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About 80 teaching assistants at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill say they will not turn in final grades until the school abandons plans to return the statue of a Confederate soldier to campus. Silent Sam stood on the campus for more than a century until the statue was toppled by protesters in August.
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Authored by Denis MacEoin via The Gatestone Institute,
The European Court of Human Rights ruled that criticism of Muhammad constitutes incitement to hatred — meaning that in Europe, criticizing Muhammad is no longer protected free speech.
What the court has actually done, however, is rule out the possibility of any debate in which a range of various experts and members of the public could take part. Now, it seems, the only views that will be respected in the public forum are those of devout Muslims.
Underage marriages are considered by some countries child abuse or statutory rape, but are acceptable under shari’a law; they also take place in Muslim communities in Western countries such as the UK. This alone is a major reason why platforms must be found to debate the issue instead of sweeping it, as something offensive, under the carpet. Ignoring it is offensive.
Moreover, as some Muslims are often offended by even small matters regarding their faith, such as a toy teddy bear named Mohammad or a prisoner on death row declared innocent — so that mobs take to the streets to condemn, or even kill, those individuals — what now will notbe censored in the West?
Under Islamic shari’a law, statements that even a few people may consider blasphemous — such as young schoolchildren naming a toy teddy bear Mohammad, a common enough name in the Sudan — might be treated as criminal offences. (Image source: Maxpixel)
There are, of course, social settings where it pays to watch your words. Saying you fancy the looks of a mafioso’s new girlfriend could well prove fatal. Spending time with a bunch of Hamas terrorists while expressing your love for Israel might not lead to your premature demise. In London today, young men who make remarks or play music to other youths on the street can wind up stabbed to death. A recent comment on The Independent website claims, “In this country [the UK], some views, regardless of how valid and logical, can result in anything from public rebuke to loss of a job to violence.”
For the most part, we learn how to avoid words or actions that may offend someone or some group, especially if it is known to be prone to violence. Yet these misfortunes are rare and we live our lives on the assumption that in democratic countries, we can speak freely within the norms of civil society. We recognize that in many countries, racist, homophobic, antisemitic, or “Islamophobic” hate speech can be reported to the police and lead to the arrest and eventual trial of the speaker. The United States’ First Amendment to its Constitution protects its citizens from prosecution for free speech, except where there is a credible threat of “Imminent lawless action.”
If angry exchanges take place, they are just a consequence of living in countries where free speech and unfettered opinion are cherished. We have seen what happens in countries where there is no free speech –as the Soviet Union or present day Pakistan (here, here and here); it often is not pretty and in much of the West is regarded as well worth the trade-off.
Particular sensitivities surround religious ideas, and histories. Nowhere is this more apparent today than in the instance of Islam, where anything untoward, especially statements that even a few people may consider blasphemous — such as young schoolchildren naming a toy teddy bear Mohammad, a common enough name in the Sudan — might be treated as criminal offences. In the West, within secular democratic states, most churches mercifully appear no longer interested in controlling matters such as blasphemy. When I lived in the Irish Republic in the 1960s and early 1970s, the Catholic Church held a tight grip on society. Books were banned, including by James Joyce, D.H. Lawrence and all of Sigmund Freud. Films and plays were also banned or censored. The intolerant ban on Catholicsstudying at Trinity College Dublin perpetuated injustice. Since the 1960s, however, we now have same-sex marriage, women’s right to abortion, and an openly gay Taoiseach (Prime Minister). This year, on October 6, a majority of the Irish voted in a referendum to abolish the blasphemy law that had been in its constitution since 1937. The country has liberalized remarkably.
Ironically, while Ireland’s 2010 blasphemy law was still technically on the books (although never actually implemented ), the 57-state Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) – consisting of 56 mostly Muslim states plus “Palestine” — cited it in 2009 during an attempt to impose an international blasphemy law on the UN. Also in 2009, the government had passed a new Irish Defamation Act that contained a full definition of the blasphemy law (the one abolished this year). This vote took place during a committee meeting for the 13th session of the UN Human Rights Council. The proposal, made on behalf of the OIC by Pakistan, used the Irish definition:
38.1 States parties shall prohibit by law the uttering of matters that are grossly abusive or insulting in relation to matters held sacred by any religion thereby causing outrage among a substantial number of the adherents to that religion.
We do not know if the principal motivation for the OIC came less from a concern about religions that Muslims might consider entirely false, abrogated and inferior, such as Judaism or Christianity, or more from a concern that no one should be allowed to criticize Islam.
In any event, Ireland finally woke up to the injustice of its blasphemy law, and the damage it was doing to its growing reputation as a country purporting to observe human rights.
Figures for blasphemy laws worldwide were recently cited by the Pew Research Center in its 2016 report on “Trends in Global Restrictions on Religion”:
We found that laws restricting apostasy and blasphemy are most common in the Middle East and North Africa, where 18 of the region’s 20 countries (90%) criminalize blasphemy and 14 (70%) criminalize apostasy. While apostasy laws exist in only two other regions of the world – Asia-Pacific and sub-Saharan Africa – blasphemy laws can be found in all regions, including Europe (in 16% of countries) and the Americas (29%).
