Category: zerohedge

Authored by Judith Bergman via The Gatestone Institute,

“At least since the events at the Cologne cathedral square on New Year’s Eve in 2015 people apparently feel more and more unsafe,” said Oliver Malchow, the chairman of one of Germany’s two largest police unions. He was referring to the mass sexual assaults committed mainly by Arab and North African men at the Cologne cathedral square on New Year’s Eve more than four years ago. Malchow was also referring to new statistics, which show that approximately 640,000 Germans now have licenses for gas pistols — a large increase since 2014, when around 260,000 people had such a license. A gas pistol fires loud blanks or tear gas cartridges and is only potentially lethal at extremely close range.

The new statistics, according to Malchow, showed a “latent sense of insecurity” in the population. The number of real firearms owned privately also reportedly increased in 2018 — by 27,000 over the previous year. In Germany now, 5.4 million firearms are privately owned, most of them rifles.

A recent annual poll, conducted in September, confirms Malchow’s estimate: Every year since 1992, R+V, Germany’s largest insurance firm, has been asking Germans what they fear most. “This year, for the first time,” according to a report in Deutsche Welle, “a majority said they were most afraid that the country would be unable to deal with the aftermath of the migrant influx of 2015”. Fifty-six percent of those polled said they were scared that the country would not be able to deal with the number of migrants. This September marked exactly four years since Chancellor Angela Merkel opened Germany’s borders and allowed in almost a million migrants. However, Ulrich Wagner, professor of social psychology at the University of Marburg told Deutsche Welle:

“It’s really got more to do with the fact that politicians and media discuss this issue a great deal — which triggers fear… For example, in the latest study, fear of terrorism has clearly gone down. We simply don’t discuss this issue as much as we used to, and that means that people feel safer.”

What the professor appears to imply is that you can solve a crucial societal issue, not by debating its ramifications and publicly seeking to find solutions to it, but by not talking about it, thereby lulling the public into a false sense of security by pretending that the problem does not exist.

The terror threat in Germany has not, in fact, disappeared. Just this March, 11 men were arrested on suspicion of planning a terrorist attack in Germany. Police told the media that the goal of the attack had been “to kill as many infidels as possible” by using firearms and vehicles. According to police, the Islamist group had already organized the rental of a large vehicle: money had been raised and weapons dealers had been approached. “The terror threat in Germany remains high,” the media reported in April. “According to security authorities, there is currently no concrete risk of an attack. But officials are prepared for any development”.

German media also reported in April that German authorities have prevented 13 terrorist attacks in Germany since 2010 and that, according to the Federal Criminal Police Office, all of them were “linked to Islamic extremism”. As recently as October, a Syrian man plowed a stolen truck into the back of a line of traffic, ramming eight cars together and injuring seven people.

Professor Wagner does have a point, however — people do talk a lot less publicly about crucial societal issues: As previously reported by Gatestone Institute, a May 2019 survey, conducted by Institut für Demoskopie Allensbach for the newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, showed that discussing certain issues in Germany has become taboo. While the survey did not specifically mention terrorism, it concluded that “The refugee issue is one of the most sensitive topics for the vast majority of respondents, followed by statements of opinion on Muslims and Islam”. As an example, 71% of Germans say, according to the survey, that one can only comment on the refugee issue “with caution”.

Also, according to the annual poll on what Germans fear most, mentioned above, the level of fear in the former East Germany is more than 10% higher than in the West. According to Deutsche Welle:

“The paradox is that fewer migrants and fewer refugees actually live in the east than in the west, and yet the levels of fear are higher,” says psychologist Ulrich Wagner. He explains that people who have had personal interactions with foreigners are less likely to believe unfounded horror stories about criminal refugees. “And in the east of Germany, people simply have fewer opportunities to meet refugees and debunk those myths.”

As for that hypothesis, it may be more likely, not that fear is higher, but that people in the former East Germany are less afraid of telling pollsters how they really feel. As the survey on German self-censorship has shown, 57 % of Germans say that “increasingly being told what to say and how to behave” is getting on their nerves. Germans from the formerly communist East complain more about this than the average German, as they have “fresh historical memories of regulation and constriction”.

August Hanning, a former president of Germany’s Federal Intelligence Service, recently confirmed that the “latent sense of insecurity” is not due to public fear-mongering. During a visit to the UK, Hanning said that Chancellor Angela Merkel had endangered security in Germany with her historic decision to allow virtually unrestricted immigration into the country by creating a “security crisis” for Germany and the other member states of the European Union.

“We have seen the consequences of this decision in terms of German public opinion and internal security – we experience problems every day.

“We have criminals, terrorist suspects and people who use multiple identities…

“While things are tighter today, we still have 300,000 people in Germany of whose identities we cannot be sure. That’s a massive security risk.

“Moreover, that decision led to the rise of the extremist right, and that’s another security risk, too…”

While Germans are afraid to speak publicly about migrants, refugees and Islam, a recent study conducted by Bertelsmann Stiftung showed that roughly every second German considers Islam to be a threat. Professor Wagner’s theory above, that not talking about certain issues makes fears go away, is, apparently, false. According to the study:

“Overall, about half of those surveyed perceive Islam as a threat. This proportion is higher in eastern Germany, at 57 percent, than in western Germany (50 percent). These findings, recorded in spring 2019, are largely similar to the results of previous Religion Monitor surveys taken in 2013, 2015, and 2017.”

According to Yasemin El-Menouar, Bertelsmann Stiftung’s expert on religion, according to the organization’s website, “Evidently, many people nowadays view Islam more as a political ideology and less as a religion and therefore not deserving of religious tolerance.”

At least 5 people have been stabbed after a black male entered Rabbi Rottenburg’s Shul, located in the Forshay neighborhood in Monsey, New York, and pulled out a machete.

