evidence.  They mean work for the prosecutor.  Even if he secures a conviction, during the same time he could have obtained many more plea bargain convictions.  For the judge, trials back up his case docket.  Consequently, a trial means for the defendant very high risks of a much longer and more severe sentence than he would get in exchange for saving prosecutor and judge time and energy.  All of this is explained to the defendant by his attorney.

It was explained to Gen. Flynn.  He agreed to a plea, most likely advised that his “offense” was so minor, no sentence would be forthcoming.  Flynn later tried to revoke his plea, saying it was coerced, but the Clinton-appointed  judge refused to let him out of the trap.

Now that we know the only Russiagate scandal was its orchestration by the CIA, Justice (sic) Department, and Democrats, failing to cooperate with the special counsel investigation of alleged Russian interference in the 2016 election is nonsensical as we  know for a definite fact that there was no such interference.

This is how corrupt American law has become.  A man is being put in prison for 6 months for not cooperating with an investigation of an event that did not happen!

If Trump doesn’t pardon Flynn (and Manafort and Stone), and fire the corrupt prosecutors who falsely prosecuted Flynn, Trump deserves no one’s support.  A president who will not defend his own people from unwarranted prosecution is not worthy of support.

In Flynn’s case, we cannot dismiss the suspicion that revenge against Flynn was the driving factor. Gen. Flynn is the official who revealed on television that Obama made the willful decision to send ISIS or whatever we want to call them into Syria.  Of course, the Obama regime pretended that the jihadists were moderates seeking to overthrow the alleged dictator Assad and bring democracy to Syria.  Washington then pretended that it was fighting the mercenaries it had sent into Syria.  Even though the presstitutes did their best to ignore Flynn’s information, Flynn gave extreme offense by letting this information out. That bit of truth-telling was Flynn’s real offense.

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Keeping It Unreal | The Blog of Author Donald Jeffries The American Love Affair With War

Posted by M. C. on January 9, 2020

H.L. Mencken defined it perfectly nearly a century ago when he said, “the whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by an endless series of hobgoblins, most of them imaginary.”

https://donaldjeffries.wordpress.com/

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Donald Trump’s recent assassination of Iranian Maj. General Qassem Soleimani was not an exceptional act of madness by a deranged president. It was instead the continuation of a long, unfortunate American tradition. Military aggressiveness has been a feature of U.S. foreign policy for a very long time.

As I detail in my book Crimes and Cover-Ups in American Politics: 1776-1963, Americans love to portray themselves as the “greatest,” the “good guys” in each of their nearly continuous foreign skirmishes. While it certainly appears to any disinterested observer that we are the initiator in most, if not all, of these conflicts, the official mantra is that we are never at fault. We are only defending ourselves, even if the opponent is smaller and weaker to a laughable degree, as it usually is.

Abraham Lincoln set so many horrific precedents, and his manipulation of events that resulted in the South technically firing the first shot at Fort Sumter, paved the way for false flags like “Remember the Maine” in 1898, the sinking of the Lusitania  which “forced” us to enter World War I, the “sneak” attack on Pearl Harbor, the Gulf of Tonkin incident which is now universally acknowledged to have never happened, the “weapons of mass destruction” lie under Dubya Bush, and many other less obvious ones.

Each time one of these false flags occurred, or stories demonizing the latest flavor of the month in some far-flung land appeared in our state-run media, the overwhelming majority of the American people swallowed the propaganda. H.L. Mencken defined it perfectly nearly a century ago when he said, “the whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by an endless series of hobgoblins, most of them imaginary.”

In just the past few decades, this “endless series of hobgoblins” has included Fidel Castro, Daniel Ortega, Manuel Noriega, Saddam Hussein, Muammar Gaddafi,  Slobodan Milosevic, Osama Bin Laden, Kim Jong-un, Bashar al-Assad, Vladimir Putin, and now Qassem Soleimani. Soleimani was that rarity; a bogeyman who literally came out of nowhere to be suddenly categorized as one of the world’s most dangerous characters. Who had even heard of him before he was assassinated by our forces? And how did he cause the “hundreds” of deaths of Americans which are now routinely attributed to him? Hundreds of Americans were killed in Iran by this guy? Are there even hundreds of Americans in Iran presently?