Possibly a better way of expressing concerns about blasphemy laws is to list the 30 Islamic countries that have such regulations, 13 of them imposing the death penalty for the offence. Here they are, in alphabetical order. Some offer life imprisonment. The ones in bold print carry death sentences:
With this disturbing list in mind, let us consider at least one dangerous development in Europe. More than one Western country is bringing forth legislation that will allow Islamic blasphemy laws in through the back door. In 2017, Canada passed Motion M-103, regarded as a shari’a blasphemy law forbidding free speech about Islam. Although at this stage it is “non-binding, one of its supporters, Samer Majzoub, president of the Canadian Muslim Forum and affiliated with the Muslim Brotherhood, wrote, “Now that Islamophobia has been condemned, this is not the end, but rather the beginning.”
The most recent and glaring of these initiatives involves not a country, but the supranational, unaccountable European Court of Human Rights, a body that issues rulings enforceable in all 57 countries of the OIC that are signatories to the European Convention on Human Rights. Forty-seven of the signatory states are members of the Council of Europe, which is different from the 28-state European Union (although all EU states also belong within the Council).
There are, as well, other bodies to be taken into consideration – ones that open up another Pandora’s Box.
Even though the primary focus of the Council of Europe is the wide network of its member states, it also has close links to, and shares activities with, a large range of international institutions. Through a variety of conventions and treaties, it helps set legal standards for those states, both members and non-members. Those non-member states include many familiar Western countries such as the USA, Canada, Israel, and Australia among others. These are states in which the values in areas such as human rights are closely aligned to those of the European member states. Many of the Council’s conventions concern human rights, the protection of democracy, and the prevention of racial and other forms of intolerance.
The Council of Europe also engages with a variety of Muslim states, many of which are included on the list above of countries that enact laws on blasphemy. At a minimum, these include Algeria, Lebanon, Malaysia, Mauritania, Morocco, Senegal, and Tunisia.
The Council also has several other conventions on human rights, including
The Convention on Action against Trafficking in Human Beings
The Convention on the Protection of Children against Sexual Exploitation and Sexual Abuse (The Lanzarote Convention)
The Convention on preventing and combating violence against women and domestic violence
These and other positions of the COE clearly align with, and develop, the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and are solidly founded within modern Western democratic values.
The Council has set out its human rights principles in its Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms. Article 9 of that Convention deals with “Freedom of Thought, conscience and religion”:
“1. Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief, in worship, teaching, practice and observance.
“2. Freedom to manifest one’s religion or beliefs shall be subject only to such limitations as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society in the interests of public safety, for the protection of public order, health or morals, or for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others.”
The following article (10) deals with Freedom of Expression. It begins:
“Everyone has the right to freedom of expression. This right shall include freedom to hold opinions and to receive and impart information and ideas without interference by public authority and regardless of frontiers.”
However, its second part does permit restrictions:
“in the interests of national security, territorial integrity or public safety, for the prevention of disorder or crime, for the protection of health or morals, for the protection of the reputation or rights of others.”
Of relevance to some of the Islamic states referred to above, Protocol 6 of the Convention deals with the abolition of the death penalty. The Protocol in Article 1 states that: “The death penalty shall be abolished. No one shall be condemned to such penalty or executed.”
With these background facts, it is important to look at what happened on October 25 this year when the European Court of Human Rights issued its verdict on a case involving an Austrian woman, called Mrs. S., presumably Elisabeth Sabadtisch-Wolff, and an appeal she had made to the court to protect her right to free speech over a sensitive but factually correct issue concerning the Prophet Muhammad.
There is no room here for a full account of the woman in question, but readers may consult the details by the Soeren Kern here and here. What it amounts to is that Mrs. Sabaditsch-Wolff had given seminars about Islam in which she had drawn attention to the well-attested fact that Muhammad had married one of his eleven official wives, A’isha, when she was six, and consummated the marriage when she was nine. He apparently continued to have sexual relations with her until his death in 632, when she would have been eighteen.
Sabaditsch-Wolff was reported to the authorities for claiming that Muhammad “liked to do it with children. A 56-year-old and a 6-year-old? . . . What do we call it, if it is not pedophilia?”. She was arrested and tried in 2009 through 2011, sentenced for “denigration of religious beliefs of a legally recognized religion”, fined €480 ($625) and threatened with three months in prison. She appealed to Vienna’s Provincial Appellate Court, which turned her down. Finally, she took her appeal to the European Court of Human Rights. That court, which reported on October 25, 2018, ruled that criticism of Muhammad constitutes incitement to hatred — meaning that in Europe, criticizing Muhammad is no longer protected free speech. In their judgement, the judges wrote that defamation of Muhammad “goes beyond the permissible limits of an objective debate” and “could stir up prejudice and put at risk religious peace.”
The judgement will have an ongoing negative impact not only on Sabaditsch-Wolff, who will carry a criminal record for the rest of her life, with the resulting serious effects on her career and other matters, but all of the West, as well. It has certainly banned her and others from exercising their right to free speech asserted in the Convention of the Council of Europe.