As VosIzNeias.com reports, the alleged assailant pulled off the cover and stabbed at least 3 people. One of the victims was stabbed in the chest.

The perpetrator then ran out and escaped in a vehicle. His plates were spotted before he left, and the police are currently searching for him.

Videos of the stabbing attack began disseminating on social media.

Horrifying!!! #nycstabbing pic.twitter.com/wI7ejhhMJE

— Mark Kennedy 🇺🇸 (@RealMarkKennedy) December 29, 2019

Up close. #NYCStabbing pic.twitter.com/i1UZbO5VwK

— Mark Kennedy 🇺🇸 (@RealMarkKennedy) December 29, 2019

Motti Seligson, director of media for Chabad.org, told The Jerusalem Post that the congregants, Hassidim, were gathered for a Hanukkah party and confirmed the preliminary details of the event.

Video from the scene of the stabbings at a synagogue in Monsey where Chassidim were gathered for a Hanukkah celebration. pic.twitter.com/wQhWp9SrdA

— Motti Seligson (@mottiseligson) December 29, 2019

Video from the scene pic.twitter.com/anPwVW1Jhv

— Jacob Kornbluh (@jacobkornbluh) December 29, 2019

The Orthodox Jewish Public Affairs Council said five people, all Hasidic, were transported to local hospitals with stab wounds. 

At 9:50 this eve, a call came in about a mass stabbing at 47 Forshay Road in Monsey (Rockland County; 30 miles North of NYC). It’s the house of a Hasidic Rabbi. 5 patients with stab wounds, all Hasidic, were transported to local hospitals.

— OJPAC Hudson Valley (@OJPACHV) December 29, 2019

“We are closely monitoring the reports of multiple people stabbed at a synagogue in Monsey, NY (Rockland County),” a representative of the New York City Police Department Counterterrorism Bureau tweeted.

Hatzalah emergency response team is on scene and victims have been transferred to the hospital.

Blood everywhere. #nycstabbing pic.twitter.com/yMw01A7gqg

— Mark Kennedy 🇺🇸 (@RealMarkKennedy) December 29, 2019

As JPost.com notes, this is the second stabbing attack in Monsey in the last two months. In November, a man jumped out of his car in stabbed a father on his way to synagogue, gauging his eye. In the last week, a spate of antisemitic crimes has swept the city.

 

 

 

Even the most curmudgeonly boomer would probably agree that the millennial generation is struggling. Though they have no great wars to fight (in the West, wars are now fought by volunteers), millennials are facing enormous loads of student debt, stagnant wages, and an entrenched sense that the future looks bleak. Whatever skills they have learned will likely be rendered unmarketable thanks to AI, and anybody who isn’t programming the machines and computers who will run our future society should fear them.

As a group, those aged 23 to 38 earn less and have fewer assets than their parents. But across the US, there’s a pretty wide variance in living conditions, and for millennials who need to watch every penny, certain states make more hospitable homes than others.

In a recent research project, Zippia.com determined the 10 worst states/territories for millennials. They are:

• District of Columbia
• Georgia
• New York
• Florida
• North Carolina
• California
• South Carolina
• Alabama
• Louisiana
• Mississippi

As a region, the south is the most heavily represented on this list, accompanied by states with expensive urban enclaves where young people flock seemingly to live in penury while they follow their dreams chasing those entertainment and media jobs that will seemingly never provide a realistic paycheck (the share of millennials in their 20s and even into their 30s who depend on financial support from parents has never been higher).

To arrive at its rankings, the researchers assigned number values for each of four categories: millennial unemployment rate, average student loan debt load, millennial home ownership and the percentage of millennials living in poverty.

Which brings us to No. 1…

Washington DC:

Unemployment: 6%

Home Ownership: 18.38%

Poverty Rate: 25%

Student Loan Debt: $60,039

A city known for its ridiculous housing prices, one in four millennials in our nation’s capital live in poverty. They also have the highest average student loan debt in the nation.

Georgia:

Unemployment: 8%

Home Ownership: 31.61%

Poverty Rate: 20%

Student Loan Debt: $37,284

Though housing is relatively affordable in Georgia, and the student-debt burden is much lower than Washington DC, roughly one in five millennial Georgians live in poverty, which is enough to secure the No. 2 spot on this list.

New York

Unemployment: 7%

Home Ownership: 24%

Poverty Rate: 19%

Student Loan Debt: $38,734

Low home ownership rates coupled with brutally high rents make New York a no-brainer for the No. 3 spot. Millennials also face high poverty rates and burdensome student debt loads.

Florida

Unemployment: 7%

Home Ownership: 29%

Poverty Rate: 19%

Student Loan Debt: $35,709

The state best known as a sunny place for shady people, one in five of the state’s millennials live in poverty. Setting the numbers aside, the proximity to Florida Man can’t be easily quantified, but it definitely sucks.

North Carolina

Unemployment: 7%

Home Ownership: 32%

Poverty Rate: 20%

Student Loan Debt: $36,246

The issues with North Carolina is low home ownership and high unemployment, coupled with a high student debt burden.

California

Unemployment: 7%

Home Ownership: 23%

Poverty Rate: 17%

Student Loan Debt $34,449

Piss-poor policymaking in Sacramento has saddled Californians with expensive housing prices (because endless environmental regs make building so expensive), while nature is punishing the state with wildfires and a brutal drought that finally ended this year. Homeownership is simply out of reach for all but the wealthiest tech industry drones.

South Carolina

Unemployment: 7%

Home Ownership: 36%

Poverty Rate: 22%

Student Loan Debt: $37,249

Alabama

Unemployment: 8%

Home Ownership: 37%

Poverty Rate: 23%

Student Loan Debt: $34,861

Alabama is very similar to the other southern states on this list: High unemployment and poverty.