And, like all modern bogeymen, Soleimani has been described as a “bully.” Alex Jones, now a pathetic shell of what he once was, declared that we couldn’t keep letting Iran “push us around.” Exactly how has Iran ever “pushed us around?” And how do you describe an officer with a military that is only a fraction of ours, in size and power, as a “bully?” That is like Mike Tyson assaulting a kindergartner, claiming they “started it,” and thereafter castigating him as a “bully.”

We definitely “started it” with Iran with the 1953 overthrow of their democratically elected Prime Minister Mohammad Mosaddegh…

Our founders never intended for America to have a standing army. They certainly never envisioned a monstrosity like the military industrial complex and its nefarious intelligence agencies. But the public doesn’t seem to mind. Give them the pomp of a good flyover or cannon blast. Watch them tear up at staged reunions between soldiers and their young children. They used to call it bread and circuses.

There are no voices for peace with a large public platform, unless you count Tulsi Gabbard, who has her own questionable baggage. But there are millions willing to beat the war drums when ordered to do so. Mark Twain, who said so many memorable things, noted that “God created war so that Americans would learn geography.” So perhaps it does serve a constructive purpose, although Americans still seem woefully ignorant about geography (and pretty much everything else).

Sun Tzu, who wrote The Art of War, is still quoted widely by our sociopathic leaders in business and government. John F. Kennedy’s timeless 1963 commencement address at American University, where he advocated for peace as no other American president ever has, was probably the final nail in his coffin, on the other hand.

John Quincy Adams spoke for virtually every American leader during the revolutionary era when he said, “America does not go abroad in search of monsters to destroy.” Our leaders have constructed a foreign policy that does nothing else.

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Another Crisis in the Middle East – When Will We Ever Learn?

Posted by M. C. on January 9, 2020

https://boydcatheyreviewofbooks.blogspot.com/

by Boyd Cathey

Friends,

Qasem Soleimani is dead, his life snuffed out by missiles shot from American drones which targeted his convoy near Bagdad International Airport. By all accounts this man, in many ways the second most important figure in Iran, was the mastermind of numerous violent actions—we call them “terrorist” acts—throughout the Middle East, and very likely was indirectly (maybe directly) responsible for the deaths of dozens of Americans in the region, at least if we can believe our discredited intelligence agencies (it’s ironic that most of those who rightly indict these agencies for their anti-constitutional attempts to “take out” President Trump, now enthusiastically embrace the assessments of those very same agencies when it comes to Iran).

And now the Iranians have reacted directly by firing ground-to-ground missiles aimed at Iraqi army bases; from reports no Americans, military or civilian, were killed or injured in these attacks. That may or may not indicate a particular strategic calculation on the part of the Iranians. Indeed, if this should be the only major response to Soleimani’s death it may—underline “may”—indicate an implicit desire to lower the level of high stakes hostilities…and a realization that the United States under President Trump is unlike previous American administrations. After all, Soleimani was arguably the most powerful and most significant military leader in Iran; the Iranians, given his death, had to react. As our leaders recognized, that was certain, and the attacks by the Iranians did not come as a surprise.

But now that this is done, multiple questions arise.

Watching “Fox & Friends” this morning there appeared former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich and newscaster Brian Kilmeade, all a-twitter—almost in a frenzy—talking about “regime change” in Iran, about a “future strategy” to “take out” the regime in Tehran, about a Middle East strategy of total American involvement which takes hardly any account of the fall of Soviet Russia or the sorry record of repeated American disaster in that region of the world (e.g. Syria, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Egypt, etc.).

President Trump ran for office on a platform of strategic disengagement from many areas of the world, the draw-down of American troops, including from the immense and complex quagmire of the Fertile Crescent.