Now, it could well be argued, as the ECHR did, that Sabaditsch-Wolff expressed her concerns about Muhammad’s sexuality without due attention to the historical and cultural context within which his marriage to A’isha took place. The ECHR did indeed argue this. The ECHR cited the Judgement of the Austrian courts:
“The national courts found that Mrs S. had subjectively labelled Muhammad with pedophilia as his general sexual preference, and that she failed to neutrally inform her audience of the historical background, which consequently did not allow for a serious debate on that issue.”
What the court has actually done, however, is rule out the possibility of any debate in which a range of various experts and members of the public could take part, to exchange views on a clearly controversial and unresolved subject. Now, it seems, the only views that will be respected in the public forum are those of devout Muslims.
The ECHR ruling also, unfortunately, will have an even wider impact across Europe and the world. The present writer, unlike Sabaditsch-Wolff, has a doctorate in Islamic studies and languages.
If I were to refer to the original Arabic texts of the sacred traditions (ahadith) in which the story of Muhammad’s marriage and sexual relations with A’isha — texts officially held to be factually correct by all Sunni Muslims — might I too now be put on trial for the same offence? Or if I were to write an article giving details of the approximately 40 individuals who were assassinated for having insulted the prophet on Muhammad’s direct orders or whose assassinations were approved by him? What if, in the article, I also added comments on what this might indicate, backed up by chapter and verse of the Muslim histories and sacred traditions that record them, should I then be brought before a court, sentenced, fined or sent to prison?
Will no academic or well-informed individual in future be able to say anything about Muhammad, or will that now be legally prohibited? Moreover, as some Muslims are often offended by even small matters regarding their faith, such as a toy teddy bear named Mohammad or a prisoner on death row declared innocent — so that mobs take to the streets to condemn, or even kill, those individuals — what now will not be censored in the West?
It may well be suggested that Muhammad’s sexual preferences are matters of purely historical interest, but in many Muslim countries, the proper age for marriage is determined, not according to the standards of the ECHR or other international bodies, but on the strength of the firmly established sacred traditions that help form the basis, alongside the Qur’an and the ahadith, of Shari’a law. In many countries, child brides are still commonplace, often in marriages that are forced – as, for instance here, here, here and here.
In some Muslim countries, such as Yemen, marriages at early ages are not uncommon and may be justified by reference to Muhammad’s sexual relations with A’isha at the ages of 9. Underage marriages, considered by some countries child abuse or statutory rape, but acceptable under shari’a law, also take place in Muslim communities in Western countries such as the UK. This alone is a major reason why platforms must be found to debate the issue instead of sweeping it, as something offensive, under the carpet. Ignoring it is offensive.
As noted earlier, the Organization of Islamic Cooperation has been trying for years to persuade the UN Human Rights Council to adopt a general blasphemy law that will block anything deemed by someone as critical of one faith alone– namely Islam.
A few weeks ago, the Islamic Republic of Pakistan informed the UN of an initiative for an international campaign to criminalize criticism of Islam.
This year, a significant and influential Western human rights court has shown the future potentially in store for us. It is not hard to imagine that the OIC is already making plans to employ the ECHR as its agency of choice for officially introducing the law it has coveted for so long: “Defamation of religion,” meaning just one faith, Islam. There do not seem any plans afoot to stop criticizing Christians or Jews, or Christianity or Judaism. If the ECHR builds a foundation for universal censorship, how long will it be before the UN Human Rights Council, pressured by its Islamic state members, will fall in line?
I already wrote about this possible threat to all of us:
The chief threat to free speech today comes from a combination of radical Islamic censorship and Western political correctness… [W]e are free to call to account any religion from Christianity to Scientology, Judaism to any cult we choose….
It used to be possible to do this with Islam as well…. But many Muslim bodies — notably the 57-member-state Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) — have been working hard for years to render Islam the only religion, political system and ideology in the world that may not be questioned with impunity. They have tried — and are in many respects succeeding — to ring-fence Islam as a creed beyond criticism, while reserving for themselves the right to condemn Christians, Jews, Hindus, democrats, liberals, women, gays, or anyone else in often vile, even violent language. Should anyone say anything that seems to them disrespectful of their faith, he or she will at once be declared an “Islamophobe”.
Barely two and a half years later, that may soon come to pass. We need to take swift collective action to fight this death to free speech that such initiatives pose to freedoms that we revere in the West and to which so many millions elsewhere aspire.
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The Committee to Protect Journalists, an advocacy group, has released its annual census showing the number of journalists imprisoned across the world. As Statista’s Niall McCarthy notes, more than 250 journalists are behind bars for the third consecutive year and the CPJ said that an authoritarian approach to critical news coverage is more than just a temporary spike.
You will find more infographics at Statista
As of December 1st, 2018, Turkey was the worst jailer with 68 journalists identified as being in prison there. China came second with 47 while Egypt was in third place with 25.