Louisiana

Unemployment: 8%

Home Ownership: 37%

Poverty Rate: 26%

Student Loan Debt: $33,860

Things aren’t easy for millennials down by the bayou. Like Alabama before it, young people face high rates of poverty and unemployment. But at least they can drink their troubles away in the Big Easy.

Mississippi

Hardly a surprise. One of the only Southern states that’s entirely devoid of a large urban commercial center (the largest city is the capital, Jackson, and it’s the only municipality in the state with a population of over 100,000 people), Mississippi is known for grinding rural poverty in communities where jobs, solid housing and even basic services like supermarkets can be hard to come by.

If your state isn’t listed above, you can see where it fell on the list here.

Authored by David Brockett via DCDirtyLaundry.com,

Disclosure:

During the 1990’s I served as a militia leader in Texas; it was after Federal agents killed Vickie Weaver and her son in Ruby Ridge, Idaho (1992), the Branch Davidian massacre in Waco, Texas (1993), the Assault Weapons Ban (1994), and the Oklahoma City bombing (1995). The nation was in turmoil.   The Clintons were in power with “Bloody Janet” Reno as Attorney General. Even the Home-Schooling movement was under fire by the Clinton cabal. We were told it “took a village’ to raise our children–but their village was full of unpatriotic idiots.

Democrat Ann Richards (responsible for the illegal military involvement at the Waco massacre) was Governor of Texas, and we had almost no gun rights. You couldn’t even legally carry a pistol in your vehicle unless you could establish that you were “traveling” and staying away from home overnight (keep a suitcase in the trunk). By 1996 the militia movement was in full swing across the nation, with a bunch of poorly-trained men and women in camo, faced off against well-armed federal agents, law enforcement and the National guard. To say it was a powder keg would be an understatement. To make matters even more dangerous, the feds were using undercover operatives to stir up and instigate violence in militias.

Today when I see people write about how close to a revolution we are, I understand the sentiment, but you ain’t seen nothing yet! Wait until you decide to group together, armed and wearing some kind of military uniform, making loud anti-government statements, and planning your resistance! Lots of interesting things will follow!

Siren’s Song

Oh, the romance of being a revolutionary: square-jawed, armed and dangerous, feared by men, admired by women and children–and your dog. But mostly it gives you a chance to buy loads of expensive, dangerous-looking toys and cool camo gear! Who could resist swaggering around with salty BVD’s, and a full complement of “weapons of war” strapped to your body? Then there are bivouacs where, after a hard day of standing around in the woods, you sit around a campfire talking shit. Maybe, if you’re lucky, one of the militia members has some acreage where you can waste a couple of hundred dollars praying and spraying ammo in the general direction of a target—it’s all about the noise! The member with the loudest gun wins. And let’s not forget the comradery forged in the fires of Hell as you and your buddies fight off mosquitos during practice night missions while humping the seventy pounds of gear (mostly useless to real guerilla fighters) someone convinced you to purchase.

Brief History

During the 1990s, the media managed to paint the militia movement as a dangerous bunch of kooks. Many will tell you that the bombing of the Murrah building in Oklahoma City was a government-initiated operation to further alienate the public. For many reasons I won’t get into here, I wouldn’t argue with those people.

The Clinton administration was very unpopular, and the last thing they needed was a national uprising. Bill Clinton was cozy with the United Nations. Globalization had reared its ugly head in the form of NAFTA and the World Trade Organization (which followed GATT). I don’t have the space to cover how these organizations crippled the US economy or affected society, so you will have to do some research on your own. Suffice it to say that both Republicans and Democrats in Washington were working together (still are) on the financial demise of our nation and its sovereignty. The Assault Weapons ban was a bi-partisan fear-response to the threat posed by a well-armed civil resistance.

To Be or Not to Be a Militia Member

The first question you have to ask yourself is what you hope to gain by putting a government target on your back, and those in your family. In 1997 I hosted a national militia meeting on my property in Texas; it was a large encampment of militia leaders and members from all over the country. We even made the cover of Time Magazine as a “militia hotspot.” What was the goal of this get-together?

Before I begin, let me tell you a funny story. During our camp set-up, we rented one of those huge blue and white striped tents (urban camo) and enough chairs to fill it. The day before our official agenda began, Channel Eight of Dallas sent a news chopper out to film our camp from the air. Seeing a bunch of people with AK’s slung over their shoulders, the chopper flew a wide circle around the camp–so wide they couldn’t get decent footage. They spent so much time flying this distant arc they ran low on fuel and had to leave. About thirty minutes later they came back, this time cautiously venturing in closer and closer; eventually, the side door opened and their cameraman began filming. I guess they decided we weren’t going to shoot them out of the sky. The point of the story is how the media had bought into their own militia boogeyman narrative.

“They” will set you up

Now back to the purpose of the meeting. Militia leaders were being picked off by the federales via entrapment schemes similar to what happened to Randy Weaver in Idaho. Government informants joined these groups and set up the leaders by doing things such as planting explosive devices (pipe bombs) on militia leader’s property to be “discovered” during federal raids. Other informants acted as instigators (our Texas group had one) prodding leaders and members into taking action that would unnecessarily put the unit in danger (physical and legal), and in a bad light to the public. Some informants got militia members on tape talking about planning illegal activities (this was actually a lot of empty bullshit boasting).

The national meeting acted as a sounding board so that other militia leaders could be informed of the risks they were taking. I also believed that we needed a strong joint public statement about our mission and our intentions. So, we invited the FBI and any law enforcement members who might want to attend—we knew they would find their way in anyway. A local sheriff deputy sat in his car across the road, watching with binoculars; my neighbors kept goading him into going up the hill to our event. He declined. Back then police were taught to be afraid of militia members and mental patients. At least we were in good company.