The fall of Communism in late 1991 as a world threat radically altered global politics. Winst0n Churchill once described Soviet Russia as “a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma”; if that was the case with Communist Russia, it certainly describes tenfold the situation in places like Iraq or Syria…

But American interests in this case do not coincide with the interests of either Israel or with the Neocons policy wonks who zealously continue to push what they call “democratic regime change” (at the price of thousands of dead Americans). Since 1991 that has been attempted too many times with horrendous results. It is not in the interest of the United States.

No; we have made our point in Iraq. We need now to find a way to withdraw our troops from that nation whose parliament just asked us to leave (Iraq is, after all, a sovereign nation). Our invasion and toppling of Saddam Hussein in 2003, while presented as necessary by the G. H. W. Bush administration was a tragic mistake, based on faulty and contrived intelligence. Yes, he was a cruel dictator, but he was a Sunni Muslim (who favored Iraq’s large Christian population) and a staunch opponent of Iran. What we “achieved” by that invasion was rule by a fanatical Shi’a majority, favorable to Iran…just the reverse that those think-tank ensconced Neocon “experts” and advisers promised us. And with dozens of body bags on their way back to American shores.

Let us hope that America will now finally come to its senses.

Let us pray that President Trump will honor his campaign promises…

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The Middle East Is More Stable When the United States Stays Away

Posted by M. C. on January 8, 2020

https://foreignpolicy.com/2020/01/06/the-middle-east-is-more-stable-when-the-united-states-stays-away/?utm_source=Trita+Parsi&utm_campaign=bf1a8aed42-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2020_01_06_09_12&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_bf648b5618-bf1a8aed42-274183893&mc_cid=bf1a8aed42&mc_eid=ba0ace703b

By
 
t has been a mantra of U.S. foreign policy for a decade or more that, without the United States, the Middle East would descend into chaos. Or even worse, Iran would resurrect the Persian Empire and swallow the region whole.

Yet when U.S. President Donald Trump opted not to go to war with Iran after a series of Iranian-attributed attacks on Saudi Arabia last year and declared his intentions to pull troops out of the region, it wasn’t chaos or conquest that ensued. Rather, nascent regional diplomacy—particularly among Iran, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates—and de-escalation followed. To be sure, the cards were reshuffled again in January, when Trump ordered the assassination of Qassem Suleimani, one of Iran’s most important military figures. Courtesy of Trump, the region is once more moving toward conflict, and the early signs of diplomatic progress achieved during the preceding months have vanished.

 

It is thus time for Washington to answer a crucial question that it has long evaded: Has America’s military dominance in the Middle East prevented regional actors from peacefully resolving conflicts on their own? And in that way, has it been an impediment to stability rather than the guarantor of it?

Following the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979, U.S. President Jimmy Carter proclaimed a new doctrine: “An attempt by any outside force to gain control of the Persian Gulf region,” he stated, “will be regarded as an assault on the vital interests of the United States of America, and such an assault will be repelled by any means necessary, including military force.” In the context of the Cold War, preventing the Soviets—the main outside force Carter was worried about—from gaining control over the energy-rich region had a strategic logic.

But over time, that logic shifted. In the 1980s, U.S. President Ronald Reagan expanded the doctrine to include threats to the flow of oil originating from inside the region, too. As the geopolitical context changed still further, subsequent presidents found even more ways to justify America’s growing military presence in the Middle East. What started as a policy to prevent others from establishing hegemony over the oil-rich waters of the Persian Gulf morphed into a policy of asserting American hegemony in the region in order to “save” it.

What started as a policy to prevent others from establishing hegemony over the oil-rich waters of the Persian Gulf morphed into a policy of asserting American hegemony in the region in order to “save” it.

As long as U.S. allies lack the capability or competence to secure the region, the thinking went, Washington would have no choice but to shoulder this responsibility. U.S. President George W. Bush was explicit about that; without an increase in U.S. troop levels in Iraq, he claimed, there would be chaos in the region. He missed the irony, of course, that his invasion of Iraq was the single most destabilizing event in the Middle East of the past decades. Read the rest of this entry »

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