You will find more infographics at Statista
Collectively, Turkey, China and Egypt are responsible for more than half of all jailed journalists worldwide for the third year in a succession. CPJ said that those countries (and others such as Saudi Arabia) are experiencing a wave of repression which has resulted in a crackdown on press freedom. The vast majority of imprisoned journalists are facing anti state charges such as belonging to or aiding groups deemed by authorities as being terrorist organizations. Others are in jail on false news charges, particularly in Egypt with 19 in total.
The issue was brought into the spotlight this week with the one-year anniversary of the detention of two Reuters journalists in Myanmar. Among a group of journalists named “Person of the Year” by Time magazine, they are serving seven-year sentences for reporting on a massacre of Rohingya by the country’s military. The issue has resulted in heightened criticism of Myanmar’s de facto civilian leader and Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi. On Wednesday, journalists, activists ans rights groups rallied in Yangon and called for the immediate release of the imprisoned journalists.
Still, we couldn’t help but notice the extreme irony of Erdogan’s current onslaught of abuse and accusations against Saudi Arabia’s MbS over the Khashoggi killings when his own nation is head and shoulders above the world in journalist capture.
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Authored by Federico Pieraccini via The Strategic Culture Foundation,
Efforts to prevent nuclear proliferation are one of the few issues on which the great powers agree, intending to continue to limit the spread of nuclear weapons and to prevent new entrants into the exclusive nuclear club.
The former Ukrainian envoy to NATO, Major General Petro Garashchuk, recently stated in an interview with Obozrevatel TV:
“I’ll say it once more. We have the ability to develop and produce our own nuclear weapons, currently available in the world, such as the one that was built in the former USSR and which is now in independent Ukraine, located in the city of Dnipro (former Dnipropetrovsk) that can produce these kinds of intercontinental ballistic missiles. Neither the United States, nor Russia, nor China have produced a missile named Satan … At the same time, Ukraine does not have to worry about international sanctions when creating these nuclear weapons.”
The issue of nuclear weapons has always united the great powers, especially following the signing of the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). The decision to reduce the number of nuclear weapons towards the end of the Cold War went hand in hand with the need to prevent the spread of such weapons of mass destruction to other countries in the best interests of humanity. During the final stages of the Cold War, the scientific community expended great effort on impressing upon the American and Soviet leadership how a limited nuclear exchange would wipe out humanity. Moscow and Washington thus began START (Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty) negotiations to reduce the risk of a nuclear winter. Following the dissolution of the USSR, the Budapest Memorandum on Security Assurances persuaded Ukraine to relinquish its nuclear weapons and accede to the NPT in exchange for security assurances from its signatories.
Ukraine has in recent years begun entertaining the possibility of returning to the nuclear fold, especially in light of North Korea’s recent actions. Kim Jong-un’s lesson seems to be that a nuclear deterrent remains the only way of guaranteeing complete protection against a regional hegemon. The situation in Ukraine, however, differs from that of North Korea, including in terms of alliances and power relations. Kiev’s government came into power as a result of a coup d’etat carried out by extremist nationalist elements who seek their inspiration from Nazi collaborator Stepan Bandera.
The long arm of NATO has always been deeply involved in the dark machinations that led to Poroshenko’s ascendency to the Ukrainian presidency. From a geopolitical point of view, NATO’s operation in Ukraine (instigating a civil war in the wake of a coup) follows in the footsteps of what happened in Georgia. NATO tends to organize countries with existing anti-Russia sentiments to channel their Russophobia into concrete actions that aim to undermine Moscow. The war in the Donbass is a prime example.
However, Ukraine has been unable to subdue the rebels in the Donbass region, the conflict freezing into a stalemate and the popularity of the Kiev government falling as the population’s quality of life experiences a precipitous decline. The United States and the European Union have not kept their promises, leaving Poroshenko desperate and tempted to resort to provocations like the recent Kerch strait incident or such as those that are apparently already in the works, as recently reported by the DPR authorities.
The idea of Ukraine resuming its production of nuclear weapons is currently being floated by minor figures, but it could take hold in the coming months, especially if the conflict continues in its frozen state and Kiev becomes frustrated and desperate. The neoconservative wing of the American ruling elite, absolutely committed to the destruction of the Russian Federation, could encourage Kiev along this path, in spite of the incalculable risks involved. The EU, on the other hand, would likely be terrified at the prospect, which would also place it between a rock and a hard place. Kiev, on one side, would be able to extract from the EU much needed economic assistance in exchange for not going nuclear, while on the other side the neocons would be irresponsibly egging the Ukrainians on.
Moscow, if faced with such a possibility, would not just stand there. In spite of Russia having good relations with North Korea, it did not seem too excited at the prospect of having a nuclear-armed neighbor. With Ukraine, the response would be much more severe. A nuclear-armed Ukraine would be a red line for Moscow, just as Crimea and Sevastopol were. It is worth remembering the Russian president’s words when referring to the possibility of a NATO invasion of Crimea during the 2014 coup:
“We were ready to do it [putting Russia’s nuclear arsenal on alert]. Russian people live there, they are in danger, we cannot leave them. It was not us who committed to coup, it was the nationalists and people with extreme beliefs. I do not think this is actually anyone’s wish – to turn it into a global conflict.”