The negative government public relations campaign didn’t always work. During the national meeting, several families came to the gate with food and encouragement. My rural neighbors supported and encouraged what we were doing. When a Dallas news team gathered, interviewing people off our property, they only found one person (not a local) who said anything negative—guess which interview made the nightly news!

I haven’t seen Clint Eastwood’s movie on Richard Jewel yet, but the Atlanta bomb that Jewel discovered was most likely planted as a false flag. Working as security, Jewel found the package and reported it. He paid the price for screwing up their operation. In a joint personal assault, the federal government and the media tried desperately to paint him as a domestic terrorist. Interestingly, the feds never investigated anyone else for this crime. See the movie.

Who joins the militia?

There were very few militia members with military experience. The ones, like myself, that had experience were Vietnam Vets. If you were around back then you will remember how vets were painted by the media as dangerous, wild-eyed camo-wearing kooks. It seemed that not a month went by without a violent incident involving a veteran. Just as school shootings are now, the media rushed to cover every veteran-involved incident. We were still wearing the scourge of the Vietnam War, and most media types came from the same liberal group that protested the war. Back then, no one knew anything about PTSD, and the VA denied such a malady existed (kind of like Agent Orange). The term “postal” was derived from Vietnam Vet Post Office employees losing it and shooting up the place. Occasionally a VA center would be the target. Eventually, many of these vets got help, but not nearly soon enough for them or their families. I digress.

Most newbie militia members had no experience, and putting these well-intentioned, patriots in a real military-type operation would have been leading lambs to slaughter. A militia leader had to be realistic about his members and their capabilities. If you were lucky you would have at least a sprinkling of country people with firearms and woodland experience. At the time, people were coming in from everywhere because so many were concerned about a government mass round-up of dissenters and/or a societal breakdown where the bad guys could come from anywhere. I personally focused on gun safety, weapons familiarization, and marksmanship. Additionally, we worked on techniques for traveling safely during times of unrest, home defense, and survival.

There was a reason so many people were worried about citizen internment. The plan for FEMA concentration camps was real. Former Congressman Henry B. Gonzales, R, of Texas, publicly admitted their existence and their purpose (contain people during a period of mass unrest). State troopers had been put on alert to be watchful for anyone who might be a militia member. Sheriffs and municipal police across the country were being fed scary bullshit by the FBI, and law enforcement was running around with hair-triggers during traffic stops.

Nothing has changed–for the good

I guess I have spent most of your time talking about how things were “back in the day,” but you can count on the same dynamics this millennium. The government is much more sophisticated in keeping an eye on citizens, and there are thousands more armed government agents. You have to assume that everything you do or say is being monitored by Big Brother. The good news is, if your group stays small and keeps their mouths shut, the feds are unlikely to bother with you. If you are looking for strength in numbers, assume you will have at least one informant in your group.

Cull these members out immediately

Gung-ho members who encourage aggressive illegal actions should be expelled immediately. Now, that may rub some patriots the wrong way, but to do otherwise is to set up your members for potential prison time. Just like in other relationships, everyone is not trustworthy. If you have a member(s) go off the rails and do something stupid, you are all guilty by association. If, on the other hand, you are willing to “take a stand” like they did at the Bundy Ranch in Nevada, just be aware it will be expensive and you risk your lives, family fortunes, and many years behind bars. Only you can know if the price is worth it. Also, be aware that if you have an informant or agitator in your group, your operation may be compromised in advance and your members put at risk, physically.

Here is an article on what happened to members of a Michigan militia. 

The FBI planted a secret informant and FBI agent in the militia in 2008 to record the activities of the group. The video and audio recordings became the crux of the federal case, including clips of the elder Stone making anti-government statements and remarks about killing police officers. The defendants all faced a maximum sentence of life in prison. Fortunately, after a very expensive and lengthy trial, most of the members were cleared of all charges. The leader and his son faced weapons charges.

Explosive “experts” (guys who want to show you how to make illegal weapons like pipe bombs, grenades, etc.) should not be allowed in your organization unless you know them really, really, really well—even then you have to worry about other members who might inform on your group. In case you choose to train members on how to manufacture/store illegal explosives or weapons, the risk is great that they will be found and you will be prosecuted. Two militia leaders in South Carolina went to prison when two informants slipped onto their property and planted pipe bombs. The guilty verdict came even though there was testimony from several witnesses, including the informants, that the group had stated repeatedly that it was NOT interested in making explosives or doing anything illegal.

In summary, there are fewer risks in forming your group around like-minded family members and close friends. As you can see from the Michigan Christian militia group–even they were infiltrated. Any stranger brings with them more risks than rewards. A family unit focused on self-protection and survival is your best option. If everyone is trained in survival skills, including marksmanship, and all members are equipped with everything they need, you should be prepared for almost anything coming your way. If society falls apart, or a government, foreign or domestic, imposes itself on the population, your group will have the option of joining with others if you so choose.

With the threat of a “foreign” military (immigrant militias) operating in our country, danger could come from any quarter!

Stay off the ridgeline and keep your powder dry!

At the same time that dipshits future Nobel Prize winners at the Fed like Neel Kashkari are walking around pondering why the inequality gap continues to widen in the United States, monetary policy has catalyzed another year of surging wealth for the richest in the country while keeping its boot on the neck of the poorest. 

In fact, as Bloomberg notes, the wealth of the 500 richest people surged 25% in 2019. And the riches are coming in atypical fashion. 

Among those are social media giants like Kylie Jenner, who became the youngest self-made billionaire this year after her cosmetic company signed an exclusive partnership with Ulta Beauty. She sold a 51% stake in her company for $600 million. 

Similarly, the Korean family who helped popularize the Washington Nationals’ rally cry, “Baby Shark, doo-doo doo-doo doo-doo”, is now worth about $125 million.