As Kiev stands on the precipice, it will be good for the neocons, the neoliberals and their European lackeys to consider the consequences of advising Kiev to jump or not. Giving the nuclear go-ahead to a Ukrainian leadership so unstable and detached from reality may just be the spark that sets off Armageddon.
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The 10th Mountain Division (light infantry) based at Fort Drum, New York, is a mountain warfare unit testing a new a robotic pack-mule that can haul more than 1,000 pounds of equipment, weapons, fuel, and or ammunition, tremendously lightening the load for soldiers.
“These guys go through pretty rough terrain, all weather conditions,” 1st Lt. Diego Alonso, 1st Brigade Combat Team, told WWNY-TV News Channel 7.
In December 2017, the Army selected four robot vehicles from a total of eight to proceed to the Squad-Multipurpose Equipment Transport (SMET) program’s operational evaluation phase with the 10th Mountain Division.
The 1st Brigade Combat Team is currently testing the robots of Mountain Peak, Fort Drum’s most extensive field training exercise of the year, which simulates war zone like environments and enables officers of 1st Brigade Combat Team to evaluate the machines.
“It’s a huge upgrade for the dismounted reconnaissance troop. I picked up five casualties in one night at different locations with this vehicle that I wouldn’t have been able to do. I’d have been able to make it to maybe two,” said 1st Sgt. Joshua Richards, 1st Brigade Combat Team.
SMET requires the four all-terrain transport vehicles to carry up to 1,000 pounds and be able to travel 60 miles over 72 hours. Each vehicle must have a “power generation system, as well, that can support an ever-expanding array of electronics, including communications gear, hand-held sensors, portable navigation systems, and electronic warfare equipment, that small Army unit carry with them even on short-duration operations,” said The Drive.
Check out the “Punisher.” A skid steered, remote controlled, transport system our Soldiers are currently testing during #MountainPeak #RobotWars #NotOptimusPrime pic.twitter.com/kVQkxKsD5Z
— 10th Mountain Div. (@10MTNDIV) December 4, 2018
Check out the “Grizzly,” an all-terrain transport system, carrying #10MTN Soldier gear through #NorthCountry brush and snow on the front lines of #MountainPeak. #Innovation @peocscss pic.twitter.com/ciygIsV1W0
— 10th Mountain Div. (@10MTNDIV) December 5, 2018
Troops will be able to control these “robotic pack mules” using handheld remote controls. A “follow-me” functionality, in which the robot will follow troops through all sorts of terrain has been a major requirement of SMET.
WWNY-TV News Channel 7 said troops will continue testing the prototypes into summer 2019.
The pilot test is currently being conducted at Fort Drum and Fort Campbell in Kentucky, before a broader deployment across the service in 2020.
“The decisions they make impact the Army of the future for a long time, so it’s outstanding to have this unit out here that’s really motivated and doing great stuff for us,” said Lt. Col. Jon Bodenhammer, who’s supervising the pilot testing program.
Robots appear to be the future on the modern battlefield. The next push will be the Army weaponizing these robots for the modern battlefield. It seems that robots and artificial intelligence will be making war decessions without any or limited input from humans.
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Authored by Brandon Smith via Alt-Market.com,
Since the beginning of this year, I have been warning that trade tariffs initiated by Donald Trump would develop into a full-blown trade war with China, and perhaps other nations, and that the timing of this trade war is rather suspicious.
Suspicious how?
Almost every instance of further escalation was made by Trump around the exact time that the Federal Reserve was also making a large cut to its balance sheet or raising interest rates. Instead of focusing on the fact that extreme volatility has returned to markets because central banks are pulling the plug on life support, the mainstream media is holding up the trade war as the ultimate culprit behind the accelerating crash.
In other words, Trump’s trade war is acting as a perfect distraction from the crisis which the banking establishment has now deliberately triggered.
The initial response to my suggestion by a minority of liberty movement activists and skeptics was outright denial. Some people argued that the trade war would be over before it even began and that China would immediately capitulate in fear of losing the U.S. consumer market. Others argued that the trade war “had been started by the Chinese years ago” and Trump was simply “fighting back.”
Clearly, the trade war is not fading away as many assumed. As I predicted, it is only continuing to grow. And the notion that a trade war is necessary at this time in defense of the U.S. economy ignores certain realities. For example, the trade deficit itself was never “theft” by the Chinese, but a BARTER between the Chinese and the U.S. government and U.S. corporations. In exchange for the Chinese and other trade partners using the dollar as the world reserve currency (and petro-currency) and buying up US treasury debt, U.S. elites have arranged a deficit advantage for China. One could also add China’s cheap labor and low cost manufactured goods as part of that barter as well.
While the American working class got the short end of the stick in this deal, the government and the corporate cabal certainly benefited.