Another great example is Willis Johnson, who made his $1.9 billion fortune by building a network of junkyards to sell damaged cars.

All of these are examples of just how much money made its way to the richest over the last 12 months. The Bloomberg Billionaires Index added $1.2 trillion, now placing their collective net worth at $5.9 trillion.

Only 52 people on the ranking saw their fortunes decline during the year. Jeff Bezos, for example, lost $9 billion – but only due to his divorce. 

Bloomberg noted the year’s biggest winners:

• The 172 American billionaires on the Bloomberg ranking added $500 billion, with Facebook Inc.’s Mark Zuckerberg up $27.3 billion and Microsoft Corp. co-founder Bill Gates rose $22.7 billion.
• Representation from China continued to grow, with the nation’s contingent rising to 54, second only to the U.S. He Xiangjian, founder of China’s biggest air-conditioner exporter, was the standout performer as his wealth surged 79% to $23.3 billion.
• Russia’s richest added $51 billion, a collective increase of 21%, as emerging-market assets from currencies to stocks and bonds rebounded in 2019 after posting big losses a year earlier.

Newly minted billionaires included Anthony von Mandl, the man behind “White Claw” hard seltzer and Hong Kong’s Lo family, who are in the business of producing soy milk. 

With the market hitting new highs every day and President Trump’s relentless pressure on the Fed to keep rates low, the gap will likely continue to widen heading into 2020 – a year politicians will undoubtedly spend bickering about proposed solutions to the problem, all the while failing to understand that the alarm is coming from the inside, right before their eyes. 

The gains are an obvious continued indicator of flawed monetary policy that everybody – except those at the Fed (and Steve Liesman) seems to understand.

As a result, currently, the 0.1% control the biggest share of the pie in the U.S. than at any time since 1929. 

Via The Babylon Bee,

The UN Panel on Outrage Change has confirmed the worst: global levels of outrage may reach the point of no return in 2020.

Outrage levels previously reached dangerous highs during the Bush administration, but Obama was able to reverse the trend. He didn’t change much about the way Bush was handling things, but he was a Democrat, so outrage levels went back down as the press stopped reporting on scandals and corruption.

However, in 2016, global outrage reached record highs, especially among Democrats. Republicans had been mildly outraged during the Obama years but mostly had to go to work so didn’t have much time to spew toxic, harmful outrage into the environment. Libertarians have generated almost no outrage since they are high all the time. 

Experts believe the reelection of Trump in 2020 would be “catastrophic,” catapulting outrage levels well into the stratosphere.

“If we do not cut our anger emissions immediately, the world will be consumed by fiery outrage by the end of next year,” said outrage expert Dr. Hal Gourd, pointing to a hockey-stick graph.

The audience responded by getting really mad, shaking their fists at the sky and making loud grunting noises.

“Now, now, let’s all calm down,” Gourd said, but this only angered the crowd further.

Finally, Gourd began to freak out as more and more bricks were lobbed his direction.

 “OK, FINE, IT’S TIME TO PANIC! AHHHHHH!!!!”

He jumped out a window to his waiting luxury jet and flew away.

Experts recommend everyone stop “yelling and stuff,” so we can prolong our inevitable death by outrage a few years. Those who do not wish to stop being outraged can purchase “outrage credits,” generated by people who are just chillin’.

*  *  *

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Elon Musk is on top of the world, has been able to capitulate shorts and send Tesla’s equity price above the $420 per share buyout level, to close at $430.380 on Friday.  

With Musk’s ego higher than ever, he tweeted Friday night that Boring Company would complete a commercial tunnel in Las Vegas in the near term and be fully operational in 2020. 

“Boring Co is completing its first commercial tunnel in Vegas, going from Convention Center to Strip, then will work on other projects,” Musk tweeted late on Friday. 

Last month, we noted how Boring officially won the contract from Las Vegas to build a “subterranean transit system” by undercutting the bids of established players in the engineering space.

We pointed out how Boring is going to have to prove that its technology and talent can scale to municipality size projects, instead of a test run using a go-kart on skates in 50 feet of tunnel. 

In July, Boring raised $120 million in a round of funding from gullible cultists “disruptive investors.” 

We noted earlier this year that Boring’s tunnel projects were debunked by PhDs and ridiculed by government officials as nothing new: “There’s no revolution here. Let’s be honest here: he’s driving a car through a sewer pipe,” Ph.D. chemist and video blogger Phil Mason recently said. 

MONORAIL! https://t.co/XJ9Q3XsWUJ

— Charley Grant (@CGrantWSJ) December 28, 2019

With the test tunnel completed in Hawthorne, California, and other projects in Chicago and Washinton, D.C. to Baltimore, Musk has made a lot of promises in the past where his timelines don’t exactly come true. 

…We’re still waiting for the one million “robotaxis” to hit the streets in 2020, another promise made by Musk. 

 

Podcast of John Batchelor Show

Summary of Broadcast Produced by Yvonne Lorenzo:

As the New Cold War gathers up speed and escalates, we are entering a “fact free world” as allegations are made that are proved not to be true are promoted; for example, the allegation that the DNC was hacked by Russia has been officially debunked—no one could name the seventeen intelligence agencies, the Coast Guard was one. The notion of the hacking was cooked up by two agencies: by the DNI’s head James Clapper and Brennan at the CIA. Nevertheless, recently News Anchor Chuck Todd of NBC (the most pro-Russiagate network, the ones who shamelessly accused presidential candidate Tulsi Gabbard of being a Russian asset) took it one step further: ignoring the facts, Todd again stated that seventeen intelligence agencies agreed that the Russians not only interfered in the election but that they swung the election to Trump. While interference is one thing, no one has previously made that allegation. Consequently, we are now in a fact-free discourse in America: no evidence is necessary to prove anything, falsehoods are taken up by the legacy media, what Professor Cohen would call a world of tabloid gossip media, except in their favor the tabloids, fearing lawsuits, will do some fact checking, which is conspicuous in its absence in the legacy media. And Professor Cohen noted that it’s hard to get traction and you can’t have a conversation with someone when you don’t agree upon the facts.