Now, if Trump had pressured corporations to bring manufacturing back to the U.S. in order to reap the rewards of his dramatic tax cuts, tariffs after the fact might make a little more sense. With production back on U.S. soil we would have more economic stability to weather future crisis events. Instead, Trump gave corporations a tax cut for nothing. And instead of using that extra capital to innovate or add value to the real economy, companies used the money to continue artificially propping up their own stock prices through stock buybacks.
It should be obvious to most people at this point that Trump has no intention of “winning” the trade war. As I noted just after the G-20 conference and the dinner negotiations with China:
“Of course, the outcome is being touted by both sides as a “win,” but it is clear that the goal was to head fake the public rather than actually resolve trade disputes. Will the 90-day delay be seen as “good for markets?” Possibly. Though, the housing market, auto market, and credit markets will continue to crash as they have been for the past few months. I expect this development might buy stocks another week of rest, but little else. As the next Fed meeting approaches this month and it becomes clear that they intend to continue hiking rates into 2019, the false optimism will fade. I also expect that negotiations with China will fall apart yet again well before the 90-day delay is over…”
The G-20 honeymoon ended even faster than I imagined.
The arrest of Chinese CFO of Huawei Technologies, Meng Wanzhou, has immediately destroyed any possibility of legitimate diplomatic negotiations going forward, and this seems to be by design. The 90 day “truce” set apparently by verbal agreement during G-20 is likely over mere days after it started. National Security adviser and CFR ghoul John Bolton admitted in an interview with NPR that he was aware that Canada was preparing to arrest Meng at the request of the U.S. while he was eating grilled sirloin with the Chinese. The claim that Trump was not aware of the situation, to me, sounds absurd.
The detainment of Meng and the targeting of Huawei comes with a host of significant potential consequences.
First, as noted the trade truce is likely dead on arrival. While Trump continues to claim that progress is being made and that “soybeans are being sold”, we have heard this kind of rhetoric for the past several months. These claims are designed to produce headlines that create a steam valve for stock markets, bringing them down slowly instead of collapsing them outright.
Second, the possibility of further escalation of tariffs is much higher (U.S. farmers should not expect a reprieve anytime soon, despite rumors of “progress”).
Third, there is a chance that China will retaliate by snatching up U.S. corporate representatives (many of them just as embroiled if not more so in criminal enterprises). This is a development I realize the average liberty activist could not care less about, but the average American will see such actions as a slight by the Chinese against the U.S. as a whole. The narrative once again turns to the idea that China should be our focus rather than the banking elites. Thus, the false East/West paradigm is further entrenched in the American mindset.
If this trend continues, the trade war will eventually expand into a war on the U.S. dollar itself, and when it does, the U.S. will suffer the worst fiscal crisis in its history. Without the world reserve status of the dollar as well as continued foreign investment in U.S. debt, what’s left of our economy will disintegrate.
Meng’s arrest is a deliberately engineered “linchpin.” I have written extensively in past articles on DARPA’s “linchpin theory,” which is a kind of propaganda exercise more than a theory. According to DARPA, overly complex systems invite growing instability, and like a chain of dominoes, the smallest part of that system could be knocked over by a minor event causing a chain reaction that ends in total collapse.
Of course, this is a misrepresentation of reality. Complex systems do not invite instability, they create redundancy, making the system stronger and more resistant to disasters. Instability is actually caused by oversimplification of a system; that is to say, CENTRALIZATION is the true cause of large-scale crisis. As we have seen time and time again with globalism, the more economically interdependent and centralized the world becomes, the more vulnerable each nation is to the calamities of other nations.
DARPA loves centralization and is certainly not going to point a finger at it as the cause of global distress. And so they have created a scapegoat of decentralization through linchpin theory.
Linchpin theory also asserts another lie — the lie that most disasters are a product of “random chance.” The problem is that the only way that linchpin theory works is if disasters are created through conspiracy, not coincidence.
A system must be purposely weakened over time to the point that any crisis will translate into a collapse of the entire edifice. Central banks have done this quite expertly through the use of debt-based bubbles, followed by fiscal tightening into economic weakness. When you build up an economy like a great Jenga tower and begin pulling the most vital pieces in a calculated manner, eventually it’s going to come crashing down.
So which piece represents the supposed “linchpin” in our system today? Well, any piece might do the trick, but the arrest of a Chinese corporate executive (which the Chinese will consider hostage taking) at the very onset of a fragile trade truce is an excellent catalyst and also an excellent distraction.
As Meng sets bail awaiting trial and possible extradition, it does not matter if she leaves for China or remains to be prosecuted.
If the Chinese arrange for Meng to escape her surveillance and escape Canada, then this will be seen as damaging to trade negotiations on the American side.
If she stays and is held up in what will be a very drawn out public trial as an example of Chinese trade villainy, this will be seen as damaging to negotiations on the Chinese side.
Either way, the negotiations are walking dead.
But here is where we need to ask the most important question of all questions: Who benefits?
In my article ‘The Everything Bubble: When Will It Finally Crash?’ published in September, I predicted that:
“The Fed’s neutral rate efforts suggest a turning point in late 2018 to early 2019. Balance sheet cuts are expected to increase at this time, which would also expedite a crash in existing market assets. The only question is how long can corporations sustain stock buybacks until their own debt burdens crush their efforts? With such companies highly leveraged, interest rates will determine the length of their resolve. I believe two more hikes will be their limit.