In conversation on a cruise with fellow liberals, Professor Cohen noted most take the view that where there is smoke there is fire and there is something to these allegations of Russiagate and Putin’s control over Trump; they state the media wouldn’t continue to promote these conspiracy theories, these allegations about Trump’s nefarious relations with the Kremlin, without reason and so there must be something to them. Yet while facts have become absolutely critical Cohen notes you can’t get people to focus on the facts; for that reason, he feels despair and observes that for the first time in his life in his public discussions of Russia there are no basic premises that people accept any more, for if you say “If there’s smoke, there’s fire,” that is just not a logical way of thinking: you either have the facts or you don’t.

Batchelor also points out in the impeachment charges there is a great deal of presumption; there are no facts regarding the president as well, and he cites Trump’s letter to Nancy Pelosi and poses this question: what does the Kremlin think about the impeachment?

Cohen answers that the Russian high policy class in the 1990s – the America worship period – they and not just the youth, strongly believed that Russia’s future was with the West and America in particular, and now what strikes Russians most is the role of Russian intelligence services in the Western allegations. Pro-America Russians thought that American intelligence services didn’t play the role that the Soviet ones did. In Russian history classes and as a staple of popular culture, the sinister role of the “secret police” goes back to the Czarist era but what distinguished America was that it didn’t have anything comparable in abuses by its intelligence services—or so it was believed. Consequently, for those who looked up to America, it’s a source of disillusion and shock to learn that the American special services “went off the reservation” for quite a long time, not unlike Russia’s, and so they have become disillusioned while for those who tried to get Russians to be more nationalistic, their perspective is to say with gratification, “We told you so. Now will you please grow up!”

Russians call the American agencies “the organs” perhaps not being clear on the difference between the CIA and the FBI and conflating them. For Russians, the role of such agencies is baked into the culture and this has resulted in rethinking not only about America but about their own special services. An Op-Ed piece in a Russian liberal newspaper the Russian liberal author wrote, after watching what’s unfolding in America, we used to beat up on our intelligence services for decades but now maybe we need them. Contrary to a “cult of the intelligence services,” Cohen thinks what must be determined is the role of the American intelligence services in creating Russiagate from the very beginning.

Yet what is critical is to know how Russiagate began in America, with the Barr-Durham probe into the origins of Russia and Russiagate will continue to be a major issue in the 2020 election. What struck Cohen about the letter from Trump to Pelosi—which was so eloquent he doubts Trump wrote it—was that he understands it will be an issue in the 2020 elections, and it was a campaign document. That aside, Trump is aware that Democrats are campaigning still on Russiagate; nothing has turned up that it factual. Therefore, despite the absence of facts, this will be a major issue. Ukraine has turned into a stand-in for Russia.

Jennifer Rubin of the Washington Post, once a quintessential conservative, published an article titled “Time to Call out and Remove Putin’s Propagandist in America.” While the article is slightly cagier than that headline, essentially she wants to shutdown and deprive access to media who aren’t espousing and promoting the Russiagate/Russophobic narratives. Cohen condemns that kind of behavior is that. On opposite side of Rubin, Cohen stated he himself has never advocated the silencing and removal of those who promote among other falsehoods the provably false Russiagate narrative. He asks where are things drifting and he answers discourse and relations are becoming ugly and awful.

Returning to the past, he notes there was an assumption that Russia under Yeltsin would emerge as a replica and junior partner of America; Cohen believes those who promote the Russiagate narrative and demonize Trump because their “impossible dream” failed—Russia is too old, too vast to ever be a replica of America. What took Professor Cohen aback in the testimony from Fiona Hill and others was how deep and wide the Russophobia runs in the Washington think tanks. Until she spoke and testified he had no idea how much she—and the other Russia experts—hate Russia.

Batchelor noted this is the language of civil war in Trump’s letter; Trump uses the term “Star Chamber of partisan persecution” and “coup” which are the language of a country torn in half and he asked the question whether the weakening of the civil contract to be an advantage to Putin and Russia.

Cohen notes every newspaper and media source in America say Putin is delighted since it is his goal is to foment disarray in America.

The fact is, however, this chaos and dysfunction and enmity is one of the last things Putin wants. Putin’s purpose is to rebuild Russia from the economic and political catastrophes of the 1990s; Putin’s role is to reverse the demographic trend—men died in their fifties in the 1990s—and spend funds on modernization; that would be his legacy. Four hundred billion dollars has been saved to implement the modernization program. That attempt would be taken with modernizing partnerships with the West. Therefore, the last thing he wants is a new Cold War; the last thing he wants is political turmoil in America or in any Western nation. Cohen points out President Macron of France appears to understand that; he called for a rethinking of relations and said there could be no European security without Russia. Macron has broken with Washington and there will be a hell of fight because Washington is against it. But the notion that Putin wants to disrupt American society is wrong; Putin wants stability and partners.

Cohen still thinks that leadership—the new President of Ukraine, Trump and Putin—could make a difference.

A Pennsylvania man featured in a $3 million advertising campaign by Democratic ‘nerd virgin‘ commander David Brock’s Super PAC was found to be a total liar, after he feigned regret over voting for Donald Trump in 2016.

“I voted for Donald Trump in 2016 because I thought he would make a change,” claimed Mark Graham, a registered Republican who lives in Erie, PA.

“Did he make a change?” asks Brock’s virgin, off camera.