If the Fed continues on its current path the next stock crash would begin around December 2018 into the first quarter of 2019.”
The timing of the arrest of Meng coincided perfectly with the Fed’s expanded balance sheet cuts. The Fed has now shifted from $30 billion per month to $50 billion per month in dumped assets. While Trump and the mainstream media hyper-focus on interest rates, there is little to no mention of the OTHER fiscal tightening that the Fed has undertaken.
The Fed is also set to raise interest rates to meet their neutral rate of inflation this month. This is something that has not happened in decades. And, corporate stock buybacks are dying in the last quarter of 2018, as the cost of borrowing to prop up equities is now too high. In response, stock markets are beginning to plunge, and this time there will be no significant bounce back because without Fed stimulus or buybacks, there is nothing left to keep things afloat.
To reiterate, the trade war is hitting a nexus, a point of extreme escalation just as the central bankers are about to kill the U.S. economy by tightening into economic weakness. The Meng snafu will be used by the mainstream media to draw the public’s attention away from central bank activities and toward the trade war. Everything Trump is doing is HELPING the banks to hide their culpability for the crash.
Why do the banking elites want a crash in the U.S.? There are numerous reasons and gains to be had. For an in-depth explanation, I recommend my article ‘The Economic End Game Explained.’ To summarize, globalists are setting the stage for what they often refer to as the “global economic reset.” This reset is essentially a major crisis event which will be exploited by globalists to centralize the system even further, into a one world currency and one world economy, governed by the banking elites through institutions like the IMF and the BIS.
The U.S. economy and the U.S. dollar must be diminished in order for this to happen. And with conservatives supposedly “in control” of the U.S. government and the U.S. economy at the time of the crash, guess who is slated to get the blame? I’ll give you a hint: Not the central bankers…
In the meantime, the globalists hope that the majority of the world will buy into the fallacy of linchpin theory. They hope everyone will blame decentralization and “complexity” instead of centralization and over-simplicity in the system. And it is certainly possible that the hijacking of a Chinese corporate official will be held up as one of the dominoes that started the collapse.
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In what can only be described as a likely preview of the next round of the Fed’s quantitative easing, an armored truck reportedly spilled cash onto Route 3 West in East Rutherford, New Jersey on Thursday morning. The incident caused drivers to promptly exit their vehicles and scramble about the highway picking up bills of all denominations.
The Brinks driver picking up cash off of the ground on Route 3
After the truck spilled cash, it caused two other vehicle crashes. Social media lit up shortly after the incident took place, showing video of drivers scrambling about the middle of an otherwise normally busy highway grabbing money off of the ground.
Early Christmas for NJ commuters! It was raining 💵 on Route 3!! @njdotcom @ABC7NY @News12NJ #commute pic.twitter.com/oNC7bs3fZz
— Sabrina Quagliozzi (@squagliozzi) December 13, 2018
The driver, who was also seen on video, was one of the many running through traffic trying to collect the cash.
The East Rutherford Police then put out a Tweet stating:
“Approx 8:30am ERPD received calls of an armored truck spilling cash along Rt 3 West, motorists exited vehicles attempting to remove cash causing multiple MV Crashes. Detectives are investigating. We ask any person with info or video of this incident, call ERPD 201-438-0165″
“$5, 20, everything. Look at the accidents. Wow,” someone in the video says.
A captain for Brinks was quoted as stating what can only be described as the incredibly obvious:
“At this time it appears the armored truck had a malfunction of one of its doors causing it to become unsecured.”
East Rutherford Police Capt. Phillip Taormina told NBC News:
“One good Samaritan had scooped up some money and handed it back to the security guard.”
The total amount of money that fell out of the Brinks truck has yet to be determined. Route 3 is an arterial road leading in and out of New York City through the Lincoln Tunnel. Additional video can be found here.
Jerome Powell, Janet Yellen and Haruhiko Kuroda were all seen nearby taking notes. A request for comment from Paul Krugman has not been returned.
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Authored by Mike Shedlock via MishTalk,
Australia’s housing collapse is now in full swing. A recession will follow shortly.
Inga Ting, Geoff Thompson and Alex McDonald provide and excellent set of graphics and information on the bursting of Australia’s housing bubble at House of Cards.
Home prices in more than four out of five council areas have reached their peak and are sliding towards an unknown nadir, according to the latest figures from property market analyst CoreLogic.
As the slump moves into its second year with little or no prospect of rebound, the downturn in capital city property markets threatens to drag down the rest of the economy.
And with a mixed outlook for the global economy, doubts are surfacing about where Australia is going to find the fuel to extend its near-record run of 27 years of unbroken economic growth.
The graph in the article is interactive with a choice of eight cities. Sydey displayed above.
Click on the graph for an even larger image.
Perth and Darwin have been clobbered. Sydney is in the works.