“Not for the good!” Graham replied.

“If I could go back in time, I would tell myself to beware the changes that President Trump has made.”

“Voting for Donald Trump in 2020 would be like putting gasoline on a fire.“

Except Mark was full of shit. An investigation by local news outlet JET 24 action’s Chelsey Withers (as she reports in YourEerie) revealed that Mark didn’t vote at all in 2016, much less for Donald Trump.

And according to PennLive, Mark’s lie caused the New York Times to issue corrections in two stories about swing voters and disaffected Trump supporters.

“While Mr. Graham acknowledged misspeaking about his voting record, he said the Times article and the ad campaign accurately reflect his feelings about the 2016 race and President Trump’s performance in office.”

Graham told Eerie News that he became involved with American Bridge through a 2018 focus group by Democratic Congressional Candidate Ron DiNicola.

Graham said the focus group was comprised of local Republicans who supported DiNicola’s run for Congress. Former Erie County Director of Administration [G]erry Mifsud was working with DiNicola.

“I sat through this focus group and a New York Times reporter had sought out [G]erry. How he got Jerry I don’t know.  Maybe it was DiNicola.  Maybe it was the Democratic Party,” Graham said.

The reporter wanted to do a story on President Trump’s popularity in Erie.  He asked the focus group how they felt about the president. –Eerie News Now

“That’s when I told him ‘It’s like if you re-elect this guy it’s like throwing gasoline on a fire.’ I just made it up.  He said, ‘I like that.  I’m going to use that,’ Graham told the outlet.

Authored by Caitlin Johnstone via CaitlinJohnstone.com,

This is getting really, really, really weird.

WikiLeaks has published yet another set of leaked internal documents from within the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) adding even more material to the mountain of evidence that we’ve been lied to about an alleged chemical weapons attack in Douma, Syria last year which resulted in airstrikes upon that nation from the US, UK and France.

This new WikiLeaks drop includes an email from the OPCW Chief of Cabinet Sebastien Braha (who is reportedly so detested by organisation inspectors that they code named him “Voldemort”) throwing a fit over the Ian Henderson Engineering Assessment which found that the Douma incident was likely a staged event. Braha is seen ordering OPCW staff to “remove all traces, if any, of its delivery/storage/whatever” from the organisation’s secure registry.

Minutes from an OPCW meeting with toxicologists specialized in chemical weapons: “the experts were conclusive in their statements that there was
no correlation between symptoms and chlorine exposure”.https://t.co/j5Jgjiz8UY pic.twitter.com/vgPaTtsdQN

— WikiLeaks (@wikileaks) December 27, 2019

The drop also includes the minutes from an OPCW toxicology meeting with “three Toxicologists/Clinical pharmacologists, one bioanalytical and toxicological chemist”, all four of whom are specialists in chemical weapons analysis.

“With respect to the consistency of the observed and reported symptoms of the alleged victims with possible exposure to chlorine gas or similar, the experts were conclusive in their statements that there was no correlation between symptoms and chlorine exposure,” the document reads.

According to the leaked minutes from the toxicology meeting, the chief expert offered “the possibility of the event being a propaganda exercise” as one potential explanation for the Douma incident. The other OPCW experts agreed that the key “take-away message” from the meeting was “that the symptoms observed were inconsistent with exposure to chlorine and no other obvious candidate chemical causing the symptoms could be identified”.

Like all the other many, many, many, many different leaks which have been hemorrhaging from the OPCW about the Douma incident, none of the important information contained in these publications was included in any of the OPCW’s public reports on the matter. According to the OPCW’s Final Report published in March 2019, the investigative team found “reasonable grounds that the use of a toxic chemical as a weapon took place. This toxic chemical contained reactive chlorine. The toxic chemical was likely molecular chlorine.”

We now know that these “reasonable grounds” contain more holes than a spaghetti strainer executed by firing squad. This is extremely important information about an unsolved war crime which resulted in dozens of civilian deaths and led to an act of war which cost taxpayers tens of millions of dollars and had many far-reaching geopolitical consequences.

Yet the mass media, freakishly, has had absolutely nothing to say about this extremely newsworthy story.

As of this writing, a Google News search for this story brings up an article by RT, Al-Masdar News, and some entries by alternative outlets you’ve almost certainly never heard of like UrduPoint News and People’s Pundit Daily.

Make no mistake about it: this is insane. The fact that an extremely important news story of immense geopolitical consequence is not getting any mainstream news media coverage, at all, is absolutely stark raving insane.

Up until the OPCW leaks, WikiLeaks drops always made mainstream news headlines. Everyone remembers how the 2016 news cycle was largely dominated by leaked Democratic Party emails emerging from the outlet. Even the relatively minor ICE agents publication by WikiLeaks last year, containing information that was already public, garnered headlines from top US outlets like The Washington Post , Newsweek, and USA Today. Now, on this exponentially more important story, zero coverage.

The mass media’s stone-dead silence on the OPCW scandal is becoming its own scandal, of equal or perhaps even greater significance than the OPCW scandal itself. It opens up a whole litany of questions which have tremendous importance for every citizen of the western world; questions like, how are people supposed to participate in democracy if all the outlets they normally turn to to make informed voting decisions adamantly refuse to tell them about the existence of massive news stories like the OPCW scandal? How are people meant to address such conspiracies of silence when there is no mechanism in place to hold the entire mass media to account for its complicity in it? And by what mechanism are all these outlets unifying in that conspiracy of silence?

We can at least gain some insight into that last question with the internal Newsweek emails which were published by journalist Tareq Haddad two weeks ago. The emails feature multiple Newsweek editors telling Haddad that they would not publish a word about the OPCW leaks for two reasons: (1) because no other outlets were reporting on them, and (2) because the US government-funded narrative management firm Bellingcat had published a laughably bogus article explaining why the leaks weren’t newsworthy. Haddad has since resigned from Newsweek.