As they say… Every bubble is different….. until it bursts. @AlanKohler pic.twitter.com/qkUJvGWZ8R
— Lindsay David (@linzcom) December 11, 2018
I also like this Tweet in response.
As they say… Every bubble is different….. until it bursts. @AlanKohler pic.twitter.com/qkUJvGWZ8R
— Lindsay David (@linzcom) December 11, 2018
I believe this person means 2019 not 2018
The VIC debt accelerator continues to fall.
The DA of May-2018 determined the Nov-2018 MEL annual house price result of -7.6%.
The DA was 1.9% in May-2018; it has now fallen to -7.5% in Oct-2018, indicating MEL prices will decline more rapidly through to Apr-2018. pic.twitter.com/r4KWmLCCtw
— Philip Soos (@PhilipSoos) December 12, 2018
There is no way Australia avoids a recession. I don’t care what the central bank does.
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US Customs and Border Protection officers are snooping through the contents of more travelers’ electronic devices than ever, and don’t follow protocol 67% of the time, according to a new report by the Department of Homeland Security’s internal watchdog.
The department’s Inspector General found that there were 29,000 devices searched during “secondary” inspections in 2017 out of 397 million travelers, up from 18,400 searches the previous year on 390 million travelers – less than one percent of all people entering the United States.
During an enhanced secondary inspection, CBP’s Office of Field Operations (OFO) can manually review information on a traveler’s electronic devices – or they can connect external equipment to copy information for uploading and analysis in CBP’s Automated Targeting System (ATS).
Unfortunately for travelers, the OFO was found to have skirted or ignored standard operating procedures during searches of electronic devices, according to the Inspector General report.
During our review of a sample of border searches of electronic devices conducted between April 2016 and July 2017, we determined that OFO did not always conduct the searches at U.S. ports of entry according to its SOPs. Specifically, because of inadequate supervision to ensure OFO officers properly documented searches, OFO cannot maintain accurate quantitative data or identify and address performance problems related to these searches. In addition, OFO officers did not consistently disconnect electronic devices, specifically cell phones, from networks before searching them because headquarters provided inconsistent guidance to the ports of entry on disabling data connections on electronic devices. OFO also did not adequately manage technology to effectively support search operations and ensure the security of data. -DHS OIG
Without disconnecting from networks before searching them, OFO officers were able to retrieve or access information stored remotely in violation of DHS policy.
The DHS IG recommended better documentation for searches, more consistent disabling of data connections prior to searches, and the deletion of data fom thumb drives once it is no longer needed, and for the development of a system to evaluate whether their electronic surveillance techniques are working.
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Three weeks ago we reported that, the Bank of Canada announced for the first time that in order to prop up the sliding Canadian housing market help increase the tradeable float of its benchmark securities, the central bank would start buying government-backed mortgage bonds, also known as Canada Mortgage Bonds which are guaranteed by Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp.
Well, it took less than a month for the BoC to execute on its intentions, because on Thursday, the central bank purchased Canada Housing Trust bonds for the first time ever, scooping up C$250 million ($187 million) of the federal agency’s C$5.5 billion five-year notes which priced today.
Canada Housing Trust, the special issuer of Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp.-backed debt, priced the 2.55% bonds due 2023 at a spread of 40.5 bps over comparable debt issued by the country’s federal treasury, National Bank Financial, the lead coordinator of the deal, said. The housing agency first offered these notes in September at a relatively narrow spread of only 31.5 basis points.
As we reported at the time, the Bank of Canada said in late November it would broaden the range of high quality assets it acquires to include purchases of government-guaranteed debt issued by federal Crown corporations. While the central bank said the expansion is “only for balance sheet management” and would give it added flexibility to offset the continued growth of bank notes, the cynical skeptics immediately accused the BoC of implicitly stepping in to prop up Canada’s deteriorating housing market.
The expansion, the BoC said, would also provide more freedom to reduce its participation in primary Canadian government bond auctions and help boost the tradeable float, supporting secondary market liquidity. Of course, if that’s the real reason, one wonders why it took the BOC ten years since the launch of global QE to expand its operation, instead of waiting until Canada had tumbled to 37th place in the latest global ranking of housing markets from commercial real estate firm Knight Frank, from fourth place in the same survey a year earlier, amid a sharp slowing in Canada’s housing market…
… coupled with the biggest annual drop in the biggest regional housing bubble, Vancouver, which just suffered its biggest annual decline since 2009.
Meanwhile, the BOC stepped in at just the right time: today’s deal marks the completion of Canada Housing Trust’s funding plan for the year. The agency has an issuance limit of C$40 billion ($30 billion) for 2018, and after today’s deal it has already priced C$39.75 billion of new bonds. In other words, courtesy of the central bank, not a concern is in sight, although one can’t help but recall that just last week the BoC said it would step in only if investor demand did no meet issuance standards. Which begs the question: what would have happened had the BOC not stepped in to complete “investor” demand for the new issue?
And now, considering that the Canadian housing market is suddenly sliding while household insolvencies and bankruptcies are soaring, we wonder if next on the BoC’s “shopping list” will be overdue credit card bills and second-lien mortgages.
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