We may be certain that this story is being killed in news rooms all around the world in similar fashion, and possibly using those very same excuses. As long as no other “respectable” (i.e. establishment) outlets are covering this story, it can be treated as a non-story, using a deceitful US government-funded narrative management operation as justification as needed. If one journalist threw his life into chaos and uncertainty by resigning and blowing the whistle on this conspiracy of silence, we may be certain that the same is happening to countless others who don’t have to courage and/or ability to do the same.

Our fearless media watchdogs still maintaining complete blackout on @OPCW whistleblower leaks debunking WMD attack in Douma. The leaks show that Trump—like Dubya— used fake WMDs to bomb Arab country—then strong-armed @OPCW to cover up the lies.https://t.co/bdbzf6py8p

— Mark Ames (@MarkAmesExiled) December 27, 2019

Many alternative media commentators are highlighting this news media blackout on social media today.

“Our fearless media watchdogs still maintaining complete blackout on OPCW whistleblower leaks debunking WMD attack in Douma. The leaks show that Trump—like Dubya— used fake WMDs to bomb Arab country—then strong-armed OPCW to cover up the lies,” tweeted journalist Mark Ames.

“The US attacked Syria for a chemical attack by Assad last year. But official OPCW scientists who investigated the event didn’t find evidence the Syrian military used chemical weapons. The media has chosen to ignore this story and fire its own journalists who try to report on it,” tweeted author and analyst Max Abrahms.

“This is the FOURTH leak showing how the OPCW fabricated a report on a supposed Syrian ‘chemical’ attack,” tweeted journalist Ben Norton. “And mainstream Western corporate media outlets are still silent, showing how authoritarian these ‘democracies’ are and how tightly they control info.”

“Media silence on this story is its own scandal,” tweeted journalist Aaron Maté.

But this spin machine is twirling off its axis trying to normalize this silence.

Surprise, surprise, Wikileaks didn’t leak the next email in this chain from the OPCW questioning why Ian Henderson was creating rogue reports.

This email also quite clearly contradicts “Alex’s” claim that Henderson was in the FFM. pic.twitter.com/qcJkAyXe9W

— Nick Waters (@N_Waters89) December 27, 2019

Bellingcat narrative jockeys such as “senior investigator” Nick Waters are already scrambling to perception manage everyone into believing their own eyes are lying to them. Waters has a thread on Twitter that’s being shared around by all the usual Syria spinmeisters claiming, based on no evidence whatsoever, that WikiLeaks is selectively publishing the documents it has to create a false impression of events in the OPCW. Waters falsely claims that an email by Sebastien “Voldemort” Braha — the guy at the center of the scandal — proves that Ian Henderson was not a part of the Fact-Finding Mission (FFM) in Douma, in contradiction to the claims made by the anonymous second OPCW whistleblower who goes by the pseudonym of “Alex”.

As Waters is one hundred percent aware, Henderson absolutely was part of the Douma Fact-Finding Mission, and one of the FFM members who actually went to Douma no less. I’ve put together a Twitter thread refuting Waters’ ridiculous claims which you can read by clicking here, but in short an arbitrary distinction seems to have been made between the FFM and the “FFM core team”, or what is labeled the “FFM Alpha team” in a newly leaked email trying to marginalize Henderson’s assessment. Henderson actually went to Douma as part of the FFM, unlike almost all members of the so-called “core team” who except for one paramedic operated solely in another nation (probably Turkey).

Of course, the distinction of whether Henderson was or was not “in the FFM” is also itself irrelevant and arbitrary, since we know for a fact that he is a longtime OPCW inspector who went to Douma and contributed an assessment which was hidden from the public by the OPCW.

So this narrative being spun by the US government-funded propagandists at Bellingcat is bogus from top to bottom, but what’s infuriating is that we already know who editors in news rooms are going to listen to.

“We have this alternative media ecosystem that is driving a lot of disinformation. It is not understood by journalists or anyone really beyond a very small group of people who are really engaged with it,” @EliotHiggins says https://t.co/RWi2Mqy8jV

— Brian Stelter (@brianstelter) December 27, 2019

It’s absolutely amazing how tightly interlaced Bellingcat is with the upper echelons of mainstream news media and the public framing of what’s going on in Syria. Mere hours after the latest WikiLeaks drop, CNN pundit Brian Stelter shared an article about Bellingcat founder and former Atlantic Council Senior Fellow Eliot Higgins, who warns of the dangers posed by alternative media reporters who cover underreported stories like the OPCW scandal.

“We have this alternative media ecosystem that is driving a lot of disinformation. It is not understood by journalists or anyone really beyond a very small group of people who are really engaged with it,” reads the ironic Higgins quote in the excerpt shared by Stelter.

We’ve been seeing a mad rush from mass media pundits to give this US government-funded narrative management operation unearned and undeserved legitimacy, churning out tweets like Stelter’s and fawning puff pieces by The New York Times, The Guardian and The New Yorker. This unearned and undeserved legitimacy is then used by editors to justify looking to Bellingcat for instructions on how to think about important information on Syria rather than doing their own basic investigation and analysis. It’s a self-validating feedback loop which just so happens to work out very conveniently for the government which funds Bellingcat.

It remains unknown exactly what’s transpiring in news rooms around the world to maintain the conspiracy of silence on the OPCW scandal, but what is known is that by itself this scandalous silence is enough to fully discredit the mass media forever. WikiLeaks has exposed these outlets for the monolithic propaganda engine that they really are, and they did it just by publishing extremely newsworthy leak after extremely newsworthy leak.

In order to perception manage us any harder, these freaks are going to have to go around literally confiscating our ears and eyeballs.

*  *  *

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